War Stories

First of all, obligatory stitching since this is a stitching blog:

 Soooooooo close to finishing this band and turning the scroll bars!

And now for more stories:

The first message in my email yesterday morning arrived from an English friend who sent a photo of her husband, attired in his boxers and dead-heading the flowers in their garden. Their garden has a head-high wall around it, so he believes no one can see him. However, all the houses around theirs have more than one floor, so someone could look down into their garden from the houses on either side. After all, my friend said, she can easily see her neighbors' gardens from her bedroom window, and all the houses in their area have the same type of head-high wall around their back gardens.

Her garden is absolutely glorious, by the way.

Then I had an email from another friend whose husband also promenades outside to check things when there's heavy rain, also in his boxers.

And then there was the call from another long-time friend, who was laughing so hysterically she could hardly speak. Her husband used to charge outside in his boxers to pick up the morning newspaper (in the days when you actually received a physical newspaper that was thrown somewhere in the vicinity of the front of your house in the early hours of the morning). One morning, while she was away helping her daughter with a new baby, he went strolling out as usual--and the door closed and locked behind him. 

Well the next door neighbor had a key to their house. The next door neighbor was a retired professor of English Literature. She had never married and was pushing ninety. This does not mean that she had never seen a man in boxer shorts, but the stereotype would indicate that perhaps she hadn't. Anyway, after circling his house to see if there was any way to get in--there wasn't--he went next door.

The neighbor invited him in while she got the key, asked him if he'd like a towel or blanket or something to cover himself more . . . 

And then swatted him on the behind when he went out the door.

This is just a sampling of the tales I heard yesterday. I find it interesting that all the gentlemen in the tales were in their 70's.

Is there something deep in the recesses of the male genome that precipitates outdoor boxer-wearing behavior at this age? Or do they just go feral?