The Luv Doc: Slobs!

Dear Luv Doc,

Austin men are great in many ways. They are usually intelligent, reasonably well-mannered, interesting, and usually entertaining, but it's time for me to get real. Austin men dress like slobs. I have been on too many dates with guys who wear flip flops and cut-offs or a T-shirt on a first date. One guy even wore his actual scrubs. Scrubs. For real. We're having coffee, not an exam.

– Unimpressed

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Here's the thing: It's hot outside. You're lucky if a guy is wearing something other than a fig leaf on your first date. Actually a fig leaf might be all right for the Garden of Eden, but it wouldn't last a week in the Austin heat. It might be fresh on Sunday, but by Friday it would feel like you had a piece of dehydrated kale flapping against your junk.

We're living in the post-fall environment. Eve bit the quince and God said, "Let there be Central Texas!" Biblically or literally, we have already screwed the environmental pooch, so we might as well just accept it and start getting used to sporting string bikinis and banana hammocks. Cool beans! (And in this case, that "beans" thing is a direct reference to the testicles.)

Nobody wants a fiery taint on their first date. That's just like throwing in the towel and admitting there is no chance whatsoever of getting lucky. I don't know about you, but I don't want to live in that type of sad, defeatist world. I need that small glimmer of hope. I need at least to maintain the illusion that my kibbles and bits will be tolerably fresh. That doesn't happen in "breathable polyester," worsted wool, or starch-crisp khaki.

What happens in those fabrics is rivulets of sweat streaming down the sternum into the eddy of the belly button and down into the delta of the crotch; torrents of perspiration cascading down the spine and through crack canyon before making the long, hot run down into the shoes. Your well-dressed Austin man might look cool as a cucumber on the outside, but underneath he is a steamy, smelly funk-cano about to blow. Don't go near that zipper. It will be like opening a hot oven with a dead possum/dirty sock casserole inside.

That guy in the scrubs? First of all, there is a decent chance he is a doctor. That's not necessarily a given in Austin (artists!), but even if he isn't, you have to agree he's making healthy choices, and aren't health and happiness the most important qualities in a potential suitor? I would argue yes. Nonetheless, fashion, like flowers, brings beauty to the world, and so we should give it the credit it deserves ... in January. Plan all your first dates for that month, and you'll feel like you're in Paris.