20 January 2006
Originally posted on greenfairydotcom
This evening, I'd like to talk about ladies underwear. Specifically, my own. Yes I know, but it's late, I'm full of chips and I've just been humiliated in one of my lectures by being utterly unable to locate Nepal on a map.
I like underwear. I do. Most of my clothes are bargainous charity shops finds and peculiar confections bought from Ebay and therefore it is safe to say that on any given day the knickers I'm wearing usually cost more than the whole of thes rest of the outfit put together. Pants are important. It is impossible to either look or feel good if you are not wearing underwear which is simply fantastic (I'd be Audrey fucking Hepburn if I could only find that pink satin polka dot set of my dreams, I tell you) - by which I do not mean, of course, underwear that you don in order to impress someone else. I do not hold with this. If I happen to meet a fellow during one of my 1970's windowcleaner-meets-housewife negligee phases and he is put off at the thought of this, let him go and find the black thong showing through white tracksuit he clearly desires, it is of no consequence to me.
You may discern from this that I hold several prejudices on the subject.
I do not do thongs. I will not have them in the house. There was once upon a time when I was younger when with a reluctant grimace and vague thoughts of VPL I used to wear the uncomfortable bastards (but then, I even wore a suspender belt once though after a couple of hours spent wondering what exactly I was supposed to gain from this retro elastic bound toment consigned the thing to the bin) but these days I happily embrace the big bottomed mummy pants, which has the immediate benefit of discluding anything with pom pom tie-sides or 'TEASE' picked out in diamonte across the arse.
I have just been given two pairs of knickers for Valentine's day in the boyshorts style, which I am going to wear without cessation until they perish and fall off my person of their own accord. As splendid as they are however they have forced me to face up to one of my worst underwear foibles - impossible as it is to find grass green Snoopy bras in the shops recently - namely being completely unable to bring myself to wear mismatching bras and knickers. It is a recurring thread of terror in my nightmares that I am knocked down in the street and upon taking me to hospital and having to cut off my clothes they find me in white bra and black pants. I am given to understand most shockingly that this isn't an issue of major importance for most other women. I shudder privately and wonder about your priorities.
I do unfortunately - there is no use denying it - do Wonderbras. But just the one. I have had it for ten years. Its sole use - I have enough cleavage as it is, thank you for asking - is under dresses with the joint liability of complicated strap arrangements and plunging neckline. As this is only ever evident in clubs, I find the Wonderbra's complete inability to stand up to more than three seconds of the gentlest jumping up and down test most trying. And while I'm deep in the murky swamps of the less visited places of my collection, I shall also own up to possession of Monstrous Bra. A big swath of 'flesh coloured' Tactel seam-free horror which remains in my drawer only because it is the sole thing that can be worn under tight pale clothing which as I have unaccountably taken to thinking I look really good in pale pink 1950's sweaters, has been making alarmingly regular appearances lately. I hope this phase is a short one - apart from anything else, I don't really have a pair of knickers that match it.
I wish I could do camisoles. I have several sets that I have bought in a running through cornfields in flowing skirt kind of daydream, before trying them on and realising the only running I am likely to be doing any time soon is for a bus and in light of this anyone over a 34B really needs a bit of underwired support. Still, I persist. One day I might meet a millionaire who wishes to fund a lying on a chaise longue eating chocolate lifestyle for me and I'd hate to have to meet the situation ill dressed.