At a recent MSO rehearsal, something just felt wrong. It finally started distracting me so much that I had to stop the rehearsal in order to figure out the problem. Once the room was quiet and I could hear my own clothing (yeah… my senses are crisscrossed, so I literally hear texture), I realized my pants were slightly askew so the center seam in the back wasn’t quite lined up with my… well… you know. This was creating a deafening static-like noise in my brain; so rather than let it continue making me nutso, I set down my baton and adjusted my pants right there on the podium. When it’s late in the day and you’re shaped like me, textile realignments require some Herculean elastic push-pull. Things stick to other things or tuck themselves into areas that make dislodging cumbersome and impossible to conceal with a mere nonchalant posture shift. I was forced to explain myself in the process. Once the mission was accomplished and the musicians regained their composure, the rest of the rehearsal went much better; however, I’m sure the front row of string players still wish they had the power to unsee those alarming girations.