It's Madras Monday!

The upper half early today during the as usual unattended (by any students) office hours. No matter. A fresh cup of dark roast coffee and the final 35 pages of a novel for one of my courses was a nice way to spend the two hours before heading off to teach. However. . . I've had at least four students indicate they will visit me tomorrow (Tuesday) morning. Can you tell the final paper is almost due?

More than a month before the unofficial start of the summer season -- Memorial Day Weekend here in the U.S. -- but the sun was out most of the day, and it just felt right. The high temperature for the days was in the mid-70s Fahrenheit after all. The necktie, by the way, is a Robert Talbott Nordstrom's thrift find, purchased three or four years ago. Tomorrow, rain, and much cooler temperatures here in Lower Michigan, so I plan to trot out my double breasted wool flannel Glen Plaid number one final time before classes end for the semester on Friday.

So many guys view the prospect of dressing presentably as, oddly, some kind of tortuous chore. I suggest that if more men learn to have fun with their attire and learn to enjoy dressing nicely, that more might begin to think of wearing items a few notches above jeans, cargo shorts, and sweatpants as something to enjoy. And, maybe, even aspire to. I admit that the prevailing attitude that a casual workplace is, somehow, a perk and, somehow, preferable to wearing a tucked in shirt (with an actual collar, a jacket, and a tie) escapes me. Like, totally. . .

-- Heinz-Ulrich

And the lower half today, featuring a pair of exceedingly comfortable calfskin monkstrap loafers that were purchased from, of all places, Land's End seven or eight years ago. The vaguely Witchy-Poo socks were purchased on sale from Dapper Classics two or three years ago, and the khaki chinos from Land's End last September. The new direction LE seems to be taking is a bit sad, because there were always numerous items that the company did well (dress shirts, neckties, some of their dress pants, etc.). These number fewer and fewer, though, as LE actively courts the the J. Crew-Old Navy customer base.

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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

The Power of Ideas. . .

T he end is nigh! The autumn semester/term approaches. And while we still have almost two months of summer left according to the calendar, "Summer is over and gone," as the crickets sang in Charlotte's Web . At least for those of us who head back to the classroom in less than a month. In advance of a meeting with my program director late Monday morning, I spent about 40 minutes total during the weekend to jot down several ideas about planned workshops and related activities for the coming 2024-2025 academic year. At an opportune moment, I mentioned "I have a few ideas," and opened my leather portfolio. My director was highly receptive to almost everything I suggested, and we had a very productive planning session for just over 90 minutes. Just about everything I sketched out on Sunday aligns with his own ideas. It's nice when meetings go that well, and two related things occur to me in hindsight. One, it pays to exercise...

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 19...

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