December Friday Retreat Style. . .

After a long week [the final week of classes this semester/term] of responding to last minute, panicked student emails -- Almost always, they create their own problems. -- and committee meetings of one kind or another, it is finally Friday with a relatively easy day ahead. I have a midday lunch retreat with program colleagues, which I am looking forward to. These are always fairly informal, fun discussions with a pleasant group of interesting people and personalities from around the world. So why not don a bit of celebratory dress for the occasion?

The only "new" item here is a vintage silk bow tie from J. Press -- in seasonally appropriate colors -- that is seeing its inaugural wearing today. Managed to nail tying it on the first try this morning, so it has only taken about a dozen attempts in the last 12 months to learn. As I mentioned in an earlier post this month, I do not plan to go full bow tie on everyone, but now and again, these items are a neat way to shake up the usual mix.

The socks are a bit much with this particular combination, admittedly, but I could not manage to dig out some plain navy or dark green from the related dresser drawer in the early morning light, and grabbed these instead. Let's just say that it is always good to include one item that doesn't quite work with everything else to avoid an overly studied appearance.

The Optimo 'Dearborn' fedora garnered a compliment and smile from a female passerby on my walk from the parking lot into the library cafe this morning, which was a pleasant start to the day. Two other favorable comments followed later in the day about the bow tie and overall appearance respectively. Never necessary, as I say, but compliments are always nice to hear from people who notice.

On a related note, my wife, The Grand Duchess, once lobbed the epithet 'eccentric' at me during a lighthearted conversation several years ago. After laughing for a minute, or two, I replied,

"Me? Eccentric? How am I eccentric?" Her retort was priceless.

"How are you NOT eccentric?" She then proceeded to enumerate in great detail about a dozen habits, interests, and hobbies that, I guess upon reflection, plant me squarely in the neighborhood of terminal eccentricity. Funny. It never occurred to me.

In my wife's view, how I dress looms large in all of this. But as I occasionally point out, with tongue firmly in cheek,

"You didn't HAVE to marry me! We could still call Judge F. [the man who married us] to decertify everything." Laughter and eye rolling all around.

Following The Young Master's bedtime, we will open a bottle of wine and enjoy it by the fireside this evening, possibly across the Scrabble board, and to the tune of soft Christmas jazz, or German language carols. Happy Friday, everyone!

-- Heinz-Ulrich

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

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