Friday, October 15, 2010

Short pants

I had the good fortune to happen upon a UPS delivery guy getting out of his truck in front of a neighbor’s house. While ordinarily I do not make it a habit to stare at MEN with keen interest, with this guy it was different – and he made me hungry. Not only was he dressed in the well known corporate dark brown togs but he was wearing his shorts too! What other jobs demand short pants as an ‘official’ work uniform - Lifeguard, Hooters girl, marathon man?

No as you might have guessed I am not a ‘shorts’ man myself. Yes I will wear them from time to time when I am trapped in a mine for 10 weeks, or an alligator has the other half of my legs. But most of the time I try not to thrill too many ladies with my knobby knees and hairy ‘tan-less’ ankles. Yes I like as much length in my pants as possible to keep everything in place and help keep the dust, bugs, and random coinage from getting trapped in various nooks and crannies.

But I was thinking about our UPS guy, Fed Ex folks, and even the post office people too for that matter. Their official uniforms often include SHORT PANTS? What is it with delivery people that demands ‘naked knees’ in the workplace? It seems to me that if I was lugging boxes and packages all over the back of a delivery van, I would want a little more skin protection beyond that which suntan lotion provides.

Also, no matter what your body type or the weather, you have to stuff yourself into those dandy pants and walk around like you are a 12 year old prep student to do your job. That was the issue with the parcel dude that I saw this week. He was sporting a hefty ‘gut-tastic’ belly flop well beyond the beltline. I am sure when the company clothing designers were imagining their corporate image, they did not anticipate their delivery folks reminding us of big chocolate muffins! See I told you I was hungry!