• by Thom Forbes , January 5, 2011

I need to clear up two mysteries: One of long standing, the other from Sunday night, when I saw a TV commercial for Pajama Jeans, followed by an effusive pitch in a Daily Cents ("cool products, hot topics") email yesterday.

By any rational measure, I am an expert in blue jeans. Even if you include the baker's dozen years I trudged through Grand Central Terminal in a suit and tie, I estimate I've spent 95% of my waking life in denim or, as they were known in New York when I was growing up, "dungarees." But "dungarees" sounds like something you'd wear when you slud into second base or baled hay and, somewhere along the line, they became jeans.

One revelation of my intense research this morning, however, is that it wasn't Calvin or Jordache who coined the word "jeans." Usage, apparently, was always a matter of where one grew up.

The reality is, however, that I'm an expert in denim no more than a guy who drinks tap water can expound up on the subtleties of Evian vs. Fred.

I've gone through a Lee phase, a Wrangler flirtation and a very passionate Levi's affair. But around the time that Levi's Slim Fits no longer seemed appropriate from an aesthetic point of view, they also climbed above $20 at retail. Hence, the first mystery: Will someone kindly explain to me why anyone would spend more than $20 on a pair of jeans, blue or otherwise? Criminy, Slim-Fits are on sale for $34.99 at JC Penney. Or you can get them in ice cream-vendor white for $70.99 at Saks -- a HUGE markdown from the regular $179. (Do they put those sticker prices there just to make you think that you've successfully hondled them?)

I know this is nothing new. I did, after all, survive the Eighties. But I was shocked, shocked I tell you, to see Sarah Steele -- playing a pudgy teenaged girl in "Please Give" -- throwing a public tantrum over her mom's refusal to shell out $200 for a pair of jeans while she gave $20 bills to the homeless. But even indie films have Hollywood endings nowadays; the family unit lives happily ever after when Ms. Steele eventually squirms her way into two-Benjamin bliss in a trendy downtown shop.

But we need not look further than the mirror. My own 21-year-old son recently told me that he must have $80 for a pair of jeans. "Jeepers," quoth I. "Get thee to a Costco, where Kirklands are downwards of 15 bucks. They're good enough for me, by golly."

Which, upon not-too-much reflection, is precisely why they were not good enough for him. He got the $80.

Recently, I bought a few pairs of designer-like jeans myself, I must admit, although it's a label no one has heard of with a defunct website (viewable in Google cache). Jaguar. My wife saw them in the Bargain Bin in the Sierra Trading Post catalogue. They fit nice and cost about $12. Sorry, all gone.

As low as my standards may be, I'll tell you this. You'll never find me in a pair of Pajama Jeans. And it's not just because they're $39.95 plus shipping and handling. And it's not because I'm not campy (which I'm not) enough to wear them. It's because they go against the grain of our American heritage, which is exceptionally documented in this YouTube video for Levi-Strauss, which is only the first of five parts.

So that's the second mystery I need your help on. Am I misreading this entirely? Are Pajama Jeans actually a hot new product? The next Snuggie, perhaps? Will the Pajama Jeans folks be producing their own videos in 2160, featuring vintage "velour-like" pants found in the dim recesses of defunct fitness centers with an archivist speculating on what the people who wore them actually ate to make them need them?

Your comments, please.