When I was first interviewed for this job a few years back, I asked my interviewer if NWsource had a dress code. I'd just come from a daily newspaper where ties were required attire in the newsroom, and before that I worked for a Web site where — while it was not a requirement — they did tend to receive me more favorably in the office when I wore collared shirts.

Threadless.com's user-designed T-shirts are to die for.

My interviewer smiled and said, "Geoff, this is Seattle."

So it is. Not to sound ungrateful, but the closest that most Seattleites come to business formal is black fleece. When I got the job, I celebrated by cutting many of my ties in half, putting my Guayabera shirts in storage and stocking up on T-shirts: short sleeves for spring and summer and long sleeve jerseys for autumn, winter and formal occasions.

It's not as easy as it sounds. Until recently I bought my unadorned T-shirts from The Gap, figuring one black cotton T-shirt was as good as another. But not too long ago, I shifted my loyalties to American Apparel, and I'm unlikely to return to The Gap, even if they did discontinue those agonizingly twee Sarah Jessica Parker commercials. I've already paid two visits to American's University District location this month to stock up.

Why? Well, as much as I admire American Apparel's mission — to produce American-made, sweatshop-free apparel for nominal prices — I like the store for reasons Sarah Jessica Parker likely couldn't comprehend: American Apparel's T-shirts are lighter and more durable than those I used to dig out of The Gap, and they just plain feel better.

Also, American Apparel's stock is so focused, and its sales people so non-obtrusive, that I can get into and out of the store within five minutes — and that's a blessing for someone who fears clothes shopping as much as I do.

However, there are those special occasions when a plain T-shirt just won't do. Perhaps you're going out bar hopping or planning to walk through a particularly self-aware part of town (cough Capitol Hill cough). The world of T-shirts-with-something-written-on-'em is a big and often times scary place, with shirts emblazoned with fine graphic designs at one extreme and "I'm with Stupid" at the other. Fortunately, I've found a few hip vendors that allow me to maintain the look that cranky urban critic James Howard Kunstler recently dubbed "10th grade nerd."

Recently featured in Wired Magazine, Threadless.com combines the democracy of open-source design, the competitive vibe of reality television and the near-limitless canvas that is the blank T-shirt. Subscribers to the site submit their own designs, and the general public is invited to vote on their favorites. The winners are unlike anything you've seen: In the Threadless world, knives talk ("Put me in your enemies!"), corporate mascots dole out abuse and pillow fights are fatal. The price is right too — between $15 and $17 for both men's and women's shirts.

The T-shirt designs of Gama-Go, while no less quirky than those of Threadless, are a bit more warm and fuzzy. Here you'll find squids shaking martinis, birds smoking cigars and "Deathbot," who's a lot less scary than he sounds. Gama-Go's women's designs are every bit as fun as the men's; I feel compelled to mention my favorite, which gives new meaning to the old saying "Kitten with a Whip". Gama-Go's shirts are expensive — $25 on the average — but just imagine the looks of sheer, naked jealousy these little babies will inspire on the Hill.

Hey, that reminds me that Capitol Hill is home to B-Bam Custom Tees. I haven't bought any shirts from the store yet, but I'm almost certain to in the future, even if I have to design the shirt myself. You see, B-Bam will put anything you damn well like on a T-shirt — your pithy sayings, pictures of your mom, the tenets by which you live your life and so on. The price is $14.99 for a one-sided shirt, with an additional side costing an extra $7.50, an absolute steal in terms of do-it-yourself advertising (or proselytizing). I haven't decided what to put on my shirts yet, but that's not unusual: It took me 10 years to decide on a tattoo.

"To the moon, Alice!" Krysztof Nemeth's designs catapult classic pinup art into the future.

Fortunately, a pair of wonderfully talented local graphic artists aren't as wishy-washy as I am. Pinup artist Krysztof Nemeth offers a number of sexy (borderline lurid) designs through his Charm School Web site, many of which are very limited editions. Ditto the work of Sam Trout, whose swirling, colorful women's T-shirt designs almost make me wish I'd been born onto the other team.

By now, you're probably saying to yourself, "Oh, I've had enough symbolism. I want a shirt that says something immediate about the current presidential administration or something favorable — yet falsely modest, of course — about my sexual prowess." (I read your mind, I know. It's a gift.) I suggest Glarkware, which offers jokey shirts bearing slogans along the lines of "Please Touch My Monkey." Or try Peeka-Booda, which taps into the enduring spirit of the '70s with shirts that declare "Death Before Disco" and "I Love Big Jugs." (To hold copious amounts of strawberry preserves, there's nothing better.)

I could go on like this indefinitely, but I'm going to limit myself to just two more T-shirt Web shops, both of which are, curiously enough, the side products of popular web comics. The T-shirts of Diesel Sweeties are very much in line with the namesake comic's techno-snotty mentality, and I mean that in a nice way. Diesel Sweeties' T-shirts boast pixilated, old video game-style designs and hip, happening slogans like "Nothing is any good if other people like it" and "Monkeys are good people."

If you want something even more hip, get some shirts from the Homestar Runner Web store. Generally, I assume that everyone's seen this hilarious, Web-only cartoon, but every once in a while, someone surprises me by looking askance at my Homestar Runner T-shirts and asking, "What's a Trogdor?" or "Who is the Teen Girl Squad?", or simply, "Uh, why would you wear that?"

The answers to the first two questions can be found in the Homestar Runner Web cartoons. The answer to the third question is obvious: Because it's Seattle, my friends, and because I can.