Let it all hang out

This should make you all feel better about your day:

I went to work this morning dressed for success in a new pair of slacks, freshly polished shoes, and silk shirt. Hey, I'd enjoyed resurrecting the ol' shirt and tie for the Communion, and I wanted to carry it over to the workplace. After all, dress for the job you want, not the one you have.

At work a friend was standing on a windowsill as he tried to lower a sign that normally hangs about ten feet off the ground.

"You're an idiot. Why don't you get a ladder?" I asked.

"I don't need a #@$% ladder, that's why. Get up here and lend me a hand."

I walked beneath the sign and was able to grab a corner as he lowered it, taking some of the weight off of him. It wasn't good enough.

"Dude, get up here and hold this while I grab the wire."

Here's where catastrophe set in. I took a step up onto the windowsill and heard what my buddy later called a "cartoon sound effect".

I'd ripped my pants from the knee to my belt, leaving thigh, crotch, and ass hanging in the breeze.

Cue riotous laughter around me.

I'll say this for me: somewhere along the line, in a lifetime full of humiliation and social miscues, I lost the ability to be embarrassed by such horrific scenes. Really. I reacted with detached fatigue. I let the laughter carry on for a minute.

"Are you going to help me here, or are you going to keep staring at my ass?" I asked.

"What the hell am I supposed to do? I'm not holding that together."

"Grab me the tape a**hole."

I wrapped a few pieces of packing tape around my leg and proudly marched across a crowded store at a leisurely pace. I walked into the office, told the boss I had to leave, and strolled back the way I came, then out and across a parking lot.

Somewhere along the first leg of that trip the tape gave way, and for much of the walk I grabbed what I could and tried to muster some dignity.

Yes, I eventually returned to work. My theory was that if I failed to return I'd never live it down. As it is it was a rough shift, let me tell you.

"What did you tell people?" I asked my friend.

"Nothing. Well, Debbie asked why you left so fast."

"What did you tell her?"

He laughed. "I said you had to go home and change your pants because you had an accident."

Great. So the people who didn't see my butt now think I crapped my pants. Only to me folks, only to me.