Yesterday I went to the mall to buy some shorts. Even though almost every size is represented in my wardrobe, from size 6 through to 16, I somehow am missing a critical segment of the shorts continuum. I only had one pair of size 14-plus-size that I could get into, but they were really too big so I was wearing them pinned together in the waist. Plus they were a little too short for a lady of my advanced years, if you know what I’m saying.

So. To the mall.

I went to the Eddie Bauer first because their pants fit me really well, but they cost a small fortune so I don’t usually buy anything there unless it’s on sale. I was in a rush, though, because I only had 45 minutes to shop before Little Miss Sunshine needed a nap, so I just grabbed and grabbed and didn’t look at prices. I put the first pair on and it was L-O-V-E and I knew I had to have them. I had a little heart attack at the price but you know what? I hate shopping, I never find anything I like, and these fit me like a dream and were super soft and a gorgeous colour and approaching-middle-age respectable, so SCREW IT, sold.

Also I bought a second pair in a different colour. SCREW IT, I say.

But really, my point here is not to talk about shopping, but rather to talk about sizing. I have several pairs of size 12 shorts in my closet and I tried valiantly to squeeze into them before the big shopping trip but no dice. I couldn’t even zip them up. All of these shorts are (OF COURSE) at least ten years old because my entire wardrobe says, “Hi! I’m from the year 1990, nice to meet you!”

So I assumed, when I went to the mall, I’d be looking for size 14 stuff. But when I tried on size 14 stuff — way too big. I needed a size 12. Even at the Eddie Bauer, when some of the shorts I already had at home were their size 12, but too tight.

This appears to be incontrovertable evidence that sizes have really increased in the past 15 or so years. What used to qualify as a size 12 is now more like a size 10. I guess it’s supposed to make me feel better about the fact that I’ve gained a bunch of weight and all that, and I admit it…it kind of does. Size 12! Whoo hoo!

Now if only I could get rid of everything in my closet that is older than 10 years, I’d be able to fool myself completely.

I do, however, find this size changing thing to be frustrating when it comes to shopping. I hate clothes shopping as it is, and it does not help if stores are changing their sizes all the time, or some are changing them and some aren’t. Sir Monkeypants likes to do what he calls “Man-style shopping” which is when he goes into a store that he knows, that he likes, that he already owns stuff from, picks something off the rack in what he knows is his size, and just buys it. Hell, maybe he’ll take two. Just like that. It takes him 10 minutes, and voila, modern, in-style clothes without even trying them on.

I’d love to be able to shop like that but with this sizing problem, I can’t ever know what size I am without actually taking the trouble of undressing and redressing and man, that is so annoying, I may as well just keep the same old 10-year crap. Even if I already own stuff from that store…even within the store’s current line…there are sizing differences for women.

Can’t the world just get it together on this ONE THING? Don’t we already have enough to worry about what with losing the entire bat and bee population of the earth?

It would really help me out.