Putting on my trousers in the morning is like completing my cyborg self, in that my pockets are filled with tools that extend my fingers like the Swiss army knife I always carry. This mini toolkit is in a permanent state of refinement, as I find new items that come in handy during the day. Front left pocket has the penknife, a purse of coins and a refillable inkpen; front right pocket has my keys (with waterproof money holder, nail clipper, retractable pencil and USB sticks), a broken sharpening stone and (in the mini pocket) an old school Nokia; rear left pocket has my smartphone; rear right pocket has my glasses polishing cloth.
With all these items, I feel ready to approach the day and anything that life might throw at me.
I may be unusual in stuffing my pockets so. What’s your approach – minimal or maximal – tailored and svelte or bulky and seam-stretching? What are the items you carry with you, in your pockets, purse or bag?
What’s inside your trousers?
Aren’t the things in the pockets *part of* the trousers – that your legs are inside of?
Good question – there’s a branch of mathematics devoted to that sort of topological question
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pair_of_pants_(mathematics)
And here’s a Math professor using it as an excuse to expose himself in front of a bunch of female students
I had a look at the Wikipedia link and I think I’m OK to look at the video at some point* to investigate further what Pants as Topology means.
*not committing to a timeframe
Pants As Topology – three more from them later. And also straight into the ‘bad band name’ thread.
Bottomology, surely….?
Can I just post this gag here?
Q Where do centaurs buy their clothes?
A Top Man. And Bottom Horse.
Thanks.
No thank you
Pen in pocket. That can lead to painful pokeage.
My black 501s ( I’m cutting edge, me) contain keys, several paper hankies, cash, face mask, and if not in a jacket, my phone and credit card holder. No wonder my “trouser area” is looked on admiringly..
Nice alliteration there, V…
Ferrets
Those reside up my nose.
Must hurt like hell.
Ah Moosey if only there was a song about it.
Oh good there is.
Very much the minimalist here… generally only my phone in the front left pocket and keys in the from right pocket. Most times I don’t even carry my wallet / credit cards / cash as the phone can do it all.
Wallet and change in the right, keys and Swissie in the left. ‘Pick a pocket and commit’, that’s my motto, and one which seemed revelatory to both my sister and my other half when I passed it on at separate occasions as we stood in the rain while they looked for their keys. You don’t have to look for stuff (in bags in their cases) if it’s where it always is.
Thats said, since wfh I only put on proper trousers if I go out the front door. My work wear is plaid lounge trousers and the pockets might contain a snotty hankie at most.
This more or less gives a philosophy to my approach – everything has its place and I just need to do something like ‘spectacles, testicles, wallet and watch’ to be sure everything is where it should be.
There is no way I could get my wallet in my trousers though – too many cards.
” I only put on proper trousers if I go out the front door” Afterword strap-line. Or should that be belt-line?
Another pair of trousers, because you can’t be too careful.
…and under them, more trousers…redundancy after redundancy…just in case…
In fact, I’m all trousers. Not even any teeth, despite what people say.
Pack of cigarette papers, 2 lighters, and a plastic trolley token.
If I venture outside of the doors, keys will be in left pocket (otherwise they remain in the fruit bowl)
Nothing apart from me.
That’s what jackets* are for: wallet, phone, beany, gloves, penknife, and latterly, a mask.
* Verney-Carron FOX Original, naturellement. None of your overpriced Barbour nonsense here.
@beany ? I wondered what happened to him….
Bastard is too busy to keep up. Currently sorting through a houseful of records & CDs I inherited from late friend. Took weeks to shift.
Pockets? Black bags for dogshit obvs.
Are you Kenny from South Park? What do you do on those hot summer days down in the south west?
Cargo pants.
Left: wallet, wipe, daughter’s house keys. Right: phone, occasional (but rare) loose change. Right rear: mask. Left rear: receipts, old shopping lists etc.
I’m trying to figure out what possible use this information will be to Mark Zuckerberg.
Shows what a dull life I lead that I can’t imagine needing to carry a Swiss army knife around with me. I use mine for opening Amazon parcels and suchlike.
How else do you open those bottles of Chateau Chunder and Hobart Muddy?
Screw caps mate.
Sacrilege! How do you keep the flies off your face?
Are we talking about trousers again?
I forgot: plectrum pocket, £1 coin for Sainsburys trolley. Also AirPods sometimes.
Trouser pockets just holes.
You absolute tart.
Trouser pockets: house keys, AirPods, wallet, mask.
I have a heavy Barbour coat with lots of pockets, and a hood. It’s not one of the standard green ones, it’s blue and is lined, like a more regular coat. The pockets have all kinds of stuff in them. Gloves, a wooly hat, some carrier bags, a Leatherman tool, spare masks, hand sanitiser, mobile charger and leads… I probably look ridiculous but I love it.
Keys, wallet, phone. That’s it.
Re the Swiss Army knife: I have owned one for about thirty years, it was a birthday gift. It’s a nice, chunky possession but all it does is gather dust in a drawer. I have never used it, not even once. Everything it is capable of doing is far better done by a proper tool designed to serve the purpose. Especially the tiny little tweezers, which are spectacularly fucking useless.
My wife has a chunky Swiss Army knife – about half the width of an adult palm – that is pointless. The smaller version I have has scissors, wood saw and corkscrew – tools i use regularly. The toothpick has gone, but the tweezers are good enough to pluck white hairs from the back of my hand – if I were you, I would get yours replaced. I also have an itsy screwdriver that fits into the corkscrew – perfect for adjusting the arms on my glasses.
You’re far better off with a Leatherman multi-tool. I had a really nice one which I kept in my laptop bag until I tried to board a flight to Schiphol, whereupon the bloke at the X-ray machine summoned me with a crooked finger and a frown and promptly confiscated it. Shortly thereafter I bought a cheapo knock-off Leatherman-like for about a fiver from a garage when I filled up with petrol, and discovered that the cheapo knock-offs are actually pretty much just as good as the real (and stupidly expensive) things.
Leathermans (Leathermen?) are great – I’ve got one, which I keep in my regular rucksack – the pliers and locking mechanism are something that Swiss Army will never have to hand. But they are heavy, bulky and get very stiff – do they need oiling?
Leatherman always sounds homoerotic, doesn’t it? Like the sort of brand the specialist boutiques of Old Compton Street might stock, don’t you think?
Ah. Just me and Moose then.
… what? Er, well, aren’t we all supposed to be wearing masks in shops these days? I’m just trying to stay safe…
The way that guy in Beezer’s video was fetishizing over his leather holster, I wouldn’t be surprised if there was a connection.
I had a mini Swiss Army knife attached to my key ring for about 25 years until I tried to get through security with it when taking a flight …
Idiots.
How do they expect you to open your bag of peanuts?
Is the right answer.
Keys, wallet, phone and these days a mask.
All a man needs for a proper day out.
I hate having stuff in my pockets. If I’m at home, my phone is in the front left and that’s it. If I’m leaving the house, keys are in front right, car key-card front left with the phone, wallet back left and facemask back right. As soon as I get to work everything bar my phone and facemask goes into my desk drawer.
Nothing in my trews apart from a chipolata.
My manbag however has everything from tissues to lipstick, kerbie grips to hairbands – everything a girl (ie my wife) could possibly need
A chipolata, hey? I suppose in these dangerous times a fellow can’t go around unarmed.
“Drivel Head wears her glad rags, She’s got her keys, money and fags”
This thread is a total eye opener.
Who would have guessed so many Afterworders are walking around packing blades.
New AW strap line: I’ll cut ya, yew toilit!
I always suspected that most Afterworders are roadies in disguise. They probably all have keychains dangling from their belt, too (apart from the creepy one with daughter’s key in his pocket).
Explains a lot.
Swiss Army knife…? Hmm.
If they made rolls of gaffer tape on tubes small enough to fit in a pocket, I’d carry one.
If only for the fun of getting bits of tape stuck to the soles of my “shoes” (WFH: slippers).
@fatima-xberg Oi! and Oi! again! I go there to help out with the grandkids every weekend and there’s nobody at home when I arrive. Hence the keys, with a cute little key fob that says Whoa, it’s twins!. I don’t want to lose them therefore I keep them in my pocket. Sorry if you think that’s creepy, but it really, really isn’t. Would it help if I got a keychain?
Check for gaffa tape stuck to the bottom of shoe? Check! Must be a roadie.
I am certainly as uncouth as one.
(Edit: ah, Fento beat me to it)
You’d be surprised at how refined a lot of technical crew are.
Yep. I read books – that caterpillar was very hungry – and I’m fully house-trained.
Mrs F still won’t let me off the lead when she takes me outside, though.
@fatima-xberg I’ve had some time to brood over this now. A gentle dig at the blokey ways of the Afterword is one thing, but your cynical and malicious dig, which apart from anything else casts unpleasant aspersions on my relationship with my daughter, is too much. I am, for the avoidance of doubt, fucking furious. You need to apologise.
No? Please yourself…
It’s the 21st century, dude – never explain, never apologise.
Certainly no apology from me – but a big THANK YOU. He’s given me the idea for a short story, working title »Roadie In Disguise«. 😉
@fatima-xberg happy for you, not what I was hoping for, obviously. Bear the libel laws in mind…
My god, come down to earth. Someone on the internet made fun of something you said, you don’t think it’s funny, that’s all. 😉
If you give me your name and address I will make a public statement in your local paper where I explain everything, no problem. Maybe they’ll publish my story, too.
As you may have dimly realised, I didn’t find your little joke at all funny. Didn’t feel like you were making fun. I don’t know, maybe I need a sense of humour reset. Or maybe you do.
Anyhow, I’ll probably get my wrist slapped by the mods if I don’t shut up, so I’m shutting up.
Even at the Afterword you can get judged for not being cool or edgy enough.
Where’s me slippers?
@moose-the-mooche: so it would seem.
Actually Moose I think it’s – NEVER explain, NEVER apologise !!!!!!
Oh, I’m sorry, I think it’s because I was typing too quickly, and anyway I had a terrible childhood, Steve Wright was on the radio all the time (etc etc)
We’re not all metropolitan milquetoasts who’d faint at the sight of a sharpened edge; and neither are we a bunch of Mick Dundee clones with shave-sharp Bowie knives nor are we be-turbaned scimitar wielding warriors. Some of us live lives that find a small knife to be a handy and useful implement to have available when out and about. How else can we slash the tyres of inconsiderate urban visitors to our rural idyll who park inconsiderately in lay-bys while heaving bags of fly-tipped crap into our fields, or lob their Starbucks and McDonald’s packaging into our hedges? A good blade is an essential tool.
https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/i-studied-the-blade
We are talking about small penknives here, not laughable accoutrements carried by inadequates, so what is that link supposed to signify?
….”laughable accoutrements carried by inadequates” – who has been telling you about what’s inside my trousers?
I’m not touching that straight line.
My bunch of keys contains a very small penknife, a legacy of the Guinness walk in about 1978, a meander along the grand union canal for medical and dental students, of marathon length, with pit stops for lashings of free Guinness. I got on the organising committee, something else altogether, which involved quarterly meetings in Park Lane. Jerry, the generously nosed company official who chaired said meetings, started each, at 10am, with a crate of Park Royal’s finest brought in, lest anyone became thirsty. Anyhoo, returning to the point, that knife has been through so many airport XR machines as to have become my good luck charm. Knife may stretch it, it perhaps capable of, at most, a flesh wound to a lemon, the other side containing a bottle opener.
Still don’t have a clue what the meme thing was for!
I know exactly what’s inside my trousers, but I’m not going to take a picture of it and post it here!
Am I the only one permanently with poo bags in my trousers? (yes I do have a dog)
My dad once wrote a song called Pastie Down His Trousers, inspired by a headline in a local newspaper about a hapless shoplifter. I don’t know if it could be worked up* into a musical, however.
*Hurrr
I can’t remember the tune and have merely been singing the title to the tune of Electric Aunt Jemima. Long winter evenings etc
@moose-the-mooche The internet is heaving with stories of people who have been caught stuffing turkeys, sausages (…), even chainsaws down their trousers – your dad could have made a whole career out of it.
There’s even a story of someone who was busted for shoplifting because of the suspicious bulge down his trousers and it turned out to be his todger.
There’s nothing more suspicious than a todger. Looking at everything with that one cynical eye.
Was it a sea food store?
I’ve snaffled us a conger eel for us tea. What can go wrong?
Just plunge it into boiling water…
A sketch comedy TV show called Bizarre caused outrage in Merrie Olde Englande in the 70s with its racy content. Mostly pretty tame as it turns out but there was one memorable sketch:
We see a hospital bed, obscured by screens. In silhouette we see a man in the bed, screaming very loudly in pain. A nurse comes out, carrying a kettle. A white-coated doctor runs in, surveys the scene, and shouts –
“NO! I said PRICK his BOIL!”
I remember a seaside postcard with that joke on it.
Keys in left front pocket (since I was 18) plus a small wallet holding cards, mobile phone in right front. Nothing in back pockets, since I stopped putting a large wallet in back right I am having less back issues!
Since pandemic have stopped carrying cash except for a couple of notes for emergencies and I can’t tell you where they are ….
Steady on, all of you. What your describing is A Thing. A Thing That YouTube Influencers Do And That.
Your ‘EDC’. Every Day Carry. Young men across the nations seem obliged to post a video of their trouser kit. There are loads of this stuff, below. Watch and be amazed
Tchuh! Men will even turn “what do you have in your trousers” into a penis-measuring competition.
…er…
Depends…if it’s the weekend and I’m in the camper van, probably a Swiss Army Knife, cotton handkerchief, nasal spray. During the week I remove the Swiss Army Knife. However, I also regularly use a “man bag” for most small items…
Undercrackers (blue – I just checked) and the top half of my socks (black).
A midnight marauder, by Jove! And a toothbrush in your top pocket too, I’ll wager!
I was leaving out my legs, of course. I am very dull.
I was thinking that you habitually went round with a spare pair in your pocket in case you a) get lucky or b) get extremely unlucky.
A spare pair of legs?
“I coulda wrote a better pair of legs dan dese!” – Puckoon
Hup-a-hoy!!
Wallet, keys, hankie, phone, mask. That is all. And the phone and wallet usuallty go in the jacket.
Right front: loose change(so empty for the last 18/12), left front: car keys, dog poo bags, right back: money wallet (empty of money but driving license, railcard etc), left back: card wallet.
Phone goes in shirt or jacket pocket.
Empty dog poo bags I trust
The full ones are good for keeping your hands warm on a frosty morn…. or so I’m told.
As you can see from the steam rising from a frosty morning outside dump, they cool remarkably quickly, ahead of becoming a lukewarm and then a cold stress reliever (with less bounce)
iPhone and slim wallet in left pocket. Keys and mask in right.
And off I jolly well go .
Well, we know what Ringo’s got in his pocket….
Keys, phone, mask. Obviously. You people are *incredibly* weird. “Of course, I never leave home without my pocket Acme folding diesel-powered industrial woodchipper, because I’m not a homosexual, but that goes in chest pocket 6 of my quilted gilet, not my chunky cord cargo slacks. We are not animals.”
By the way, lads – bags exist. Allow to recommend the Maxwell-Scott “Paolo”. It’s billed as a briefcase but it’s really a beautiful satchel. You can look and sound like Tommy off Ground Force was possessed by the spirit of Alan Partridge and the resultant chimaera took to habitually smuggling 4lbs of walnuts next the thigh, or you can follow the example of The Bunk:
“You know, there’s a name for a man who pays that much attention to his clothes?”
“Yeah. A grown-up.”
Huge fan of bags.
Keeps the pockets relatively empty, thereby preserving the all important line of the trouser, while additionally allowing one to carry enormous, Police and Criminal Evidence Act-bothering machetes, should one feel the rigors of modern life sufficiently justify the need to do so. As one of the London Drill scene’s leading skengmen, I always want to be ready to back out the Rambo.
More importantly still, the bag is also the transportation vessel for the two most important carry-alongs of all: the current book and some moisturizer, because good skincare is a 24 hour game, particularly amidst these, the harshest of months.
Good to meet a fellow skengman. What ho, old chap?
Salutations!
A bag is the answer. It holds more and as Bingo mentions keeps one’s chinos looking snappy.
Women have had it their own way for far too long if you ask me.
Of course I’m weird – I wouldn’t be on this site, otherwise. I just fancied a change from posts about obscure Colombian bands that nobody else is interested in – with a general interest thread that everyone is an expert on.
I hope never to be seen in a gilet or cargo pants, but I must to confess to a little musing about a pocket wood chipper – that’s not possible …or is it? Could I justify getting one?
I couldn’t justify that briefcase. Terrible for the back and I’d rather spend the money on a new bike for my daughter. I did qute enjoy the devotion they put into describing the double stitching, the top of the range zip and the organiser panel
https://www.maxwellscottbags.com/journal/italian-leather-briefcase/
Pfffft! That website must be a put-up-job by Harry & Paul. Good grief.
These days, in jeans, it’s keys in right front pocket, phone in left front pocket, wallet in right rear pocket. If I’m going grocery shopping my list will be in my left rear pocket until I enter the shop, my mask will be in the right front pocket until I get out of my car. Unless it’s cold enough to wear a coat, in which case the mask will probably be in the right coat pocket and my phone may well be in it’s left inside pocket.
If I’m suited-up (a very rare occasion) I don’t carry anything in my rear trouser pockets and my phone will be in an inside jacket pocket.
Before the lockdown my right front trouser pocket would contain coins as well as keys. I haven’t carried any coinage since March 2020.
I’m loving this rigorous policing of the right pocket/left pocket divide. Quite right too.
It feels the perfect cue to let everyone know that the new West Side Story is a mere 9 days away, and it’s very very good indeed.
Crazy boy…crazy boy….
I hate having anything in my pockets. I don’t like that feeling of flexing a leg and finding resistance, or the gravitational tug of an overstuffed pocket. If I need to walk around town from my work office I will carry phone and wallet in my hand.
I do have a magic washing machine, however, that inserts a guitar pick into each pocket during the spin cycle…
You’ve seen this like ten years ago, but here it is anyways…
I don’t habitually leave the house tooled up, like many here apparently do. Phone and mask in the trousers (front left/back left, if you’re asking) and everything else in jacket or bag.
Bazooka? Tyre iron? Rubber chicken? Wedding marquee (folded)? No?
Amateur.
Ah yes, nearly forgot, the wedding marquee. Always impressive to have tent in your trousers.
At the front, of course. At the back, not so attractive.
A small rear portico structure is acceptable for friends to use as a smoking area.
It’s been said that my ass is smokin’.
Only by me though.
Mine steams quite a lot.
…as Faith No More almost sang.
Specifically by Roddy Bottum.
Left front pocket; card wallet, right; mobile. Notebook, sunglasses, reading glasses, pen, pencil; one of several man-bags.
I’m surprised how many people put their phones in their trouser pockets. If I’m wearing a jacket of any kind it goes in an inside pocket there, if it’s shirt sleeve weather it will go in the breast pocket if one is present. Otherwise I’m more likely to carry a bag just for my phone than put it in my trousers; I just don’t trust myself not to forget it and sit down to undesirable effect to either the phone or me.
Front pocket is fine *, back pocket I don’t understand.
* Apart from the frequencies messing with your balls
Uhhh? what’s that? I thought the problem was more leaving it on vibrate and getting an inconvenient chubby (TMFTL)
I have never put anything in the back pockets of any trousers.
They could easily be stolen and it will ruin the outline of my perfect pert arse.
Arse pockets (TMFTL) are there so that sickeningly twee couples can put their hands in each others’.
….and then in their pockets. You’ll be pleased to know I’m off to bed now.
Door keys various, van keys, wallet, phone, small Swiss Army Knife, black PVC tape.
An insight into a dark and sinister world there.
Not really. I pretty much AM a roadie, albeit working on poncy conferences rather than rock n roll.
Not really?
Generally not much in the trouser pockets. Usually a paper hankie. Maybe some change when we used it. A plectrum in the little half pocket above the right hand main one. Occasionally phone in back (right) pocket. Bulgy trouser pockets are very uncool.
Back right pocket = Wallet
Back left pocket = Empty
Front left pocket = Keys
Front right pocket = mask / tissues
That’s it. No blades, no remover of stones from horses hooves, no corkscrew….
A hanky, keys in a Keysmart key holder (very neat) and a credit card wallet. That’s it.
I’m surprised that most people still seem to carry wallets – I use the phone for all my credit card payments and we are pretty much cashless those days also.
I use phone too, but still carry debit and credit cards in case something goes wrong or tap is not accepted, plus driver’s licence (also needed for ID) provincial health card etc
Plus mask-wearing makes it a less convenient process.
In the mean streets of the Cotswolds, cash is the only way to buy chips. The cure for all known ills, and also the cause of many of them.
Good luck fitting that hamper down there @salwarpe
It’s Madness, I tell you, I’ll have to invest in some baggy trousers
Reminds me of the shoplifting scene in Filthy Rich and Catflap.
“Eddie, how did you get so much meat in your trousers?”
“That’s what all the girls say”
….quality
Who needs trouser pockets?
One of these all you need:
The only permanent fixture is a ventolin puffer. Everything else is optional.
A phone is rather foisted on me along the lines of “You better take it, what if anything goes wrong?” which translates as “I know you slide off to have a beer or two after the Rugby/football, this critter might stir you to get a move on.” It does.
One day I hope to only ever carry 1. cash (if still possible), 2. a notebook and pen, 3. bus pass, and 4. a pocket watch which I will house in a top pocket.
Or you replace that lot with a phone, which could fulfil all of those functions and more (keeping up with what’s happening on here for a start). Your family doesn’t have to have the number.
Left front – wallet, mask, banknotes
Right front – handkerchief, house keys, change if right rear has a hole
Left rear – phone
Right rear – change if right front has a hole
Prior to reading this thread I imagined the AW crowd as a bunch of cool metrosexual hipsters, wearing well-fitted trousers with band T-shirts and designer jackets and leather man-bags hanging across their chests, as they ride their electric bikes from one record store to another, whistling the latest by Taylor Swift or Stormzy…turns out your trousers are mis-shaped and sagging from all of the hardware you’re packing (no, Moose), and if you sat down on a bike you’d probably end up losing a testicle through an unfortunate key-spiking incident! 😉
Doesn’t anyone smoke or vape? I have a disposable vape in my pocket at all times.
Smoking is a bit of a commitment. You needed to spend about 5 minutes outside with one fron start to finish. But a vape is a quick couple of puffs and you’re back.
Smoking is pretty unusual amongst people I know either socially or through work these days. I was in Paris a couple of weeks ago and two of the 7 crew were smokers (both 25 – 30 at a guess). I was quite surprised as normally there are no smokers at all.
Yes – my contemporaries from school days are now in their mid-50s. 80% of us smoked and now most of us vape. I don’t think anyone smokes any more.
I just remembered, the show caller (Italian lady who lived outside Paris with her French boyfriend) also smoked. She said she was 40.
Hurrah! My trousers now have an extra leg!
Braggart….
“Wherever I go through rain or snow…….”
Wot’s inside me joggers today?
Quartz crystal. Shiva Lingam. Ipod. £20 note.