A number game...excessive? Let's compare!

So I was doing some counting the other day and I have a few numbers for you that I'd like you to just take a guess as to what in my household I might have been counting.
Do it! Just for fun, take a wild guess before you read on. Here are the numbers I counted:

81
112
18
24
43

(~No it was not grains of rice, or how many beans were left in the bag, or the number of squares left on our final roll of toilet paper. These numbers do not come from my pantry or potty! However that seems to be where I spend most of my time lately. But that's another story.)

Okay, here we go...prepare to be amazed!

Several weeks ago, as I was putting away laundry, I had a dilemma. Every stinkin' drawer in my bedroom was full. Not just full but overflowing. For example, once you were able to pry the drawer open, you had to use all of your strength to hold down the contents while pushing with all your might to shut it back. And it was not just a few of the drawers that were like this, as I just said, it was every last one of them. [We have a large chest that has 6 large (large warrants repeating so you get the picture loud and clear) drawers and then we also have an armoire that has another 4 large drawers and 4 small ones.] So that'd be 14 drawers in all. If you're counting.

My bed held stacks of folded, fresh laundry ready to be put away and I had no place to put it. I finally cleared out a place on a shelf in our closet (no small feat as our closet is jam packed also) and placed the "overflow" on the shelf. So the next thing I did was to politely approach my husband (okay, you know the truth but "politely" sounds better) and I asked him if he would "please clean out his drawers". Being a male and not humanly capable of resisting it, well I'll spare you, I had to clarify "NO! The DRAWERS in our bedroom that contain your clothing!" He agreed that they needed to be cleaned out and said he'd do it.

I being the caring, good wife that I am did it for him last Saturday. It had been three blasted months since I'd asked, I guessed I was going to HAVE to do it if it was going to get done!!! (So much for that caring, good wife part; but who am I kidding, you know the truth.)

Before I go any further, let me interject right here that not ALL of the drawers contained Nathan's clothing. I did take up 3 of them with my things. (YES, THREE, out of the FOURTEEN that we have!) Okay, just needed to clear that up as to not get into trouble with my husband IF he reads this. So, it's on record, I said it, SOME of the drawers were mine. Something else I must say...just so you get the ridiculousness of the situation, his drawers did not contain any of his khaki dress pants, jeans, nice shirts, work shirts or nice pull overs. They only hold his underwear, socks, t-shirts and shorts. That's all! 11 drawers it took for that! But I digress...

Back to it...The first thing I did was to take everything out of each drawer and pile it on my king sized bed then I went through each stack only keeping the things that were not stained or holey. -or saying something completely inappropriate like "Hooters" or "Phi Lambda Chi Hoopty something or 'nother" (Yes, that would be from college days which were 8-11 YEARS AGO!)

Here are the answers for your numbers above:

81 was the number of t-shirts that were contained in some of those 11 drawers of his. THAT WAS NOT A TYPO! I PULLED OUT EIGHTY-ONE T-SHIRTS!!! It's the TRUTH, its ACTUAL, everything is NOT satisfactual...I had no "wonderful feelings or wonderful day" ...zippity doo da...sorry, had to do it! :)

After weeding through, I allowed him to keep 6 solid white that he occasionally wears as undershirts, 6 solid black that he needs to wear with his Air Force Uniform (he generally wears one maybe two of them a month when he goes to drill. Do we need the other 4?) 11 printed short-sleeved t-shirts and 13 printed long-sleeved t-shirts. So now were down to only 36 t-shirts in his drawers. Sounds a little excessive, but considering that number was 81, I'm fine and dandy with 36.

**One more thing to keep in mind: My laundry is NEVER completely done. And on this day that I cleaned out the drawers it was FAR from being all done. So you can actually add 5-10 to each of these numbers to get the ACTUAL number. (I haven't taken a new count since adding more clean laundry into the drawers.)

112: Just for kicks (not because I was going to clean it out too) I went over to the closet and proceeded to count ONLY the number of shirts hanging in there. Not pants, jeans, anything else, only shirts. To be fair to him, (sarcastic HA), this included long sleeved and short sleeved. There were 112 shirts hanging there. I was dumbfounded! Aren't you? I mean have you EVER heard of such???? It's NUTS!

Next...18, would be the number of SHORTS in his drawers. The majority were khaki shorts. In fact, since we're being number people here today, only 5 pairs of the 18 were of another color or fabric than the traditional cotton khaki kind. Who doesn't need at least 13 pairs of khaki shorts, I ask you?!

24: Again, since I was into counting that day I decided to count the pants and jeans hanging in the closet. Yep, 24 pairs of (khaki, mostly) pants and blue jeans. I don't even have anything to say about this. Twenty-four says it all.

And for our final number, 43, what did you guess for that one? You didn't guess SOCKS did you? Wow! You're really catching on! 43 was not the actual number of socks in his drawers before the massive clean out. 43 is the number I put back into his drawer, allowing him to keep. Well, keeping until he can throw out the ones he doesn't want. There were many more pairs and single socks missing their match that I threw out. By that time, I didn't have the energy to count how many I was going through.

So I know you're asking yourself how I can remember all of these numbers to write about it almost a week later. I wrote them down as I counted. Seeing the mounds on my bed, I knew that the number would be astronomical. And Nathan being more of numbers person would have a much better appreciation for the actual number of items rather than the 6 trash bags it took to haul it all out not to mention his appreciation for me cleaning it all out for him. So I did it just to enlighten him on the gravity of the situation.

Later that day when he called from the base, as he was at drill that day, to ask what I'd been doing I answered with the usual answer that he expects "oh, nothing." Then I played the guessing game with him. I told him I had cleaned out his drawers and asked him to guess how many of each thing he had. He was so far off it wasn't even funny. He was astonished at what he'd had packed into those drawers. Just the reaction I was hoping for. He defended himself by reminding me that he'd not bought hardly ANY of the items...they almost all had been given to him either by his company or the t-shirts for example by dealers of his when he visits their dealerships or tournaments. It's true but it doesn't excuse the fact that there were so many.

So I've done a lot of thinking about this clothes situation and I believe I have figured out why he has so many. In counting the 112 shirts in his closet, I noticed that many of them he's had for 8, 9 maybe 10 years! So the reason he has so many is that men's clothing does not go in and out of style like women's do! It's SO UNFAIR, if you think about it. I mean, would you dare to put on something that you wore 8 years ago? Heck no, because number one, IT DOESN'T FIT ANYMORE...you can't even get your calf into those pants not to mention the gluteus MAXimus and that blouse just doesn't look the same split open at the upper arms and rolled up over your tummy,(another unfair advantage that men have!) and two, it's 7 seasons out of style!!!

I just wonder if my husband's drawers and closet are the only ones like this? And I have to say, this is not the first time in years that they've been cleaned out. They get cleaned out at least once every couple of years. I guess he has just hung on to things that probably needed to go and now it's just piled up.

So I have a little assignment for you: NO, you don't have to clean out your drawers..unless they need it. What I want you to do is just to go into your husband's closet and count the number of shirts hanging there. Be fair and count winter and summer (short and long sleeve, as that's what I did to get the number 112). I just wonder if the number hanging in Nathan's closet is anywhere near the number in YOUR husband's closet.

I've put a poll on here (find it below) where you can click the range that your husband's number falls into. I'm interested to see how this turns out! So DO IT! It won't take you long to run and go count...go right now so you can click on the poll! Remember shirts only! ~and you don't have to sign in to vote, just click on the circle by the number and then click vote.