I've Attacked Your Ring, And Now I'm Going After Your Purse

At some point, I'm convinced that my social generalizations regarding women's accessories will end. At the very least, I will exhaust the list of potentially generalizable accessories available wherever the hell it is you buy these useless things. Until then, though, I will keep on informing you female readers what I (and by "I" I mean all men) think of your bodily ornaments. And for you male readers, I'm reassuring you that, no, you're not crazy, you're just thoughtful and concerned about your ability to perceive that which lures you and how to best act upon that probably ill-discovered perception.

As Jason Stackhouse (yeah, the guy from True Blood) said when he became enraged at his girlfriend for convincing him to kidnap a vampire to keep in their basement and slowly bleed for personal pleasure, "I should've known that something wasn't right the second you walked into my life carrying that big bag of crazy."

The myth of Pandora and her box is centuries old, yet it still holds a bit of truth in these days of Coach, Prada, Patagonia. Rather than sealed ceramic jars, the women of today carry with them purses, satchels if you will, full of their potions, elixirs, trinkets, and general mischief. In general, the bigger the purse, the bigger the crazy. These women carry over their shoulders or hold tight under their arms pharmacies worth of medical and hygienic equipment; entire Victorian wings of libraries; shelves of mystical Latin American hot sauces. These walking Y2K disaster kits are prepared for any situation they or their companion may run into.

Being prepared like this is useful......if you're a mother of 18 hyperallergic kids with ADHD, diabetes, hemophilia, swine flu, and shingles. If, however, you are not said mother, I just don't get it. I like to think that I encounter just as many hairy situations as a woman with equal amounts of good and bad luck. Why is it that I am somehow able to deal with these daily events of peril with my wallet, cellphone, Vicks Nasal Inhalant, keys, and occasional wadded up receipt while you need David the Gnome's infinitely deep hip-pack to get through the day?

The bag is slowing you down. It's ruining your posture. It's begging you to become reliant on it, leaving you completely vulnerable when it isn't at your side to deal with the most basic of confrontations. My experience with these massive purse wielders (other than my mother of course) have been solidly in line with Stackhouse's observation. Within the abyss of your massive purses brood the evils, ills, diseases, burdensome labor, and general chaos passed down through generations of similar bag handlers from Pandora herself.

Every time you spend 25 minutes looking for your bus pass, every time you waste 10 minutes of my time in the grocery store looking for coupons, every time you pull out the "S" portion of the Encyclopedia Britannica, every time you discover a moldy $5 footlong, every time you surprise me by pulling out a 200 gig Ipod rather than a nano, mini, or shuffle, when you reach into your bag for a cigarette and pull out a middle aged Cuban man who proceeds to role you an illegally procured Cuban Cigar you are reigniting the memory of Pandora, and you are freaking me out.

Tiny purse owners aren't out of the woods either. I'm sick of carrying your keys, lipsticks, lotions, candies, etc. My pockets have my things in them, and whatever you give me to hold for you is going to be forced in my back left pocket. Most of what you want me to hold you do not want in my back left pocket as I will inevitably sit on it. Your things will melt or irritate me during their journey in my pants. Get a bigger purse.

Now, does this mean when a woman with a ginormous purse, or a woman with a tiny bag and a handful of pocket-bound items shows interest in me I run for hills of Olympus to ask the gods for mercy? No, I don't think I'm in a position to hold such strict rules, but rest assured, I'll be much better prepared for what you've got in store for me once I've sized up that bag.