Trading up

Us guys don’t give up on worn out things like clothing very quickly.

John Pinette had a funny bit where he was talking about having to play a role as the fat woman in the play “Hairspray”. I can’t find the bit. It’s in the beginning of he special “I’m Starvin'”. So he’s complaining that when he had to put on pantyhose, they’d rip damn near any time. He said as guys, we don’t understand this, we keep our underwear for what? three, four years!

Ain’t that the truth. I have some that are in early stage breakdown. A small hole, here or there. But I refuse to get rid of them. They’re Jinshi bamboo boxer briefs. They weren’t cheap and you can’t find them anywhere these days, which sucks because they fit well, are stupid comfy, but don’t make your boys sweat. By the way, as I looked for that link, I noticed that they are hand wash. Who knew? Probably explains the wear. Whoops. How would I know? I’m a dude. We don’t read directions.

I’m over sixty and I just last month started paying attention to the laundering details on clothing. I’ve had to, since I’ve been upping my fashion game these days. You pay top dollar for Lacoste polo shirts, you want them to last.

All that said, what I’m on about today is gloves.

I had weightlifting gloves that I think I’ve had five years or so. Never occurred to me to change them. But they got real shabby and my palms were hurting doing bench presses. So I had to up my game.

These are Harbingers like my last pair. I had to order on Amazon, since Academy had FuckAll for gloves. What a treat, having decent padding. Took way too long to do this.

I needed bike gloves as well. Those were also getting ratty after nearly a decade. So I got these while I was at it:

The extra padding is awesome. Keeps your hands from going numb. I especially like the laces between fingers. Makes them easy to pull off. My others were leather, where these have fabric backs, which are much cooler.

I have a few pairs of motorcycle gloves, but they aren’t the same and aren’t really appropriate for bicycles. The padding, if there is any, is wrong. My two light pairs have none at all. You don’t need much, if any, on the bike since it’s so smooth. Unlike my Yamaha, it doesn’t have any high frequency vibration at highway speeds.

I’ve been culling the collection of clothes that neither fit me or I haven’t worn in over a year, donating them and backfilling with nicer editions that plan on caring for better. I chucked the worn and ripped stuff, and donated the rest.

Now, I need to take my Jinshis out of the laundry basket and wash them properly from now on.