It Turns Out That if You Leave Your Underpants Around a Hardware Store as a TikTok Gag, the Police WILL Have a Word With You

You know, I consider myself a man with the gift of self-awareness. I know who I am and I'm comfortable in my own skin. So while the public may see me as a dashing, silver haired fox with a glamorous lifestyle and the admiration of men and women alike, that's just the image I project. 

The reality is that I'm just living the quiet, normal life of a simple suburban homeowner. And as such, one of my not-guilty pleasures is a visit to a hardware store. Whether it's the small, local franchisee where you can find the exact anchor screws I need to hang that framed piece of a bleacher seat signed by Adam Vinatieri commemorating the final points scored in Foxboro Stadium, to the giant home improvement chains to replace the Cordless, Light-Filtering, Top-Down Bottom-Up, Single Cellular Shades that don't stay up any more, that world is my dojo. I mean, I'm no Ron Swanson:

But give me a Saturday project when I have nowhere else to be, a history podcast in my earbuds, and I'm one happy Do It Yourselfer. 

You know what is not my world? TikTok. I mean, I use it for blog purposes. But it's a culture I do not belong to. Where I'm a stranger in a strange land. And when those two worlds collide, it can't possibly be a good thing:

News.com Australia- When Layla Kelly spotted two policemen standing on her front doorstep, her heart dropped.

The 33-year-old says she was told by the pair that they were there to have a “very serious talk”.

“I instantly thought, oh my god, someone has died,” the Wellington, New Zealand mum told news.com.au. …

In what she describes a bizarre twist, they were there to talk about one of her videos that had recently gone viral on social media. …

The two cops had been sent to Layla’s house to talk about a playful video she had filmed in a nearby Bunnings hardware store weeks earlier.

As a popular pornographic film star, she explained that she uses social media to hook new views and advertise her profile on subscription based adult content site, Only Fans. 

In one of her clips, she and a friend filmed themselves jokingly taking their underwear off and leaving them in parts of Bunnings as a “surprise for the dads” and the “hard working tradies”.

It rapidly went viral, racking up over 15 million views. …

Layla – who won the title of New Zealand’s ‘Best Porn Star’ for 2023 – also says she was “double layered”, meaning she was wearing another pair underneath.“They were simply a prop for the video, we didn’t really take our underwear off,” she said.

“You can’t believe everything you see online. I also wouldn’t leave my underwear for free like that."

Ordinarily I'm no fan of this sort of authoritarian overreach. In fact, when you hear about police in some countries trying to crack down on someone for stating a socio-political opinion online, it can be nothing short of chilling. But I have to take the side of New Zealand's finest here. 

Regardless of whether Layla Kelly and her friend were double or even octuple layered, stay in your lane, ladies. Go produce content for the lonely incels who subscribe to your OnlyFans. Try to win New Zealand's Best Porn Star in back-to-back years. At least these are noble pursuits. Playing to your audience, giving the people what they want and all that. Just leave our sacred hardware stores out of it. 

When I was a kid, my dad would stop at the local multi-use store where he could pick up a 5-pound bag of 1-inch finishing nails and a GI Quart of Carling's Black Label and he and the owner knew each other on a first name basis. They didn't have to worry about finding some harpy's soiled panties dangling from the rack of roofing hammers. Sometimes a guy just wants to be in a guy's world. And when I'm swinging by the power tool section and reach for some cordless screwdriver to decide if I want to put on my Christmas list, I don't want to grab a handful of some 33 year old mom's used thong. And if I ever do, I'm not calling the local PD. I'm going right to the Environmental Protection Agency to report a bio-hazard. 

So thanks for trying, Layla. But seriously, stick to giving sad misfits something to pleasure themselves to and leave us DIYers to our business. Those shelves in our office aren't going to hang themselves.