MEN'S SHORTS

If you like the sight of bony knees and hairy calves, this the season for you. Because it is summer, and men with scant sense or taste all over the Bay Area are wearing shorts.
As a San Franciscan with plenty of taste and common sense, I am of course horrified -- dang some of my brethren are ugly gits! -- as well as garbed in long pants.

[For the past two days, very mature men with ghastly gams wearing flamboyant shorts have been a dime a dozen. Pink shorts. Stripey shorts. Cargo shorts. Tight cut-offs. Baggy campaign shorts. Sailor Jerry shorts. My eyes hurt, and every time I come back from Marin County my stomach aches. Bony knees. Paunches. Liver spots and flab. Wattles. 
Gentlemen, stop airing yourself. Dress like you mean it. Feh.]

Truth be told, I do not have the right physique for shorts.
No, even if I did, I wouldn't ever wear them.
And my legs are quite nice.
Thank you.

The last time I wore shorts was down in Menlo Park, over a decade ago, when the Glynn sisters and two brilliant Filipina Americans talked me into participating in the inter-departmental volleyball game.
They then sat on the side lines making humorous rude comments.
Something about British tourists at the Costa Del Sol.

Dark socks were part of that image.

I am not proud of that.


When I say I don't have the right physique, what I mean is that there is no way in heck anyone could confuse me with an athlete.
I wear slacks well. Not shorts.

The only people who should wear shorts are athletes, children, and attractive young ladies.  Athletes look perfectly fine in shorts, and attractive young ladies also look fine. Mighty fine.
Exceptionally fine.

Same goes for summer dresses.
Athletes, children, and attractive young ladies.

On anybody else, shorts and summer dresses look ridiculous.

I do not ever, in this life time, wish to see any of the cigar smoking old farts who infest Marin wearing a summer dress. Even if they do stuff the front with convincing falsies. Actually, I can think of nothing more likely to upset the masses and cause unrest.

But let us limit our conversation to shorts.

No matter how acceptable the shape and dimension of each of my legs, or even the surface texture of said appendages, I have this perfectly reasonable paranoid suspicion that my friends would utter all kinds of nasty albeit funny comments if they saw me in shorts.

As would I with them in the same circumstance.

Dang you look like a fratboy!

Are you drunk?

[Unfortunately I do not know any young ladies who wear shorts. Which is a pity. I have always thought that college girls looked their sunniest and brightest best when jauntily dressed.]

In fact, the only plump thighs I wish to see underneath shorts had better be adult female. Adult males with plump thighs -- such as many of my friends who smoke cigars -- are quite displeasing aesthetically.

[By the way, ladies, your thighs are NOT humongous, but curvy. And consequently your knees look correctly proportioned. I know some of you have this weird hang-up about your weight and the thickness of your legs, and want to have scrawny gams like some of the anorexic stick-insects walking around the city. But their knees seem enormously knobby because they have no flesh, and they look painful to know, and likely to break. Trust me, you look fine. Just ask any man. And please feel free to ignore your various women friends regarding this matter. Can I offer you some more pizza?]


No matter the weather, one should attempt to look socially acceptable, dignified, and not ridiculous. In other words, not like a druggie or a fratboy, nor like a trollop or crazy cat lady. How you dress affects how you will be treated by strangers, and how comfortable or not your friends and family are in your company in public places.
Yeah, it's your right to dress like an idiot.
We'd rather not be seen with you.
So please don't.

[If, for instance, you wished to swan around wearing boxer shorts or hot pants, that is perfectly fine, in private. If you are a young lady of anywhere between twenty and forty who decides to try boxer shorts, very few people would mind being seen with you, provided there was no one else around. Go for it.
Heck, I wouldn't mind your company either, you would probably look fine.
And if you are a man so garbed, somewhere some young lady probably wouldn't mind seeing you thus.
I wouldn't know, as to the best of my knowledge I am the only person who wears boxer shorts, and I never wear them on the outside. Again, it's a question of taste and common sense.]


One of the reasons I do not like hot weather is the smorgasbord of visual ghastly parading around in public.
Too many people flashing wads of ugly. Large Midwesterners, milky white Scandinavians, and flaccid suburbanites of either gender.
Wrinkles, flab, freckles, wobbly bits, and sponge.
And cleavage you can drop coins into.
Men, women, and others.


On the other hand, all those young ladies who were wearing yoga pants previously are now wearing shorts, and that is an improvement.

Men in shorts look bleeding ridiculous.

For crapssake, wear a kilt.



I'm actually rather jealous of women who can wear summer dresses well. It always looks so fresh and festive. Like one should offer them tea or something.




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