>The Man in Coral
>Hubs has always had a hankering for a pair of red pants.
His reasoning is sound: We have a Christmas party every year and he thinks the red pants would be festive. I can’t argue with that.
The problem is, he doesn’t want to pay for a pair of pants he’d wear once a year. He has this philosophy, you see, that everything he owns should be worn until it has attained the look of, well, rags. And I’m sure it’s disturbing to him that with that kind of thinking, the red pants he buys now and wears once a year could very well outlast him.
Of course, all of these thoughts went out the window when he found a pair of red pants on sale at Lands End online last summer for a mere ten dollars.
“I don’t know,” I said, squinting at the computer monitor. “They look a little bright. I was thinking of more of a cranberry red.”
“But they’re only ten dollars,” he said, unable to tear his eyes from the screen as visions of being the uh, best pants wearer at the Christmas party danced in his head.
“You’re right,” I said. “Get them. You can’t go wrong with ten dollar pants.”
As it turns out, though? You can.
“Look,” Hubs said, frowning, as he held the pants up to the light after they’d arrived.
“They’re…. coral!” I said.
“I know,” he said glumly.
“You can’t wear those to the Christmas party! Send them back!”
“But they were only ten dollars,” he said. “That’s more trouble than it’s worth. I’ll find a use for them,” he said over his shoulder as he carried the pants upstairs. “I’ll wear them to work.” I stared at him, aghast.
“Ha ha!” I shouted futilely. “Very funny!” He didn’t answer, but I hoped he got the message.
He didn’t.
A few weeks later, he came downstairs dressed for work in the coral pants and a Cookie-Monster-blue shirt. Hubs has what I would term an “interesting” fashion sense and normally, I try to leave him alone. But this, this, was too much. People at work would know that I let him leave the house looking like that. My reputation would be shot.
“You can’t wear that outfit,” I said seriously.
“Why not?”
“Because. It’s. Hideous.“
“It’s not that bad.”
“Look,” I tried to reason with him. “You can wear the pants, okay? But for God’s sake, at least put a white shirt on with them.” It took some convincing, but Hubs finally went back upstairs and changed his shirt.
That night, he came home from work, pleased. “Everyone was talking about my pants,” he said.
“I’m sure they were,” I replied dryly.
“They said I looked like Darien Trotter*,” he added.
“I can see that,” I said.
“I sort of like these pants now,” Hubs said.
I gritted my teeth and kept peeling potatoes.
“I said I think I like them.”
“I heard you.”
“What’s wrong?”
I put down the peeler. “Look, Hubs, those pants have got to go. They are fugly.”
“Well, I don’t think so,” Hubs said defiantly and went upstairs. When he came down, though, the pants had been replaced by another pair. The battle had been tough, but victory, at last, was mine.
At least it was until a few months ago. Back down the stairs Hubs came one morning, dressed in the pants and, once again, that ridiculous blue shirt. This time, I sighed and shook my head. If he was determined to be ridiculed, how could I stop him?
And that is how a pair of pants came between us.
“Hubs,” I said when he walked through the den a minute ago. “How many times have you worn those coral pants to work now?”
He stopped and thought for a moment. “Maybe four,” he said.
“And do people say stuff about them when you wear them?”
“Every time.”
“What do they say?”
“They say stuff like, ‘Are you a metrosexual now?'”
“What would you do if I burned those pants?”
“Burned them?! Why would you do that?”
“Because they’re butt ugly.”
“No they’re not,” he laughed. Then he paused and grew serious. “Yes, they are,” he said quietly. “But I don’t like to waste things.”
And so, readers, we won’t waste these pants. Instead, we’ll put them to good use. And I’ll leave it to you to help me. Give me your best idea on what to do with the pants in the comments and I’ll choose my favorite and follow its advice. With pictures! And maybe video!
>well, you could send them to my mom and she’ll cut them up and use them in a quilt…
>cut the legs off, sew the back and the front together at the bottom and use the legs to make straps. Instant coral purse… the rest of the scraps can be burnt, or if there are lots of scraps, little purses or bags to “wrap” gifts in.
>*snort* i like how “urban edge” in that guys clothes montage means putting a sport coat over his regular clothes. edgyYou could make the pants into a coral skirt for yourself. You know, take the leg seams out and sew them together (i’m sure there’s a tutorial somewhere… and I’ve seen these sold in stores), take some width out so it fits you. Voila! Summer skirt.OR! You could make pants for Punky out of them somehow, or maybe a cute jumper. That’d be cute.
>I would save them for a summer vacation to Nantucket.Wear your pearls!
>Hmm. Already, too many of you are assuming I can sew.Anything I make from the pants will be, no doubt, uglier than the pants themselves. Hubs asserts that despite their ugliness, “they are extremely well made.”
>I was going to suggest making a purse out of them, but I see Felicity beat me to it. My mom used to do this with jeans I had outgrown when I was in high school. Unfortunately, I was too cool to use a purse my mom had made! I could kick myself for that because they were really really cute and I’m sooooo tired of carrying around a plain black diaper bag!
>Great link, Meredith. Does toggery have anything to do with buggery?
>The thing is that the Trotter fellow doesn’t even seem to be as badly dressed as a pair of coral trousers sounds to me. Could you come up with a clever ebay ad and post it for us?
>As soon as I commented I realized I should have linked to another page on that site, so you can see how great the whole family would look wearing matching red pants…Like, for a wedding…
>So you say you don’t sew. But you don’t have to have grand seamstress skills to sew up the openings; turn them inside out, sew up the waist, then turn them back and stuff them. Sew up the hems and you have created an incredible stuffed “pillow” (hey, it’s not that different from a boppy), and will thus be able to continue its’ original life as a creator of comments and not be wasted! Think lounging with laughter, a sure-fire family hit with the added benefit of mortifying the young ladies in your midst when you pull them out when their friends are there watching movies, or whatever it is that young people do these days.
>I’ve seen successful sales by you and other bloggers on ebay…. write up your funny story there – as long as you get more than $10, you’re golden!
>wait, that was already a brilliant suggestion… nice work Liv
>How about donating them to the Salavating (sic) Army secondhand store or the local Goodwill store, etc.? Then if you ever saw someone actually wearing them, you could point out to Hubs how he used to be such a standout in a crowd kinda guy. That way, the pants could generate income for a charity, and give someone else the opportunity to have glow-in-the- dark pants.When I first saw Darrian’s name, I thought I recognized it, and then while reading the feature article, I realized he’d been employed by a Grand Rapids, MI station. They used to stick him atop the highest snowbank in town during the nastiest blizards ever visitited upon West Michigan. Or have him reporting from the Lake Michigan shore during our version of a typhoon. I just remember that regardless of what he wore, it was always blown up from the back, over top of his head, and he was always about to get whisked up by the wind and sent flying off to see the wizard. Apparently he hit a northeast wind current and ended up in Nashville. Thanks for the laugh…
>Dress a scare crow?Scare crows need clothes too ya know, the gaudier the better.
>After thosse pants shrin in the dryer I would cut them up for rags. If Hubs misses the pants he an use the rags to wash the car.
>Freecycle, donate to a thrift store or something… or cut ’em up and sue them as rags in the garage. If your enterprising enough to want to learn to sew, use them as practice, and make some doll clothes out of the pant legs… That’s it. I’m out. *S* Good luck getting rid of them!
>Send ’em to Darrin, with a copy of the blog, to get his final ruling?’Accidentally’ have a bleaching incident.Future Halloween costume?Good luck getting rid of them, I’ve been trying to do away with one of my hubbies 1980’s ‘brush stroke’ ties for the past 5 years. He has 2 beautiful (and current) ties that he never has a reason to wear, and wouldn’t you know that the minute we have a tie occasion, he puts on the ugly one?! Men.
>Oh… sadly, I have been there myself! I have ordered more than one item from those sale catalogs — yes, always well-made, but the colors… Well. There’s a reason they’re “overstock.” I’d donate them to a homeless shelter or the Salvation Army or someplace… Or to a seamstress who could make them into napkins or totebags or something!Or you could auction them off with your hub’s autograph or something! You could donate the proceeds to his favorite charity.
>Yeah…I was going to ask for a picture of the coral pants and blue shirt, but I have delicate retinas. Sew up the legs, cut them away from the main part of the pant and you could use them to carry golf clubs. Assuming you only used two.A. Beaverhausen (used to be Wordgirl)
>I think that you should buy some Rit dye and dye them black. Then he will have some well made black pants.And Rit dye is kinda fun….And if it turns out badly, you have a real excuse to turn them into a dust rag.
>OK, this is where the UK / US ‘two nations divided by a common language’ thing comes into play. Here, ‘pants’ means underwear. So you can imagine, until I switched the babel fish on in my ear, I was a little confused.As for use of said pants? Dusters. (I say this as a woman who’s husband actually DOES have a pair of red trousers. Damn, but these Dutch guys have bad taste some times…)
>Turn them into work (not-office) pants. Use them to do yard work or house painting. Coral pants beg to have paint on them. Imagine splatters of multi-colored paint scattered amongst that coral background.
>Dye ’em.
>Pay someone to make new clothes for your, I mean Punky’s, new doll she got for Christmas. You know, the really well-dressed one. What was it’s name? I can’t remember.
>I’m going with dying them too, except I’d go with dark red, or blue….he wants the red pants, so I’d see if the dark red would take…it’s easy with rit dye, you can do it in the washer.
>Sell them to me for $11 (I’ll pay for shipping) and the money will be donated to http://www.bringlight.com/projects/show/143 – a charity for visually impared children in honor of your husband’s apparent color blindness.
>I was going to say give them to Darien, but by the looks of the photo montage, he already has his own coral -ish pants!And Carrien beat me to my suggestion of the scarecrow. I also like the eBay idea others have suggested.
>Re-gift them and start a Sisterhood of the traveling Pants kind of thing…or in this case I guess it would be “Brotherhood”
>I’d use them for a scarecrow in the fall. Stuff them with newspaper or leaves.
>OK, this is not original, but when my husband has something I hate? I simply put them in the Goodwill bag. Goodbye!Except his expensive cowboy boots his friend got him, I sstill mean to put those up on eBay. Occasionally he asks about them, but he hasn’t seen them in almost 2 years.
>Ooooo that is a GREAT idea. Dye them dark red. It would definately work over the coral, and then he will have red holiday pants!!!
>Die them black.Save them for Halloween.Or my favorite – Wear them to the Gay Parade.
>Just going to add that you should die them, I would go with a dark red so he has the red pants he wants and nothing got wasted. Would be a great activity for the whole family to help with.
>When is the next three-legged race in your town?? You and hubs could compete togehter using the pants! Plus, since everyone competing in these races look like goobers, you won’t stand out with your goober-ish pants.
>”accidentally” spill nail polish on them. tell hubs your soooooo sorry then cut them into rags and use it to scrub the toliet!
>Donate them to charity!Or cut them in half: you have summer picnic shorts and kitchen rags!
>I just want to thank you for posting this. Because we have a guy in the office that wears lime green pants (now forever known as Key Lime Pie). And we all wondered how his wife let him leave the house.And I pray it is the same as this situation.Also, for $10, four wearings is more than your money’s worth. I say rags or Goodwill. And then you can drive around town looking for the homeless person in coral pants.
>I just want to thank you for posting this. Because we have a guy in the office that wears lime green pants (now forever known as Key Lime Pie). And we all wondered how his wife let him leave the house.And I pray it is the same as this situation.Also, for $10, four wearings is more than your money’s worth. I say rags or Goodwill. And then you can drive around town looking for the homeless person in coral pants.
>Sneak them into the Goodwill donation bag! I “accidentally” put a couple of my husband’s Cosby-ish sweaters from the 80’s in our last donation bag. Oops (tee hee).
>OK…I have an idea that we did at my kid’s school that got alot of comments from people, and it involves no sewing.Take the pants and stuff them with newspaper. Then you can either put sticks or pvc plastic pipe (cheap, at Home Depot) and stick them in the ankle part of the pants. Stick an old pair of shoes onto the pipe or stick and put the whole thing upside down in a public place….like a dumpster, a shrub, or whatever. It gives the illusion of someone falling into something. It’s pretty funny….
>Take LOTS of pictures of him in the outfit. Print out the pics and place them on your fridge.When I was a kid, my father wore LIME GREEN POLYESTER (sansabelt?)PANTS, a hot pink button up shirt, and a pale yellow tie.TOGETHER.We called it his Watermelon Suit.When my sister and I asked mum why she didn’t make him change, she just grinned and shrugged.That was almost 20 years ago, and we STILL talk about it!
>With that bright color, stick them on a pole in your yard, and voila! Instant wind sock, just like at our local county airport 🙂 Let the pants tell you what direction the wind is blowing. If they are heavyweight pants, cut them in half, and you can have TWO wind socks! WOW! Give one to a neighbor too.
>I odn’t really care what you do with them but I can’t wait to see a photo!
>Make short shorts out of ’em a la Reno 911 girly man cop shorts. I double dawg dare him to wear them then.
>I am all about the Halloween costume idea. Hubs could go out and get a zebra stripe shirt, with matching shoes, a nice purple fedora with a bright coral feather in it and a bunch of gaudy gold chains. He could be a pimp! This is why I NEVER buy clothes online, sure it’s cheaper sometimes and it’s convenient, but pictures can be deceiving and you never know what you are going to get. I feel for him, at least he wears them. =D
>Paint pants. Gardening pants. dirty-work pants, becuase he won’t ever wear them in public again (!!), so it won’t matter if he stains them permanently.