Brassiere geoeconomics

My cheap bras have had it. I went to Arthur Barnett, thinking it was the safest bet for getting in & out again quickly.

Approaching the lingerie service counter I was faced by 4 women standing around not doing anything, who all looked at me, and stood silent while I waited to be served. Finally the furthest away & eldest of the group realised I was in fact a customer & came around to ask whether she could help. What followed was a geoeconomic discussion on why it is impossible for a woman in New Zealand such as I, to buy a bra made in China with cotton grown in Pakistan, India or South Asia.

I really only want a cotton bra, that is it. But not one bra in the store is 100% cotton, has cotton lining, or in fact any cotton in it whatsoever. Not even the sports bras, the maternity bras or the bras for elderly women contain a fraction of cotton in them.

I am frankly amazed. Back when I began wearing bras cotton was the only option. When I was in my 20s I was wearing what I now realise was essentially the last of the cotton bras. It was by Bendon & called a "Cotton Capri". It was later updated with a synthetic version that looked much the same but more sophisticated. And from then cotton bras no longer featured anywhere in my underwear drawer. And of course knickers must match the bra, so against advice from doctors & mothers everywhere I, & probably a large number of women in the western world shifted into synthetic underthings. As sales of Canesten (or equivalent anti-fungal) sales increased, cotton appears to have vanished from the racks of both women & of intimate apparel departments.

The lady serving me explained that the current lack of cotton in their range was due to the recent flooding in Pakistan, which had rotted the cotton crop leading to scarcity & subsequent price rise in cotton sales. Bra manufacturers were therefore shifting their production into cheaper synthetic fabrics. While she was informing me that I really had no option & ought to consider giving up the cotton idea right away, I began to take quite an interest in the geographical economic lecture she was giving me. As I became more enthusiastic at seeing the connection between the complete lack of cotton on her sales floor & a serious weather event in a usually far more distant country, she became irritated as it became clear I was far more interested in the whyfores than in giving up my nouveau-hippie dream of cotton, switching to synthetic & marching out of her store owing my credit company a further $200.

Her irritation was slightly quenched by me leaving with a pair of 100% cotton boxer shorts & armed with the information that I would not find a cotton bra anywhere. "You'll be back - and in synthetic too" her look seemed to say.

I am currently wearing a gorgeous 100% organic cotton bra (organic cotton being a different market, and apparently one currently unaffected by economies of climate vagaries). This cotton has probably come from India or the United States, who provide most of the organic cotton.

www.faeriesdance.com, or, depending on your choice & your abilities in the langue française, www.peau-ethique.com.

Next week: Cotton futures trading. Actually not really. Nor another post about my underwear. Not one more. This is the last. Promise. Maybe. Maybe I'll actually start posting about spondyloarthropathy or EDS. Needs Assessments. That sort of thing. But this is just so much more fun!

Uncomfortable conversations about comfortable underpants

 

Yes, these are The Comfy Underpants. Like men's underwear they come in only 2 colours: black & white. No pink, baby blue or candy stripes. Black & white, that's it.

The other day I was at my physiotherapist - my wonderful, fabulous physiotherapist who is absolutely the best ever. "Strip down to your undies this time I think" she says...and then we did the usual conversational dance: "Ha ha, I wonder what underwear I put on this morning ha ha". Of course I know what underpants I put on this morning. I might not recall which colour, but I am never wearing any other kind of underpants ever again until they stop making these ones, at which point I might stage a one woman riot. Or start going commando. Given what's to follow, let's not go there.

I climb up on the physio table & turn on my side as I'm directed by my awesome physiotherapist. And casually I say "Oh, that's right, I blogged about these undies the other day" *I just said what???*. "You what...?" says the brilliant physiotherapist. "Blogged. Blogged about my undies, I write a blog, just stuff..." mumbled before quickly trailing off.

In case you missed it, here's an example of a conversation never to have with your physiotherapist. Not ever. It's weird. No good can come of it. I'd go so far as to say it's an example of a conversation to have with no-one. Blogging about underpants is weird. Talking about blogging about underpants is freaky & people will think you are some sort of, well, freak.

"So do people read your blog?"

"Well, my mum does ha ha..." (weakly) "some other people..." Change the subject!!!

We did change the subject, but still it lingered around the topic of underwear..."yes, they do look a bit like the ones...(insert some All Black's name here)...advertises on the television".

Next conversation never to have, especially when you're trying to get out of an awkward conversation already: "Um, who? No, I haven't seen it. I don't watch television". "During the world cup?". "Um, sure, I watched a bit". 

Lies, all lies! I watched the haka, then I went to bed & listened on the transistor radio. For the semi final & final we recorded it & before we had any contact with the outside world the following day we watched it. I don't watch live telly & I watch virtually no recorded telly, except at the moment we're recording "Whose line is it anyway?" because it is tummy hurtingly funny.

After admitting that while you have a television you don't actually watch television, there isn't a lot to say. It's already clear that you are at least "odd". That's if it wasn't already made completely clear by the fact that you wrote about your underpants & that you talked about writing about your underpants.

Just to cement the image I thought the best way to tie it all up was to blog about having a conversation about blogging about underpants. It really can't go any further than that. Can it?

Comfy underpants

This one is a bit more for women who will know what I am talking about. Comfy underpants are a bit of a holy grail among women, so I wanted to share with you my story of finding a pair of truly comfy underwear.

For the uninitiated (by which I mean blokes) it's important to know there are only 2 kinds of women's underwear: 

Granny pants

Granny pants look like something your grandmother would have worn - heck, they look like something she might have made at home herself. They sit approximately 2 sizes too big. They come up over your belly button & extend to your knees. And they are not comfortable. The Bridget Jones movie got that wrong - they just aren't. Mind you the second type of underwear isn't either. 

Ooh la la undies

Ooh la la undies look really sexy on the rack, before you put them on. They might even look sexy on. They are a tiny piece of synthetic (awful itchy nylon pretending to be silk). If we could afford silk ones, I'm not sure we'd escape the next problem: Ooh la la undies feel 2 sizes too small & creep up your bum during the day so you end up having to "discretely" pick them out of your butt crack twice on the way to work, on all of your breaks at work and at least twice while you're at your desk. On the way home you've usually just given up & are ignoring it.

It's about this point some of us have given up & gone for g-strings. I'm not going to give them their own category because they are really just another version of Ooh la la undies for those of us who've given up. G strings already sit right up in your butt crack so once you get used to the fact that they're there it's just a case of ignoring it. You can pretend all you like that it's for fashion, or that it's because you don't want VPL (Visible Panty Line), but really, it's because you've given up.

I gave up once. For quite a while I wore those little things. They do dry quickly on the line. And I suppose in terms of resources you could say that the small amount of fabric required to make that piece of underwear is about 5% of what goes into the granny undies. So, they're environmentally friendly knickers.

Blokes do not seem to have the problems women have with underwear. You see the selection of blokes underwear - it's all the same. Basically you've got either jocks or boxers. As far as I can tell boxers are kind of like going commando & jocks are for the man who prefers a little "support". But they just don't have the same issues women do - it's basically white, grey or navy.

So this time I saw a pair of undies that were clearly for women but they looked like blokes underpants. They even looked as though they had stitched support for a *cough* "package". I walked away (actually I was online shopping, so technically I clicked away). I can't wear boys undies. It's just wrong. But I kept coming back. They looked just like boys underwear. Boys seem to be really comfortable. *I* want to be really comfortable.

After a while I began to cave. I knew. I knew they were going to be properly comfy underpants. So I bought a pair. Just one. Just to try.

You know what I'm going to say don't you? Of course they were comfortable! The most comfortable pair of underwear I've ever worn. And yes, I went straight back online & bought enough to never have to wear uncomfortable underwear ever again. And I don't care if they look like boys underpants. I just don't. I'm going to wear my boy pants with pride!