What the World Would Be Like If Let’s face it. If you’re a middle-aged man, you’re too old for skinny jeans Didn't Exist

The horrors of the midlife fashion crisis.

BY THE time you read this, Australia will have either a new prime minister or a newish prime minister. And I thought turning 40 was confusing.

As you will no doubt know after last week’s column, there is a small lag between the writing date and publication date of such must-read columns as this one.

Otherwise I would be writing these words even as you are reading them, and frankly my typing just isn’t that fast.

Having said that, as a seasoned and astute political commentator I can state with absolute confidence that, just as I predicted, the election has been won by Bill Shorten/Malcolm Turnbull. (Sub-editors: please delete as necessary.)

But the true burning issue, the one that really fires up everyday Australians (you know, those people politicians always talk about but you never seem to actually meet), rages on without any hope in sight.

You know what it is, I know what it is, and yet our so-called “leaders” still refuse to talk about it. The cowards.

I refer of course to this: middle-aged men in skinny jeans.

I was first alerted to this creeping epidemic two Saturdays ago while standing at the childproof gate of a Bunnings playground, a place where all of society’s ills seem to manifest themselves if you’re prepared to wait long enough.

Owing to a combination of market forces and an unexpected shutdown of the sausage-sizzle stand, my son and I had been forced to migrate from our regular Bunnings to a slightly trendier Bunnings some 50 metres down the road.

And what I saw, frankly, shocked me.

Not only were there a lot more people, a lot more piercings and a lot more sausages, but there was also a gentleman of a certain age wearing what I believe they call “the new trackpants”.

He seemed to be in all other respects perfectly normal, yet I couldn’t help but judge him on his figure-hugging legwear, which revealed his unusually toned thighs. He may also have been wearing a hat.

Surely, I thought, this is age inappropriate? After all, if virile menfolk are going to consign new mothers to an eternity of muu-muus, what right do they have to wear a bun-hugger that says: “Well, at least I got out of it unscathed!”

Still, being a man of peace and tolerance, I thought little more of it until it was brought home to me — quite literally — when some friends of ours dropped by the house on one otherwise unremarkable Sunday night.

“He’s wearing his skinny jeans again,” muttered DJ* by way of apology as his husband followed him through the door.

“Hey, they still fit!” said Jay** as he walked past, apparently on stilts.

I nervously made my excuses to pick up some beer, wine and spirits and, if there was time, perhaps something for the others.

But every time I went to leave, the conversation recircled. “Seriously, you’re almost 40,” said DJ, a hypnotically rippled man who could pop walnuts with his biceps.

And so I rushed to the bedroom and put on a pair of what I believe they call “the old trackpants”, a modest affair that covers both one’s bedsores and manhood in a single piece of polyester fleece. DJ and I have been friends ever since.

But that Jay guy and the handsome man from Bunnings?

Man, they’ve got to learn to grow up.