Feminine Trials

I hate bra shopping. I really do.

I haven't been bra shopping in an age. Not since I put on all that weight with the Depakote. Now that I'm well along the way towards losing that weight, I've noticed that there's a certain amount of...sagging...going on. Some of this may be due to the weight loss, and some due to my hitting forty a couple of years ago. But whatever the reason, things (two of them, to be precise) are definitely going south, and so (heavy sigh), it's time for a new bra.

I can hardly wait to find out what's "in." What some flaming fashion designer in Paris--who probably doesn't even own a pair of breasts--thinks they should look like. Last time I went bra shopping I had a terrible time finding something that didn't make me look like I had a couple of weapons of mass destruction strapped to my chest.

What's wrong with a plain old white, cotton, comfy bra? Seems like these days everything's either

• padded (don't need any padding, thanks, got enough of my own),
• push-up (if they get pushed up I'm going to have breathing difficulties, thank you)
• covered with lace (it must be men who design bras with lace, secure in the knowledge that they will never have to suffer the torture of wearing one),
• shot through with enough hardware to set off airport metal detectors,
• fluorescent enough to show through all but thickest of winter coats, or
• made of some horrid modern fabric that requires dry cleaning or other delicate handling (if I can't just chuck it in the washing machine, I'm not buying it!).

So it's off to the department store today to try on a bunch of fluorescent, padded, push-up, lacy, underwire instruments of torture, and choose the one that is (a) comfortable enough to wear for more than five minutes and (b) doesn't make me look like a glow-in-the-dark nuclear missile silo.

Oh...and I wouldn't mind feeling somewhat attractive in it, too, if that's not too much to ask.

Sometimes I envy Gladys. The Chief finds her alluring no matter what she wears.