Zimbabwe Absurdity

Winter is a bit late this year in Zimbabwe but that seems to be the trend the world over. Last night seemed a bit cooler than most, prompting me to get up and put on a T shirt which was easier than finding a blanket. I don’t bother putting on pyjamas to go to bed, I really cannot see the point of getting dressed to go to bed and then having to get dressed again in the morning, unless of course you are a teenage male but I haven’t been that for many years. Lately though, I have had second thoughts on this; there is a spider in this country, I believe it is called a yellow harp spider, that likes to hang out in linen. Its bite is not painful but the venom is cytotoxic and the result is VERY messy if you don’t excise the affected tissue straight away. Jenni, my dog, got bitten on an inner thigh some months back (probably while sleeping on my bed) and it did not make too much mess but then dogs have a pretty robust immune system and I have seen the result of a bite on a human leg. Yuck! What if I got bitten on….? Never mind, just enjoy life and react quickly!

This all got me thinking on what people do wear to bed and why. The obvious thing for any male to wonder about is what women wear to bed (hey, I have not slept well – never go straight to bed with brain in turbo mode from late night programming). Well, if one believes the adverts (I don’t have a lot of personal experience in this field) in the glossy ladies magazines (I learnt my sex education from Cosmopolitan after all), it’s nothing much at all. Really what is the point? It’s all so diaphanous that it:

• does not hide anything so cannot possibly be used for “modesty”so
• it is probably designed to be taken off anyway so
• cannot be designed for comfort

Many years ago I remember asking my mother (I got precious little of my sex education from her but in all other respects she was marvellous) why women wore such frilly little bits of nylon underwear as panties that were certainly not designed for practical purposes – they could only be designed to be seen and most of the time they were the only ones seeing them. She just giggled and did not answer. Note that in this part of the world they are called “panties”, “knickers” seems to be a British thing. Well, fashions change as they are bound to and it seems that now it is “in” to show off your panties, especially if it is a G-string (or thong – apparently there IS a difference according to Wikipedia). I see women of all ages wearing hipster jeans that inevitably show off a G-string when they sit down and we are not talking about a subtle panty line here. I have distinctly mixed feelings about G-strings, yes they are sexy but I can’t help thinking of the alternative, less polite name; anal floss.

They have also got to be made from the most expensive material on the planet. I don’t have a sample to work with but with a ruler and a bit of guesstimation there is all of about 150 sq. cm in an average pair (pair of what?). That works out to about US$1000 a square metre of material (taking an average price of $15 and you can get them a lot more expensive than that). So what are you paying for? Labour? I have no idea how many a skilled seamstress could make, 3 an hour? How ever you look at it someone is making good money so maybe that’s why you can even find software that helps you set up an on-line lingerie store! No, I cannot for the life of me remember where I saw that one but just Google “lingerie” for a bit of entertainment. Oh, and you can also get thongs for men. I will definitely pass on those!

And for even more entertainment you can try www.google.com/trends which will give you the search trends on any topic (or group of) by city, region or language. France is by FAR the biggest searcher for lingerie (closely followed by Belgium) with very distinct peaks of activity in February! Oh, les Francais, ils sont trops romantique!