Some young men out there get it. . .

An old Laurence Fellows illustration, showing, I believe, what male undergrads wore in the mid-1930s.

Mornings like this do a man's heart good. Very early today, about 7:40am, while I was in the dining commons on campus enjoying a cup of fresh, black coffee before my first class of the day, a young man approached me to compliment what I had on. Even more important and noteworthy was his own ensemble: a charcoal two-button sports jacket, a blue OCBD shirt with diagonal striped tie, creased khakis with a belt, and black bit loafers.

Everything seemed to fit him pretty well and was worn where it should be worn rather than down around his knees. I'm sure the student in question had a presentation or something for one of his classes today, but he looked damned nice at a glance as we spoke, which I let him know, and he had clearly made some effort to look not just presentable but actually good in a traditional, non-hipsterish way. Nice to see a young man dressing without ironic intent. Who knows? There might be hope yet for some of these young bucks.

-- Heinz-Ulrich

This particular Fellows illustration is definitely on campus. The background structures here have always reminded me of the Cathedral of Learning and the nearby Heinz Chapel on the University of Pittsburgh. I studied Swedish at Pitt for two years and used to sing in the chapel with a Scandinavian choral group.

Comments

Up North Style. . .

Bad Dad makes a friend. YMP and Bad Dad on the shores of Lake Michigan. Or was that Crystal Lake? The Grand Duchess takes a selfie in her kayak. How NOT to impress the girls sunning themselves along the river. YMP and Bad Dad kayaking on the Platte River headed toward Loon Lake. J ust back from a week in Northern Michigan in a charming and spacious house on the banks of the Betsie River outside of Thompsonville. A largely pleasant seven days despite some challenging episodes with the Young Master, who has picked up some very questionable habits and language from his friends in the 8th Grade during the school year just ended. But otherwise, we enjoyed ourselves and contemplated remaining for a few days longer since the house was available. In the end, we decided to return home as planned originally since neither my wife, nor I wanted to spend the remaining days chained to our computers in Zoom meetings from our vacation destination. I actually managed to leave the laptop and ip

Mid-June Thursday Style. . .

A nother pretty typical variation on the theme for late spring, summer, and very early fall. I'm a huge fan of Madras and have several such shirts in the seasonal rotation. Lightweight, exceedingly comfortable, and even dressy when pressed and tucked in, which is the usual way of things here at Totleigh in the Wold. Now, if I had my druthers, I'd still rather be skiing the trails in the upper half of "The Mitten" (of Michigan), in the Upper Peninsula, or Ontario. But summers ain't so bad either, and I'd look pretty funny walking around in cross-country ski attire during June. -- Heinz-Ulrich

A Lazy Saturday at the End of June. . .

A sleepy first half of the weekend here at Totleigh. Warmer and quite humid ahead of an approaching cool front here in Mid-Michigan. Perfect for yet another pair of chino shorts an a seersucker shirt -- tucked in of course -- with the usual leather deck shoes and ribbon belt. Otherwise, not much accomplished beyond a page or so of writing and monkeying around with audio settings for an upcoming podcast episode. However, I was not completely useless yesterday! I made a huge fruit salad for dinner, which the Grand Duchess and I enjoyed a short while later at the table on the back porch. The Young Master, as is his wont on Saturday evenings, took his dinner on a tray in the TV room upstairs where he whiled away a couple of hours on Flight Simulator, flying some sort of commercial airliner to some destination across the Atlantic or Pacific. I would have loved that sort of technology at about nine or 10 way back during the late 1970s, aka The Stone Age. As it is, my sister and

Classic Style

Search This Blog