hey- wanna look at my butt?

there are very few things i dislike more than shopping for jeans.

that said, it became crystal clear last weekend that i'd have to bite the bullet, take SO up on his offer of new jeans for xmas (we're a little behind- what can i say?) and suffer through an unending quest for jeans that

1. had a tag that said "polo" somewhere on them
2. came in my size
3. made my butt look fabulous
4. didn't end approximately six inches after i do

i realize this is not a simple mission- hence the dread with which i am filled each time i look in the closet and realize that 90% of my jeans have holes that enable passersby on the street to determine not only if i'm wearing underwear but also the exact cut of said underwear (if applicable), and the other 10% of my jeans don't fit and/or have some bizarre stain on them from approximately ten years ago. (what can i say? i'm holding out for some new miraculous cleaning agent from the makers of oxiclean....or maybe i'm just too damned cheap to throw out otherwise perfectly good clothing.)

after the tragic death of my next-to-last decent pair of jeans last weekend (it was very dramatic- i swear i heard the individual threads crying as they gave way when i crossed my legs), followed by wearing the last decent pair an unprecedented four days in a row without washing this week, i dragged SO out to the mall last night for my roughly annual jean-shopping mission. (i tried to make it sound as pleasant as possible- "hey honey- wanna look at my butt in public? no? what if i let you stop for a few minutes in front of every television we pass that's set to a sports channel?")

two stores, one hour, and four changes later, we walked out of macy's with two "well, they're not perfect, but i really need something to cover my butt with tomorrow and they're on sale for half price" new pairs, which was astounding enough, since my jeans seem to be getting harder to come by, and on the rare occassions when a store actually admits to having polo jeans, they're usually left with sizes for girls who are a wee bit more robust than i.

i am thrilled to report that my morning treadmill sessions seem to be paying off, as i could finally stuff my thighs into jeans that weren't "relaxed" without looking like an overstuffed sausage.......at least that's what SO said, anyway, though i'm using the term "said" loosely, as it was more like a grunt while watching espn classic on one of the televisions outside the dressing room at macy's.

since things went so well last night, i thought about dragging him over to the swimsuit display, but figured i'd probably be better off not pushing my luck- especially since there weren't any televisions in the area playing anything other than what appeared to be amish music videos.