Coat System

So, I have yet to make good on my promise of tales from my trips to Hebei Province and Tianjin. My writings are still in the works. But, here's what I wrote about my most important accessory: my coat! (or jacket, as I mistakenly referred to it in a previous post)

My coat system is understandably enviable, and I do not blame you for your jealousy. To start with, I bargained down from 980 Yuan to 220 Yuan for the Arcteryx coat at the Silk Market. After some quick math, which I postponed until a broken zipper episode a week ago, I realized that I had only paid about thirty bucks for this pretty sweet coat. The coat includes a fleece jacket and a waterproof shell. Before going to Hebei Province last week, I added a down vest at the suggestion of my boss. (He told me that Hebei is cold and urged the wearing of a petticoat. When I realized that he meant to say “padded coat” I told him that I was covered, but could not shake the image of myself dolled up like a Gibson girl in a whale-bone corset frame.) These three layers offer me up to eleven pockets. I reserve the breast pocket over my heart for thick wads of paper after having heard the tale of President William McKinley being shot in the chest during a speech, but finishing the speech nonetheless because the thickness of his handwritten speech had taken the blow in his breast pocket. The side pockets of the shell contain gloves, Ipod, and napkins taken from restaurants as possible emergency toilet paper. The breast pocket of the fleece jacket contains my passport, a drawing of an arrow emerging from the symbol for Yuan and into the symbol of the American dollar, and a potentially counterfeit fifty dollar bill I am stuck with and trying to pass off as a real fifty every month as I send home money. The zippers for each sections of the coat act independently and in combination, with the most exciting possibility being a sudden increase in temperature. In such a case, the interior vest can be stuffed into its own breast pocket to form a pillow that can be stuffed into the side pocket of the shell. In combination with my new beard, the potbelly that forms ages me about twenty years, if I remember not to wear my Chuck Taylors. In conclusion, my jacket can sustain rain, sleet, and snow, deal with sudden temperature changes, turn Chinese kuai into American bucks, produce counterfeit American money, disguise me as an old man, and protect me from assassination attempts. If only I could get the zippers to stop breaking, then I think it would be worth the full $30.