Went to the mall for a little while tonight.  Went to the mall and HOLY HELL, what in the name of mercy is going on with women's clothing this season?  I wasn't shopping for anything in particular; I just wanted to walk around a bit after a big dinner.  And thank God for that because ladies, this season...We have been punk'd.Let me make it clear that all of these pictures were not taken at stores called Grim Fashion or Soul Suckers.  No, they were all taken in the anchor stores at my local mall (you know who you are), the smallest of which only has locations in five states, and two of them are in all fifty.  And they were all taken in the general, Misses' Sportswear section.  No Junior, no Women's, no "This is that weird corner where I shop for my Grandma" sections.  Straight-up, on-trend, non-clearance, Misses' sections.  And a significant portion of the pictures were taken of clothing placed prominently, on high-traffic corner mannequins or 6-foot feature tables that faced a main walkway or were front-facing on tall center racks.  It started here, and I don't usually take offense to embellished shells, but this one seemed confused.  Take a look again at that detailing...Let's get a better look at that embellishment, shall we?Ladies, repeat after me: No one shirt can do all things.  But in all seriousness, even though I think the shirt sucks, it isn't THAT bad. Then I looked around.Feel free to click on all of the photos for enlargements, so you can get the full grasp of the shopping horror.  It will enhance your viewing experience like no other thing.  And I digress.Holy crap. I've always looked forward to spring fashions; they're generally light and cheery, and remind us that we're moving away from heavy clothes and won't have to wear shirts that remind us of gloomy days or drudgery.  But not this season.  Horizontal stripes, flaccid colors and poorly-planned and/or executed design surrounded me, as far as the eye could see. If you need proof that there is a war against women, you could start right in the stores.I've taken the liberty of adding commentary directly to some photos, as I saw fit...

It's only marginally less unappealing in fuchsia.In keeping with the "shapeless" trend, I give you the following:

While we're looking at ill-conceived sweaters, let me direct you to Freddy Krueger's sweater, reimagined as a deconstructed cardigan.

 And a plethora of stripes, stripes, stripes.

Garbage bag, muffin top, however you choose to describe it, it will poof out in all the unsexy places.  Once you move past lilac/buff/taupe/peach/and what I can only describe as "burnt magenta", please feast your eyes on the woeful return of the parachute material.

This shirt also signals the start of an unfortunate run of pale-yellow-and-white stripes, which perhaps more than any other -and-white combo just looks like it's trying so damn hard to be interesting, but fails miserably.

As though slapping the necklace on the mannequin on the left can add any sort of spark of life or interest.Seriously, I dare you to find all the things that are wrong with the above set of shirts.This is probably my favorite of the "horrific horizontal stripe" set, though there are so many legitimate and qualified contenders.

I'll reserve my ultimate favorites for later.  Now, we move on to shoes.  Because it seems that for all the melancholy that has been sewn into women's attire, they've gone batshit crazy with shoes, especially if they're some kind of flat.Here's more wrong things to do with snakeskin on a ballerina flat:

And this shoe looks like it's been used by tree frogs as a repository for their egg sacs.

Don't believe me?

But my favorites for this season, the clothes that I think bear the most impact, are the ones that help the potential buyer lose all sense of hope or joy, the ones that push the light right out of their eyes.If these mannequins were people, they would be standing in the "greeter" position in the store, handing out complimentary copies of No Exit and  mimeographed rules for Russian roulette.  These aren't clothes that make you think, ooh, I want to shop here!  These are clothes that make you think, well...wearing this beats getting arrested.

My boyfriend says, in his eternal quest to try and understand the ugliness that inhabits the world, that maybe--just maybe--shirts like this are showing this season because more and more people are in the medical field, and they've gotten used to wearing scrubs.  And I say that if that is the case, if we can't break people from the habit of wearing things that people bleed and explosively poo and boogie all over, then it is certain that all hope is lost.

By the looks of things, I'm fairly sure that if one of us is right, it's me.

We can witness the debilitating effects that occur when you combine shapelessness and colorblocking in the next dress:

I actually think to fully grasp the misery woven into the very fibers of this dress, you need to see it from a slightly different angle:

Because I, for one, can't wait to appear in public looking like a refugee from a prison gym class, with a torso covered in putty.For all its magnificent anguish, however, this dress still doesn't win my award for most dismal piece of attire I managed to come across in one infernal evening.  That award, without reservation or hesitation, rests firmly in the patent-lined collar of this next pair of shoes.Now, this shoe.  I'm not sure if it's the (ONCE AGAIN!) combination of khaki + dusty coral, or if it's because the designer tried to lighten the mood by the hot pink toecap and blue-and-green heel cap.  But.  This is bad.  This is what clown shoes would look like if a clown had to stop clowning and get office work.  These aren't vibrant.  These aren't energizing.  These are the shoes of a sad, lost clown, with a bad haircut and a big flowery brooch that doesn't shoot a single drop of water.Wanna know what's creepy?  These shoes?  Go with that dress.

Maybe the Mayans were right.