I finally mustered up enough courage for a moustache, then stocked up on short shorts galore. I now appear, half the time, like some ordinary Dad in Detroit during Reagan’s heyday. (Finally!) To fully inhabit the role though, I’m thinking I’ll need to douse my Dad skin in a dull and un-daring drugstore scent.
Tabac Original Cologne turns 50 this year. Right down to its dated, disco-era packaging, it’s just the fiery, faux-riche splash an ol’ Detroit Dad would’ve reached for. I gotta be reaching now too.
I’ve been storing adolescent junk in this military foot-locker with my family name printed on it ever since high school. It’s been buried in various basements, unceremoniously, but I’m proudly polishing it up and placing it somewhere sunnier from now on.
Being that neither my father nor any of his male relatives that I know of ever served in the military, I can’t explain the locker’s existence. My Grandpa Rees did serve as a (top secret) lawyer for the U.S. Government in the 1940s (shhh!) … so maybe that has something to do with it.
At any rate, heroically handsome as the trunk may appear on the outside, what it’s been housing deep inside is undeniably dorky: A Janet Jackson tour book, a jellyfish motif Swatch watch, and a shoe box’s worth of notes my b/f/f had written me in 10th grade.
Presented for your snooping pleasure is a 17-year-old message she’d written me covering such diverse topics as my pre-adult chest hair and which Algebra teacher we should register for. (BTW – I went by my middle name of Scott until I was almost 21.)
My parents have lived in Florida for five years and when I visit them its become a tradition for them to drive me to the abandoned Old Colony hotel where I would cross the No Trespassing tape to take photographs while they patiently waited in the car.
It unintentionally became a tradition because three years ago my parents mentioned the building was to be leveled soon so a strip-mall could take its place – but every time I came back, the pink battered beauty was still standing. I felt I owed it to her, and to the postcard perfect vision of old Florida, and to the way America used to sparkle, to continue to photograph her as long as it was still possible.
The day before Mother’s Day, my mother e-mailed me this:
“at 7 a.m. this morning, the Colony Plaza motel that the Disney people stayed at while building Disney World will be destroyed and the pink motel will be no more. Good thing you got your pictures of that piece of history while you were here.
i sure do love you, my heart.
-mom”
And then an hour later she sent this:
“They televised the implosion live. The building went down at 7:10 with a thousand pounds of dynamite sticks that were set off from the ground floor up. It sounded like a series of 20 loud gun shots, and then the building dropped and there was a huge cloud of dust that they said would be picked up by dopplar radar because it is so large. Interestingly, it was 41 years ago that there was a press conference at the hotel where there was a world-wide announcement about the construction of Disney World, so it really was a historic landmark. It will now become a shopping center. Hundreds of people were lined up to watch the implosion. They said it looked like a fourth of July parade turnout.”
Sometimes I feel like just about everything postcard perfect is being leveled by a thousand pounds of dynamite sticks, merely to be replaced by a closer Barnes & Noble or a larger Verizon Wireless store. All we can do, friends, is whip out our cameras and save what we can.
Dressing up for a day, driven by the style of a constructed character is a snappy ‘lil shortcut to refreshing a gentleman’s original, stale self.
In the Character Driven series, a single fashion find is fleshed-out, through its pairing with other items-of-interest, into a full-fledged, fictional figure, complete with a Treasury-issued name, age, and fatal character flaw.
This collegic crew from Paul Smith brought to mind a crystal lake canoe, but manned by a stiff city slicker, striving to shed his stuffiness (despite his overwrought weekend wear). EXTREME CLOSE-UP on: Mr. Bailey Anderson Haines.
‘Round where I live, there’s a trio of surplus stores called Ax-Man Surplus that offers bin after bin of obsolete odds ‘n ends. You might not need 250 doll legs, or 75 calculators shaped liked Kentucky, or half a dozen mousepads with Mr T.’s face on them, but it’s life-affirming to know there’s someone out there who will nab up that crap, and gladly.
One man’s trash is another man’s treasure after all, and nestled next to the tacky glow-in-the-dark travel thermoses, there’s also an awesome assortment of cleanly-designed and perfectly-packaged products from years gone by that, with some patience and a finely-tuned eye, transform Ax-Man into a Minnesotan version of the style-savvy Salvor Kiosk.
Last Saturday at Ax-Man, with a stupid grin on my face, I swiped up:
- 2 U.S. military pins = 1.45
- evaporating dish = 2.50
- 1980s police training shorts = .95
- metal clasp wristlet = .45
- German golden bullet = 4.95
- 2 French military arm bands = 1.50 (watch out, Chris Martin)
Never has spending sixteen bucks been such a blast.
I don’t care that spring is just getting started, and I don’t care if I’m not heading “Back to School” come September. I’m already prepping the pencils, sweater vests, campus ties, and textbook satchels I’ll need for autumn in order to fulfill my annual tradition of pretending I’m the sullen but stylish co-ed I wish I had truly been, back in the day.
Handmade in England, the leather bags from The Cambridge Satchel Company are playing a crucial role in my schoolboy ruse this year. I’m thinking a navy blue batchel (a satchel with a handle on top) embossed with “Wm” in gold lettering.
Some say it’s harder to look suave in shorts in comparison to a full pant. I agree – unless the shorts are decidedly short.
I realize I’m in the minority but, more and more, knee-length shorts seem stupidly squat, square and style-stunted to my eye. The choice of beer-gutted grandpas golfing.
A shorter short, six-inched inseams or less, suggests the seductive swagger of the early 80s or a movie star from Milano making waves on a hot ‘n haute yacht.
I may be stuck in the year 2009, surrounded by WalMarts and Golf Galaxys, but my super-swank and super-short shorts will strongly suggest otherwise.
This is the second moustache I’ve admired now that seems to be naked in the middle dip above the lip. It adds a groovy gigolo-like gusto but I’m wondering…
Do men shave their moustaches to get that effect or are they naturally bare right there?
(Confession: I just tried carving myself out a bare bit above my lip and it did NOT go well. OM total G. )
April was a brutal month ’round here and only the promise of a long weekend later in May was making life bearable.
As a Treasurer, daydreams of my trips revolve less around where I’ll be, and veer closer to what I’ll pack and in what I’ll pack it all. I’ve considered this trio of canvas pieces at Luggage.com:
All of them timeless, rugged yet refined, and half the price of other much blogged-about brands.
In the end, I might opt for something all-leather though just to watch it bruise and soften over the years. Maybe something like the Latico overnight bag.
Decisions, decisions.
(Note: The site’s briefcases section is just as major.)
