The Great Lederhosen Switch of '04, or Bet Needs a Child, a Pet, a Hobby, or a Second Job (Well, Maybe Not A Child)

It really all started when I discovered Sherman's lederhosen had a tailhole.

See, most of you probably already know this, but The Boy's lederhosen were actually stolen off a bear. A stuffed bear that was for sale at Mountain Lake's Oktoberfest last year, a cute fuzzy brown number all decked out in his Bavarian outfit. The first sight of that little item set my mind in motion, and it was the very next night I bought Mr Bavarian Bear, then promptly raped and pillaged him for his outfit so I could give it to the inimitable S.

And from early on of last year, S had his "real lederhosen" so he could celebrate with all us Sauerkraut Band members. (If you'll recall, his hat came earlier, when I - and this is a sad story, so the weaker of you should look away - stole the cowboy hat off a toy monkey and turned it into a Bavarian hat. The story is sad because Mr M kept dangling him in front of me saying that if I didn't take that monkey with me and give him a good loving home, he was throwing him into the dirty smelly garbage right then and there to be taken to the landfill for all eternity. And as much as I love toys, that monkey was just unloveable. So I snatched his hat, and he's biodegrading as we speak like so many disposable diapers.)

So. Anyway. When I was dressing S for this year's Oktoberfest Opening Night, I noticed, oddly for the first time, that the leather lederhosen to his outfit did in fact have a tailhole. I went and looked at now Naked Bear, who sits in my living room, and OK, he does have a smallish tail, which is odd, because I've never once in my life thought of a bear has having a tail. But there you have it. I didn't dwell on the matter long, because as soon as I saw the tailhole my mind zoomed elsewhere.

Mr. P.

I remembered last year, on the final night when Mr P wanted to sit in on the festivities, I had to slap him together something very quickly, and in making him a very makeshift pair of lederhosen out of silk, one of the things I had to do was make an opening for his rather handsome tail to pop out of. And so I knew right there and then while dressing little S that somewhere at Mountain Lake was a pair of lederhosen screaming my name.

And last week my first order of business after putting my horn on my chair was to pop back outside and purchase one of the new Sauerkraut Band beer mugs for myself (I deserved it), and a second bear for raping and pillaging and theft of outfit.

It was a funny thing, though. Well, one of a couple of funny things for me, though I don't really see any of you laughing out there. Leslie up at the sales table, when selling me my bear (I chose the one in the blue shirt for Mr P, since that was a little different), said, "Isn't this odd, I have all these cute little bears, then I have Big Bear. They're the same price, exactly the same in every way, but he's just too big, look." And I did, and yep, he was basically Bavarian Bear With A Glandular Condition. So I bought my bear, and thought little about it.

Until Sunday night, when I tried to dress Mr P. Now, I happen to know from making his outfit last year, though don't tell anyone this, that Mr P has quite a large rear end. I mean, it's OK, many of us do, but fitting the fella in clothes is not easy. Not to mention the one thing about P that I didn't even consider: Because his left hand is affixed to his pipe, which is affixed to his mouth, I had no idea how I was going to get his shirt on!

It was pretty much an ugly mess. I had to end up actually cutting the shirt into three pieces and piecing it all back together on his body using straight pins. He's basically a canine pin cushion, bless his heart.

But the lederhosen - well, as one might expect, with his hind quarters, they were way too tight. I had to push and jam so hard to get him in them I'm surprised his inner beans didn't pop out. But I jammed him into them, stood him beside his boy, and didn't think about it till today, when I was planning on completing the project.

Tuesday night I started work on P's hat. Since I had some luck turning a cowboy hat into a bavarian hat before, I found a P-sized version of a cowboy hat at a craft store. (BTW, put it on his head in its cowboy hat incarnation, and P looks just like Lyndon Johnson.) I decided his hat would be of the dapple-gray variety, so I painted it gray and waited for it to dry. Then I spent my afternoon off today altering it, putting a hatband on it, and topping it all off with its feather. When it was complete, I went to get Mr P so he could try it on.

And I got to thinking.

Thinking about how tight his lederhosen were, and how huge S's were - I noticed from the very beginning last year that the boy is just swallowed up by his lederhosen. So I went and looked at S's bear, and lo and behold - his clothes came off one of those Bavarian Bears With a Glandular Condition!

Imagine my luck!

So, off came S's lederhosen, off came Mr P's lederhosen, and the switch was on. And it was like the perfect fit - Mr P's ample rear end is no longer squooshed, and S is no longer swallowed up.

And yes, I put what you're all thinking right up there in the title of my blog.

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Betland's Olympic Update:
* Boy, did I have an odd occurrence today at work. I had someone refuse to take a phone message for me. I had to call a client and she was out to lunch, and I asked the person answering the phone if I could leave a message. I started with my name, then the girl said, "No, I'm not going to - she's a very private person." What does being a private person have to do with my giving my name and phone number? "You'll just have to call back," the girl said. I said thanks and hung up - and promptly left for the afternoon! Fuck all of 'em!