No, hip and douchey, obviously, jerk.
Not making any apologies for these guys, but there's no good place to keep a hat once it's doffed, these days. When's the last time you saw a hat-check room or a hat rack? You can't just hold a fancy hat in your hands, or keep it on your table -- it'll get squashed or bent or otherwise mangled. Then what are you going to do, take your hat in to get it re-blocked? There's probably like only four places in the country that have any idea how to do that anymore. It's a no-win situation for the hat-wearing douche these days.
I'm with ed. I'm pretty sure that in an alarming number of counterfactual situations where I'm a hat-wearer and I remove it upon going indoors, I lose it.
I hope I lose it nobly, by placing on the head of a drunk girl who giggles at being newly hatted and whom I can't find at the end of the night. But I probably just leave it somewhere and can't find it again.
in one of the father brown stories, a character is never seen without his purple wig, because (so he sez) to gaze on his denuded head would be so terrible it would drive the viewer mad (or strike him/her dead)
it is generally ruder to strike other people dead than to afflict them w.yr headpiece, be it ne'er so douche-y
There are a number of factors which would aggravate a former wearer's hat-hair. He is presumably better acquainted than the casual bystander whether and how many of these might apply in a given situation.
In England in the mid 1950s it was widely believed (really) that one of the main differences between British and Americans was that Brits took their hats off when they came indoors and Americans didn't.
My mother taught me this, and I'm sure she'd met a good few GIs during the previous decade. But any kid on any playground would tell you the same thing. I think it came from watching too many matinee westerns.
I hope I lose it nobly, by placing on the head of a drunk girl who giggles at being newly hatted and whom I can't find at the end of the night.
Link doesn't work for me.
I have a Stetson hat. Not much call to wear it, but I have yet to see a woman who doesn't look terrific in it.
And do you know where a gal who looks terrific in a Stetson hat can wear it? Anywhere she wants.
Applying this long established and undisputed principle to the modern age, I'm forced to conclude that a man who looks good in a Stetson hat may also wear it anywhere he wants, and this provides the answer to the question in the OP: depends. Ironic hats should be doffed. Terrific looking hats may be kept on.
9. It's Fred Astaire doing "I left my Hat in Haiti". Don't know why it doesn't work. Corporate regional internet-fucking?
11: I love that song! But I think of Johnny Hartman and not Fred Astaire.
So it just seems half-assed not to take the fucking hat off! What's the problem, are you afraid no one will notice your hat-including ensemble?
But when, O Ben? For instance, I was wearing one of my camo hats when I went to the post office, on account it was fuckin' cold, and I lack teh hair. So if I go indoors, should I take it off as soon as I go inside, even though it is, in fact, fucking cold in the post office? (And the post office is huge, nay, cavernous, so 80% of the floor space doesn't have a human within ten foot of it most of the time.) Or should I remove it when I am in the queue? Or can I wait until I go to the counter to actually speak to lady running the register? The time before last, I reflexively removed it when I went through the door, because it was not so much with the fucking cold, but last time I simply forgot when passing though the open doors (why were the doors wide open when it was majorly the fucking cold? The post office people mayhap work in a barn?), and continued to forget while in the queue, but of course removed it when it was my turn at the desk. When does the outdoors cease and the indoors begin in public building, as compared to the home?
And I note as an aside that it turns out that people here take up to fifteen minutes to conduct the business of shipping a package, whereas it took me less then 90 seconds to ship my item, as I was prepared beforehand. When I was leaving, I held the door for an elderly lady who was at least a foot shorter than I am; she seemed shocked and angry that I would do such a thing, and spat out a vicious 'Thank you!' as she bustled past me. This seems to be of a piece with the charming local custom of being rude, unhelpful and generally nasty unless working as a clerk. Am I being unintentionally nasty by not grimacing often enough? Should I say rude things to help offset the effects of any faux pas I may commit by being too helpful or polite?
max
['Help me Osama ben Laden, you're my only hope!']
Yes, Ben, you're being unreasonable.
You only quote half the rule of etiquette: Gentlemen remove their hats indoors, but ladies keep them on. The hipsters to whom you refer are striking a blow for gender equality. The military, probably the largest group of obligate hat-wearers left in North America, went the other way: even female officers remove their covers indoors. In the military women assimilate by copying male behaviour; among hipsters men assimilate by copying female behaviour.
More seriously, back when everyone wore hats there were a plethora of social rules, mostly around rank, about who should doff, when. As fewer and fewer wear hats less and less, these rules have been allowed to quietly drop. Caviling about violations of the last one left seems cranky.
For what it's worth, being bald, I often wear a straw hat outside in the summer. I don't necessarily remove it going indoors. I do, however, invariably doff it for the National Anthem.
My understanding was always that ladies were supposed to keep their hats on indoors. My highschool had a strict no hats indoors rule (to make people take off their baseball caps), but they did make an exception at the commencement chapel servcie for girls who wore hats with their dresses.
Hm, Andy's site answers something I'd wondered (and asked my grandfather about to no avail):
Hats are removed when inside, except for places that are akin to public streets, like lobbies, corridors, and crowded elevators (non-residential). In a public building (where there are no apartments) the elevator is considered a public area.
It had seemed odd to remove a hat in a long hall in college, just because I was indoors. I was right!
And I would have made a point similar to ed's. Though occasionally there are coat-racks that can double as hat-racks.
13: I think winter hats--knit caps, toques, etc.--follow a different rule: You take them off when and only when you take off your coat and gloves. So if you are going into a store you probably won't take them off.
17: What if one is at one's place of work, but one's place of work is unbearably cold due to various structural and financial difficulties, so one would like to wear one's hat and/or scarf, but one's coat would be a bit much, because one's coat is this great big floppy wool thing one got at some army/navy surplus a while back, and so one tends to wear just the hat and scarf along with regular indoor clothing, thus attracting the scorn of various passers-by who look at the hat, look at the scarf, and take one to be a douche?
I stopped getting haircuts a few months back, just to see what my hair would do left to its own devices, and now probably the only hat I could fit on my head is one of those rasta knit thingies.
Never been a hat wearer anyhow, though.
Isn't part of the answer that a hat worn for fashion rather than warmth is now so unusual that there are no currently operating social rules about when to take it off? You're expecting hat-wearers to take them off in a home because everyone takes their hat off in someone's home, but the last part of the sentence isn't true anymore. The hatwearers are simply less wholeheartedly archaic than you are.
It may be unreasonable to object to this kind of hat-removal lapse, but it drives me batshit as well.
What LB said. Women's hats were often considered part of an outfit, not outdoor attire, and so were permissible indoors. Now almost no one wears hats except to complete an outfit or a look, so that's the rule that's being followed.
You should all doff your hats in respectful memory of Remeal Linguine, Rory's pet rat who passed in his sleep last night.
OT, I know. I'm just sad.
More seriously, back when everyone wore hats there were a plethora of social rules, mostly around rank, about who should doff, when. As fewer and fewer wear hats less and less, these rules have been allowed to quietly drop.
In theory I agree completely with jim. In practice these rules have been allowed to quietly drop only for people with a certain level of social and class privilege. I have on many occasions informed young men that failing to follow the code of taking off the hat WILL cost you jobs and interviews. It's a harder lesson to teach when there isn't a consistent society-wide message, and it's all the more painful to watch when an interviewer uses petty social tells as a proxy for whether a 20-year-old is deserving of the great privilege of a minimum-wage job.
Shorter me: As always, people who don't appear to "belong" have less freedom to break rules.
24. That's sad. I'm sorry to hear it.
PK famously loves mice. You should talk to Dr. B about coping.
My take, as a wearer of hats*, is that when you're wearing an old-fashioned hat, you follow old fashioned rules. Thus, I generally remove my felted wool, brimmed hat when I go indoors, but if I'm wearing a ballcap, I leave it on.
Regarding the hair situation, this is why they used brylcreem and the like - for hat-proof hair. Quite short hair also works for this. If I'm wearing a hat because my hair is messy, then of course I leave the hat on. But the overlap between that situation and the old-fashioned hat wearing is close to nil, so....
I'm kind of swayed by the various defenses of indoor hat-wearing, but ultimately ally myself with the OP.
* One could do worse than to be a wearer of hats
Was 2 meant to be self-referential?
This is written in exactly the same style as the "Hateful Things" chapter in Sei Shonagon's Pillow Book.
Ben is nothing if not a literate courtesan.
I'm sad to hear about Rory's rat, Di. They are marvelous little beasties, aren't they?
20: Is The Apostromullet returning? Oh please oh please oh please!!!
24: Condolences, Di. My hat is doffed.
Would it help if I told you that actually Remeal just went to live on a farm in the country with lots of fresh air and sunshine and garbage to play in?
I would also like to add to this complaint (which I fully endorse) the wearing of winter-type scarves indoors. I once had dinner with Bernard Tschumi, and the entire time, he kept on a bright red woolen scarf. It was very hot in the room, and I couldn't think what possessed him to keep it on.
I am an indoor winter scarf offender! Whenever I am a little too cold, it is always the item of outdoor clothing that I leave on, and then forget about. I have even been known to teach in my outdoor scarf, which no doubt made me look like quite a lunatic.
I have been an offender myself on at least one occasion, but the self-loathing that followed was too much for me to bear.
I've mentioned before one how much I enjoyed it when some of the professors in grad school would forget to take off their bike helmets during the day.
A lover who is leaving at dawn announces that he has to find his fan and his paper. "I know I put them somewhere last night," he says. Since it is pitch-dark, he gropes about the room, bumping into the furniture and muttering, "Strange! Where can they be?" Finally he discovers the objects. He thrusts the paper into the breast of his robe with a great rustling sound; then he snaps open his fan and busily fans away with it. Only now is he ready to take his leave. What charmless behavior! "Hateful" is an understatement.
Equally disagreeable is the man who, when leaving in the middle of the night, takes care to fasten the cord of his headdress. This is quite unnecessary; he could perfectly well put it gently on his head without tying the cord. And why must he spend time adjusting his cloak or hunting costume? Does he really think that someone may see him at this time of night and criticize him for not being impeccably dressed?
A good lover will behave as elegantly at dawn as at any other time. He drags himself out of bed with a look of dismay on his face. The lady urges him on: "Come, my friend, it's getting light. You don't want anyone to find you here." He gives a deep sigh, as if to say that the night has not been nearly long enough and that it is agony to leave. Once up, he does not instantly pull on his trousers. Instead, he comes close to the lady and whispers whatever was left unsaid during the night. Even when he is dressed, he still lingers, vaguely pretending to be fastening his sash.
Presently he raises the lattice, and the two lovers stand together by the side door while he tells her how he dreads the coming day, which will keep them apart; then he slips away. The lady watches him go, and this moment of parting will remain among her most charming memories.
Indeed, one's attachment to a man depends largely onthe elegance of his leave-taking. When he jumps out of bed, scurries about the room, tightly fastens his trouser-sash, rolls up the sleeves of his Court cloak, over-robe, or hunting costume, stuffs his belongings into the breast of his robe and then briskly secures the outer sash -- one really begins to hate him.
Would it help if I told you that actually Remeal just went to live on a farm in the country with lots of fresh air and sunshine and garbage to play in?
Alas, not. Country farms, IME, are lousy with kittens. Better to know he went peacefully than to imagine he went, well, piecefully.
Sweet Remeal is in an elegantly lined box inside a Ziploc bag inside the freezer waiting for Rory to be able to say goodbye when she comes home tonight. I imagine we will be having some sort of rodent funeral service and burial? I sort of understand now why we were only allowed pet fish as children. I'm a little surprised to be crying about a rat, but there it is. He was a marvelous little beastie indeed.
Is The Apostromullet returning?
A mullet requires cutting. I'm just growing crazy hair.
Having just caught the relevant parts of From Russia With Love on TV, I can speak to these useful rules for a British gentleman traveling under an assumed name on the Orient Express. Upon embarking on the train, one may treat the corridor as a public space and wear your hat until you reach your sleeping compartment. Similarly when leaving the train, whether by normal means at a station or otherwise. However, while the train is in motion the corridor is treated as a private space and the hat should be left off.
Special bonus hat-wearing tip: When you commandeer a motor launch on the Adriatic, replace your regular hat with the Greek style captain's hat of the Slavic gentleman you have overpowered to do so.
One could do worse than to be a wearer of hats.
I have done worse, myself.
39: Alas, not. Country farms, IME, are lousy with kittens.
But maybe he went to the farm to join Nicodemus and the Rats of NIMH.
1. Most of those hipsters are wearing hats indoors because they are balding and they think the laydeez will not realize this if they wear a hat. It's sort of the modern equivalent of the horns of the cuckold, now that cuckoldry has lost some of its stigma. Everyone except the nitwit wearing the hat can see the balding pate underneath.
2. I often find myself in social circles (as diverse as crusty punx and frat boys) where wearing a knit stocking cap of some type all the time is de rigeur. I wish that I didn't, but there you have it.
3. If a gentleman is going to wear a brimmed hat, and not remove it indoors, he might as well complete his foppish affectation by tipping it when he meets a lady. To do otherwise is to cement his reputation as a bounder and a cad.
39: Good point about the cats.
And good luck with the ceremony.
A mullet requires cutting. I'm just growing crazy hair.
The Apostrophro!
It will look splendid on the cover of your next mix, no doubt.
I wear a Cargill stocking cap when it's cold. It's not stylish here, though. Baseball caps all the way, and keep them on indoors.
42: "i may drink red wine with fish while wearing my hat in the corridor even when the train is moving, but you're the one on your knees!"
wearing a knit stocking cap of some type all the time is de rigeur
I think its cute when women do it. I'm indifferent to it as men's fashion. Also, I'm rarely exposed to it.
(is bond in fact a "gentleman" at all? i think he is a bit TOO obsessed with "the rules", which marks him out as a mere weasely parvenu IMO)
27 gets it right, I think.
If you are wearing a proper hat hat -- fedora, or whatever* -- then take it the fuck off indoors, or you are in danger of looking like a twat of the Docherty/Fielder-Civil variety. But ordinary woolly hats don't seem to cause offense when worn indoors in the same manner.
* on the great tragedies of our time is the way that many classic hat-designs have been co-opted by the duster-wearing dork community.
re: 52
I thought that was part of the point [of the Bond character]?
You know who really rocks a bush hat? Moi.
well i didn't go to eton and he did PLUS he can (probably) tuff me up anytime he chooses, so i prefer to leave an element of wiggle-room
the duster-wearing dork community.
Ha! This is pretty much the entire male student body of my alma mater. Many hats on display, yes. And still, whenever I see someone wearing a classic chapeau, I assume not "fashionable hipster" but "20-sided-dice-owning wolf-T-shirt wearer who probably files his fingernails into points."
This is pretty much the entire male student body of my alma mater.
Speaking as someone who currently teaches that very student body, let me just say: FACT!
re: 58
Where I am there's pretty much a three-way split within the classic-hat wearing community.
i) the duster-wearing dork,
ii) the fashionable hipster [although this look is fading],
iii) people who think that dressing like something out of Brideshead Revisited is what you are supposed to do when in Oxford.
'Course some people just, in a non-twatty way, like classic looking stuff, as they should, since it's classic for a reason.
1. Has nobody yet thought to blame this on Justin Timberlake?
2. I hold out hope that I'll one day be able to rock an Irish walking hat without looking like a twit.
3. These hats these days, they're all so tiny! Pity us poor megacephalics, for they perch like thimbles atop our heads.
3. These hats these days, they're all so tiny! Pity us poor megacephalics, for they perch like thimbles atop our heads.
Christ, yes. I'm lucky enough to have access to a couple of shops with huge stocks of classic hats [see 60.iii above] and while the largest sizes fit me, they look pretty ridiculous due to the immense size of the bonce underneath.
I saw someone wearing a beret in the street the other day, in a non-ironic way I assume [they were middle-aged enough to be outside the hipster demographic, I suspect], and it looked great.
These hats these days, they're all so tiny! Pity us poor megacephalics, for they perch like thimbles atop our heads.
Exactly why I had to stop wearing hats. BTW, the rule for purely functional hats, such as those worn to keep the rain off, is that you take them off when you would roll your umbrella.
i saw someone wearing a top hat in the street in (edgy) hoxton just before xmas: i assume from the area -- arty hipster-reclamation of a long-shuttered light industrial district -- that it was an attempt at a Bold Fashion Move, rather than some insane throwback (he was fairly young; but judging by the rest of his kit it wasn't some clown-shoes rave thing)
the bowler is the real taboo classic in the UK: only now worn by the actually insane
I'm sure 60.iii gets tiresome if you live there, but damn, that's hot to a poor midwestern American girl.
Remember how absurdly ubiquitous baseball caps were during the mid-90s? And the brims were all bent into that narrow horse-shoe shape? I'm glad that baseball caps have once again been relegated to sporting events and bad hair days for the college age set.
re: 65
Oh, I like the clothes. If I was a bit more sylph-like, I'd wear more of it myself. I just reserve the right to think actual-toffs dressing like that are twats.
Age is the answer Tweety. In 20 years you can wear a hat and not look like a hipster even if that was the impression you wanted to convey.
Hats are removed when inside, except for places that are akin to public streets, like lobbies, corridors, and crowded elevators (non-residential). In a public building (where there are no apartments) the elevator is considered a public area. Not for the US military. Indoors for them includes things like mass transit and subway stations. Of course cars are indoors too.
66: 7-3/8"
Which I know isn't that huge; I have a theory that every man thinks his head is unprecedentedly giant, like off-the-scale huge.
My grandmother would always make me take my fedora off when I entered her house. Granted, I was 11, and really shouldn't have been wearing a fedora anyhow.
44: Did you ever read the last of Robert C. O'Brien's "children's" book? A tale of post-apocalyptic date-rape, it's rather haunting, especially because the author died before finishing it, and the ghostwriter (or whatever such a person is called in such a situation) note this in the text, before concluding the book from O'Brien's notes.
re: 64
There's various shades of steampunky stuff around. I saw a girl at the Eurostar terminal in Paris dressed in an honest to goodness Victorian style cloth bonnet [and weird heavily laced Edwardian style overcoat]. On her it looked absolutely amazing; but I could see that it would slide over into pretty damn awful if done badly.
Sorry, that comment should have carried an OT prefix.
72: he finished it as a ghost? Eerie!
Granted, I was 11, and really shouldn't have been wearing a fedora anyhow.
I also wore a fedora at age 11. Set way back on the crown of my head, like Wham, because of my keen fashion sense.
Wait, 7-5/8". I'm underselling my head!
You know that little ad in The New Yorker with the old-style hipster in a beret? That's for one of my favorite local institutions.
I have a theory that every man thinks his head is unprecedentedly giant, like off-the-scale huge.
Well, you know what they say.
The macrocephaly problem is aggravated when one is shorter than average height. I (7 5/8) don't wear hats.
I'm also 7 3/8 [or sometimes one size larger] but due to being hugely fat at the moment [for me], the moon-face makes hats look small.
75: Exactly. Or so it seemed to my nine-year-old self. A self, it should be said, who was expecting more stories of clever rodents -- not post-apocalyptic date-rape! The psychological scars, I still have them.
Well, okay, M/tch you throwback, lay it on us.
Are you asking me to lay my head on your shoulder, Sifu? That's sweet!
Yes, Ben, you're being unreasonable.
I didn't ask if I was being unreasonable!
38 is gorgeous, and reinforces my conviction that I really should get around to reading Sei Shonagon one of these days.
I'm underselling my head!
buy small, sell big.
I think the chances of a male under, oh, 35 wearing a brimmed hat being at least somewhat if not fully douchey approaches 1, provided he is not Jewish, African-American, or a ska fan approaches 1 (exceptions to be made for sun protection, etc.). Sorry, JRoth.
That would have made better sense if I had not been called away for 10 minutes in the midst of writing it.
re: 88
I presume re: Jewish you mean Orthodox? Because otherwise, how would you know? [they were Jewish, I mean].
Anyway, I'm 37 this week, so I am allowed, it seems ...
72: OMG! I have very faint memories of the teacher reading that to us, in 5th grade I think. I do not recall the date-rape part and will assume there was some crafty page-skipping and gap-filling by the teacher.
Anyway, I'm 37 this week
How old will you be next week?
The hatwearers are simply less wholeheartedly archaic than you are.
That is, half-assed.
To clarify, these are proper hats, not caps.
Because otherwise, how would you know?
We have our ways.
I presume re: Jewish you mean Orthodox? Because otherwise, how would you know? [they were Jewish, I mean].
Chopper is provincial and presumes that any circumcised male is Jewish.
Recently in a rather rough area of Minneapolis, an 80-year-old woman who ran a shop making those flowery, lacy old lady's hats finally retired. She had taken over the shop from her mother -- it was 70+ years old. Two of her customers, twins, lived here in Wobegon and died recently at the age of 102. Those hats were old-fashioned fifty years ago. Someone should have made a documentary.
But anyway, happy birthday, Ttam. May you be gifted with many becoming and well-fitted hats.
91: The rape was never actually, um, consummated; it was just threatened. But that was enough for my nine-year-old self, thanks very much.
Last week I was 36, this week I'll be 37. Next week I'll be 37.019.
You'd think someone named "Chopper" would have more accurate knowledge about circumcision.
86: I very much love it and recommend it. I made my freshmen read the whole thing this year.
There's a special kosher method of circumcision that you learn to recognize after awhile.
There are great hat stores in some parts of Miami. Any place you get orthodox jews, church going african-american women and wealthy, elderly cubans in one place is going to have some awesome hats.
Which I know isn't that huge; I have a theory that every man thinks his head is unprecedentedly giant, like off-the-scale huge.
In a similar vein, I am of the opinion that my hands are ridiculously small, even though they are actually well within the range of normal adult woman hand sizes. They are still small enough to make it difficult to find gloves that fit, and this year it seemed that the glove makers have decided to get in on vanity sizing, so that my previously size-7 hands are now a decidedly more difficult to find 6.5. (Surely there is not actually any widespread vanity about glove size, and this change is not actually about vanity sizing, but it felt that way.)
OOH! This is the perfect thread for my Ask The Mineshaft: if you wanted to buy a light, solid colored three-piece summer suit (like, e.g. this general realm of thing) where would you go to do it?
I find vanity sizing positively offensive.
The hardware store is a good bet for the plungers.
105: Actually I quite liked your story.
106: 1974
106: So the toilet plungers would be coming out of your nipples, and your skirt is made of giant knobs? I suppose you should start at a hardware store.
To me, 110 contributed something new and fresh.
109: someplace that doesn't require a passport and/or time machine, optimally.
108, 110: No, see, imagine me in the suit, and Blume in the dalek costume.
To me, 110 contributed something new and fresh.
But what's wanted is something new and fresh contributed to us, heebie.
So you want to look like a Time Lord but not have to travel through time? You sound conflicted.
Okay, I actually find the suit in 106 rather sharp.
I would go to Linens 'n Things.
Why would you want a three-piece suit, especially in summer? Don't you sweat copiously anyway?
118: I do, yes. But they just look so darn good.
I'm thinking I could just roll around in talcum powder before putting it on, or something. Or wear an undershirt made of liquid nitrogen.
re: 104
Heh. For years I was convinced I had fairly small, feminine hands. Until I actually started looking for proper gloves [and then investigating other people's "stretch" qua guitar]. Turns out, most people's hands are tiny ...
My hands aren't giant, but they're oddly proportioned, which makes glove shopping a challenge. A challenge I meet fearlessly!
re: 3-piece suits...
http://www.edeandravenscroft.co.uk/stores.html
[not that I've ever bought anything from there]
72: ["NIMH book guy traumatizes 9-year-old ari" subthread]and the ghostwriter (or whatever such a person is called in such a situation) note this in the text
The ghostwriter being his wife and daughter according this short bio. His daughter (Jane Conly) has continued the NIMH series.
50: i may drink red wine with fish
And speaking of prematurely dead Roberts, I had previously only seen that film as a traumatized 9-year old (during its theatrical release), so I had no appreciation of the fact that the assassin was played by Robert Shaw.
122: Do you have huge fingertips with narrow bases, like a frog?
125: I just have one big finger in the middle of my palm.
Or:
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2220/2073272445_011cb73b81_o.jpg
126: That's not your palm, and you're freaking them out at the glove shops.
If I was in Thailand, I know exactly where I'd go.
My hands aren't giant, but they're oddly proportioned.
Well, you know what they say about the proportionedness of a guys hands.
My hands are almost perfectly square. Small, wide, with short stubby fingers. I have a hell of a time finding gloves that fit and consequently have about three pairs of ill-fitting ones that I leave at home, preferring to jam my hands into my pockets.
I rock a size 7 7/8 or even size 8 hat when I can find one. It irritates me so much when I see ads for, say, a really sweet stingy-brim porkpie, and the largest size they go up to is 7 5/8. Bastards. And all the large-hat websites seem to be convinced that their enitire customer base is made up of sports fans and Kangol-wearing losers. Just one of the many reasons for my malaise.
i used to wear small latex gloves, now for some reason they are becoming too tight, it's not acromegaly something starting hopefully, but medium size is still too large, so i have grown uncomfortable to wear gloves long time doing something which is very frustrating and i feel it affects negatively my productivity
I'm not sure what 127 is recommending. A haircut? Some whisky? Quality clots?
My sister bought me a pair of women's gloves in a size 7.5. They are too small.
re: 134
It's called, "Walter's, The Man's Shop" and is where you'd go for a nice suit or hat [as per Tweety's request].
To think that I wasn't aware that women's gloves were sized -- but of course they must be! I seem just to have numerous pairs of gloves in a variety of materials and thicknesses, for differing needs. This is not what people do, I take it.
I'm a baldy, which means I have to have a hat in nearly all seasons (to ward off sunburn or cold). My hat size is 7 3/4, but my head seems more oblong than expected, because many proper hats in my size don't actually fit me. So my usual no-sunburn hat is one of those cotton crumplers I invariably think of as a fishin' hat, and my winter hat is a fleece stevedore that has just enough stretch to fit.
I always take off my hat when going indoors, but it's not like I have to worry about hat-hair. I affected a fedora in high school, but I grew out of that phase.
Oh, I only looked at the tag just now.
I would also like to add to this complaint (which I fully endorse) the wearing of winter-type scarves indoors.
Nooooo! I do this all the time. They keep you warm!
137: I do, or rather would if I didn't routinely lose almost every glove I've ever owned. I have numerous single gloves in a variety of materials or thicknesses that I have kept in hopes of one day locating their matches.
My head seems to be abnormally small, which makes buying both hats and glasses quite frustrating. But there's the upside that when I do find something that fits me, it's often on sale, because it was too small for everyone else. This was the case for both my newest pair of glasses and my newest cloche-type hat. (The latter of which a friend tried on the other night. It perched on the top of her head, looking like a fez.)
I wore a fedora when I was 11, but it was a Duran Duran program related activity.
138: I think your old-fashionedy-er type of hat shop should have a steaming machine that'll let them reshape the hat to your particular oblongness. That requires finding a real hat shop, of course.
142 elides the fact that Blume looks awesome in pretty much any hat.
I look good in hats but I wear a very large hat size. Thick hair, oblong head. Doofus.
You're biased. Plus, you probably find the over-my-ears-and-eyes look more amusing to look at than I do to wear.
Thick hair
I was going to object to Charlie's remark upthread that every woman looks smashing in a stetson with this counter-example, but I thought it would be overly contrary.
They can be hard to wear if they're not made well, though. Because they sit so low, you can knock them out of place if you raise your head up too high and hit the back them on your collar/scarf/neck.
I once tried on a perfect cloche that had a cutout at the back, so that didn't happen. It was beaver fur and dark green. And $400.
I seem just to have numerous pairs of gloves in a variety of materials and thicknesses, for differing needs. This is not what people do, I take it.
Why do you take it that this is the case, and what has it to do with glove sizes?
cloche that had a cutout at the back, so that didn't happen
Oooh nice. Want!
I wore a cloche, just a standard issue black wool-and-velvet dealio, for most of 1990. I think I thought I was Anais Nin.
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A mystery is resolved. What's up with that track from Drumcorps's Grist called "Pig Destroyer Destroyer"? It turns out there is a band called Pig Destroyer.
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Such hats are indeed ridiculously sexy.
I wear a hat indoors to shield everyone from my godawful hair. What was that expression? "It's better to wear a hat and be thought a fool than to expose your hair and remove all doubt."
Oooh nice. Want!
Yeah, it's one of those things that you didn't buy (couldn't, really) and then you think about for years after.
152: Why do you take it that this is the case, and what has it to do with glove sizes?
Oh weird, my actual comment disappeared. Reconstructing:
152: Why do you take it that this is the case, and what has it to do with glove sizes?
I left out a crucial part, which is that most of these gloves I have fit to varying degrees, as I acquire them haphazardly, rather than shopping for them with an eye toward them fitting any more than more-or-less.
Back in the early nineties, university cafeteria in Warsaw, freezing winter day, me chilled to the bone. I keep my hat on while in line to warm up faster. An older man gets upset and tells me to take it off. I do, and the friend I'm with jokes to me that I could have used my racial background as an excuse (I'm half Jewish). Older man, overhearing, turns to me and says - your kind aren't welcome here, we don't want you, you shouldn't be in Poland. I put my hat back on, and say 'just to bug you, mr. professor asshole' (panie profesorze skurwysynie). He mutters away at the lack of manners of the younger generation.
I like the idea of owning fitted gloves, but all I tend to wear are my big wooly Icelandic mittens, and only when it's super-bitterly cold.
27 gets it right, I think.
Woo!
Also, ttaM, thanks to you, I made sushi with Scottish salmon last night - really excellent.
I got a pair of cashmere-lined leather gloves when I was 15, bought with Christmas money from my grandparents. They cost $40. I had them for fourteen years, at which point they had holes all through the lining and were coming unsewn. But they fit me so, so well by that point.
I got a pair of cashmere-lined leather gloves when I was 15, bought with Christmas money from my grandparents. They cost $40.
Which is like $190 in today's money.
Okay, OJ.
Seriously! I didn't follow the OJ trial, the glove thing, but really: Does the glove fit?
Well, no, probably not really. I mean, fits well enough. I've had a number of moments watching police procedurals on the television when I have to scoff: what, some guy showed up at the funeral, and you figure that must mean he was having an affair with the deceased? Uh, actually not; he just used to live across the street. And no, the gloves don't fit: so what? And some of my gloves have holes in them, which doesn't mean I'm on hard times, but rather that I hang on to things and still have uses for them. I also have gloves that are way too huge for me, which I've worn once if at all, but they were hand-made by a friend and are otherwise lovely. That doesn't mean someone with huge hands frequents my abode.
Ahem.
That actually makes me feel better. When I replaced them, the new ones were way more than $40.
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ObBurghContent:
I'm not sure that this is really the best way to sell people on moving to your town.
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170: I think they're maybe at the point where it's worth giving anything a shot.
167: But Blume is only seventeen. So really, we're talking about $37.50 in today's money.
Lucky Frank's is NOT to be confused with those nancy establishments in Lawrewnceville or South Side. Come in, shut up, order a giant Yuengling draft and relax. Parking, of course, at your own risk.
Fuckin' Lawrenceville nancy boys.
I wear a hat every day, a simpler cloth version of the one Knecht is rocking in the link at 56. I do not remove it indoors because I am in the USA and that is not the tradition over here. When I am in Botswana I do, not because that is the local custom - in fact it isn't the custom of the Tswana. I was, however, raised in a community composed in large part of the jetsam and flotsam of the British Empire, people who were all the more strict in their adherence to obsolete English customs for their awareness of the fact that they were the remnants of the outposts of a now lost True Civilization, a civilization that at its peak looked down on people like them for their provincial backwardness, and always regarded them with a hint of suspicion that they might have begun to slide towards going native. So I take off my damn hat because I've heard the lecture a hundred times and I don't want to waste time politely listening to some aging imperialist gasbag waffle about the importance of maintaining ones' standards.
171: Well, they've already started by being selected as the location for the movie adaptation of The Road, so I'm guessing they agree with you.
176: my opinion is based largely on that Times article about whatsisface the (brash, tattooed) mayor, so yeah, I know they do.
I mean, I read the article and forwarded it to Blume with the annotation "I'd totally live there!" so they're at least having some (minor, theoretical) success with the kind of idiot that gets excited about living in a dystopia (so much room for robot building!).
177: So why don't you share these things with the rest of us, huh? Hoarder.
178: Hoarder.
Look it was that or looter.
I do not remove it indoors because I am in the USA and that is not the tradition over here.
It may not be general practice anymore, but that does not mean it is not "the tradition," even in the US, among imperialist gasbags or otherwise. When you are in the US, do you wear that hat all the way to the table at someone's house or in a restaurant, in your seat at the theater, or at your desk at the office? I am curious!
I wear my sunglasses at night.
I wear my heart on my sleeve and my gun outside my pants.
You do your little dance on the catwalk?
180: I take it off at dinner. If I went to live theater I'd probably take it off. At the movies, I take it off or leave it on depending on what's more comfortable. At the office or at home it's usually sitting somewhere upside down, with the contents of my pockets inside. One of the reasons I wear it everywhere is that it serves as a sort of field-improvised purse where I can dump my kit so that my cellphone or wallet don't impede my ability to climb on top of or crawl under things, both of which I am called upon to do with some regularity. If I am at your house and I ditch my kit into my hat and drop my hat somewhere, you know I feel completely comfortable and relaxed.
Usually it's off if I'm sitting down, but that's not really a matter of tradition or manners.
Usually it's off if I'm sitting down, but that's not really a matter of tradition or manners.
You ordinarily sit on your head, so it'd be tough to manage?
At the movies, I take it off or leave it on depending on what's more comfortable
Or whether anyone is behind you, I hope.
Can't be very comfortable watching a movie with somebody hitting you in the back the head every three minutes.
Or whether anyone is behind you, I hope.
It's not the kind of thing that'd interfere with anyone's view. I have a hankering for a Carmen Miranda style hat, but it's unlikely I'd wear that outside the bedroom. Laydeez.
Dammit! Missed the Braddock subthread. I'll compile several comments into one:
- The first construction-type work I ever did was demo for Habitat for Humanity in Braddock (H4H prefers new construction, but several branches in SWPA have pushed rehabs, since old, structurally-sound houses are practically free in a lot of places here). While I was at it, who should walk past but some young men clad entirely in blue - first time I ever saw real live Crips (1990ish)
- I've never met the mayor, but my best friend/colleague has, and was seriously impressed by the guy before he ever got any momentum together. The Times underplays his awesome domicile, which is a shipping container dropped atop a nondescript little brick building.
- I've done a shit-ton of architecture/planning work in Braddock, some of it productive/successful (as in nice, new houses being built in a town where all the housing is falling apart). The place was a shithole in 2001, and has only accelerated - the accumulated neglect is far outstripping any recovery efforts.
- The architecture really is(was) impressive.
- It's not literally true that there's no retail there, btw. Among other things, Bell's is one of the great, old-fashioned butchers remaining in the region. A few years back, I was unable to get skirt steak anywhere else, and they custom butchered like 10 lbs. of it for me.
- Self-taught documentary-maker Tony Buba has done a number of stunning pieces about Braddock. I believe that Thunder over Braddock has played festivals nationwide.
- There's a boat put-in there. I've kayaked there, and there's always fishermen.
- A couple years back my family and I (inc. my MIL) had gone to dinner out near Braddock. On the way home, I decided to take her past the mill, which looks awesome at night. I hit a huge pothole at speed, blowing out both tires on the right side. Took about an hour to find someone who would come to tow the car. Not scary, but weird to be so stranded in an ostensibly settled area.
- There's an awesome communal bakeoven built into, IIRC, the hearth of a demolished home on a vacant lot right near the mill.
- I spent my 5th year in school working on Lawrenceville, which was far from nancy 14 years ago. We all loved the neighb, but were convinced it could never be saved (it's quite extensive, having gone from 30k people to 10k). Now it's the subject of loving pieces in the NYT. Weird. Still not really nancy, except compared to places like Braddock.
187: Holy crap, that is, my goodness, togolosh is cute!
I'm disappointed that W-lfs-n did not take this opportunity to make German-English puns.
Er "hat" seinen Hut nicht abgenommen! Ho ho ho!
A glass and a half of wine and I'm finding 195 far, far too funny.
Belatedly:
My other half wears hats, and considers taking them off indoors part of his US heritage, just not one he'd actually been taught. Buses are particularly vexing; you're sitting down next to people, but balancing the hat on the bag on your lap is annoying. A few years ago he asked the woman next to him, one advanced in years and conservative in dress, what the rule was for being polite with a hat on the bus. She eyed him tolerantly and said "Nowadays, sonny, you can do whatever the hell you like."
Alarmedly:
He looks really good in a bowler. Now, this is rarely a problem, because where is there to wear one in the States? Weddings of friends, who have already forgiven us our dorkinesses. But what insanity does it signal in the UK?
Sometimes one sees walking about, or standing lanky, in the hip or fashionable or douchey neighborhoods, parties, or bars (no one wants to admit that the first and the third substantially overlap, everyone knows it, but no one wants to come out and say it, as if it won't be true, not really, until someone says it)
Really? Maybe this is another transatlantic divide thing, but in the UK, it's a cliche to say they overlap. What was for a while the trendiest part of London - the above mentioned top hat encountering Hoxton/Shoreditch - was and is renowned for its douchiness. To the extent that there was a popular fanzine called Shoreditch Twat and a sitcom was made based on a spoof listing for a TV show called C*nt all about how despicable a human being its archetypal Hoxton resident subject was.
But what insanity does it signal in the UK?
General and severe. The connotations of the bowler are half banker from the 70s or earlier and half Malcolm McDowell in A Clockwork Orange. So anyone wearing a bowler is projecting both of those images at the same time. Clearly only someone who is stark raving mad would want to do such a thing.
Suppose one is wearing a hat as part of a specified dress code fancy dress outfit --- say, a beret with one's stereotypical Frenchified get-up --- must one take one's hat off indoors, if that would destroy the Frenchification and thus contradict the dress code?
(Or does this merely signal the weakness of one's get-up?)
Keir: Shouldn't you do whatever the French person in question would do? Louchely leave it on; hang it from a marble statue's genitalia; roll it tightly, tuck it under your epaulette; etc?
Ginger Yellow, thank you. Although, hm, bankers from the 1970s or earlier: in at 10, out at 3, 3%, don't bring down the global economy? I could get behind that.
