It takes forever to remove all the detritus

As faithful readers of this little blog might guess, I can spend an hour in a used bookstore, and ultimately leave with a $5 bargain and a smile on my face.

But when it comes to clothes shopping, I can drop $200 with the speed of a Japanese bullet train, out of pure desperation to minimize the misery of the experience.

There are few tasks that I enjoy less than shopping for clothes. When I can, I do it online. But sometimes it’s easier to bite the bullet (there’s that word again — this topic gets me violent) and head over to Macy’s in downtown Boston, where I will do a super quick grab & pay for whatever I need.

And so it was a few days ago, when the sorry-a** state of my wardrobe demanded a replenishing of dress shirts, pants, socks & underwear, and a few other things I seem to have already forgotten. As I made my instantaneous choices, with an eye out for sales signs, the stuff was falling out of my arms. Within a few minutes, I plunked down my credit card and assessed the damage. Mission accomplished, I rushed out to reconnect with civilization.

I hauled all it home on the subway, and the next day I started the arduous process of removing the packaging. It took me almost as long to remove all the stickers, tags, tape, needles, and those make-me-homicidal little plastic fasteners as it did to buy the clothes in the first place. I will never be able to recover those minutes of my life. They’re gone — poof.

By contrast, this is why Hawaiian shirts are my top garment of choice: You open the package, you remove a sticker or tag or two, it’s ready to wear, and it’s comfortable. No drama, no multiple-safety-hazard needles, no stiff cuffs or necks to cramp my style — to the extent I have a style.

Anyway, I have survived my annual/semi-annual/whatever clothes shopping ordeal, and now I can breathe easily. I don’t think I’ll have to enter that retail zone again for at least another half year. Phew.