On Choosing Apparel

For those of you who might be inspired to try this at home, a few helpful hints from my experiences at Sports Authority. They are as follows:

1. If you enter Sports Authority wearing wash and wear polyester pants, you are likely to get a few glances that could be construed as pitying. Ignore them.

2. If you try on spandex bicycle pants, no matter what size is indicated on the tag, be prepared to be astonished, repulsed and a bit out of breath.

3. Buy an extra pair of baggy pants to go over the spandex ones. I cannot stress this enough.

4. Be sure that the pants you are trying on are indeed women's. Men's pants take on a whole new character of ridiculousness when they come in contact with womanly curves.

5. Pay no attention to the smaller and more lithe bodies of the shoppers around you. In ten or twenty years, they will be as bulbous as your own. If not, they will circulate blood that is at least 40% Advil based after having spent 20 years clinging to the sides of cliffs, hurtling through space with skis attached to sensitive ligaments, crashing through underbrush on moutain bikes, or dislocating limbs as they abuse the lowly soccer ball.

6. Remind yourself that while their physiques are no doubt superior, it is you that has the superior medical coverage.

7. Choose black. It's slimming.

8. Ok, maybe it's not, but it will hide the bloodstains better once you hit the road.