These predicaments Wifey gets me into always start innocently enough.

Like … let's go out to eat tonight. Or … we need to go buy something for the baby. Or … there's a fiery meteor heading straight for our block; everyone's evacuating to the mall … RUN.

Whatever the reason, I'm always taken from the safe, cozy, butt-hugging confines of my leather recliner. And, somehow, some way, I end up standing … lonely … in Forever 21 … for forever minutes.

If it's not that particular women's clothing store, it's another. They're all the same for a husband.

No matter how cool or casual we try to appear, we always get that same look from other female shoppers.

Why's that guy just standing there? Creepy.

Our wives aren't with us. They're dolphins swimming in an ocean of fabrics, weaving in and out of circular racks with glee. Meanwhile, we're isolated, cold and lonely, looking not like happily married men but like desperate prowlers for whom eHarmony has failed.

What's a man to do? I usually just lean on a rack and play with my phone. But I always seem to be in someone's way. Usually this person is impatient and scary and not at all understanding, as if I'm really trying to hog all the spaghetti straps for myself.

I've even tried to purposely find the ugliest rack of clothes and lean on that one, since they attract less traffic. It's usually a rack of pant suits. But I'm always scared that Hillary Clinton is going to jump out of the rack.

So I just kind of wander, trying to look natural, until an employee comes up and asks me if I need help, and then I realize I'm kind of near the fitting room, which is kind of creepy, so I kind of want to say, "Yes, I need help, I need help getting out of here."

And so I go elsewhere in the store.

But I can't escape that music, that ultra-peppy music. It's loud, but not Man Loud. It's like someone wired the entire sound system with 100 tweeters — and absolutely no woofers. Barry White would be inaudible in stores like this.

It hurts my brain. I just want to break into the "employees only" section, wire up two 15s and blast E-40 until all the costume jewelry hits the floor.

But instead, I just wander the store, not trying to get in the way.

How do women make sense of all these options? They actually want to shop and look at every rack. Men, we shop when we realize: Need black shirt. So we get in the car, drive over and walk into the store focused only on the fact: Need black shirt. And so we simply buy the first black shirt we see, even if that means buying off a dude already wearing it.

But back to Forever 21, which really should be the title of a kick-butt movie about Blackjack … but it's not.

I'd leave, but Wifey begs me to stay. She says she wants my opinion. I scoff. She offers pizza afterward. I become Tommy Hilfiger.

I do have a blessing nowadays: My daughter. When she's shopping with us, I'm no longer the creepy guy hanging out in the women's section. Now I'm the poor dad trying to keep his toddler from running through the racks and knocking everything onto the floor.

Either way, I can't win.

Women don't have the same problem when they come shopping with us. They actually like shopping with us. Dressing us up is a treat. It takes them back to their Barbie days.

Malibu Mike now comes accessorized with vertical stripes, giving the illusion he's had a good week of cardio.


Mike Hazelwood's column appears every other weekend in Inspire. Follow him @MikeyHazelwood on Twitter or e-mail

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