Last Friday was Cara’s last day at Ziff Davis, where she has worked for about the past 8 years (minus the 6 months that she was in Burundi).

When I asked Cara what part of leaving her job made her the most excited, without a doubt she was most eager to get rid of her brown pants. Cara wore brown pants to work just about every single day (except casual Fridays). At all times she has at least two pairs, so she can alternate between them. But she always sticks with the brown pants. She would have to confirm this, but I’m pretty sure that the reason that she started wearing the brown pants was because it was easier to wear the brown pants than try to come up with something “business-casual” every day.

The brown pants were so essential to her wardrobe that if something happened to one of the pairs of brown pants, she had to spend the next day in the mall shopping for a new pair. Once at a college graduation ceremony that we were at, it poured rain. Cara’s bag that she had leaked blank ink all over the brown pants. Ruined. Another time she called me to tell me that she ripped a hole in the pants climbing in the window of her apartment (she got locked out).

At any rate, the brown pants are history. Cara wanted to burn them – I convinced her not to. But one of her favorite things about her new job is that she no longer has to wear the brown pants.

— Cara, today at work