Hard-Fi, "Help Me Please" (2005)

I don't wear it very much, for obvious reasons, but I do have a sweatshirt that I like quite a bit. A nice shade of green, it's a hoodie that zips up the front. It's more of a long-sleeved T-shirt than a sweatshirt, really, since the cotton material is thin and the whole thing quite form-fitting. The seams of the shirt are ragged and unfinished-looking; reports are that this is the current, trendy look. Or perhaps those goddamned children making two cents an hour in sweatshops just need to improve their sewing skills, preferably via tougher whippings.

Because it's not too heavy and zips up the way it does, it's a perfect sweatshirt to take with me when I'm traveling. It's always a good idea to have something that you can layer, of course, given those unpredictable plane temperatures. When it's warm, you don't want to have to lug around a sweater that weighs as much as a mink, though. And plane hair is bad enough without the further aggravation that would come from pulling a sweatshirt on and off, on and off.

When I was packing last week for my trip, therefore, I naturally grabbed this shirt. But then I realized the potential problem. The design of the shirt includes these words, stenciled across the front: NOTTINGHAM 1973. I bought the thing in the USA and have always worn it happily in various places, but this time, well, I was actually going to Nottingham.

"Will this do?" I wondered. Because, really, wearing a hoodie with the words NOTTINGHAM when you are anywhere but Nottingham = slightly cool. Wearing said shirt while in Nottingham? Why, it might be as bad as walking around in a tacky souvenir T-shirt, or going into a Hard Rock Café wearing a Hard Rock Café T-shirt. (We may also need to talk about why you're even going to the Hard Rock Café.)

Fine. I'll wear the thing on the plane, but when I get to Nottingham it can come off. Cunning! I could even tie it across my waist. Dashing! Or possibly around my neck. Girly!

But last Tuesday at Schiphol airport, as I am waiting for the last plane ("BMI: Our Logo Is A Baby. How Cute Are We?!") that would whisk me to Nottingham, I suddenly felt very self-conscious, and just this side of retarded. There I was, about to get to Nottingham, and my chest announced that fact.

I felt like one of those refugees going to the UK for the first time but who don't speak English, and therefore wander around airports with a note tremulously clutched in my hands ("Hello. I don't speak English. If I am lost, please help me get to where I need to go.") and a sign around my neck with the name of my honkin' destination.

Well, at least I wasn't also time-traveling to 1973.

But welcome back, me. This week: reports of CD shopping in Nottingham, and possibly more stories about the trip.