Dear Americans, please put your pants on.

As I was driving about the city this weekend I noticed a peculiar and unsettling trend. Too many people are walking around in their pajama bottoms. I’m not sure where this trend started but it needs to stop. I can appreciate your search for comfortable garments for the lower half of your body, but flannel pajama pants at the grocery store are not appropriate.

I think this trend started with teenage girls. I only say this because a few years ago I noticed a large number of young girls with their “Juicy” sweatpants tucked into their Uggs Boots. I noted at the time how very strange this new fashion development was but I checked it off as just something teenage girls were doing and it was quite literally none of my concern. But now it’s out of hand.

I saw a man yesterday walking down the street wearing a heavy winter jacket and snow boots. In between the boots and the jacket were green and red Christmas flannel pajama bottoms.  I’m sure he was just out for a quick jaunt, perhaps to brush the snow off his car and thought he’d go unseen. He was wrong of course, how can one miss green and red pants on a guy amongst a sea of white snow? I must be too old fashioned. I’d never be caught dead outside in my pajama bottoms. Even if I have to run across the street to the convenient store, I put jeans on. Going outside in pajamas, simply isn’t done.

I was driving to my mother’s house yesterday when I saw another middle aged woman hurrying across the street. It was a very cold day yesterday and the wind was howling through the street. This woman was bundled in her tan coat, Knock-off Uggs and pink and light green flannel pajama bottoms. No wonder she was in a hurry, her legs must have been freezing. I shook my head again. Why in the world would you venture out in sleeping pants?  Is it just simple laziness? Are we now so self-indulgent that putting regular pants on to walk down the street is now beneath us? Are we so devoid of other people around us that we just don’t consider how much the rest of us don’t want to see what Great Aunt Tilly bought you for Christmas last year? I wouldn’t dream of it. I doubt anyone would want to see me gallivanting around the boulevards in my martini patterned sleeping pants. I mean, the only time it’s acceptable to be seen in your pajamas outside is if your house in burning down in the middle of the night and you and your family just escaped. Then, wear your pajamas where ever you like.

So America, please, put your pants on. It’s not too hard. One leg at a time.