Honolulu Lite Charles Memminger

Underwear day will reveal all

Several prominent underwear makers are urging people to walk around in only their underwear that day, raising a few important questions, like, Where do I put my cell phone? and, Should walking around in your underwear when you are over a certain body weight be a federal crime?

Freshpair, a large Internet underwear retailer, will send male models onto the streets of New York City in hot new underwear styles, which, no doubt, will cause Osama bin Laden and radical Muslims to feel really bad about attacking that city. See? We're all alike. Your women wear burqas and ours walk the streets in bustiers and thongs! Happy Underwear Day!

Freshpair also is trying to make National Underwear Day an actual national holiday instead of what it currently is, an unofficial fun, carefree day in which gullible idiots are tricked into walking around without their pants on. Considering how long it took to make Martin Luther King Jr. Day a national holiday, I think we're OK on the federal underwear thing.

I WANTED to go into the history of underwear, but it turns out there's a lot more history than there is space here. I'll just give you the highlights:

2 million B.C.: Oog straps a badger over his private parts, simultaneously inventing underwear and the term "private parts."

40,000 B.C.: First briefs made from woolly mammoth skin, starting the eons-old debate: Badgers or briefs?

Middle Ages: European men's underwear becomes looser-fitting. Gigantic "whew!" heard all the way in China.

Later Middle Ages: "The flap," or "codpiece," is invented, allowing men to go No. 1 without disrobing. Women jealous.

13th century: Men invent corsets for women that can only be tightened by a maid leveraging a foot against the small of the victim's back. Women officially hate men from then on.

17th century: Women invent garters, frilly knickers, petticoats, stocking suspenders and Victoria's Secret catalog. Men jealous. Cross-dressing invented.

20th century: Bra invented. Men cheer.

21st century: Comfortable bra invented. Women (and cross-dressers) cheer.

There's a lot more unimportant history we could go into (Li'l Abner invents long-john "back panel"), but you get the idea. Try to celebrate tastefully. The world is watching. Please, no panties on head.