Pocket Full Of Surprises

As so often happens, while I was out Christmas shopping for other people I found several things I would like for myself. This happens just about every year, mostly because Christmas shopping is the only time I actually spend in store anymore. (It's the same insulated phenomenon which leads to people complaining about there not being any good new music released anymore because they only listen to music from their iPod. It's not until they are in their car for an extended period that they finally turn on the radio and discover the cool 'new' band everyone has been listening to for the last 6 months.) Anyway, the good news is that before these finds I had been having a hard time coming up with a list for my family this year and a couple of these discoveries were able to be put to good use. One of things I found for myself was a very cool pair of golf shorts. Admittedly, royal blue shorts with a white pinstripe pattern on them are not typically something you would find in my wardrobe, but every now and again I like to take chances with my clothes and the golf course is a wonderful place to experiment with looks, because even the ugliest pair of pants in the normal world will be seen as stylist as long as you are holding a putter. I first saw these shorts a couple weeks ago at the local TJ Maxx, but didn't want to pull the trigger on them because I was shopping for other people. When they were still there a week later, which never happens with items in stores like TJ's and Marshall's, I figured it was fate and added them to my Christmas list.

Since giving directions to where they were in the store proved to be slightly difficult I eventually went down, found them myself and physically handed them to my mom while promising to act surprised on Christmas day. It was only after I opened the present yesterday I realized that for all the times I had held these shorts I had never actually tried them on. The tag said they were my size, but considering the number of times I have experienced buying two shirts from the same store which were the same size and discovering that one fit perfectly while the other didn't fit at all, you would think I would have known better. So yesterday during a lull between the storms of children opening presents I ran to the bathroom to try them out and I am happy to report they fit just fine. However, while I was putting them on I felt something in one of the side pockets. I assumed it was the packet of spare buttons, even though it felt a little too big. Reaching in I discovered it was actually three coins. Sadly, another second later I realized they weren't legal tender, but coins of the chocolate variety.

As you can imagine, this was more than a little strange to me. I asked my mom is she put them in there to add an element of surprise since I knew what the gift was going to be, but she was as unaware of the contents of the pocket as I was. I would claim it was a Hanukkah miracle since gold coins are a staple of the festival of lights, but since Hanukkah ended a week ago I don't think that was the case either. (Also, there is the little factor of my family not being Jewish.) I have been trying to come up with a few theories as to what could have led to these random candy coins in these shorts and here is what I have got so far: some little kid was bored while his mother was doing her shopping and decided to engage in a little mischief, some parent lost track of their kid who then opened a bag of candy and rather than pay for it the parent decided to stash the evidence in the nearest article of clothing (the shorts do come with surprisingly deep pockets) or someone stole something which came with these coins and didn't want the candy (which is smart. It is always the superfluous items which end up getting robbers caught). Whichever of those you pick to be the truth, by asking my mother to buy me these shorts I think I just made her an accessory to shoplifting.

I have long held the policy of washing my clothes before wearing them for the first time. Some have argued that this is unnecessary, claiming that the day you bring clothes home from the store is the cleanest those clothes are ever going to be. I guess that may be true with clothes which are wrapped in some kind of plastic container like socks or shipped directly from the manufacturer, but for the rest of the clothes you get it just seems like the smartest move. I know this is one of those things we have decided as a society to not think about because then no one would buy anything, but you can never be sure how long any piece of clothing has been hanging on that rack or how many people tried it on before you decided to take it home. Hell, for all I know these shorts were bought by someone else and then returned and the chocolate coins really were part of a Hanukkah present. If the thought of a total stranger trying on the pants you are currently wearing isn't enough to get you to wash them before putting them on your body than you are clearly just more comfortable interacting with strangers than I am, because now not only am I going to wash my clothes before I wear them, I'm going to check the pockets as well. All I can hope is that next time the money will be real.