The year was 2001. Blue were pissed you took the money AND the free rides, Britney was a slave 4U (urgh) and Shaggy had never heard of plausible deniability.
As for me, I was in my first London flat and feeling unspeakably fatal.
But I needed go-getting pants to match my sexy new life - and so against my better judgement I bought a pack of G-strings to try out for a week.
And that's essentially how long it took to realise I’d rather die alone than please a man by eviscerating my bits in such an abomination.
They are simply awful.
I spent one hideous date in a pair (can you call them that?) listening to a guy wang on about skiiing while my undies went fully #metoo on my butt crack. It wasn’t just the constant salvage operation that grated though - what rankled was knowing I looked far hotter in normal knickers.
Finally seeing sense, the Thong Song got its swan song and I ditched my permawedgie in the bin soon after.
So it’s a relief to hear the rest of the world is finally catching up with Grandma over here.
That bastion of reliability, John Lewis, reports that sales of comfy ‘Bridget Jones’ pants are on the up… while suspenders and push-up bras are down.
Clearly, British women have finally got that investing in crushing, squashing, flossing scraps of material is no way to live.
Suspenders are a nightmare, let’s be clear. Fiddly to do up, they may feel sinful but a draughty gusset in November is no laughing matter. Plus I was always worried they'd peek out at work, denouncing me as a massive goer when I wanted to be taken seriously as a junior writer.
I did adore my Wonderbra though. Before the Kardashians made bums a thing, Britain was simply boob crazy.
And any woman could turn her tatas into an assault weapon on a night out with a little nudge inwards and skywards from Gossard.
Put simply, I loved the attention. And I didn't care a jot if I was getting it for the wrong reasons.
Of course, Wonderbras were agonising to wear too. The world’s thinnest underband would slowly cut off your blood supply while two gauzy triangles (you always had to hunt for the insert pads in the washing machine) did their best to defy gravity. And my god it was crowded in there - the poor girls would come up gasping for air when I unleashed them at the end of a long evening poking mens’ eyes out.
So thank god 'comfort' is no longer a dirty word in the undies game.
That’s not to say I’m a fan of truly vast pants though - you can still be Beyonce if you say no to the G.
In fact there are dozens of options besides tarpaulin-like swathes of cotton big enough to shelter refugees in.
Yes, women dream of enough support to scaffold in the worst excesses of our cheese and wine fixation; but we don’t want to feel like we’ve given up on ever having sex - or feeling sexy - again.
It’s just that we want to feel like our version of sexy - and so much of this old-school clobber is someone else’s.
Women these days can’t be arsed to spend all day warding off the ravenous attentions of a hungry bum.
Plus, are men even that fussed anyway? Why try that hard to tickle the gaze of someone hopefully planning to take it all off me ASAP anyway?
I suspect most men see our expensive silks and satins as pointless window dressing covering up the real goods.
And it’s not like blokes have sexy ‘date’ underwear so how is this situation fair?
“You wore the crotchless Y-fronts for me, hon? GET OVER HERE, YOU TEASE!”
So all hail the boy short, the magic-eye miracle of Brazilian briefs and the dreamy exhale of a wireless bra.
Got a hot date? A matching top ‘n’ tail set in either red, blue or green from M&S usually does the trick.
Because sexy is more about a state of mind than shoehorning one’s privates into a torture garden of tight straps, digging clasps and ASBO elastic.
And pants to anyone who says different.
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