Brand Whore.

I feel like I've come full circle in my quest to be clothed decently. Everyone recalls when they were younger, specifically Jr. High, when all you wanted was name-brand clothing. It was as if the pubescent gods would cause you to spontaneously combust if you did not own a pair of Lucky jeans. In reality, you'd just be knocked down a peg on the social totem pole, which felt like the same thing.
Getting your parents to spend outrageous amounts of money on what seemed like the exact same thing as something you'd get at K-Mart but was labeled "what the cool kids wore" took a force of nature.
Christensen's has ruined me. I've been somewhat of a tightass in my adulthood anyway, but working at a clothing store has made me even worse.
A $59 price tag on a great hoodie in the real world is unacceptable. FIFTY NINE DOLLARS? Seriously? And lets get back to jeans- A pair of Big Stars out in the real world run about $108. I own several pairs of these, but surely did not pay that price. In fact, I didn't pay ANY price. See, I work for clothes. Two Saturdays a month affords me pretty much anything I want in this store. Which makes paying actual dollars in the real world impossible.
I'm the best dressed poor kid in town.
Basically, I'm a 24/7 posterchild for Billabong and Hurley, which I happen to usually like but feel limited to since I won't go out and pay full price for anything else.

Recently my mother called me a brand whore. This is probably true. Even though I get amazing deals on my brand whore items, I don't ever really look at clothing at cheap stores.

This all changed last week when trying on close to one million pairs of jeans. None of which fit me. I've always said that I'm not built for jeans. Something about my small ass and bran muffin top just doesn't work. If I can find jeans that fit my butt, they're too tight up top, and if I find jeans that fit my waist.... well... then... I walk around looking like I just crapped my pants. I'm also able to regularly perform a magic trick of walking OUT of my pants.
Utterly defeated in my quest for new jeans, I got a crazy idea.
I'm going to Shopko.
I tentatively wandered into the clothing section towards the denim. I quickly realized that I no longer trust anything Stacy London has to say, since she's endorsing Rider Jeans. I looked at them and realized that I wanted nothing to do with trying to find jeans at this store.
As I felt like hope was lost and I'd be destined to wear sweat pants for the rest of my existence- which Stacy London says would be the coup de grace of my social life, but I'm not listening to her anymore so who cares anyway- I discovered the juniors denim.
I found a few pairs that looked pretty decent and made my way towards the dressing rooms.
In a matter of minutes, I found two pairs that actually felt like they fit. They didn't squish the hell out of me and they didn't produce sag ass.
Excellent.
Suddenly, I've gone from wearing $108 jeans to $19 ones. Yeah, they were even on sale.

I guess when you get older (and you also happen to be misshaped) you come to realize that having something that actually fits you is worth a lot more than someone recognizing that you have a $200 True Religion tag on your ass.

Yeah, I own those too, and yeah, they fit like shit.