I’ve got an update on the Cheat Panties. The suggestion came in via reader tip. The reader wishes to remain anonymous because she doesn’t want anyone to know she wears cheat panties. I went on an investigative mission today to verify the information given. It is legit.

I introduced Cheat Panties in my March Work Release. My reader pal told me that Warner’s (purveyor of panties since 1874) makes a super-lightweight, super-thin, super-soft version of cheat panties called Sleek Shorts. They come in five colors and six sizes. Best of all they cost significantly less than the athletic versions I recommended. Oh baby.

I had to see these for myself so I checked a local retailer. Not only are they freakin’ fantastic, they don’t creep or crawl and have no seams. I found them over by the granny panties and girdles but I promise you they are non-binding and feathery. You can move and breathe and bend and hustle and bustle in them. Probably not as durable as the heavy-hitting utility shorts I linked in my previous post, but whisper quiet and airy by comparison.

If these are too long for you there are shorter shorts too. I think the longer ones work better for the intended purpose, which is sneaking in exercise during the work day in skirts. The inaccurately named Boy Shorts come in eight colors and five sizes. Although the name sucks, the fit and fabrication is the same.

To be fair though, Warner’s was founded by a boy. It was founded by two boys. A Dr. Lucien Warner gave up his medical practice to revolutionize the corset industry to make them less cruel and injurious. Yes, in the 1800s women were being injured by their underwear.

The good doctor and his brother Ira designed and sold a flexible model named the Coraline Health Corset. By comparison to the primitive corsets which proceeded the Coraline, it was considered cruelty-free. Soon after the Warner brothers acquired a patent for a primitive bra, and the coming years would bring traditional panties into the healthful product line.

Much later the Warners teamed up with DuPont to make Lycra, rendering everything worn next to the skin kinder to the wearer. For these reasons I could forgive the moniker Boy Shorts if the new conglomerate which bought out Warner’s in 2012 would rename them Dr. Ira Shorts or Lucky Luciens. Because those boys in particular earned it for having a vision of comfortable, healthy women. Otherwise the notion of girls wearing boy shorts is stupid. I will wear panties named after a boy, but I won’t wear panties designed to be considered boyish.

Her hair must smell so good.

I love vintage advertising and this is a classic example of why I love it. That middle girl’s hair either smells really good, or photographers in 1959 thought it was preferable for girls to touch themselves or other girls but pretend to be looking at something else, like carpet fibers or clouds.

Both lengths of the miraculous modern cheat panties are also available online. Again, these are not Cute Panties. They aren’t supposed to be. They are strictly functional for desk jockeys trying oh so hard not to be sedentary from 8 to 5. And if these powerful, empowered desk jockeys refuse to be relegated to wearing boy pants every damn day, they need garments which support moving and grooving in feminine clothing without injury. Maintaining wellness while fiercely preserving our femininity; the Warner brothers’ vision of healthy women lives on.

Thank you, anonymous reader, for the tip. May we all cheat ever better because of you.

— Mercy