The slowest zipper in the world

is on my brown corduroy pants from J. Peterman. Yes, I know that Peterman is generally overpriced, but all the clothing I've ever bought from them has been comfortable and astonishingly durable. As someone who values comfort and often wears garments until they're in tatters, these two properties make the high price acceptable.

These pants, however, are driving me crazy.

I was hesitant to get them in the first place, because I don't wear a lot of brown. It's a color that can lead to looks--usually from women--that sneak into your auditory brain centers via your optic nerve and scream loudly, "You can't wear those colors together." Blue jeans and black pants, by contrast, go with just about anything--which makes my life simpler.

The issue of the color of these pants, however, pales beside the problem with their zipper. It simply won't go down without a battle. Up is easy; it's fine with closing. It resists opening with the extraordinary determination of a close-mouthed child refusing even a single bite of particularly nasty squash.

I consequently find myself at urinals tugging on the zipper while simultaneously pulling up on the front of the pants and cursing--a situation that instantly mutates from merely maddening to terribly embarrassing when anyone else enters the restroom at, say, the office. Not that this has happened to me. Well, not since I left the office this evening.

I'm sure others have faced this problem and resolved it with some appropriately high-tech zipper technology, and in the end I'll probably have to resort to using said tech. For now, though, I'm falling back on the classic male solution of tugging like hell while getting increasingly angry. It's me vs. the pants, and I refuse to lose.

Until my eventual and ultimate triumph over these corduroy demons, please accept my apology now if we happen to share a public restroom while I'm wearing them.