Every woman who leads a social life needs and usually owns a “little black dress”.  These days that need probably surfaces at about the age of ten.  A ridiculous turn of affairs in my opinion, but hardly relevant to my tale of woe.  I last owned “the dress” in the late sixties.  It was quite svelte; the fabric was clingy crepe.  I last wore it in San Francisco during a dinner date with the intended of a disliked and previous roommate.  In my earlier years I possessed few scruples when it came to attractive men and, with no conscious urging on my part, he was the one who proposed the rendevous.  I should mention now that I was a heavy cigarette smoker.  That night when I returned home I discovered, to my horror, that I had burned a huge, revealing hole in the side of my beautiful dress.  What could Ernie, or any other observer, have possibly thought?

Unfortunately, this was not my only attempt at self-immolation.  Some weeks later I made a disgusting display of myself at work.  In that case the fabric of my outfit was dacron.  It mattered little that, during either event, I felt nothing as my clothes cremated themselves.  I did learn one lesson.  I stopped resting a cigarette holding hand anywhere near my waist and probably should have stopped smoking long before I actually did so.