Pudenda on a plane

pudenda: (1) Feminine gerundive adjective of pudeo (to feel shame). That of which one ought to be ashamed, shameful, scandalous, disgraceful, abominable. (Used as a noun) A scandalous woman. (2) Neuter plural gerundive adjective of pudeo. The private parts.

So a young woman named Kyla Ebbert, a college student and Hooters waitress, gets on a Southwest Airlines flight, heading from San Diego to Tucson on a day trip for a doctor's visit. An FA named Keith tells her that her attire is inappropriate and that she'll have to catch a later flight and find something decent to wear in the meantime.

I saw her appearance on Friday's Today show. Although it doesn't appear on the online video, when the story ran live, when Ebbert sat back down, NBC superimposed a small oval where her crotch would have been visible under her very short skirt, if you could call it that. (Looks like the top cut off of a pair of white jeans.) NBC was afraid of the viewing public seeing what the FA worried his other passengers would see.

Looking at her outfit, as worn on Today, and seeing the un-ovaled video, I think I know how she transformed herself to look slightly less trashy on national TV. Watch the video and look at her when she's standing up. Based on the position of her hips, the top of the band of fabric she calls a skirt can't be much higher than her pubis. She then pulled down her shirt to cover what should have been covered by her skirt. How low her skirt was would have been more evident had we been allowed to see her from behind, particularly as she sat down.

Look at the screen cap of her sitting down. (And will you look at the simpering smile on her mom's face!) That small dark circle is the button on the waistband of her skirt, right at the top of the skirt. When she sits down, she's sitting on the entire skirt. No way is any of that covering her posterior. In fact (sorry for the bluntness) with her skirt in that position, she could probably use the toilet by just pulling up her shirt in back.

Having seen this mode of dress, my best guess is that she had the bottom of the shirt gathered above her navel, the skirt's top pulled up to her hips, somewhere below her navel, and showing everyone what Britney Spears showed everyone when she carelessly emerged from that car. Quite right for the flight attendant to require her to adjust her clothing.

As to what was she thinking, wearing that on a plane: My theory is that she was going to see the gynecologist, was on a tight travel schedule, and didn't want to waste any time having to undress.

Dawn Eden has a great take on this story, as always wittily making a profound point, in this case to the woman she calls "That Big-Chested, Long-Legged Hooters Hottie Who Almost Got Kicked Off a Plane."

That embarrassment is a gift, TBCLLHHWAGKOP. Instead of suing the airline, you should be paying it out of gratitude for showing you the truth of what you are doing every day — treating yourself as a walking commodity, and others as consumers.

(Great headline, too: "Runway Muddle.")