Salute Your Shorts on August 10

Salute your shorts on August 10

By BURTON COLE Tribune Chronicle


I grew up in the groovy generation that advocated, "Let it all hang out.''

Most of us had the good sense not to. I sure hope we are layered in good sense a week from Wednesday. That would be National Underwear Day.
You read right.

Aug. 10 is the third annual National Underwear Day, sponsored by Internet retailer and event founder Freshpair.com, and by a drawer full of manufacturers of clothing formerly known as unmentionables.

One of my co-workers informed me that if I showed up that day in nothing but Jockeys, she was going home sick. I told her that if I came to work so attired, I'd probably go home sick myself.

"National Underwear Day was created to bring attention to something almost everyone wears but rarely gets the attention it deserves,'' Freshpair Chief Operating Officer Michael Kleinmann said.

Well, see, I thought that was because underwear, by definition, was meant to be worn underneath your outer - or visible - clothing.

Not our boy Mike and the gang. Once again this Aug. 10, Freshpair will turn loose male and female models - they dress it up with the term "underwear ambassadors'' - wearing nothing but skivvies to walk around downtown New York in promotion of National Underwear Day.

Oh, but lest you think it's merely a publicity stunt for a $13 billion business, the, uh, ambassadors will be carting clipboards and polling pedestrians on undergarment preferences. For scientific research. A debriefing on briefs, if you will.

In the last two years, such enterprising ambassadors helped uncover these unmentionable facts in men's dressing preferences: briefs, 32 percent; boxer briefs, 28 percent; boxers, 25 percent; thongs, 4 percent; other, 4 percent; and nothing, 7 percent.

Thongs? Commando? In my office? Right now? And what do they mean by "other?'' I firmly believe that some surveys just ought not to be conducted for the sake of our peace of mind.

Research also has shown that married men change their underwear twice as often as unmarried men, and that the loincloth remains the simplest and most popular form of underwear worldwide.

But of course there's a National Underwear Day. Organizations always are creating new national days of something or other, especially if they have a good cause or cash register handy. There's even National Bosses Day coming up Oct. 16. Oh c'mon, who ever felt like celebrating their bosses! I mean, except for my bosses. Who are wonderful. But I'm still not buying them any underwear.

Health groups are responsible for plenty of the commemorations, only they generally aren't satisfied with a single day. For example, according to the National Health Information Center, August is the national month for a half-dozen causes, including Psoriasis Awareness Month, National Immunization Awareness Month and National Pain Awareness Month.

Personally, if I'm feeling pain, I don't care to have to wait around until August of every year to make my friends and neighbors aware of it. I think that's why nobody asks me anymore how I'm doing.

Now a group who really knows how to mark celebration is the National Confectioners Association. I believe it is my duty as a fully sanctioned dispenser of public information to make sure you are aware that in August alone, we should be celebrating National Chocolate Chip Day (Aug. 4), S'mores Day (10) and National Toasted Marshmallow Day (30). And I can hardly wait for Sept. 13 - International Chocolate Day. Those are days in great need of commemoration!

So whatever day you are celebrating today, I hope it is wonderful and pleasant. And come Aug. 10, please do us all a favor and remember that we are NOT living in New York City. It will be just fine if you neither show nor tell - and I'm especially talkin' 'bout my generation.


Cole hopes you had a wonderful National Milk Chocolate Day on Thursday. Write him at burtseyeview@tribune-chronicle.com