Don't Forget to Register Your Inaugural Ball Gown

Avoid the embarrassment of showing up at an inaugural ball wearing the same dress as someone else:

You search for weeks before finding the perfect gown for an inaugural ball. You're thrilled; its silhouette and color are exactly what you had imagined.

Then, on the night of the fete, you spot another woman wearing the same dress.

Oh, the horror!

A new Web site, http://www.dressregistry.com, hopes to limit these social nightmares by allowing you to "register" the gown you're wearing to a specific inaugural ball. It includes a place to detail the color, length, designer, neckline description and other distinguishing characteristics. You can even upload a photo.

The genius behind it?

A man.

Andrew Jones got the idea after his wife traveled from their home in West Palm Beach, Fla., to New York City to buy a gown for a charity ball in their hometown — solely to avoid seeing the same dress at the event.

I can think of all sorts of evil things one could do with that website. Go on there and register lots of expensive designer gowns, thus driving the hoity-toity women crazy who thought they had an original. It'll stimulate the economy as all those ladies rush out to find something else.

You can have the same effect by looking to see what's already registered, and then registering the same gown two or three more times. You'll drive them all bats.