I’m from Oklahoma (which is a great place to be from, I hasten to add); I don’t get back much so it delights me to hear news from my home state. The following Christmas tale is especially heartwarming.

In the town where my family lives, two women were recently arrested for shoplifting clothes from a department store. Shoplifting in itself is pretty unremarkable, especially at this time of year. What is remarkable about this pair is how they did it.

Ailene Brown, 28, and Shmeco Thomas, 37, were busted at the TJ Maxx in Edmond, Okla., when loss-prevention officers spotted them hiding stuff under their belly fat and their breasts.

Let me repeat that – they were hiding stuff under their belly fat and their breasts.

Cops said the dynamic duo took four pair of boots, three pair of jeans, a wallet and gloves; all totaled, the pair had managed to hide $2,600 worth of stuff under their … uh … insulation.

Again, let me repeat – four pairs of boots (that’s eight boots total, for you liberal arts majors) three pair of jeans, a wallet and some gloves. Under their fat rolls.

Man, that conjures up all sorts of unpleasant mental images, as well as lots of questions you probably really don’t want answered. Like, eight boots? Really? Assuming they split up the booty (Ha! See what I did there? Magic!) evenly, that’s still four boots apiece. How do you hide four boots on your person? Actually, I’m pretty sure I don’t want to know.

The story prompts another question: what happened to all that merchandise that had been hidden where – so to speak – the sun don’t shine? Does it go back on the shelf for some unsuspecting shopper to buy and perhaps give to someone on Christmas morning? I hope not – can you imagine a loved one opening their present and asking, “Mommy, how come my new gloves smell like boobies?” Not pretty.

This is one place where those new airport scanners would have come in handy. In fact, I bet the cops who had to search these ladies would have chipped in and bought one on the spot.

Here’s a thought – if those scanners make it harder for would-be terrorists to smuggle stuff onto planes, then I bet they’d also make it harder to smuggle stuff out of stores. On the other hand, if someone can hide pretty much an entire ensemble under her (or – let’s be fair – his) fat rolls, I really don’t wanna see them nearly naked – on a scanner or anywhere else.

As distasteful as this tale is, it could have been worse – they could have been boosting stuff from Hickory Farms. I don’t even want to think about where they might have hidden the cheese logs.