mill.txt

Mil Millington <mil_admin@thingsmygirlfriendandihavearguedabout.com>
	
Wed, Mar 24, 2010, 10:24 PM
	
to me
As the Internet revels in speed and topicality, I thought I'd tell you something that happened at Christmas. It's rather a long story, so those of you who don't want to spend quite a significant amount of time hearing about the trouble caused by the pants I bought my girlfriend when you have work you should be doing ought to stop reading now. And also unsubscribe - because, if you're anxious to do the job you're being paid for rather than read about pant-related problems, then you are *seriously* on the wrong list.

OK, let's get to it. A couple of you might recall that my girlfriend, Margret, is German. When I met her (I'll say 'met', even if a better word is 'rescued'), she, like all German women of her generation, had no interest in pants. This was only partly because she spent a good proportion of her time entirely naked. Mostly, it was because German women back then dressed purely functionally; Margret didn't own a skirt and, until she came to England, I don't think she'd even *seen* any cosmetics - the first time she was handed a tube of lipstick I imagine she initially tried to load it into the clip of an assault rifle. The only question Margret might ask herself when selecting pants would be, "Could these be used as a makeshift fan belt in an emergency?" - i.e., if an aesthetic consideration came into it at all, it was just, "Will my knickers match my carburettor?"

You can imagine the work I had to put in.

Gradually, however, by exposure to Britain's gentle wisdom, she came to appreciate that pants need not always be chosen solely on the basis of tensile strength and her preferences edged somewhat closer, at least, to Agent Provocateur than to Baader-Meinhof. It was a long road, mind, and not without the constant danger of relapse - unexpectedly finding £4.25 in her pocket, she could easily return from Lidl carrying a value pack of four hundred knickers and a £3.20 case of socket spanners. So, this Christmas, anxious about the possibility of her re-offending, I set out to buy her some underwear to prevent her doing it, disastrously, herself: I intended to launch an attack of pre-emptive pants.

That's the background, then. Now, walk with me...

First, I go to one of the local goth shops. Goths have great stuff. The problem is that the lower age restriction for being a goth went into freefall even before the plunging atrocity of Twilight. The result is that it's really not comfortable, as a sophisticated, mature gentleman, to be looking for pants in a goth shop any longer. Standing side-by-side with a twelve-year-old girl - your hands involuntary touching as you both reach for the same leather basque - is *definitively* What's Wrong With This Picture. So, after just a few minutes, I flee to the safety of Marks & Spencer's; quite surprised to be walking out rather than leaving in a police van that's being pelted with eggs. OK, the underwear isn't going to be as invigorating at M & S, but at least I've got an even chance of picking out some pants without ending up on an offender's register.

As it happens, if black rubber grave-wear is off the menu because it's behind tiny, pale-faced Creatures of the Night who really ought to be at home working on their Key Stage 2 SATs, I go for a sporty pant on a woman. And my girlfriend is a woman, so that's ideal, really. (By a sporty pant I merely mean longer in the leg, by the way; not some bicycle underwear with a padded gusset, or those colossal navy blue gym shorts that cause Catholic girls to over-react in later life and become such tremendously good nights out.) With this in mind, I hunt for that style in the M & S women's pant section. After looking for ages with no success I go over to an assistant and ask her for help. She noticeably glares at my dyed hair, as all M & S assistants do - they must go on a course - but, a true professional, then enquires what I need, instead of just shouting, "*You* are what's wrong with this country!' into my face while a security guard strikes me repeatedly in the kidneys. I tell her what I'm trying to find. For some reason, as I do this I automatically illustrate, using my hands, the shape I'm after, on my own body. Brilliant. The assistant nods wordlessly. I realise what I've just done and over-rapidly add, "They're for my girlfriend!" Brilliant squared. Second shop of the day and I've already moved from Humbert Humbert to 'defensive transvestite'; by the time I get to Tesco I'll probably somehow find myself discovered naked in the fruit and vegetable aisle fumbling surreptitiously with a Labrador. Anyway, the M & S assistant pauses for just... that... bit... of a second, then says - truly excellent: I'll never forget this - she pauses for just that bit of a second, then says, "Let me go and get help."

She returns with a much older and larger assistant; returns from about 1840 with her, I reckon, as I can tell at a glance that until interrupted just now she'd been running some summerless northern workhouse in a Victorian novella. I explain again what I'm after, this time keeping my hands in my pockets. Her brain computes, and then she leads me across to a section of shelves.

"This is all we have in that style, sir," she says.

I look at the selection. Some of the items are labelled 'white'. Others are labelled 'black'. Others are labelled 'truffle'. They are *all* labelled 'control'. They are, my friends, control pants. Now, one thing alone is enough for me to know - to know instinctively, but absolutely - about control pants. It is this: if I gave Margret a pair of control pants as a present, she would lose control. I might as well sign my own death warrant as sign the cheque that bought Margret control pants. She'd think I was implying something, and, next thing I knew, I'd be hanging upside down in the freezer room of an abattoir with duct tape across my mouth watching her tug on the starter cord of a chainsaw. Even if - and I can't imagine how I'd pull it off, but *even* *if* - she didn't kill and dismember me, well... M & S is famously good at taking returns, but I profoundly doubt they'd take some control pants back from me after I'd retrieved them from where Margret would stuff them.

"Those," I reply to the assistant, "would be an unwise choice."

Her head shakes thoughtfully. "I'm not sure what else to offer then, sir." She peers around the shelves for inspiration. "What size do we need?"

You know, maybe you have to be me to fully grasp why this is reasonable, but I hadn't considered that at all. Perhaps it's because of all the things I generally need to consider when buying stuff - cost, frequency range, clock speed, is Alyson Hannigan in it, etc. - physical size is rarely an issue. If I do, say, have to get shoes for First or Second Born, I'll simply push the relevant child into the shop, hold a selection of shoes next to his feet to get the general idea, make him try several on, and the pair which finally gets the response, "Dunno. [Shrug.] S'pose," to the question, "Do they fit?" I buy. For God's sake - I'm never walking through town alone, spot a pair of shoes and think to myself, "Ah, those'd be nice for a child I have." What am I? Someone's mom?

What's truly amazing, though, and will probably incline you to think that I should be nominated for an international award or made UN Ambassador for Splendidness, is that I actually managed to finish the day with a bagful of M & S pants. Oh yes. They don't call me tenacious for nothing; nor do they 'idiotically bloody-minded'; nor 'probably autistic or something'. Eight, ladies and gentlemen, *eight* pairs of pants awaited Margret on Christmas morning. If I were on stage, let's me honest, I'd be bowing right now, and you'd be throwing roses.

Right, then: Christmas Day arrives. Margret sits amid the bounty of mystery parcels I've showered upon her - nine different presents (well, different to an extent - eight pairs of pants, and a Robbie Williams CD). She opens the first neatly wrapped parcel, smiles, squints, holds up the pants, purses her lips, stops smiling, looks at the label, and then says, "Size 14?"

(I've had a look online, and British size 14 is American size 12. American readers, therefore, might like to imagine Margret saying, "Size 12?" I don't know what the equivalent is in Australasia - I think their measurement system really only covers 'alcohol by volume'. Whatever the local variations, though, you should imagine it being said in a voice that sets off all the car alarms for three blocks.)

"Why did you buy size *14*?"

The answer to that question, of course, is 'Because I took a stab'. Marks and Spencer sizes go up to about 270, so the 14s were easily at the smaller end of the pant rack. And no one wants to look like an idiot in front of an M & S assistant, do they? So, to avoid seeming like a doesn't-know-his-girlfriend's-size dolt (especially as I was well aware she suspected that I actually *had* no girlfriend, but merely a full-length mirror and a yearning for the private caress of satin), I took a stab and replied to the assistant's, "What size do we need?" with a swift glance at the racks and a confident, "14."

"Aren't you size 14, then?" I say to Margret.

She stands up, turns, leans forward - so she's facing away from me and bending over - and then hikes her skirt up onto her back.

A brief aside here. Even after all these many years (and they've been years *full* of words) Margret will still sometimes not quite hit English accurately. That's fair enough, obviously - my German is a complete disgrace. It's simply odd that, every time she misses, she seems to do so in a way that ensures distress. The other week she was on the exercise bike in the loft, for example. (She's in training as later this year she's going to take on the Alps. When this confrontation happens, my money's not on the Alps.) Out of breath to the point of feeling that she couldn't get enough oxygen in her lungs because she'd drained all of it from the air in the room, but not wanting to stop herself, she called down to me. She wanted me to climb up and open the window. However, this played out as my innocently walking along the landing and Margret - breathless and urgent - suddenly calling down to me, "Mil! Come up here quickly - I'm gagging for it!"

I *did* go up there. Really quickly. To find, as I say, that she simply wanted me to open the window and then get out of her way. My life is essentially a necklace pearled with a thousand tiny disappointments. Anyway - back to the pants.

Margret stands up, turns, leans forward - so she's facing away from me and bending over - and then hikes her skirt up onto her back.

"Come here," she demands. Sometimes, I quite like her demanding voice.  I hurry over.

She grabs the back of her pants and begins to pull them down. I am, oh, let's say, 'attentive'. Which is good, I suppose, as she pulls the back down with one hand, finds the label by touch, holds it, and then with her other hand stabs a finger at it.

"Does that say *14*?" she asks. Ahh, I see now. Phew. Glad I realised before I went any further that all this was actually a rhetorical device.

"No," I mumble.

"No," she echoes.

She whips her skirt back down curtly, straightens, and returns to sitting where she was. I watch in silence, thinking, "God... there are seven more parcels of this to go."

She does thank me for the Robbie Williams CD, however.

In your house, I'm sure that'd be the end of it. But in our house, hours later, on Christmas Day night, she marches into the bedroom wearing nothing but one set of the pants I'd bought. (Another language issue, I suggest, is Margret never really connecting, conceptually, with the English phrase, "Why not just let it go now?") She is reaching round to grip the top edge of these pants with both hands.

"Look at this," she says, incredulous. "*14* - look at this." She twists, to better show me the gap at the back. "You could get another arse in there!"

I immediately think of a massively funny joke. It's this: "Not if it's another arse of *yours* you couldn't." I open my mouth to share the quip with her. Then carefully close it again before any sharing takes place, as I realise that before long I'll be lying here asleep and there's a drawer full of kitchen knives downstairs.

Practically the whole day has been defined by the pant issue, then. Scrooge had to go through only a night, and was also never, as far as I can recall, visited by the Ghost of Christmas Mental.

Next year, she'll be getting a book token.