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Back in the '90s, this happened at prom -- and we were PISSED.

Prom season is here! Magazines, websites and well-meaning-but-crazy family members have been preparing girls for this magical dance for years, ensuring that prom is second only to a wedding in terms of a young woman's self-worth. How exciting!

Such a grand occasion calls for just the right dress -- something classy yet memorable, unique but age appropriate. Unfortunately, the prom dress websites we've researched have terrible grammar and cater only to future escorts who have crackwhores for moms. Where are the pastel cupcake dresses from Footloose or the black taffeta number that both Brenda and Kelly wore on Beverly Hills 90210? But perhaps we're jaded and aren't seeing these gowns with clear eyes. Maybe we need a dose of reality from someone who's lived through two tantrum-prone girls clamoring to grow up too fast.

Enter our mother Marsha, a corn-fed Ohioan with good taste and solid Midwestern values. We showed Mom a few dresses and asked if we could wear them to prom. Boy, did she have opinions:

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Photo: Jen Silverberg

Tom Kavanaugh's "No Sweat" will trace five articles of clothing to the factory where they were made.

Tom Kavanaugh realizes his documentary on sweatshops in the clothing industry won't be an easy one to make. For starters, the companies he plans to profile -- Walmart and Nike, to name a few -- aren't likely to cooperate. Then there are the language barriers and other logistical challenges of shooting a documentary that will largely take place in Southeast Asia and Central America.

But the biggest hurdle, for the moment, is financial. The 35-year-old SLU grad estimates the movie will cost at least $150,000 to make. So last week the budding filmmaker turned to Kickstarter to help raise part of those funds.

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NYT Style Page

A story with far-reaching importance.

Can we all just agree that the New York Times Style section is the most important source of news in our time? How else would we know about all the ways wealthy, Ivy League-educated residents of Williamsburg and Park Slope mingle, mate, marry, raise dogs and children and send those dogs and children to private clubs and private schools and thence to Ivy League institutions (children only). Ah! the circle of life!

But today's edition contains the most important story we have read all week. Even more than the Manti Te'o fake-girlfriend hoax. Yes, it's true. Webster Groves-raised supermodel Karlie Kloss has a new haircut!

Take a minute to absorb that. This is a story that has far-reaching importance. You may never have a fake dead girlfriend. But you can get Karlie's new haircut, known as the Chop or, simply, the Karlie. Everyone will be getting Karlie's new haircut. It is the haircut of the year. The Style section has declared it so!

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Stan Kroenke, walking tonsorial faux pas.

Stan Kroenke, owner of the St. Louis Rams, Arsenal Gunners, Colorado Avalanche and a few other sports teams we're too lazy to mention, No. 92 on the Forbes 400 list, subject of a recent and thoroughly unilluminating Sports Illustrated profile, is 65 years old and -- if for no other reason than that he's a grown man -- is entitled to dress himself however the hell he wants.

And wear his, um, hair however he wants.

But dude would actually look kinda rad if he shaved off that 1970s cop 'stache and the -- let's face it -- small rodent perched atop his dome.

Really, if he took those two small steps, he'd actually look like a guy who can bench press 225 pounds.

See for yourself....

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Perhaps our favorite part about People of Walmart, a site where readers submit photos of Walmart fashion, is that you can isolate just one state -- like ours!

Click through to see who's been shopping at Missouri Walmart stores in the last year.

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Dormify founder and Wash. U. senior Amanda Zuckerman in the bedroom of her off-campus apartment, decorated with Dormify's Fall Into Fall bedding collection.

Amanda Zuckerman is a young woman with discerning tastes. "I'm very into fashion," she says. "And if you care about fashion, you're going to care about how your dorm room looks. It's another form of self-expression."

Three years ago, though, when she and her mom, Karen, made the epic shopping trip to purchase fittings for her very first dorm room at Washington University, she was bitterly disappointed.

"Everything was so youthful," she complains. "It's stuff I could have had back in elementary school."

As they made the rounds of stores near their home in Potomac, Maryland, trying to assemble, piecemeal, a dorm room that would best display Zuckerman's personal style, an idea occurred to them: Why not start a business that sold cool, sophisticated dorm room furnishings all in one place and shipped them straight to school?

Now Dormify.com is one of the leading online retailers for stylish extra-long twin sheets, comforters, decorative pillows, wall hangings, desk accessories and, most importantly for dorm rooms, not known for their spaciousness, storage boxes and organizers. A team of 250 style advisers at colleges across the country are on-hand to tell shoppers exactly what to do with it all.

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gotopless.org

GoTopless encourages the women of Columbia to free their, um, minds.

Free your breasts, and your mind will follow. Such is the mantra of GoTopless.org, an offshoot of a religious movement tied to UFOs that is bringing its fight for bare breasts to mid-Missouri later this month.

"When a woman takes her top off in public, there's a chemical reaction in her brain that is very powerful," explains Donna Newman, a Raelian priest and spokeswoman for GoTopless.org. "It's something men will never understand. We want it written into the Constitution that women should be allowed to go shirt-free in public. We were human beings before we're gendered."

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Private citizen Sarah Palin is free to dress however she pleases when stumping for her friend and fellow "mama grizzly" Sarah Steelman. It's a free country, after all.

photo via @davecatanese

But what the hell is going on with Palin's outfit?
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Steve Truesdell

World Naked Bike Ride started at Grand St. on Saturday night.

See also:

WNBR 2012 slideshow part 1

WNBR 2012 slideshow part 2

WNBR 2012 part 3 (the thrilling conclusion! hint: everyone's still naked).

Ah, to feel the wind in your pubic hair. It is a rare treat many enjoyed this weekend at World Naked Bike Ride St. Louis. At least those among us who still have public hair, anyway.

Wouldn't it be great to bike in the buff all the time? Huh, Mayor Slay? Can we? Please? Laws governing public nudity in Missouri can be pretty hairy. Below, we do our best to give you the basic quick and dirty.

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Spotted outside Baked T's in the Delmar Loop:

Isn't this a little premature? Especially since we've got 100-degree temperatures lined up as far as the National Weather Service can see?

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