Shopping, I like it but what size!

The other day I went shopping with my Mom and we found a few T-shirts that we liked.  I bought two because they were really on sale.  They were very soft and a simple stripe that I can wear everyday.  I don't know if I was momentarily hypnotized in the store or just stupid.  Now that I have washed them several times I have found that they seem tighter and the once soft fabric is pilling significantly. They are Polyester Rayon and Spandex. They are both the same size, medium.  Of course one feels slightly more snug than the other.  They are a bit snug in the arms.  It doesn't bother me too much but I don't have really big arms.  I admit they are bigger than when I was 20.  For purposes of perspective, I am 5'8 and no more than 155 lbs.  I consider myself pretty average.   So much for a good deal.

I am sitting here typing in a shirt I bought at Target the other day.  It is an extra large.  I originally bought it to sleep in but then decided it was fine to wear out.  I don't usually shop at Target but their t-shirts run pretty small or is tight the norm?
What is the deal with spandex and t-shirts, or just about everything these days?   Good lord, I don't know how we kept our clothes from stretching out to ridiculous sizes until spandex came along.  My favorite old jeans that have formed to my body are pre-spandex.  Now, we can't have jeans without it. Why is that?

I went shopping with a good friend in Chattanooga and she took me to my all time favorite store, JJill.  Why do I like it?  I like it because all the clothes look like they are fresh and clean.  They don't look like they took them out of an overpacked shipping container from China with all the beautiful creases and wrinkles...and off smell that comes from traveling over the ocean salt air and all.  (Which they did when we later went to Kohls where I couldn't buy a thing for that reason)  I am digressing.  What I wanted to say is that I found a cute shirt on the sale rack.  It was a size SP.  You know what that means, small petite! As I said earlier....5'8" 155.  Nope not small or petite.  They do cut their clothes large (vanity sizing).

A couple of weeks ago I was going to a beer tasting and I wanted to wear my logo shirt from the brewery.  I had purchased and XL.  You heard me.  These woman's cuts are so small.  You know, I am of the age, 60, where our middles are not as svelte as they once were.  Why the heck would I want my clothes to be so tight as to show the complete outline of my bra and the top of my pants!  This is a problem with every woman's logo style shirt I have tried.  I have a Bonnie Raitt shirt...won't wear it out, another micro brew shirt, same deal.  I could buy the men's or unisex shirt... I hate them.  The crew neck is too small, the sleeves are huge boxes that look ridiculous and the body has no shape.  They are made for men so they go straight up and down...  that works out for many women but they are tighter on top and on the bottom and huge in the middle.  They are not made for us!

For that matter...I don't know who clothing manufacturers are making clothes for anymore!  I was explaining sizes to my husband.  I explained that there is the Misses dept and the Woman's dept.  He was like...Whatttt????? "Okay so that means sizes 0-16 (18) is in Misses and anything above that is Woman's."  Then there is Juniors which sort of works the same way but they are odd numbers 0-11, or sometimes they do a double number such as 7/8 or 9/10.

ARRRRAGH!  Now you know why we have to try everything on, often in multiple sizes!

I have been struggling with glass for almost 8 years.  What I mean by that is that I have been having trouble finding my voice with it.  Glass is hard.  It doesn't want to easily be sculptural when you are working with it as a kiln casting material and not blowing. There is carving the castable piece, making a duplicate model of it, and then making a plaster mold.  Each of these steps is arduous and fraught with failure.  

Along with that trip up, a family tragedy squashed my mojo. 

Now there is a crazy level of environmental concern for the manufacture of glass.  It has effected both the manufacturer that I use, Bullseye Glass but also others such as Uroboros. Spectrum glass in Washington state, announced they were giving up the ghost.  Bullseye is soldiering on and doing everything in their power to abide by the demands of all the governmental entities.  This has cost them money and thus they must increase the cost of their glass by 12.5%.  All the while, most customers have no idea.
Living on the East coast, we are at a disadvantage as the cost of shipping the material to us is over 10%.  Living in a small town with very little sales outlets we must ship our work to galleries, again another 10% hit.  This for a material that is already one of the most expensive mediums out there.  
Maybe this is a bit of sour grapes but all of this together has led me to question my desire to continue with glass.
Then the gallery calls and wants more...what is a person to do.  ARRRRGH!
Left in a quandary.