Unfashionista by the numbers

I am on my last 3-day stretch of compression stockings. What I thought was going to be a week-long minor nuisance ended up being over a month of seriously cramped style (punctuated by periods of freedom that sometimes lasted days). Among the many things I learned about thigh-high compression socks during this time, was that you can really only wear them with loose pants and knee-length or longer skirts. That's a hard pill to swallow when the weather's warming up and all you want to do is parade around in your short dresses!

Since I haven't been able to make full use of my clothing collection for over a month, I consoled myself by taking inventory of my clothing collection, and while I was in counting mode, I decided to take inventory of some other things as well. Read on to find out the vital statistics of my closet and blog!

I have 179 articles of clothing within easy access in my closet. Consider this a very low estimate of my current collection, as this does not include athletic clothing, pajamas, socks, undergarments, and layering pieces such as tanks and leggings, nor does it include seasonal clothing that is currently in storage or clothing in the laundry. The breakdown of this collection is as follows: 45 dresses, 38 tops (sweaters and blouses), 36 T-shirts, 27 skirts, 22 casual pants, and 11 dress pants.

Since I value recycling, my next step was to calculate how many of these 179 pieces were new and how many secondhand. As it turns out, I purchased 21% of my clothing new, received 9% of it new as gifts, and purchased or received the remaining 70% used (some of these still had never been worn when I received them, but I consider them secondhand). Casual pants really skewed the "new" percentages upward, as 11 out of 21 pairs of them were purchased new.

Along a similar vein, since I "recycle" my own clothing a lot, I also set out to determine how much of my clothing I have personally given a second life—that is, altered, repaired, or outright refashioned. In nearly all categories, 26-29% of my collection was modified in one of these ways. Once again, jeans and casual pants were the outliers, with only 23 percent of them being altered. In the end, I calculated that 27.8 percent of my clothing is reworked. 

Now if you've looked at pictures of my closet recently, you'll know that I organize my shoes by color. But which color wins the day? Let's find out. For this count, I included all the shoes out in plain sight as well as all the shoes in boxes within easy reach. I did not include the summer shoes that are stowed away in the back of my closet, nor the snow boots that I've already packed away. Unsurprisingly, black shoes strongly outnumbered those of any other hue, but among the more colorful varieties, aqua had a pretty clear majority. Note to self: stop buying aqua shoes!

• Black - 16
• Brown - 7
• Tan - 4
• Cream - 4
• White - 2
• Black & white - 1 
• Grey - 1
• Silver - 2
• Gold - 2
• Red - 4
• Yellow - 1
• Green - 3
• Aqua - 5
• Blue - 4
• Purple - 4
• Pink - 3
• Multicolor - 3

Growing bored of counting my clothes, I decided to start counting blog posts about my clothes. If there's one thing I love as much as fashion, it's words. I know I enjoy a good pun as much as more than the next writer, so I was curious how many times I let my penchant for wordplay play out in my posts.

As it turns out, prior to today, I have written 404 posts. Of these, 23 have a new portmanteau or play on words as the title. That's only 6%, but as dads everywhere know, too many cheesy jokes are just that: too many. However, if you are ready for cheesy pun overload, here's a list of all the posts I found that play with words a little too rough...along with explanations, because it's not a good joke unless you have to explain it!

1. Poppycock (Interjection containing the sound "peacock" to match the clothing's motif)
2. Bad Jeans (Bad genes)
3. Grape Fine (Grape vine)
4. Cutup Girl (Pinup girl)
5. Looking Sharp (Pointy shoes = Common phrase)
6. Bug Spree (Bug spray)
7. Spring / Roll (Spring season + rolled hems = Common food)
8. Look o' the Irish (Luck o' the Irish)
9. Pinka Dots (Pink + Polka dots)
10. Frog Legs (A food, refers to the frogs on my legs)
11. Peptomint (Pepto pink + Peppermint)
12. Pin(k)stripes (Pink + Pinstripes)
13. CaturDIY (Cat + Saturday + DIY)
14. All White Already (All right already—common phrase in my youth that seems to have gone out of vogue)
15. Curls' Night Out (Girls' night out)
16. Cowboys and Indonesians (Cowboys and Indians)
17. Knee Length to a grasshopper (Knee-high to a grasshopper—you've heard this one, right?)
18. Modochrome (Monochrome + mod)
19. Vest Western (Best Western)
20. Vestoration (Vest + Restoration)
21. Curl Talk (Girl talk)
22. Cat / Suit (Suit + cat shoes = catsuit)
23. Surf's Pup! (Surf's Up + a dog)

And finally, because one of the easiest ways to play with words is to co-opt an already popular combination of them, I had to include a tally of how many of my posts have a reference to a work of film, literature, and music as the title. The total is 26, which is, again, fewer than I thought, but copyright litigation isn't fun, so again it's probably better that most of my titles are original works. Still, in case you're interested, here are the ones that aren't!

1. Are you Ready, Boots?  (Song lyric)
2. Blue Moon (Song title)
3. Greensleeveless (Modified Song title)
4. My Future Valentine (Modified Song title)
5. The First of Autumn (Song title)
6. He liked it so he put a ring on it! (Modified Song lyric)
7. The tree was in the wood (Song lyric)
8. She's a pirate (Modified Song title)
9. How does your garden grow? (Nursery rhyme verse)
10. The Hunt for Red (Shortened Book title)
11. Scarf Face (Modified Movie title)
12. This is crazy (Song lyric)
13. HVAC is the cruelest this month (Modified Poem verse) 
14. OpUnfashionista Style! (Modified Song lyric)
15. Blue Velvet (Song title)
16. Shopping Hood: Woman in Tights (Modified Movie title)
17. Yippee Ki-Yo-Ki-Yay (Song lyric)
18. Valerie, you're a star (Modified Song title)
19. Doctor Shoe (Modified TV show title)
20. Strawberry Fields (Song title)
21. I just wanna be a sheep (Song title)
22. Don we now our gay apparel (Song lyric)
23. They say I'm shoe-nuts (Misremembered song lyric)
24. No country for old scrunchies (Movie title)
25. Paint it pink (Modified Song title)
26. Gold & Curls (Modified TV show title)

And now, I'm finally done—with this post, if not with compression stockings! But in two days, I hope to have full use of my legs and wardrobe again...so if statistics are not your thing, stand by for your familiar flamboyant fashion, coming soon!