A Rookie Mistake Ordering Another Kilt

[Riverkilt]

I know that pant sizes measure much larger than what they claim...they all do it...guess it makes us feel good.

I've ordered kilts from 9 different kiltmakers over the years and they all say the same thing - MEASURE - DON'T USE YOUR PANT SIZE.

So, I know this...but I'm ordering my 81st kilt, but I'm in a hurry so I'm ordering stock from USA Kilts. Just a Casual for another trip rafting down the Grand Canyon. I'm on the website checking stock...without thinking plugged in my pant size.

So the Celtic Nations tartan kilt showed up - but when I tried it on it fits - but too tight to be comfy moving around on a raft in whitewater. Groan...we have met the enemy and he is us.

Good news, in a quick call to see what they have in stock to express ship to make it in time (hopefully) and they found a Firefighter's Memorial Tartan in my correct size and a Casual - perfect for easy on and off as needed. I love that tartan. It's a beautiful tartan and meaningful since I spent 5 years volunteering with the Phoenix Fire Department's Crisis Wagons.

I had the Firefighter's Memorial tartan in a Semi-Trad but sold it after losing the 110 lbs.

So hey, I feel "stupid" or "elderly" but the good news is I'm happy to be able to fly the Firefighter's Memorial tartan down the Grand Canyon of the Colorado River.

And now I also have a great tartan with the Celtic Nations when I lose some more weight. AND, my kilt inventory is back up to 20 kilts.

Hope that all makes sense - ye olde basic, "The hurrier I go the behinder I get."

[jhockin]

I know that pant sizes measure much larger than what they claim...they all do it...guess it makes us feel good.

Aka: “ vanity sizing”

[OC Richard]

Where the "I've done this so long I should have known better" thing happens to me is with the pipes.

The pipes are cantankerous anyhow, and have a way of misbehaving in a way they've not done before, and at the worst possible time. That's IF you do everything you're supposed to do, take every precaution, do all the preparation that 40 years piping has taught through many mishaps.

As if that's not enough, sometimes I do something that's just plain stupid.

The worst for me is plain forgetting stuff:

-showing up at a wedding without my kilt hose

-showing up at a memorial service without my kilt

-showing up at a memorial service with the wrong pipes

[gun eagal]

One of the worst things I've ever done is leave my pipes sitting in their box in a parking lot after playing for a wedding. The wedding was the day after Princess Di died, so I guess I was a little spacey. I was already home from the wedding when I realized my circa 1910 Lawries were not in the car. So I raced back, feeling a huge relief when I found them just where I had left them, sitting on the asphalt.

[Brian Rose]

There are so many snarky comments that could apply. We'll go with someone looked in the box and left them. After all, where does one fence a set of Great Highland Pipes? Despite the price of a set. The odds of another piper happening by are somewhere between slim and none. That piper would also be well aware of the value of the box. Of course, the piper might cruise by in an hour or so to see if the set had been recovered. After all, one wouldn't want anything to happen to them.

[OC Richard]

I realized my circa 1910 Lawries were not in the car. So I raced back, feeling a huge relief when I found them just where I had left them...

Back in the 1980s two very good local pipers left their wonderful early silver & ivory Hendersons on the roof of one of their cars in the car park, they soon realised their mistake and ran back only to find both pipes missing.

Nothing was seen of them, though both guys kept their eyes open, checking out the pipes on the shoulders of other pipers at Highland Games, watching Ebay and Craig's List etc.

Then 30 years later the pipes appeared on Ebay, being sold by a Pawn Shop hundreds of miles away.

A couple days later the pipers appeared at the Pawn Shop with a Police Detective and were able to establish that these were indeed their pipes. (They had numerous old photos of them playing the sets, and they knew very specific details about each set that no-one would be able to guess.)

[MichiganKyle]

Sorry to hear Celtic Nations didn't work out, both for you and for entirely selfish reasons - was hoping to see some pictures, as I've been considering buying one myself.

Glad to head you got a workaround, though, and it sounds like a very good workaround at that. Sometimes salvaging a bad situation is the best you can do.

[Katia]

Aka: “ vanity sizing”

I am completely unable to wrap my head around this. I get that they can get away with it in women's sizing, since we don't have the benefit of buying trousers sized by the waist measurement and so our "sizes" can be very variable, but how on earth do they pull it off by selling clothing advertised as one measurement when it's actually another? That would be up there with Google Maps telling me I need to drive 10 miles when it's really 15.

The worst for me is plain forgetting stuff:

-showing up at a wedding without my kilt hose

-showing up at a memorial service without my kilt

-showing up at a memorial service with the wrong pipes

I showed up to a dance competition without my kilt once (actually really the whole kilt outfit). It was when we were in Scotland... the day before, I had hung my kilt and waistcoat to dry after another competition (when I've been sweating into it all day, I'm not packing it directly into a closed garment bag). We were all running late to get to this one and I grabbed my garment bag and ran out the door. We arrived at the competition... I pulled my stuff out of the trunk of the car... the next thing you hear from me is a semi-panicked "Where's my kilt???" Yup. That was the exact moment when I remembered it wasn't in the garment bag (I have NO idea how I missed seeing it hanging in the small dorm room I was staying in). There was nothing I could do... we were a 45-minute drive away from where we were staying and maybe only an hour until the competition started (and I couldn't ask my friends to drive all the way back, anyway). The only outfit I had was my hornpipe outfit, the only dance in that competition that wasn't done in the kilt. There wasn't anyone I could borrow an outfit from as all of my classmates were in the same category as I was and would either be on the platform at the same time as I was or right before or after.

In the end it turned out for the best; I turned my ankle badly during hornpipe and if I'd had my kilt, I probably would have tried to finish the competition anyway, which probably wouldn't have been a good idea (considering the ankle didn't get better for days even as it was; luckily it did get better just in time for me to get one more competition in before we left. Then again, on the way to that competition, I left my hornpipe hat in the rack on the train... and luckily that turned up at the lost-and-found in Glasgow; otherwise I would've lost it since it was the weekend and ScotRail's lost-and-found was closed and I left on Monday... I have never left behind so much stuff as I did on that trip!).

[OC Richard]

That's a great story Katia! Well except for your ankle, sorry about that.

Somehow in Scotland nobody in our band ever forgot anything, which is good because except for The Worlds the contests we went to were a few hours' coach-ride away from our Glasgow rooms.

Apropos to nothing here we are playing in George Square

[OC Richard]

There are so many snarky comments that could apply.

Yes, there's the time I left my pipes on the back seat of my car when my mates and I went into the pub, when I came out my car's back window was smashed... and there were two sets of pipes on my back seat.

I drove off and left my accordion on the street corner where we were busking...I rushed back and there were two accordions there.

Do you know what Perfect Pitch is to a banjo player? When you throw a banjo into a skip and it lands on an accordion!