Tag Clothes

Undressed for Success

Michael 14 Comments

Okay guys, buckle up.  This is one if those posts. I know some if you will, “just don’t look,” but I’ll say, “then don’t go out in public like that.” The public was a doctors’ office waiting room. Yes, that’s doctors plural. One of those places with 45 different physicians with 45 different sub-specialties. So there are usually a couple dozen patients, some with the entourages, filling up the chairs placed with about as much attention to spatial management as the average airport gate area.

The”who” who couldn’t be overlooked was a 50-60ish woman about as skinny as a dining room table leg. Seriously thin. But of above average height. I would say about 5’10” – 5’11” and she carried about 20 pounds. I’ve seen sacks of potatoes heavier and dowel rods chunkier. Some how, she managed to find clothes tight enough to look painted on those legs that could be the literal “pins” as slang for women’s legs going back to the 1500s. Capri style naturally. But that wasn’t the eye catching portion of her body. At least it was t the part that caught my eye.

She walked in – no, she wobbled in on strappy sandals, the type you might find cruising the runway if your local fashion shoe, except they sported a 4 inch platform adding to her obvious natural height. But we still haven’t gotten to the eye catching part.

Stuffed into those sandals (and I’m not sure how you “stuff” something into somewhere that is built mostly of leather straps, but stuffed they wear) were foot so long the entire length of all 10of her toes extended beyond the front edge of the footwear. Made more noticeable by the lime green nail polish.

In 99.7% of my interactions with other humans, including the just see and be seen variety, I am a live and let live, you do you, whatever floats your boat, play it as you like it. Every now and then comes the other 0.3%. And she was it.

I am the first to admit, even before other people see me, that I a, not a fashion plate of the male variety. There were, are, and never will be pin-up pictures of me gracing the insides of women’s lockers, and I dress a tad more conservatively for the 21st century than the average male. But I do dress, and I cover all my parts, including the parts that don’t comfortably fit within the confines of clothing, sometimes even breaking down and being a larger size of said clothing if the current occupants of my closet are not up to the challenge. Is that too much to ask for of my fellow planet sharers.

I think you for the chance to get that off my chest. If you’ll excuse me, I must now write apology letters to all those when saw me at dinner last Saturday wearing a half-Windsor knotted tie when a Kelvin was definitely the least acceptable.

Appropriate Attire Optional

Michael 13 Comments

I think I’m turning old fogie. Yesterday I had the opportunity to go to an Alton Brown live show. Alton Brown is the cinematographer turned chef turned celebrity who created the long running Food Network show, “Good Eats.”

I grant you, this was not a symphony concert nor a Broadway marquee performance, but it wasn’t the Grateful Dead either. As such, I was not dressed in my Sunday go to Meeting Clothes (even though it was Sunday), but I looked respectable in a collared shirt, slacks, and blazer.  My daughter was with me in a flowy spring dress. Sprinkled among the crowd were others like us but most looked like they would have been more at home at that Grateful Dead concert.  One particular couple who caught my eye, she with what appeared to be a beach coverup (although I don’t know what it was covering, not even close to beachwear weather) and he with a sweat stained t-shirt, cargo shorts, and grass stained work boots. She was wearing a rock on her left hand the size of the Hope Diamond and they were in the VIP session with us so I guess the lawn business is a profitable one for him and perhaps she just flew in from the yacht to catch the show.

This is all on the heels of another event on Saturday. I can’t recall if I ever mentioned here that I am a member of the Toastmasters. We are in the midst of contest season. Every year, Toastmasters around the world compete for a spot at the World Series of Speaking, moving through Club, Area, Division, District, and Regional contests in search of that spot on the International stage. Saturday was the Division contest and drew about 100 people from 18 local clubs. Of the 12 speakers, four looked like professional speakers, suits and ties, or at least blazers for the men, and a dress on the one woman.  The others looked like lawn boy’s cousin. I’m sorry, but that is not how you present yourself if you want to be taken seriously. (Unless the style of dress is a reflection of the topic like a tropical shirt if you’re discussing surfing. Nobody talked about surfing.) (Or even lawn care.)

But…through it all, whoever it was and whatever anybody looked like, I noticed a lot of people nodding and saying hello. I was flabbergasted! It was just last week in the ROAMcare Uplift post that we talked about how the world needed more Hi Guys. If you haven’t already, take a look at it.

Did you notice I was late this week? If you did, I’m sorry to have kept you waiting. If you didn’t, why not!?

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Undressed for Success

Michael Leave a comment
Over the last few days I’ve been scrolling through various social media platforms because, well, because I’ve always had that kind of time, and I’m picking up on a disconcerting trend. Clothing options are getting scary.
 
I know you’ve seen the posts, “Its 9am. Time to change from my night PJs to my day PJs!” or similar and probably from people who used to be the closest things to fashions plates outside of Project Runway. Now they’re all giving new meaning to “not being a slave to fashion” and in serious jeopardy of being busted by the fashion police. 
 
Work fashions have always been a little out of the average dresser’s realm of understanding. How dressy is dressy? How casual is casual? What can and can’t I get away with? are more likely the questions rather than, oh let’s say, Are my seams straight?   
 
I’ve always worked in health care, almost always in some healthcare facility – hospital, rehab center, nursing home. Over forty years I’ve seen it all. When I started, nurses still wore whites. Not white. Whites. Some even with caps. All with their pins. Scrubs were worn in the OR and never over outside those automatic doors without an accompanying white coat. Down in the pharmacy where I was the uniform of the day for males was shirt and tie, the ladies had blouses and skirts or slacks with short white consultation jackets for staff pharmacists and long white lab coats for supervisors and department heads. Except for those working the IV rooms. There it was either lab coats over scrubs or gowns over street clothes. There was similar garb in the other ancillary departments, x-ray, respiratory, and the various therapies. Non-clinicians like admissions and administration wore suits. Period.
 
That was the routine six days a week. Friday was different. Ah, you are thinking, Casual Friday. Nope. Not then. Work was no place to be casual. Fridays were dress up days. Everybody came in if not dressed to the nines, to the 7-1/2s at least. As soon as the figurative whistle blew, administration, staff, and support proceeded en masse to the nearest adult watering hole. 
 
Somewhere along the way Dressup Friday yielded to Casual Friday but Saturday through Thursday work fashion remained as it was. I’m not sure when that happened. I don’t recall being part of the movement so I think it must have shifted during my years in the service when the army rather than the calendar dictated our dress. But I don’t think it was very much before I returned to civilian life and its itinerant dress because people were not yet debating how casual casual could get. At the time khaki pretty much defined casual. Men shed their ties and may have just opened a collar or taken an extra step to a structured “sport shirt.” Women adopted khaki lower halves either as skirts or slacks and typically pulled a sweater over an open blouse and called that casual. It would be years before anybody even considered denim acceptable and then it was only black, never blue. 
 
Somehow from that we made it to daytime versus night pajamas. Considering in today’s hospital world everybody including the guy patrolling the parking garage is in scrubs and scrubs are just a hop, skip, and tied waistband from pajamas, it was only a matter of time until people started showing up at work looking like Captain Kirk on the bridge of the Enterprise. Only now the screen in front of the helmsman and navigator displays not a possible incursion of the Neutral Zone but instead the morning Zoom meeting.
 
Live long and prosper! Casually.
 
FashionPolice 
 
 
 

All Washed Up

Michael 12 Comments

Since the beginning of last week I’ve been fairly much home bound with my pneumania. I say daily much because I’ve still had to go to dialysis and the occasional outing for a lab draw or x-ray. That means I’ve had to make myself presentable to the general public. You know how us old people are. Um, how we old people are. I still dress up to fly.

I was beginning to think that I had better do something around the house and since I had a hamper full of germ laden clothes from the week I thought that might be a good place to start. Dust on the furniture and dirt in carpet could hang out for another few days. Used linen could wait since I have enough sheets and towels to outfit a good size bed and breakfast. But socks and underwear exist only in a finite supply.

So I tossed a small load of said mangerie in the machine, selected the load size and water temperature, and measured out the appropriate amount of liquid detergent. Just like on the television commercials. At the appropriate time, when I heard the machine shift from wash to rinse mode, I poured in the required amount of liquid fabric softener. You see, unlike the machines on those commercials, mine is not of the fancy variety with dispensers where you can pour everything into at the beginning and forget it. I have the cheap model that requires me to be my own dispenser of detergent, bleach, and fabric softener at the appropriate times in the cycle. (Darn apartment living!) As I was returning the fabric softener bottle to the shelf I realized something was in its space. What was it? Why, it was liquid fabric softener! Hmm. Then what was in my hand awaiting its return to this space? Why, it was the liquid detergent! But I knew I had my hands on fabric softener and indeed I had. At the beginning of the wash cycle! And that’s how I ended up washing that load twice. Well, they were germ laden and probably benefited from the extra spin around the tub.

At least I had to dry them only once.

 

Packed Man

Michael 5 Comments

Thanksgiving is a week away and that means that many families are preparing for their week away. All those people that come home for the holidays and the homecomings and the reunions are coming from somewhere. And that involves travelling.

I don’t travel. I only have to go about 12 miles to get home and if anyone wants to return to my nest it’s still only a dozen or so mile markers only from a different direction. No cots or sleeping bags will adorn my living room floor next week, I’ll need not make any hotel reservations to visit anyone and at the end of the day everyone can use their own pillows without having to pack them.

A friend of mine doesn’t share the same travel stress-free holiday as I and it brought up the subject of packing. And not just pillows. Although I have never had to pack to enjoy a weekend with loved ones, I have over the years packed billions and billions of times for work, leisure, both, and sometimes in retrospect, neither. And all our talk brought up memories of packing and even unpacking that I have lodged in my memories vault.

Packing for vacations was always a harder than it should be ordeal for me. I wish I could be one of those who spend a summer backpacking across Europe and actually manage to spend an entire season crossing an entire continent while surviving out of one actual backpack. I needed an entire three suiter sized suitcase (plus my allotted two carry-ons) to spend 7 days on Puerto Rico. Just for me. And I’m a guy!

You’d think that would have been easy. Swimsuit. Flip flops. Done. Pack in a day bag. Still have room for a toothbrush and some sunscreen. I had that covered. It actually went more like this.
-Swimsuit and flip flops into the case. A whole week? Just one pair of trunks? In goes another.
-If I want to walk anywhere but along the beach I don’t like flip flops. Sandals, into the case.
-Can’t have dinner in swimwear. Shorts, tropical print shirt. Times 7.
-Gotta go to a nice dinner at least once, maybe twice. Maybe more. Slacks. Nice shirts.
-One even nicer dinner. Add a blazer. Wait, now we need real shoes.
-I’ll want to go to the casino. Bond, James Bond always wears a tuxedo to the casino. I’m not Bond, James Bond. No tux. But something nicer than shorts and a t-shirt. For a few nights. Ok, all of them.
-And something for the work out room. I never use the work out rooms but just in case that means work out clothes and shoes.
-Don’t forget pajamas. Even if you don’t wear them at home you have to have them for travelling in case there’s a fire at night. Don’t forget slippers.
And that is why I have paid overweight baggage fees.

SuitcaseBusiness trips weren’t less painful. The last few years of work I traveled a lot to other hospitals to do operational reviews. These would take me one or two days each and I usually did 2 or 3 hospitals at a time so I was mostly gone for 4 or 5 days. Because these places could be located almost anywhere in the country and there are only 3 airports in the world that have direct flights between them, business travel meant more time in and between airports than at productive work. Somehow I managed to get a week’s worth of shirts and ties, laptop and files, and the requisite book, phone and flight snack crammed into one approved sized carry-on. Heavy, but within the limits of the underseat and overhead compartment areas.

No matter if it was a week-long vacation, a long weekend getaway, or the puddle jumping business treks, each time I’d check in to a hotel I’d empty my modern day steamer trunk and/or little carry-on, iron the wrinkles out of the shirts, then hang everything up and load the folded stuff into the dresser drawers. When I’d go anywhere with anyone else I’d get the questioning looks that said “what the heck are you doing?” and that included the ex who should have already known I was more than a little on the “over organized” side of things. (Does anybody else do this also or do all those hotels put in closets and dressers and provide irons and ironing boards just in case I happen to show up?)

And that’s why I’m looking forward to next week and one of the things I am thankful for. No matter where I end up for the holiday, no suitcases will be involved in the travel.

Pantsing Around

Michael 6 Comments

The last couple of days here have been the cold, rainy, dreary, generally not the kind of weather you want to go outside in unless you have to type of days you find when fall really turns into prep days for winter. So I’ve been practicing sitting around and relaxing since most of my days include “don’t go outside unless you have to” on the to do list.

Mostly I’ll read, write, or puzzle something out to bide my time on those inside days. Every so often I’ll turn on the television and see what I might have missed in prime time over the past few years by watching whatever new has hit the late afternoon/early evening syndication runs. I’ve discovered that I’m much too overdressed to be properly relaxed. Apparently the All-American male cannot relax with pants on. I missed that somewhere along the way.

In every sitcom on television today, there is a male character who barely crosses the threshold of his house before taking his pants off. These males range from youngster at the cusp of teendom, to teenager, to young adult, to middle aged parent, to grandfather. They are from struggling, middle class, well to do, and outright rich families from New York across America to California, of a variety of ethnic backgrounds. Their only common denominators are male-ism and being pantsless at home.

This concerns me. I never ran across this behavior in my personal experiences. I have often been in what I would otherwise consider a relaxing situation and I have always kept my pants on. I have observed other men from my own, older, and younger generations, and have never seen any of them kicked back on the sofa in boxers or briefs. Yet our television role models are dropping trou before they clear the front door. And not just in solitude. They do it and stay that way in front of wives, mothers, siblings, offspring, and on several occasions, delivery persons.

Don’t say that they’re only sitcom males and I shouldn’t be taking them seriously. Sitcoms are America. We may want to think that the hour long dramas are where Americans are really at but they aren’t. The dramas may be what we want to believe us to be. We want to be that deep, that inclusive, that concerned with the environment, current causes, and family. But we aren’t. As much as we want to be the Pearsons, deep down we know we’re really the Hecks.

Clearly I’ve been doing it wrong for a lifetime. And I’m afraid that as I’ve gotten this far in my life I’m too old to change and will continue relaxing with all of my clothes on. I know, I’m bucking convention here but I can’t see myself any other way. And I sincerely hope it doesn’t offend any of you to know that as I’m typing this, I’m wearing pants.

 

Shopped Till I Dropped

Michael Leave a comment

I did something different last week. I went shopping. Not the shopping you do at a supermarket regardless of how super your market is. Real shopping that involved considering style and fashion, color and fabric, and trying stuff on. Oh that might not be very different for you but I assure you, it is indeed different, almost exciting, for me. Over the last 3 years I’ve managed to lose 110 pounds. I may have mentioned that about 20 of them were desired and even intentional. The other 90 or so came off as pieces of me came out during and after various hospital stays and recovery periods.

During that time I made due with piecemeal attire supplementation and the occasional reintroduction of an item that was spared a trip to the donation bin during the years when I was busy gaining some 110 pounds. But I finally had to recognize that I could no longer go out in public – even a public as limited as companion patients in doctors’ waiting rooms, dialysis clinic nursing staff, once a week grocery co-shoppers, and fellow churchgoers – with the ragtag rags that my togs were quickly becoming. Thus, a shopping spree.

And let me tell you something that probably every mother of a teenage boy already knows. If you are male and are not an adolescent male whose fashion sense is dictated primarily by the local college or professional football teams’ uniforms (regardless of the chronologic age of said adolescent male), there’s not much one can call smart for men out there. Oh I found plenty of shirts, slacks, and jackets in formal, informal, and in between styles but those styles were quite the same as the styles of those few previously mentioned articles that had stayed with me since the last time I weighed this little. And that was around 30 years ago.

Not to be deterred I soldiered on and did grave damage to my credit limit, restructuring my wardrobe to one that does not elicit questions like “have you been sick?” by any passerby who subscribes to the Hi Guy Principle. To be honest, when I started the day I thought I’d be exhausted and want to quit before it got on to time for a mid-morning snack. And to continue to be honest, I was getting tired. But tired and somewhat exhilarated at the same time. It had been so long since I had been shopping, even though most of what I was buying was basically the same stuff I had bought so long since, that I was actually enjoying myself.

There’s nothing like spending a day, and lots of money, shopping in a store where your selections aren’t plopped into a plastic cart with wheels you push to the check-out line at the front of the building.

I’ll have to try to do it again sometime in the next 30 years.

 

Visions of Fall

Michael 1 Comment

Each season has its own personality, its own identity, its own character. Fall is inexorably marked by the colors of the leaves, the aroma of burning logs in backyards and fireplaces, the promise of family gatherings, and the growing piles of laundry that threaten to lay ruin to your detergent budget.

It’s almost cruel that a single autumnal wash load comes close to equally all of summer’s dirty clothes. Think about it. Summer’s wardrobe is all the same fabric, all the same color, and in smaller pieces. Whites, pastels, t-shirts, shorts. If it wasn’t for sheets and towels I could probably go through an entire summer month on a single large load.

But fall, fall starts out ok. You trade in the shorts for khaki slacks, t-shirts for golf shirts, and you add socks to the mix. But in a couple of weeks you’re in to long sleeve shirts, polos, and jeans. Another week goes by and now you start layering. In one day between undershirt, shirt, sweatshirt, and hoodie you’ve worn – and dirtied – what would take almost a full week just 3 months ago. And all the different fabrics and colors. Everyone has to be checked for what can be washed with what at what temperatures in which cycles. It’s enough to make you breathe a sigh of relief when you find a care tag suggesting not to be machine washed.

And it’s not just the volume of laundry that torments your sanity. It’s the additional danger the fall wardrobe poses to your health and safety. Long sleeves and trouser legs get wrapped around the agitator causing you to wrench your back or possibly dislocate your shoulder trying to extract them from the machine. (And you wonder why they named that part an agitator!) Socks that are optional equipment in the summertime become entangled in other laundry pieces from the time you toss them into the hamper until you’re returning to the dresser. The only thing lost more regularly in laundry rooms is your temper when you realize you missed the beginning of the rinse cycle and your last opportunity to add fabric softener to the mix (an essential component to minimizing the chafing you’ll certainly encounter when untreated broadcloth rubs across the back of your neck).

But I digress. I was talking about the visions of fall and breathing in the sweet smell of burning logs while walking along the lane wrapped up in a warm, snuggly sweater. I hope it’s Dry Clean Only.

That’s what I think. Really. How ‘bout you?

 

 

There’s No Business Like Shoe Business

Michael Leave a comment

I was looking for shoes last week. I don’t really need them, I have more shoes than I really need but since I was shopping anyway, why not? I found out why not.

I was at the local mall with the basic department stores, a shoe “warehouse,” and some discount department stores (you know, the ones that end in “Mart”).  No real shoe stores. For them you have to go into town, to a high end shopping area, or to an outlet mall. And that’s the shame of it. You see, for a man, unless you want athletic shoes or work boots, the only places to buy shoes are the real shoe stores.

I haven’t figured it out. These same modestly priced shoe stores and departments have plenty of women’s shoes in various styles – casual shoes, sports shoes, dressy shoes, sandals, boots, clogs, mules, pumps, flats, and yes, even athletic and work shoes. Women can buy shoes to work in, play in, go gardening ,shopping or boating, can go to the beach or to the mountains, go riding motorcycles, bicycles or horses, go to church, go to a marathon as either spectator or runner, or even go shopping. Men can buy shoes to play hoops or go to the worksite. Actually, men can buy athletic shoes with steel toes so he can go the work and stop off at the basketball court after without even having to change shoes. How convenient.

Anything more than that, anything like a Scotch grain loafer, a natty cap toe, a conservative wingtip, a plain toe slip on, a basic oxford, or a canvas moccasin aren’t going to be easy to find. For them you have to clear a day, plan a trip, pack your lunch, and check your bank balance.

And you look at us and wonder, often out loud, “are you really going to wear those shoes to church?”

That’s what I think. Really. How ‘bout you?

T(-Shirt) is for Thinking

Michael 2 Comments

I’m all for self-expression. I’ve expressed my approval of it already in several posts. Over the years we’ve written about expressing one-self in signs on our the walls (Walls O’ Wisdom, March 19, 2012) on license plates (UNDTSAY, April 2, 2012) and even on license plate frames (Mobile Philosophy, June 30, 2014). But the “selfest” of self-expression has to be the T-shirt. And by goodness there are some expressive ones out there!

I started wondering about this a couple of weeks ago. I was at the supermarket and was reminded of how nobody wears a plain collared shirt any more. Everything has something on it. Around here, the sports-minded person rarely goes out in public without declaring his or her devotion to some team or another. (See ‘Tis the Season – Summer 2014 Edition, July 28, 2014.) Coming on strong, though, are the shirts that spout his or her thoughts beyond championship seasons.

It always seems to be around the meat counter that I am struck by people’s clothing. This time it was a guy wearing a T-shirt that read “Lie Like You Mean It.” I found myself wondering if his wife gave it to him for his birthday. Two aisles over, another fellow sported “Drive It Like You Stole It.” Two shirts, two commandments. We were on a roll!

It wasn’t just the men – or maybe boys. A woman got me noticing her T-Shirt inscribed with the self-assured (self-)expression “I’m A Keeper.” Another had a more practical opinion to share. Her shirt read “If I Had Ruby Slippers I Wouldn’t Pick Kansas.” And my favorite was a lady mature enough to be in her retirement years seen at the deli counter, “Out To Lunch – Permanently!”

My walls are filled with boards and posters of seemingly clever sayings (Behind every great man is an enormous amount of caffeine); I actually have a custom license plate frame appropriate to an old geezer that I someday want to grow up to be (Aged to Perfection). I don’t have a vanity plate on the car but I have thought of it. But I can honestly say I’ve a veritable dearth of philosophical clothing.  The closest I come to is an old T-shirt proclaiming “I Fought the Lawn and the Lawn Won.” Actually, if you ever saw my lawn you’d realize that isn’t philosophical.  That’s the honest to gosh truth!

That’s what I think. Really. How ‘bout you?