I’ve learned that girls notice what you’re wearing, especially when you’re not wearing much. One time I was making out with a girl in my boxers and socks—well they were my “old man black work socks” that I had worn with my business casual work outfit. I was entirely too lazy to take these socks off and proceeded to make out with the girl with no shirt on, but in boxers and the work socks—the look popularized by the grandfather in Sixteen Candles when Sam first sees him in the movie. After a few minutes, the girl I was with said: “can you please take those socks off, it’s just a terrible look.” I really wasn’t that into her, so I refused. We never spoke again after that night.
With their snug fit, boxer briefs exist comfortably with any pants. But it’s sad that I’m too fat to wear them. So, I’ve continued to wear the kind of underwear I’ve always worn: boxer shorts. But is my allegiance to boxer shorts making me look un-sexy when I have amorous moments in the bedroom?
Graduation from college was to my beer gut like the Big Bang was to the Universe: like the universe, my beer gut has been forever expanding. I know better than to think I can wear a pair of boxer-briefs topped off with tight elastic. The first time I realized this was when the elastic from the boxer-briefs I tried to wear eroded a temporary dent into my gut and left a red mark all the way around it. The models that sell boxer briefs have perfect washboard six-packs. If I try to pull off this look, it will just make my gut spill over the elastic—and I’ll look terrible when I take my pants off during an amorous moment. OK, so I must earn the right to wear the boxer-briefs—just like those women in those weight loss commercials that exclaim: “now, I can wear whatever I want.”
So, that leaves boxer shorts as my underwear of choice. But there are a few problems in using them as my go-to underwear. Let’s examine them:
1. The Patterns
Why do boxer short designers feel compelled to cover the boxer shorts with the most random objects in the world? A closer look at my boxer short inventory revealed the following patterns:
Blue Monkeys
Blue Lobsters
Turkeys (cartoon turkeys, not ornithologically-correct turkeys)
Stars
Snowmen
Baltimore Ravens Logos
Howling wolves separated by pine trees
Mistletoe
Marlin captured mid-leap out of the water
Blue octopi against a pink background (cartoon octopi luckily)
Four leaf clovers
I may be wrong but these prints don’t really seem like they are capable of sealing the deal.
2. The Muffin Top
A muffin top is the distant cousin to the wedgie. When boxers ride up, they bunch up at the top and then spill over the top of your pants. You may have read about my “Abusive Boyfriend Jeans”—the trendy tight ones I’ve finally figured out how to wear—in an earlier post. These jeans do NOT get along with boxer shorts, so when I wear them with boxer shorts the two garments wrestle with one another constricting my legs, pushing up a muffin top. In high school, muffin tops were cool. I gave a quick thought to selecting boxers that would look good as muffin tops but, at my age, I don’t think girls want to see a muffin top poking out of jeans.
Now, there are a few good things about boxer shorts: they say that the looser fit lets the body manufacture more healthy sperm. Also, importantly, boxer shorts don’t make me look as fat as boxer-briefs make me look. So, I’m just going to assume that while dressing to impress I will never be comfortable. Some day I’ll have a six pack and I’ll break out the boxer-briefs: my V-thing and six-pack will just sit there over the top of my jeans with no muffin top. The nice, tight boxer-brief will fit snug under any pants I wear. But until then, boxer shorts it is.
But what are your thoughts? Can a guy ever look sexy in a pair of goofy boxers? Should a guy without great abs avoid squeezing into boxer-briefs? Do you guys notice what your man has on (before it’s off) in bed like the girl who tried to put the kabash on my black old manwork socks? Are boxer shorts our version of your granny panties?
