The Laundry Day Boxer Problem

As a certified lazy person, I've been known to put off chores like, say, laundry for quite some time. And since I can keep wearing the same pair of pants until I drop food on them or something, it's easy to let things slide a little too long. To moderate my laziness in this regard, I use a tried and true lazy person technique: laundry day boxers.

This is the pair of boxers that stays in the drawer until all the other boxers are gone. This is the pair that is so garish that even in your sleep-addled 8am state, you can't help but notice what you're putting on, and realize that this means the grace period is up. You can't put it off any longer. Your laundry day boxers are a constant reminder that you need to do laundry now.

I know some of you own laundry day boxers. Don't be shy. Mine are bright orange, with little bats and Frankenstein monsters on them. My old roommate had a pair that were silk, with a screenprint of Elvis on them - brilliant.

Now here's where I encounter a problem (see, that title was relevant after all!): I need something to wear on laundry day. That, naturally, is my laundry day boxers. But I can't wash them because I'm wearing them. So come next laundry day, what will alert me that it is, in fact, laundry day? My laundry day boxers are now dirty and in the laundry, where they are useless to me. Useless!

Having ruminated long and hard on this problem, the only solution I can come up with is to obtain a second pair of laundry day boxers. At that point it's just a bootstrapping problem to arrange things so that one pair remains clean the first time I do laundry post-acquisition. Then, come that first laundry day, the dirty pair gets cleaned while I wear the clean pair, and I alternate from then on.

It doesn't seem quite right though. I really feel like each person should only own one pair of laundry day boxers. Call me old-fashioned, but when it comes to laundry day boxers, I believe in monogamy. I mean, when you're cavorting around in your purple sequined laundry day boxers, how do you think the ones with the Taco Bell chihuahua feel, down at the bottom of the hamper? Maybe I'm just off on this particular topic. Anyone out there own more than one pair of laundry day boxers? Maybe if I got two identical pairs, that might be a reasonable compromise - it's like I'm wearing the same pair, even if they're actually twins. And with that, I've strayed into borderline creepy analogy territory. Moving on.

Is this two-boxer solution the only way? Am I overlooking something painfully obvious? I feel like one of you people who likes game theory or something should be able to model this mathematically. This is serious business, folks.