Lessons Learned: Wardrobe Malfunction

Let this be two lessons to you: 1) buy quality belts, 2) don't wear them too tight and then sit down in your APC New Standards.

Bonus lesson from the image's background: The Lincoln Tunnel costs $8, and they don't accept a giant handful of quarters which you had been saving for the laundromat.  And when the toll booth guy waves you through without taking your money, they take a picture of your license plate and send you a bill.  If you pay the bill promptly, it's only $8.

Clothing Hacks: Nametags

Much credit to Zach Kitts of my office for this tip.

Conferences and meetings often issue nametags with alligator clips to attach to your clothes.  But if you leave those on a suit jacket, shirt, or anything else for more than 10 minutes, they leave an indentation that takes a long time to come out.

Instead, attach the alligator clip to your hotel room key or a credit card and stick the key/card in the breast pocket of your shirt or suit jacket.  The nametag will hang over the lip but spread its weight across the entire width of the pocket, preventing premature clothing destruction.

Problem solved via low-tech, unobtrusive, no-marginal-cost technique.

Of Acorns And Trees

Pater recently created this outfit, which receives the Dapper District stamp of approval.  Note:

1. Tiny brown squares in the jacket coordinate with the large brown squares in the shirt.

2. Deep, solid blue tie picks up a blue in the jacket that you don't see at first and also coordinates with the brown to make the mood less somberly autumnal.

3. Necktie dimple helps the knot assemblage reach the bottom edge of the collar points so the collar points don't sort of hang down unaccompanied.

It runs in the family, I guess.

To Every Thing, There Is A Season

The first whispers of autumn, an approaching birthday, a viewing with the GF of the Gwyneth Paltrow version of "Emma", and a delicious pilsener remind me of time's merciless pace and single-minded destination.  A shirt's stay on this earth is even more limited.  Only so many pressings may a French cuff weather until the fabric shrinks unevenly, leading to the acute--and, dare we admit our feelings, gentle reader? acutely painful--gap between edges, as seen here.  (The yellowing you see is an artifact of the camera flash, by the way.)  It is time for this shirt to experience its own rebirth on the opposite end of a Goodwill rack.

But spring will come, just as new shirts will come, perhaps from Charles Tyrwhitt this time.  They have a "$40 per shirt" deal for new customers.  Or will I sign up for a fitting with Joe Hemrajani?  We shall see.  Perhaps the crickets have the answer.