I spent the day shopping with R.J. It was enjoyable, but let me tell you, shopping with a man is far more wearing than shopping with a woman. I don’t know if this is true of all men or just gay men.
He was downright persnickety about what we were buying.
Of course the biggest catch was his current lack of substantial funds. So my job was to find him nice looking clothes at wonderful sale prices. I must say I did quite well.
He was convinced that Lord & Taylor was going to be the easy solution to all his fashion woes. I had serious doubts. My experience with that store is generally that their sale prices finally reflect what are regular prices at other stores. Rarely a wonderful bargain to be found. So he tried on a couple of pairs of pants that were nice, but still pricey even though they were on sale. He agreed to wait and see what we could find elsewhere first.
Next stop Macy’s, where I managed to find a huge rack of sale pants. Voila. Three pairs of pants for sixty dollars. It was a nice selection and I liked two of them. I hated the brown ones. But then I hate brown in general.
Now I was under the impression that our shopping goal was new pants. Period. Wrong!
I should explain that the reason for this trip is his new restaurant management job. He’s in training for a small chain of upscale restaurants that are primarily in Massachusetts. He had previously been doing the same job, but in a much more casual setting in Orlando. Consequently the khaki and jeans wardrobe don’t work here.
Suddenly we needed to find ties and shirts. Earlier he’s told me he was all set in this department. Apparently the new trousers inspired him to create ensembles. Ties were an argument. He’d pick ones that made me gag, and I’d pick ones that he thought were too wild. I really liked the Gerry Garcia ties. I mean I had to find some way to counteract those brown pants. We ended up able to compromise, and I found a table where the ties were 50% off the markdown price. I think they were about $11 each.
Then we were off to Filenes. I decided I needed to spend some time looking for some things for myself. R.J. felt compelled to move on to his own department. I told him I’d meet him.
Where’s the equity here? He can’t hang for fifteen minutes while I scour the racks but I have to be his personal shopper? Hmph! I let him go, and took my own sweet time. I did get a couple of things, but the pants have to be returned. Too big in the rear. I’m a large person, but have a flat backend, so finding pants that fit well is difficult. Oh well, they were kind of funky, but I don’t think they look right.
Purchases in hand I went back downstairs to find him. He’d taken the pants he’d purchased out of the bag and had them draped on the various counters in order to find shirts to match. Choices were strewn everywhere and he was becoming downright anal about finding the right shirts.
I’d find one that I liked and he’d tell me he already had one like it. So what were we buying shirts for?!? He finally found three that passed his test. All my choices were rejected. He decided that corporate wouldn’t like dark colored shirts. They were downright snazzy, but he wouldn’t get them. We got light colored ones instead.
Yawn.
Back to look at more ties. Two more were chosen, one of which I liked a lot and I think may help the pale yellow shirt not look so dull. That’s the shirt that he chose to go with the ugly brown pants. I just asked him not to wear it if we were together.
The wardrobe hunt concluded there. I think he ended up spending about sixty bucks for the three shirts and two ties. Good deals again.
He was happy with his bargains.
We had a late lunch at the Rainforest Café. Neither one of us had ever been, so we figured we could try it and then be able to say "OK, we’ve been." Generally I thought it was pricey and had mediocre service. The food was fine, but nothing memorable. My biggest grumble with the place was that it was FREEZING. Tropical rainforest? Nope. Frozen tundra works for me. It took me ages to warm back up.
We also went to my stamp store (hey, if I’ve traveled thirty miles to that town, I’m going to my stamp store!) I bought a few stamps that had recently come in, including two beautiful butterflies. One from a company called Magenta, and the other from "Ducks in a Row". I really seem to like butterflies lately.
We ended with a trip to a branch of Tower Records that was downright pitiful. Not worth stopping at. Need to go into Boston to go to the real store if you want to find a decent selection of anything.
So I dropped him back at the hotel where they’re putting him up until he moves into corporate housing.
It was an enjoyable day. I enjoy his company and we have a few good laughs every time we get together.
So now I’m wiped out. I could just put my head down on this keyboard and snooze. Time to throw in the towel I’d say.
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