A post where I mention “crotch” too much…almost as much as John McCain said “my friends” in the last debate. Enjoy.

The other day, in an attempt to avoid embarrassment, I checked to make sure my fly was zipped…as I was walking out of the bathroom. I run into one of my students. He looked down and then gave me a funny look. He happened to catch me at the very moment I had my hand on my crotch! Lovely. Now which is more embarrassing: an open fly or people seeing you grab your crotch?

This is not an isolated incident. I have a tendency to pull up my pants as I am walking in the hall, after leaving my office. So I risk the department chair/advisor/other professors/grad students/former students/current students/random people catching me yanking up my pants by the belt loops. If they are exceptionally lucky, perhaps they'd witness both the yanking of the pants accompanied by the individual leg shake (left 1^st, then right). You know, it makes the belt loop yank twice as effective at making the crotch of my pants line up with my actual crotch. Especially if the pants are a wee bit tight in the thigh (damn quads) and a wee bit loose in the waist. Whenever I am caught, I immediately let go of the pants and put my hands up (I wasn't doing anything…honest!) or pretend I was looking for something in my pocket (often while muttering "where the hell are my keys"). Either way…AWKWARD!

That reminds me of another incident involving a student (not involving my crotch, thankfully). Some of you may have heard this one already…or witnessed it.

One day (several years ago) I got back to my office after teaching and I noticed that my sweater was on backward! But that's not the embarrassing part; it was a black turtleneck sweater and the back and front were indistinguishable on the outside. Even so, I feel that I must make it right; even I'm the only one that knows. So I turn it around.

Just as I am slipping my right arm back into the sleeve of my sweater, one of my students appears at the door. An expression of shock, horror and embarrassment appears on his face. He shoved the paper into my (right) hand before booking it out of the office. He apparently thought I was changing in the middle of my office with the door open! At noon! On a Tuesday!

From now on, I'm gonna be careful. I'm going to wear a button down shirt tomorrow – it's easy to tell when they are on backward. And a skirt. Skirts don't have crotches.