Right now, I am in possession of some seriously ratty underwear.
The problem is not that I am in some way incapable of procuring new underwear; I am not in need of any underpants-based charity. The problem stems principally from my accursed absent-mindedness. (Also my twisted sense of logic and detest for wastefulness)
Where to start?
Abent-mindedness seems to be a decent jumping off point. So. I’m a space-cadet.
It’s not just that I forget to buy underwear when I am at some emporium where underpants may be had (although that is a factor in my ratty-assed equation). It is mainly that I will pull a pair of drawers out of the drawer in the morning and note that they’re in appalling condition and that I should throw them away when I take them off that night. However, come evening bathtime, I take off the underpants (along with whatever else I was wearing) and bung them into the laundry hamper. Unless a pair of underwear is egregiously awful (mostly, when the elastic is shot and they become “creepers”) I almost invariably forget my intention of throwing them away.
So what happens is that they get washed. And here comes the explanation of my curious logic and abhorrence of waste. So, I wash the underwear. I put the underwear away. As I’m putting away the underwear, I note that they’re awfully ratty and that I should throw ’em away after the next wearing. I do not, however, throw them away RIGHT THEN AND THERE because it seems like a shame to waste the energy of having washed and sorted and put them away. What a waste of detergent, water, and time! So of course, I’ll just wear them and throw them away after wearing them. In my logic, if I wear them, I will not have wasted the time, water, and detergent; I’ll have gotten one more washing’s worth out of them.
So of course, what happens is that I wear them again, forget to throw them out again, wash them again, put them away again, and wear them again. And again. And again. And again.
The only thing that will break this idiotic cycle is if I go to Target, buy as many underpants as my budget will stand, and come home and throw out everything that looks in the slightest bit dubious and start all over again. This has to happen and this has to happen soon, ’cause the state of my knickers really doesn’t bear any further debate!
I do the exact same thing with socks. They are discovered to have holes, I wear them anyway, they get washed, they somehow get rolled up and put back in the drawer, they get worn again…
There’s also that problem of mass replacement. If your sock situation is at all like my underwear situation, then you tend to replace ’em all around the same time, so when it comes up to failure time, they all fall apart simultaneously as well! Amirite?
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