Sew What?

Years ago I worked with a guy named Tim. He had a problem. Actually, he had a lot of problems. But the problem I'm talking about today was his pants.

Tim and I worked on cars. And like most guys that work on cars, we would wear mechanic uniforms. Ours were striped blue shirts with navy pants. And the pants always gave Tim trouble.

Every time the clean uniforms were delivered, Tim would complain because for some reason his pants were "made wrong". Specifically, the button on the waist was in the wrong spot.

Even though he would order his pants in the "right size", the incorrect button placement would prevent him from being able to do them up. Occasionally it prevented the button from being able to remain attached to the pants. He claimed this was due to the poor quality of the button-sewing thread. He would sometimes have to poke a hole where the button used to be and then hold the waistband together with a plastic zip tie.

(Note: Do not try this. It is VERY inconvenient when you have to use the bathroom in a hurry and you can't find your wire cutters. And your coworkers won't tell you where they are because they're too busy laughing.)

If only Tim knew how to sew, maybe he could have fixed his pants. He could have put those buttons right where they needed to be and he would never have had to come to grips with his actual waist size.

Anyway, after helping Diane with a sewing project the other day, I realized why men don't sew. It isn't because it isn't fun or that they wouldn't be good at it. It's all the strange little sewing terms.

I had to look up a few in a sewing dictionary. Then I had to watch a YouTube video showing how to do one of the things so I could explain it to Diane. Eventually we figured it out.

But, just so I still seem like a man after talking so much about sewing, here's what else I found in the sewing dictionary. My Top Ten list of sewing terms that sound dirty even though they aren't:

10- "Threading your needle"

9- "Bar tacking"

8- "Piping"

7- "Warp and weft"

6- "Lower the feed dog"

5- "Fusible interfacing"

4- "Duct tape double"

3- "Finger pressing"

2- "Hong Kong finish"

And, finally, the number one sewing term that sounds dirty even though it isn't:

1- "Stitch in the ditch"