Fashion issue.

Can I level with you about a fashion issue? I'm going to be very candid.

This skinny jeans trend... it's awful. ESPECIALLY here in Miami. And ESPECIALLY when one... is a sweater.

The jeans are constricting and not comfortable... and there's the matter of one's... "junk."

Way back when, when one's junk could hang wild and free in a nice pair of boxer shorts in one's "going-out" jeans, the world was my oyster. Floppin' around inside my pants, all over town!

Not so anymore.

The skinny jeans trend means that one has to wear boxer-briefs or briefs with one's jeans, in order to fit into one's jeans... because boxer shorts will not sit right in skinny jeans.

The issue with the boxer briefs and/or briefs in said jeans is that not only do boxer briefs and briefs compress one's junk, but the jeans also compress it. It's like double-compression. It makes one very uncomfortable. Constricted and...

Itchy, really.

And it's the same whether one has shaven, or trimmed or not. Itchy, itchy, itchy. Really, there's no happy medium.

Also, I'm not going to lie to you... I have pretty awesome thighs. I've always had a good butt and good thighs. Genetic, really. HOWEVER, the problem with having well-shaped thighs, is that they don't fit in 30/30 skinny jeans, which are apparently manufactured for victims of Auschwitz. I hate to make a starvation joke, but it's f*ckin' true. As the jeans are not cut for someone with quadriceps, chafing is a MAJOR problem along the upper inseam.

The saddest part is that skinny jeans are only about two years into fashion, which means they'll be here for another three years, at least... and even after the skinny jeans trend is over, we're going to go back to the Jerry-Seinfeld leg, which is only slightly better.

I miss wide-leg, boot-cut going out jeans -- I almost miss sitting on my 'nads, by accident. At least that's a situation I could, for the most part control. Itching and chafing in skinny jeans is not.

And by the time boot-cut jeans come back in style, I hope to have hung up my "going out" jeans for good. Or at least re-named them my "bad-idea" jeans.

Helen Thomas

From the Washington Post:

Back in the Front Row

Helen Thomas hasn't lost anything off the old fastball.

The 88-year-old legend of the White House briefing room returned to her front-row seat this afternoon after a long, illness-related absence.

"We're hapy to welcome back Helen Thomas," Bush press secretary Dana Perino said at the top. "We missed you a great deal, and we'll let the sparring begin here in just an instant."

Thomas wore her trademark scowl but sat silently through much of the briefing. Perino was about to bring the session to a close when it was brought to her attention that Thomas had a question.

"Helen has a question!" the 36-year-old exclaimed with a smile.

"Yes I do," Thomas piped up. "You say the president is not at fault for the auto industry problem. Do you think he's responsible for a solution?"

"Well," Perino began, I think that he - "But Thomas had not yet relinquished the floor. "And also, is there a quid pro quo on the Colombia trade agreement."

Perino explained that there was no quid pro quo between an auto-industry bailout and the free trade deal, and she assured Thomas the auto industry is "very important."

Not good enough. "Is he aware that Michigan has 9 percent unemployment?" Thomas demanded.

"Very well aware of it," Perino said, padding her answer with a few more sentences.

Still not good enough. "Is he aware that Detroit won World War II by retooling in a matter of days to a wartime condition?"

"He knows how important Detroit is, its history," Perino assured Thomas.

Perhaps Bush knows the history. But Helen Thomas is the last one in the room who lived it.

Here's wishing her many more years in the front row.

This blog was bittersweet. Helen Thomas is a Washington institution like... the Smithsonian... or Old Ebbitt's Grill. Or the Willard Hotel.

I got some sort of pang with the "last one in the room who lived it" line...