Pants: The Saga
Oh, I forgot... I have a slightly amusing story to tell.
Went on Saturday with Emily to the Atlantic Center, which is basically the closest thing to a mall that you can find in the 5 Burroughs and, therefore, is a place to avoid at all costs under normal circumstances. However, I really needed pants. Side note: Buying clothes in New York totally blows. Sales tax here is ludicrious and is only slightly preferable to getting mugged in an alley and you have to go to 18 different stores to find what you're looking for, unless you want to go to the aforementioned Atlantic Center, which, again, I don't recommend. It's like that one mall in your hometown that everyone knows is The Ghetto Mall but worse because it's right on the edge of Brooklyn's worst neighborhood. Whatever. Most right-thinking people go to Jersey for their shopping needs, but I'm waaaay to lazy for that, ergo, Atlantic Center.
Anyway...
I go into the Men's Warehouse in the Atlantic Center because I have a discount coupon for there and, from what I understand, they have a bounty of pants. In my coupon-inspired eagerness, I'd forgotten a couple of things about the Men's Warehouse:
1. The employees work on commision, which means they are pushy to the point of physical violence in their attempts to force purchaces upon you. I'm not that friendly, so I really don't like strangers harrassing me in general, but I'm particularly averse to it when I'm shopping; an activity I regard about as highly as having to pee really bad while stuck on a stalled subway.
2. Men's Warehouse caters to Men who make a whole lot more money than I do.
So the dude comes up, leaps on my back and locks his hands, and starts licking my neck about how they have all these great pants to offer me. I'm all, "Just need some pants, size Fat if you've got them." He starts pulling from the racks every single pair of pants in my size, plus some on either side of the line, in case I immediatly eat an entire ox or get some sort of wasting illness on my way out the door. He smiles irritatingly and makes a sweeping motion with his hands, "These are all 75$ a piece." Wha...? I nearly shat myself, but I play it cool. "Oh, um, do you have anything a little on the cheaper side?" He gets, if possible, even more smary and tells me that these are the bargin-priced, step-above-burlap-sack, most-homeless-people-won't-wear-these, cheapest pants he has. I freeze.
Then, because I'm lucky like this, he gets called away to the register for a second. "Just try these on," smile like a hateful dagger. The minute his back is turned, I hightail it out of there so fast I nearly take the door off it's hinges. I head across the way to the Bath and Body Works where Em is browsing for soap. I can see through the windows the dude come back to where we had been talking, finding nothing but an empty space and a bunch of overpriced slacks. The look on his face, seriously, was that of a man who's lost all that is dear to him. Sorrow, misery, loathing and desperation all cross the man's features. He slowly begins to hang the pants back on the rack, a piece of him dying with each click of the hanger on metal. Near tears, he wanders back into the wilds of the sales floor, waiting to pounce on another opportunity to catch life by a rainbow and find it's pot of commision gold.
I went to Old Navy and bought some jeans.
Went on Saturday with Emily to the Atlantic Center, which is basically the closest thing to a mall that you can find in the 5 Burroughs and, therefore, is a place to avoid at all costs under normal circumstances. However, I really needed pants. Side note: Buying clothes in New York totally blows. Sales tax here is ludicrious and is only slightly preferable to getting mugged in an alley and you have to go to 18 different stores to find what you're looking for, unless you want to go to the aforementioned Atlantic Center, which, again, I don't recommend. It's like that one mall in your hometown that everyone knows is The Ghetto Mall but worse because it's right on the edge of Brooklyn's worst neighborhood. Whatever. Most right-thinking people go to Jersey for their shopping needs, but I'm waaaay to lazy for that, ergo, Atlantic Center.
Anyway...
I go into the Men's Warehouse in the Atlantic Center because I have a discount coupon for there and, from what I understand, they have a bounty of pants. In my coupon-inspired eagerness, I'd forgotten a couple of things about the Men's Warehouse:
1. The employees work on commision, which means they are pushy to the point of physical violence in their attempts to force purchaces upon you. I'm not that friendly, so I really don't like strangers harrassing me in general, but I'm particularly averse to it when I'm shopping; an activity I regard about as highly as having to pee really bad while stuck on a stalled subway.
2. Men's Warehouse caters to Men who make a whole lot more money than I do.
So the dude comes up, leaps on my back and locks his hands, and starts licking my neck about how they have all these great pants to offer me. I'm all, "Just need some pants, size Fat if you've got them." He starts pulling from the racks every single pair of pants in my size, plus some on either side of the line, in case I immediatly eat an entire ox or get some sort of wasting illness on my way out the door. He smiles irritatingly and makes a sweeping motion with his hands, "These are all 75$ a piece." Wha...? I nearly shat myself, but I play it cool. "Oh, um, do you have anything a little on the cheaper side?" He gets, if possible, even more smary and tells me that these are the bargin-priced, step-above-burlap-sack, most-homeless-people-won't-wear-these, cheapest pants he has. I freeze.
Then, because I'm lucky like this, he gets called away to the register for a second. "Just try these on," smile like a hateful dagger. The minute his back is turned, I hightail it out of there so fast I nearly take the door off it's hinges. I head across the way to the Bath and Body Works where Em is browsing for soap. I can see through the windows the dude come back to where we had been talking, finding nothing but an empty space and a bunch of overpriced slacks. The look on his face, seriously, was that of a man who's lost all that is dear to him. Sorrow, misery, loathing and desperation all cross the man's features. He slowly begins to hang the pants back on the rack, a piece of him dying with each click of the hanger on metal. Near tears, he wanders back into the wilds of the sales floor, waiting to pounce on another opportunity to catch life by a rainbow and find it's pot of commision gold.
I went to Old Navy and bought some jeans.
posted by Clinton at 1:47 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home