Maria and I went on a trip recently. Nothing fancy, just a weekend in Washington, D.C., to see some tennis and have a celebration for our 15^th anniversary a couple of months early.
As is our usual custom, we flew by the seat of our pants for most of our plans. That meant enjoying lunch the first night at a pub we just happen to read about in a guide book that afternoon.

I love this part of traveling. You never know what you will find when you stop for a meal in a city like D.C. In fact, on the next night, we ended up meeting the brother of a guy I went to high school with at our dinner spot.

That coincidence, however, paled in comparison to what happened on our first night. We had settled in our booth with a couple of drinks and waited for our sandwiches when I saw it.

At first, I could not believe my eyes. It had been a long day, and I wondered if my eyes were playing tricks on me, but there was no mistaking it. A family of four walked into the bar and the father, probably about five to 10 years older than me, wore something that made my jaw drop.

A fanny pack.

I had one of those difficult moments when I wanted to stand up and laugh and point, but all I could do was nudge my wife and tell her to look at the people coming in the bar so she could get her own look at the situation. I hate having a conscience sometimes.

Now I don’t pretend to be any sort of fashion expert. On more than one occasion, I have had to change clothes just based on the look I get from my wife before we head out somewhere.

Even though I have those kinds of problems, however, I understand most of the fashion basics for guys. That means I know that no man should ever, ever, ever wear a fanny pack. Ever.

Ever.

I thought we came to an agreement on this about 15 years ago. We had the whole fanny pack craze. Weird Al made fun of them in a song. That means the jig is up. No more fanny packs, especially for men.

If you need to carry things, you put them in your pocket. If you can’t fit everything in your pockets, you ask your wife to put the rest in her purse. The problem here is that this guy’s wife also had on a fanny pack, which almost made me fall out of our booth.

In retrospect, I guess I should not have been surprised. If a woman doesn’t stop her husband from leaving the house with a fanny pack on, the odds are she will think wearing one of her own is a good idea.

To top it off, the Fanny Packs had two teenagers with them. I bet they spent the whole day praying that they didn’t run into anyone they knew. They probably have to beg their parents not to wear the things when they are in their hometown.

I guess things could have been worse though. The guy could have been carrying one of those man purses.