Just because your pants contain spandex doesn't mean you can try to pour your lumpy jello ass into them. For the love of peanuts, someone please reign in this horrendous fashion faux paus. It's like an epidemic and it begins to spread like wildfire every time the sun goes down on the weekend. Really, what's it going to take? Tough love from friends? A department store fitting-room type mirror--you know, the one that makes you look like a washed-up, over-tired, blotchy face hobo? A visit to a therapist?

In the interest of preserving the sanity of the people who have to witness this atrocity, here are some cardinal rules of fashion construction for you women offenders out there, and, for those of you who secretly love them because, after all, they make you look better.

Rule Number 1: If you have more rolls than a bread truck, please, don't try to be like cat-woman. Black is your friend, but, don't abuse it's magical powers. By this I mean don't think that if you somehow manage to cram yourself into say, a cat-woman style "thing", that you look anything remotely close to "hot." On the contrary, you look hideous. If you're trying to attract men, I assure you that the very sight of you looking like an over-stuffed burrito will make a man's genitalia invert into his body. You might actually be able to see his wee-wee through his nose at this point. The over-stuffed burrito look only looks good on my rolly-polly pug. See Exhibit A (pugaroo):

Rule Number 2: Lingerie should be kept at home, buried in your bra and panty drawer. Again, just because Fredericks of Hollywood models look good in the magazines and in the on-line stores, you will never, ever look like that or that good. It's called air-brushing, people. Don't be fooled into thinking that you will look like that. Only about .0002% of the population does. You're not one of them. Certainly if you were, you wouldn't be hanging out on the corner trying to bum a smoke and slobbering over some plumber with the ultimate aim of having him buy you a shot.

Rule Number 3: If you wear heels, learn how to walk in them first. You know the saying, "if you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen"? This applies directly to heels. You have no business teetering around in anything other than two inches if you can't keep your balance. And, please, you absolutely must account for the impact of alcohol on your balance. Here's the rule: whatever heel height you think you can manage to walk in, subtract half an inch for every two gin and tonics or cosmos you intend to drink that night.  Some of you women out there look like Clydesdale horses coming down the street with your four-inch stripper shoes. Can you believe I actually saw a girl wearing clear lucite 7 inch heels with goldfish in the platform sole? I almost had to gauge my eye out to get the burn out from that image. Stripper heels are for strippers and for channeling your inner stripper in the bedroom with your mate---that's it. There can be no derivation from this rule.

Rule Number 4: If your thong is showing, your pants are either too low or you like flossing your butt in public. Let's all remember why thongs were invented, to prevent panty lines--that's it.  Somewhere along the downward trajectory of the life of the thong and probably exacerbated by the "Thong Song," women began to think that pulling your pants down and your thongs up was hot. Well, needless to say, it's atrocious. It's visually and sexually horrifying, especially if you're a plus-sized girl. Just because they make it in your size doesn't mean you should be wearing it. No one wants to see Ursula the Sea-Witch's cottage cheese behind and lumps of love shimming on the dancefloor.

Rule Number 5: Spanx that ass. And tummy and thighs and anything else that is being tested by gravity. Seriously. Enough said. Just Spanx it.

Rule Number 6: Please know your correct size. Not the size you'd like to be, not the size you were in high school, not the size you'd be if you could get all the liposuction you think you need. This goes for your bra size as well. Don't, under any circumstances, ever wear two bras and don't ever try to push your breasts up to your chin. It's not a good look--for anyone! And, since we're on the topic of boobies, please, if you've gotten, oh, what's the proper term, "augmentation," not everyone in the entire world needs to see your new found glory; keep your refund gap to yourself.  No one needs to see those balloons in their face, unless they paid for it.

There's many, many more rules that should become commandments for fashion. I'm sure I'll expound on more of them at some point in the future, probably after I've been sufficiently scared into the nadirs of my condo, afraid to step out into the jungle out there. For the time being, though, if we strive to memorize and enforce the above mentioned, we should be well on our way to a betterment of the late-night visual scene.