This morning I realized that Today’s Young People have created the need for a device which can assess the pajama-like qualities of one’s outfit in a quick and objective manner to determine whether or not it qualifies as clothing for the purposes of, say, attending school.  This pajameter could be used at the school entrance alongside the metal detector.

I feel old and curmudgeonly complaining about the trend of wearing pajamas in public, but honestly, it’s so silly and sloppy, and how can it possibly be appropriate in a Learning Environment?  When you are supposed to be sitting up and paying attention and thinking clearly, wearing the same garments you would wear while asleep in bed is not going to help!

Furthermore, if it is 40 degrees outside and pouring rain, and if you ride the city bus to a stop two blocks away from your school and then walk, and if that bus stop is at an intersection notorious for the deep flooding of its gutters, flannelette pants are not a practical choice.  This morning I watched a group of high school students fording the intersection of which we have a bird’s-eye view from the kitchen window of our cliffside home, and at least three of them appeared to be wearing pajama pants.

Then my son, whose gym teacher handed out cheap pedometers a few months ago, announced that he was going to wear his pedometer today, and in my mind this new word leapt forth!

Unlike autumnymity and distortellini and grildebeest, other people have thought of this word–but they have conceived of the pajameter as a device for counting your steps when sleepwalking.  That could be accomplished with a regular pedometer (if you can keep it affixed to your pajama pants–the one Nicholas got tends to leap off one’s waistband at the slightest nudge) so let’s save any pajameter research funding for combatting this foolish fashion trend!

But I’ve got other research to do first.  Meanwhile, I would love to hear from anyone who has established a Pajametric System for determining whether the pajamoid qualities of a particular outfit exceed societal norms.