A Saturday Visit to the Tailor. . .

It's 10:30 Saturday morning, and I am still waking up with the first mug of coffee, and the two cats milling around here in my office at home. A dark, wet, and dreary day outside, but I've got much activity planned since the Grand Duchess and Young Master have decided to visit Chicago for the day and left very early this morning.

First off, and following a hot shower, a visit to my tailor to take in a new three-piece suit from J. Press for the usual minor alterations. It arrived yesterday, and was/is a gift to myself for some good news professionally speaking earlier this fall. And since three-piece suits are generally pretty hard to find in 2023, I leapt at the opportunity after spotting this particular number on the J. Press website two weeks back. A charcoal Donegal weave, very soft to the touch, and perfect for the cooler months, which here in Mid-Michigan are, conveniently, October through April, and sometimes well into May. So this one should get a lot of wear.

Then, it's off to run a few Christmas gift errands. Most of my shopping for the season long ago -- and well before Covid with its initial lock-downs -- migrated online. Nevertheless, there are a couple of things I have spotted that the Grand Duchess will enjoy on Christmas Morning and beyond. Once that errand is done, a few things at the supermarket, and then home again to enjoy the rest of the afternoon preparing the next batch of toy soldiers, 1/56 scale models actually, for painting.

Initially, I had planned to spend the day working through final student assignments, their course capstone projects, but that can wait until Monday and Tuesday next week. Time instead to play hooky and take a couple of days for myself. Sunday, I will record, process, mix, master, and post another episode of my podcast, an activity that, while time consuming, is actually a lot of fun, so not something I mind doing. But that is putting the cart before the horse.

Back to Saturday activities!

This evening, I plan to enjoy some coffee and possibly a dram or two of single malt by the fireside in the library with some Christmas music playing softly in the background. And who knows? I might actually crack open an actual work of fiction that has nothing at all to do with work pursuits. It used to happen now and then. Once upon a time, I was a great reader of fiction, and that habit, I think, ought to be resurrected as we approach the Christmas break with its related festivities and downtime.

-- Heinz-Ulrich

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

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