Has this happened to anyone else?

When I was a kid just into puberty, I was ecstatic when one day I checked the mail to learn that we'd begun receiving the Victoria's Secret catalog. My mother, however, was not so excited. You see, she hadn't ordered the catalog, and the addressee was my father. Dad maintained his innocence and claimed to have no knowledge of how he got on their mailing list. Never-the-less, the catalog arrived every three months like clockwork to re-stir the familial tension.

Having been out of the house for nearly a decade and married for the past four years, I hadn't thought about that in some time. Then Friday afternoon, my lovely wife was flipping through the mail and informed me that I had received a coupon. "Did you need some pink cotton panties?" she inquired. I tried to conjure the words to encapsulate my confusion, but before I could stammer, "Huh?", she showed me the postcard sized advertisment--addressed specifically to me--from Victoria's Secret.

I was lucky. As newlyweds, we spend almost every waking hour together, so my pleas of ignorance regarding how I managed to land on their roles did not appear as redflags of an affair. (Full disclosure: I've never stepped a foot in the place. On the rare occasions my beautiful bride insist on going in, I depart and play with the gadgets at Sharper Image across the hall.) Other guys, not so lucky.

On one hand, I was annoyed. How the hell did Victoria's Secret get my name and address on their mailing list? On the other hand, I was relieved. Any psychoanalysis I may end up partaking in won't have to dig up doubts that my dad had been unfaithful to my mom. And if I had a third hand, I would be impressed.

Victoria's Secret has come up with the perfect marketing ploy. They get the information of married men (probably from credit card companies) and send them stuff. The wives see the stuff, then assume the man must have gotten on the mailing list when he purchased something there. You know what that means? The guy better have something from VS he's been saving for a special occasion...which means, said husband better get to V.S. lickety split so he'll have something ready. It's genius.