Invasion of the Mannequin Snatchers?

I don't go clothes shopping very often mainly because I don't enjoy shopping. Every now and then I'm in the mood, or need a piece of clothing and so, I go. Which is what I did one morning last week.

While I was standing in line I vaguely noticed a man's plaid shirt and  dark green down vest on a mannequin near the cashier area. It wasn't until I was in bed that evening (after a very short and successful shopping trip) that I considered the mannequin. It was one of those greyish-whiteish somewhat featureless forms resembling ancient Greek statues that have been left out in the elements for centuries.

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And I wondered. Whatever happened to the ubiquitous humanoid Barbie doll mannequins I grew up seeing? Do you remember them? The females had plastic-y hair styled in bobs or flips. Their red pouty lips smirked and their arrogantly staring eyes were stylized with horrendous blue eyeshadow (whoever thought blue eyeshadow ever looked good on anyone real or plastic?). Their shapes were Barbie doll hourglass perfect and they had bare, toe-less feet. The male Ken doll cohort stared at passersby with blank blue or brown eyes and a perfect plastic pompadour of blond, brunette, or brownette.

So, they were actually the thing of nightmares.

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And the replacement models are no more endearing with their sometimes bald heads and bland, androgynous, often featureless faces (but continuing to possess  Barbie and Ken style bodies).

When did the new models replace the old? I don't actually remember the take-over.

The question, however, that really disturbed me as I lay sleepless that dark, hushed night was, what happened to the thousands, or maybe millions of humanoid mannequins? Did semi trucks quietly rumble down discreet back alleys, park in the shadows of closed buildings, soundlessly open their doors, silently steal into stores and kidnap the mannequins? Did the bland-faced mannequins plot a silent coup? Did stores open one bright, cloudless morning and discover featureless zombie mannequins had replaced the garishly shaded faithful mannequins of old?

Did hundreds of semi trucks travel along the highways of America stuffed full of naked mannequins? Where did they take them? Are they in mannequin Guantanamo? Incarcerated in cold, dank, abandoned warehouses? Were they dumped in dozens of landfills across our beautiful land and crushed to smithereens?

Someone needs to investigate this and discover what happened to the missing humanoid mannequins.

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