The Suit

I think its finally time to admit that my kids are adults and not the slightly older versions from high school and college that I tend to think of them as. The point was brought home yesterday as the Son decided he needed a suit and needed some help. As I recounted in an earlier post the Son resides at home. He's had a "real job" for about a year now for a local IT firm. He makes a comfortable salary for an entry level job and has gotten some decent business travel out of it as well. Because he interacts with his customers, he's required to at least wear a tie. Now coming out of college, as you might imagine, his professional wardrobe was not all what it should be and you'd be right. Actually I think he owned one tie that might have been worn a few times at best. He did have one suit. I can't remember now what the occasion was the required us to buy it for him, but it had been some time ago (high school) and didn't exactly fit very well anymore. Over the year he's been working, he's steadily added to his wardrobe with Ann's help (i.e., he pays and she shops). Now apparently he has a semi-fancy work shindig coming up next week and he decided he needed to get on board with the whole suit/jacket thing and asked for mine and Ann's help. Now like most males, my idea of a good time is not heading out to the Mall to shop. I like to do what I call speed shop. Figure out what I need in advance and see how fast I can get in, buy it and get out. But suit shopping requires a bit more work. Therefore, after he arrived home, he, Ann and I headed out to one of the local men's shop. I think we all were dreading it. Either the suits were going to look like crap or be too expensive or a combination thereof. Plus I hate dealing with the salesmen. But hey, not so. While we had gone into the store with a particular suit in mind that we had seen on line at the store's website, they didn't have it in that branch of the store, but could order it. Since he needs the suit by next week, that wasn't going to work. So he tried on a few jackets to determine his size. Given his height, he's right on the cusp on the "Short" "Regular" jacket sizing. We decided he looked better in a "Short". He found a style he liked and went to try it on. The jacket looked great, but the pants, not just pleats, but double pleats. I have no idea who decided "pleats" on pants was a good look, but dude it so isn't. Back to the racks for something else. We found another suit, which cost a bit more, but looked good and no pleated pants. The tailor was dragged out for a fitting and we were done. Relatively painless for all and best of all he paid! Having kids that are employed rocks. He picks it up on Tuesday.

Weds, since its a telecommute from home day, is a day I try to fit in at least 5,000 meters on the erg. However, between work and the suit buying, I totally skipped out. I'll get back into it on Friday, my Friday off, thank goodness. Skipping Weds will probably affect my time on Friday, but we do what we have to. I'll have an extra beer tonight to make up for it.