Grass stains

And here we were, watching the news on the television, and my mom complains that the grass stains on the kid in the liquid Tide commercial are incredibly fake. "Look at that," she says, "it would never be like that. You'd never have grass stains like that."

I turn towards the television to see a smiling kid with a patch of green running diagonally from his shoulder across his chest. On one leg, there is another green patch on his upper thigh, and on the other leg, a green patch on his shin, below his knee. "You get those circles on the knees," she said.

"And on the elbows," I replied, "and maybe around your wrists." She knows these things because she's someone's mother. I know them because I'm someone's child. Obviously people who work for advertising agencies are neither. I've always been convinced that they are sub-human and this only confirms it.

The chest "grass stain" confused me though. I sat there for a while, puzzled, before I thought of the solution. "That kid had to have been dragged face down by his feet," I said to her, "that's the only way to explain the stain on his chest..." Mom started to laugh.

"But it kind of goes over his shoulder, doesn't it?" Mom didn't reply. "So that means that instead of being dragged flat along his chest by his feet, he'd have to be dragged at about a 45 degree angle, I'm guessing, with his feet at an altitude of a metre or so..."

"But at that altitude, coupled with the bagginess of his shirt and the friction of the grass, the shirt would bunch up near his chest and result in very different grass stains, possibly even on the inside of the bottom hem of the shirt. Not to mention, he'd have noticeable abrasions on his face and possibly chipped teeth..."

"Alright, enough!" Mom said, still laughing. "Stop being so intelligent!"

Tomorrow my sister's going to rescue me from school downtown so we can go eat Ethiopian and browse all those awesome hipster consignment stores that we love so much. If I suddenly come home with a custard yellow herringbone chiffon dress with matching bolero jacket and crenoline you will know who to blame.

Well, actually, I'm still on the lookout for a decent tweed jacket. I haven't been able to find one that fits me in a way I find satisfactory yet, even though I've been looking for a while. When I find the right one I'll know, and then I'll spend too much on it, no doubt.

I'll take my camera if the fog lets up.