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Uh-oh! A thread for hats, trousers and potential comedic embarrassment

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Mon Oncle Ignatius

13:37 / 27.09.05

I was going to post this in the Headsick thread initially, but this isn't actually anger-inducing - more provoking of extensive irritation which is developing into potential comedy - for now.

The button on my trousers just broke while sitting up at my desk to do some more work. Actually broke, not just the thread holding it on, which has snapped too, naturally enough.

These are some cheap-jack trousers which have never fitted properly, but have the sole advantage of extensive pocketing. This is what I get for buying them on spec for about a tenner at the camping/surplus shop in Chapel Market - a source of many bargains, but also of shoddy goods, it seems.

So then I go to somewhere not in the middle of the office to see if anything can be rigged to hold them up long enough to avoid any comedy moments in the middle of a reasonably busy office today - and then the zip breaks in half too. Now it's just becoming silly, so I can at least find it all wryly amusing - or at least until I actually have to walk down the road, get a bus, and then go to a committee meeting, all with a pair of strides with the potential for falling down at any particular moment. And I don't even have a belt on today.

There must be somewhere around here which sells safety pins...

13:40 / 27.09.05

Hah-hah! *points and laughs*

Next you'll accidentally spray water on the crotch, or they'll fall off and you'll trip over and land on the dog just as the Vicar walks in... "I can explain!"

Mon Oncle Ignatius

13:48 / 27.09.05

Exactly. That's pretty much how I'm feeling right now. I did walk downstairs to the other part of the building to see if there was anywhere with safety pins to hand, but have this terrible feeling that I'll suddenly be in Grace Brothers before I can say "I'm free!" if I walk around there too much. If I see any vicars nearby, I'm hiding behind the potplants.

I have tried pinching myself, but I'm not naked yet, so I will work on the assumption for now that I am fully awake.

13:57 / 27.09.05

You poor thing, are staples a possibility? There's always lots of those around an office. You could even do a little motif around the pockets etc (or maybe not). Alternatively if you have a strappy bag like mine the strap could be converted into a form of belt belt. As a third alternative basic sowing components are usually available in most shops, a button from a pocket (or if their is a spare button on the pants interior) could be sown in the broken ones stead.

14:09 / 27.09.05

String, or possibly elastic bands tied together could probably be utilised as a form of belt. The fly could be held together with parcel tape (on the inside of the trousers to avoid looking too weird). Either of these should probably prevent catastrophic trouser failure and the associated embarrassment. You'll still look odd, but not pant-showingly odd.

Mon Oncle Ignatius

14:12 / 27.09.05

I might try the staples, though maybe I'll wait until everyone else has left for the day to avoid yet more sitcom moments.

A quick jaunt downstairs has shown that the slight benefit of these trousers is that they are too tight (normally) so are staying up of their own accord so far. I just have to remember that they might fall down at a really inopportune moment - such as at the end of the aforementioned committee meeting.

14:13 / 27.09.05

You might be able to make do with a paper clip if no safety pins are to hand. Push one end through the fabric at the spot where the button used to be and then thread it through the buttonhole.

Any chance you could get home to change clothes? Managers tend to be understanding about wardrobe malfunctions if they're sufficiently embarrassing...

ONLY NICE THINGS

14:15 / 27.09.05

Dude, if you're wearing Union Jack underpants (any style), the setup is complete. Just go about your business and the universe will sort it out.

Mon Oncle Ignatius

14:34 / 27.09.05

You might be able to make do with a paper clip if no safety pins are to hand. Push one end through the fabric at the spot where the button used to be and then thread it through the buttonhole.

Trying that was how the zip broke.

But geek-style, a spare ADSL modem cable has come in very handy as a temporary belt to get me through the meeting tonight (I hope).

I am once again grateful that we are not required to wear suits to work - the trousers are usually so much baggier.

Thanks for all the suggestions. I'm going to try to remember to get some safety pins for any future comedy emergencies.

Lilly Nowhere Late

14:38 / 27.09.05

I really want you do the staple motif thing. Really. Go on...
And never ever ever ever bitch at me again for buying quality expensive trousers...
Those little kids at the factory work hard to keep guys like you out of situations like this.

14:45 / 27.09.05

*later at A&E two nurses joke over a cuppa*
"So this dude came in, who'd apparently been trying to staple his fly shut.."
"A likely story! Fnar! That's what they all say!"
"..so he's alone in the office with the staplegun, going at it, when who should walk in but the boss, his wife and their Vicar! The shock obviously made him reflexively convulse, and sure enough he was brought in bleeding profusely...I'm gonna post the pic online and send it to all my friends!"

14:47 / 27.09.05

Trying that was how the zip broke.

Go figure...

As one who has frequent mishaps of this sort - I've actually given up entirely on two pairs of pants and a skirt, each of which now has a safety pin as its permanent fastener - you have my sympathies, and I am not giggling at all.

Totally. Not.

Mon Oncle Ignatius

15:05 / 27.09.05

I really want you do the staple motif thing. Really. Go on...
And never ever ever ever bitch at me again for buying quality expensive trousers...
Those little kids at the factory work hard to keep guys like you out of situations like this.

You know what - that's pretty much what I thought as the zip broke.

So what motif shall I do? The office should empty out soon, and the cleaner's not due for another 40 minutes to walk in on me with stapler down the front of my trousers...

I'll leave it to Stoatie to describe the circumstances when I walked in to his flat only to find him kneeling behind a well-known gayer who had his trousers and pants at his ankles, with a marker pen in poised Stoatie's hand...

15:11 / 27.09.05

*hee hee* you just made me laugh out loud in a v quiet office. But you should surely do a motif of a banana skin -- one will surely come into play soon.
Or perhaps a custard pie

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

15:41 / 27.09.05

It was all in a good cause, is all I'm sayin'...

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

15:42 / 27.09.05

Have you considered roller-skating home? I think today's the day they move the big sheets of glass from one side of the road to the other... shame you missed yesterday, really. Or "ladder-carrying day" as it's known...

15:48 / 27.09.05

Or tomorrow... Fruit-Cart Day.

Mon Oncle Ignatius

20:08 / 27.09.05

I would have rollerskated, but the rubber chickens were too bulky, and they'd have bounced me straight off the plate glass sheet anyway. I did see someone walk into a lamp-post along the way, but I think they were a mime artist who had stepped into the wrong sketch by mistake.

The trousers probably didn't fall down initially as I don't wear sock suspenders - I suspect they are a necessary comedy adjunct for dropping yr kecks in public without intending to do so (cf. Union Jack underwear referred to above).

20:34 / 27.09.05

I seem to encounter young men walking like bow-legged cowboys in order to stop their trousers falling down entirely, all over town, because they wear them with the waist just above their knees. They do all seem to be wearing underwear with a mass-market designer's name on them though. I thought it was just an absurd fashion but perhaps your trouser problem is endemic in London.

Mon Oncle Ignatius

20:48 / 27.09.05

If only I had had the sense to realise just how fashionable I was in danger of becoming, I should have left the trousers to fly at half mast and gained a modicum of street cred. But alas and alack, my underwear is not from a tailor named Giorgio, so it seems I will have to content myself with remaining merely undone.

21:54 / 27.09.05

with remaining merely undone
Forever? You have started a new fashion after all. Perhaps tomorrow you could wear all your clothes back to front like criss-cross - sorry, Kriss Kross*, circa 1980-something. Just be careful not to "jump jump!" too high without said union jack shorts.

*did they wear their shoes back to front too? shurely not

21:57 / 27.09.05

Nah, the obvious answer is dungarees. Sexy or what?

P. Horus Rhacoid

22:50 / 27.09.05

Dungarees ('overalls' as we call 'em in the states) would be efficient and sexy, since you wouldn't have to wear a shirt.

22:58 / 27.09.05

I suggest staples.

I mean, I've seen guys rip open the crotch on their jeans while playing baseball and duct taping it back together, but that didn't work out too well.

The Return Of Rothkoid

23:41 / 27.09.05

Gaffa tape is pretty handy at times like this.

As are jumpers.

I recommend against the stapling, unless we're talking heavy-duty motherfuckers.

P. Horus Rhacoid

23:44 / 27.09.05

Soldering the zipper together would also be a viable solution, if this happens again. I wouldn't recommend doing it while wearing the pants, though.

08:40 / 28.09.05

*Later in A&E*

"So this dude was soldering his fly shut..."
"FNAR! A likely story!"

ect

09:00 / 28.09.05

There must be something in the water Tango-Mango. I had a 1/2 cm hole in the crotch of my trousers that has somehow trebled in size in the last 4 hours. If it carries on at this rate my trip home could be very embarrassing. Thankfully I will be able to change my trousers before my boss and Mr Takahashi (our biggest client) come round for dinner tonight.

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

11:17 / 28.09.05

But Cash... doesn't your boss hate Japanese people???

The Return Of Rothkoid

12:27 / 28.09.05

The crotch-hole is something that does, mysteriously, increase during the day. Particularly when wearing jeans.

I know not why.

12:36 / 28.09.05

Stoatie, no, that's the vicar and he's not coming round to dinner until the 28th.

Crotch hole has stabilised at 3 cm.

21:27 / 28.09.05

dude, thelonius monk used to say 'it only the wrong note, 'pends on what you play next'

take off the trousers. take off the tie and shirt. be free! walk around the office declaring your freedom to the world, free of the paradigm of the man, free of the constraints of society. go all out. go wild.

or use staples.

21:34 / 28.09.05

When it comes to crotch holes: so dense with comedy, no-one's sight can escape the event horizon.

Mon Oncle Ignatius

13:17 / 03.10.05

Just as a follow-up, this Saturday in the pub someone managed to spill a glass of perry across the table which naturally splashed all over my thigh, making it look like I'd had a little accident. Fortunately my trouser, their buttons and other fastenings remained securely in place.

ONLY NICE THINGS

13:27 / 03.10.05

You can get perry in pubs? Or did ze have to conceal the bottle on hir way in, creating a gigantic bulge in their trouser pocket? Did they further then tell the Vicar "I had to take care to hide a great big thing in my ingress. I was afraid it was going to spurt everywhere and ruin my trousers!"

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