Dressing for Success: Harder than Ever

In the old days a wife took the blame for letting
her husband go out like this (Urban/WSJ)

Wearing a coat and tie during the sweltering days of summer was uncomfortable, but that was the businessman's lot during most of the 20th century.

Being required to wear the "uniform" had its advantages, though: men didn't have to spend a lot of time deciding what to wear. The basic wardrobe consisted of blue, black, and gray suits, blue and white shirts, and black shoes. We expressed individuality through ties.

Today it's much more complicated because there are more combinations that are possible and more ways to go wrong. Also, being classy and casual doesn't come cheap.

P. Johnson Twill Linen Corbu Vest, $490,
Oxford Shirt, $175, Ice Cotton Tee, $245,
and Tony Jeans, $370 (WSJ)

Alternatively, you could dress like a suave guy who just happens to work with money. [Alex] Seo loves classic-but-not-corporate jackets from the Armoury, including the safari styles. Zach Garst, a trendy Houston tax consultant, 28, pairs cotton slacks with “something a little more spicy,” like boxy shirts and cardigans from Auralee and Frizmworks.

For style inspo, Le Alfré founder Brandon Snower recommends @schoonerscorer, an Instagram account popular with finance guys. It features videos of a charismatic Brit—Alex Hendy—rating beers at pubs. He’s stylish but never mentions clothes. After bingeing clips, I can tell you that I won’t be slurping the ho-hum porter at one central London pub, but I do need Hendy’s cream cable-knit sweater and red Ralph Lauren shirt. I like that he’s not a “fashion influencer”—outfit-dissecting accounts often come off cringe—just a cool guy doing his thing.

One menswear account I do enjoy: @the_daily_mirror. Founder Manish Puri, who works in financial services and writes about menswear, radiates unprecious elegance with flowy trousers, suede chore coats—and a cartoon chicken head superimposed over his own.

Another benefit of the old dress code is that business attire could hide a man's defective physique. Now his flaws are accentuated.

I'm glad I'm retired.

Sock Shoes: A Good Idea But I'll Have to Pass

Brave Pudding also has sock shoes for men

Relishing comfort, and being lazy, I initially liked the idea of sock shoes.

[Brave Pudding] sells one style of sock shoes in multiple colors for $380. Made from recycled cashmere with a small amount of a recycled performance stretch blend for durability, Brave Puddings look just like a sock. But the structured interior and recycled rubber sole make them feel and function like proper footwear...

“I was like, what a strange name and interesting shoe,” said Medine Cohen, who writes the popular style newsletter The Cereal Aisle. “I really quickly tried them on and [thought], ‘These are exactly the right bridge shoe when it’s too cold for sandals but you still want to feel like you’re barefoot.’” (The brand is named for a legend of a woman who defied British soldiers during the Revolutionary War by throwing her pudding down a hill in East Hampton instead of feeding them.)

Not having to put on shoes when coming or going is convenient, but sock-shoes don't solve the sanitation problem of tracking dirt and germs into the house. (We always remove our footwear at the entryway.) And I imagine sock-shoes can't be worn in wet weather.

Wearing slippers solves the sanitation problem, but if you're going to do that an ordinary pair of socks will do (although I personally find the slippers-with-socks look cringey). It's a good idea, but I'll have to pass.

Yakking It Up

Not having to don a coat and tie for work--as your humble blogger did for most of his life--does not necessarily mean that men can cut their clothing budget. A nice cotton shirt will no longer do.

American Trench's yak shirt ($249)

A well-turned-out guy must wear a "luxe material", for example a shirt that contains 10% yak wool.

While [Jacob] Hurwitz believes the 10% of yak wool definitely contributes to his bestselling shirt’s softness, he hastens to add that the fabric, otherwise “high-grade” cotton, has been scrupulously “brushed” to amp up that tough-yet-tender effect. As he explained, the fabric goes through a “comber, which has little picks that pull fibers out and create that fuzzy texture.”

And, yes, Hurwitz and his team considered the yak fabric’s potential to offer his customers talking points and even bragging rights. “The yak factor really helped drive the sales,” he said, noting that the shirt, new for American Trench this past fall, “crushed” for the brand, selling better than any previous shirting in its lineup. The yak, he stressed, “added something exotic. It would be a lot less interesting to go around saying ‘I have a really soft cotton shirt.’”

We should not be overly critical of this latest trend in men's fashion. In a blind touch-and-feel test, the $249 10% yak shirt beat out a $998 64%-cashmere button-down from Todd Snyder. Cheaper and better, that's what capitalism is all about.

Bottom Story of the Day

Magnus Carlsen's illegal pants (x/twitter)

One of the best chess players in the world was banned from a tournament for refusing to switch out his pair of jeans:

five-time world champion Magnus Carlsen arrived at the upscale Cipriani Wall Street, host of this year’s World Rapid Chess Championship, wearing something organizers considered utterly inappropriate. He was sporting a pair of jeans.

To FIDE, the game’s world governing body, this was as unacceptable as moving a pawn three spaces.

Denim, FIDE said, is “explicitly prohibited under longstanding regulations for this event” and promptly fined Carlsen, one of the greatest chess players of all time, $200 for his infraction. When the chief arbiter requested that Carlsen change his clothes, he declined to do so. And as a result, the 34-year-old grandmaster from Norway wasn’t assigned a match in the following round. It was chess’s equivalent of a one-game suspension.

Carlsen responded by quitting the tournament altogether—and then pulling out of the World Blitz Chess Championship, too.

“At that point, it became a bit of a matter of principle for me,” he said in an interview on his Take Take Take chess platform. “I’m too old at this point to care too much.”

Carlsen added that he’d been returning from a lunch meeting and barely had time to go back to his room, where he put on a shirt and jacket. He even threw on a different, dressier pair of shoes. But once the arbiter warned him about changing his trousers, Carlsen decided he’d had enough. Instead of arguing about pants, he figured he might as well spend his New Year’s somewhere warmer than freezing New York.

There are some people who are bigger than their sport. Tiger Woods, at his peak, was bigger than golf. Magnus Carlsen is bigger than chess. FIDE would be wise to consider that power dynamic when it seeks to assert its authority over a trivial matter like wearing blue jeans.

Santa Cruz Students Don't Know Why It's Popular

John Travolta wears the iconic T-shirt (SFGate/YouTube screenshot)

Most UC-Santa Cruz students don't know why its banana slug T-shirt is a sought-after item. The shirt's popularity is due to Pulp Fiction, Quentin Tarentino's greatest film, which celebrates its 30th anniversary this year.

“The Fiat [slug] is like the logo,” said [Jason] Cohen of the UCSC bookstore. “It’s a cartoon banana slug wearing glasses and reading Plato. It’s our best-selling logo, period. We sell it in many different capacities. I put that on academic planners and notebooks and all kinds of stuff.”

Among all the slug merch available, the Fiat Slug T-shirts remain the school’s top seller, by far, Ray Rideout, UCSC’s apparel buyer, told SFGATE. “Everyone gets it,” he said. “Anyone who’s seen the movie, it was the cleaner scene, right? When people — they find out where I work, they always send a picture of Travolta wearing it.”

Last month we noted how the banana slug has been named the official California state slug.

"Politics is downstream of culture" is a well-known saying. 30 years after it entered the culture, politics has recognized the cultural significance of the lowly banana slug.

Use Hose When Your Toes Repose

(USA Today photo)

I never did this during my Hawaiian childhood, but cold winter nights on the Mainland--with the interior heat turned down to 60°F--encouraged me to wear socks to bed, which turns out to be a controversial choice:

an under-cover inquiry by The Wall Street Journal finds that socks-in-bed is dividing couples and the public square. Opponents physically recoil at the notion, and say people who snooze in socks can’t be trusted.

The emotional backlash is surprising, because science supports leaving the socks on:

A study published in the Journal of Physiological Anthropology found that young men fell asleep 7.5 minutes faster, slept 32 minutes longer and woke up 7.5 times less often than those not wearing socks.

It might seem socks would make you too toasty. But counterintuitively, researchers say, socks help lower core temperatures, a process that assists sleep.

Chilly feet can raise the temperature by sending more blood, and heat, to core areas, according to the Cleveland Clinic, which explains: “So, what does adding in a fluffy pair of socks do? Those cuddly duds warm your feet, relaxing and widening blood vessels that constricted while cold. This improved blood circulation in your overall body helps release more heat through your skin.”

Comments:
1) Adapt to the circumstances. If your feet become uncomfortably warm, take the socks off.
2) Wear a clean pair to bed, preferably after showering or at least washing the feet.
3) The animus against socks probably stems from the days when men wore dark dress socks to work. Wearing the same pair to bed is the mark of an uncivilized person. If someone shares your bed, you have only yourself to blame for the long-term consequences.

Slimming Down

Cash is being used on fewer transactions, and payment-by-phone is increasing. The ineluctable result: the wallet is shrinking, and doughty individuals are leaving home without it altogether.

Given these trends, here's what the experts say you should carry in your wallet:

Cash: $30. Chelsea Ransom-Cooper, director of financial planning at Zenith Wealth Partners...recommends $30 just to cover small transactions, like buying from a food cart.

Credit cards: 2-3. The average American has about four credit cards, but financial advisers say you should leave home with no more than two or three. Having one or two credit cards and a debit card may be ideal.

My thicker wallet undoubtedly reflects personal insecurities. I carry at least $100, 1 debit and 3 credit cards, a driver's license, a gym membership, a health insurance card, and an auto club card. The latter two hardly ever see the light of day.

But hey, I'm getting better. I ditched the COVID vaccination card about a year ago.

Cold Logic

(Martha Stewart photo)

Your humble blogger always hand-washes dishes with hot water. There's no question that hot, soapy water cuts oils much better than cold. Also, more bacteria are killed, and running the hot water while rinsing reduces grease build-up in the drain.

But heated water is not better than cold when it comes to washing clothes, according to Tide experts:

P&G has sold a line of Tide designed for washing in cold water for almost two decades and still sells that product, called Tide Plus Coldwater Clean. The latest campaign pitches the overall brand as being effective in cold water. The company says it has reformulated Tide over the years to be more effective...

P&G says that cleaning clothes in cold water could save $150 a year on a household’s energy bill, or somewhat less with the high-efficiency washing machines used in about 70% of U.S. households.

A Clorox scientist says warm is more effective than cold:

[Mary Gagliardi] says warmer water is generally the best way to ensure clean clothes, especially in colder climates. Ms. Gagliardi says manufacturers are able to test garment-washing in water as warm as 85 degrees Fahrenheit and define it as a cold-water wash according to levels set by standards organization ASTM International. A warm cycle is around 100 degrees, while hot is 122 degrees, she says.

“If you are in Minnesota right now and your cold-water temperature is 45 degrees, some people are washing in temperatures barely above freezing,” she says. “You are not going to get any cleaning done in 49 degrees.”

I'll stick with what I learned at the kitchen sink when it comes to washing clothes.

Call me clothes-minded, but warm is better.

Brain Protection: Not Just for Football Players and Construction Workers

Amazon sells this $79 lead cap hood

People who wear tin-foil hats have been mocked for nearly a century, but they weren't crazy, just ahead of their time.

Headline: When Your Boss is Tracking Your Brain

Over the years, these electroencephalogram, or EEG, devices, along with the software and algorithms that power them, have gotten better at tracking brain-wave signals and decoding people’s emotions and cognitive skills. Some employers use the devices to monitor employees’ fatigue and offer brain-wave tracking as part of wellness programs designed to decrease stress and anxiety.

My mental alacrity has diminished significantly from when I was in high school, and I'm glad that I retired before employers' brain-scanning devices could document the degradation.

If I ever do go back to work, I'm wearing a lead hoodie purportedly to hide my balding pate, but you and I will know the real reason, dear reader.

It's Not Really About Shoes

(WSJ montage)

The Nike Dunk Low Retro White Black (aka "Panda Dunk") was a hot property with aficionados until the shoes became ubiquitous:

The sneakers illustrate the primary conundrum of limited-edition items: Enough have to be available to become a mass-market phenomenon, while remaining rare enough to seem exclusive...

The Panda’s frequent restocks were too much for Miami-based event producer Norma Moreno, who got a pair when the model first came out but decided to give them away after they became too common.

The 32-year-old said the sales represented how streetwear culture has been watered down. “No one is showing that off,” referring to the Panda Dunk, she said.

If the shoes are comfortable, durable, look nice, and are not too expensive (currently over $200 on Amazon), then I would be in the market. Despite the disdain from some quarters, there's still a significant social-status premium embedded in the price of Panda Dunks, so I'm not interested.

Still Binary After All These Years

(WSJ illustration)

For men's underwear it's still a boxers vs. briefs world, but now there's a multiplicity of colors, materials, and shapes:

Tom Patterson, CEO and co-founder of New York City brand Tommy John, also suggests guys no longer feel the need to stay in traditional underwear lanes. “The ‘boxer or brief’ paradox is no longer as relevant…because there are so many more options to choose from,” said Mr. Patterson, whose brand offers six (six!) above-the-knee cuts, from 8-inch boxer-briefs to skimpy briefs in a breathable pima-cotton blend...

If you feel like mixing things up, which styles should you pull on—and when? Damien Paul, head of menswear at retailer MatchesFashion, recommends men sync their underwear with their trousers silhouette. It’s a like-for-like situation: Neat tailored pants go best with snug briefs, he said, because the high-cut, immune-to-bunching underwear is invisible beneath the trim trousers. Flowier pants, on the other hand, accommodate “a looser fit such as a boxer.”

Of course, there's the option of going commando, which seems to have health benefits. The problem with the latter is that no one wants to associate with boomers (plus-59-year-olds) who do so.

I'm sticking with boxers or briefs in basic cotton.

Losing My Sole at Church

The uppers still looked ok

When men's wear in the San Francisco Financial District transitioned toward business casual, I bought a pair of Ecco's, the first and most durable rubber-soled dress shoes that I ever owned.

At last night's church dinner that culminated the 2023 pledge campaign, half the right sole cracked off in four different pieces.

The shoes were unsalvageable, and off to the bin they went.

After 25 years of service a broken sole led to an ignominious end.

I'm Going Back Inside

WSJ recommends for a man in his '60's:Jacket, $1,498,
Ralph Lauren; Polo, $1,395, Brioni; Glasses, $795,
Jacques Marie Mage; Boots, $945, Manolo Blahnik;
Belt, $1,050, Hermes. Total $5,683.

Now that they're venturing out again, older men who want to look au courant are making serious fashion faux pas:

“Older guys wearing Allbirds sneakers with jeans, khakis or more formal pants. To be honest, don’t wear them at all—no matter what you pair them with, it won’t look good.” —Cassandra Sethi, personal stylist, Los Angeles

“The client was a recently divorced banker in his late 50s. His hair was dyed too dark for his complexion and he wore baggy sweatshirts and skinny jeans. Plus: a proliferation of jewelry that made him look like he was on several random spiritual journeys.” —José Ramón Reyes, founder of wardrobe consulting service the Custom Project, New York

“There’s nothing more unappealing than an older gentleman wearing an outdated, ill-fitting suit.”—Andrew Weitz, celebrity style consultant, Los Angeles

“In New York, I always notice older men wearing graphic T-shirts and embellished jeans. Those work on younger guys; [on anyone else] it makes you look like you’re trying really hard to dress like the kids.”—Peter Nguyen, personal men’s stylist, New York

“Too-tight clothes! I’m talking to you, Mr. Bezos.” —Michael Fisher, stylist, New York

Not too tight, not too loose, don't dress like the kids.

I don't feel like wasting nearly $6,000 (see picture) on clothes that not only look uncomfortable but will be out of fashion next spring.

I'm going back inside...

“Menswear is getting bigger, bolder and brighter”

"Ken" actor Ryan Gosling (WSJ photo)

The Barbie movie is coming out in 2023, and SoCal sensibility--for better or worse--threatens to become the next fashion thing:

Such vibrancy aligns with the current menswear mood, said Bruce Pask, men’s fashion director of Bergdorf Goodman. “There’s real contemporary relevance to how they’re costuming the ‘Barbie’ film,” he said. “Menswear is getting bigger, bolder and brighter.” Just look at recent fluoro-flecked collections from Giorgio Armani and Louis Vuitton. Arguably the last time we saw such carefree, SoCal-inflected menswear was the ’90s, when overalls were worn with the straps down, tips were frosted and Marky Mark exposed his Calvins.

Bold pastel, sometimes-fluorescent clothes went out in the 20th century with disco. You can still find them on kids whose parents want them to stand out, more for safety than fashion, especially at night time.

If the style is coming back, and we're going to have to pay 3-4x what we are used to paying, it should be comfortable, right? Au contraire, mon ami.

When trying outré colors, heed attention to fit, said Los Angeles stylist Brand Williams. Keep tailoring close to the body rather than going oversize, he said. The bolder the shade, “the more conservative the fit has to be.”

By the way, if you're going to commit to the look, you've got to do one more thing.

Bleach your hair.

Nope.

Fair Weather + Shirt

The Giants (46-43) are 13 games behind the Dodgers(59-30), yet the bleachers were filling rapidly an hour before game time. It could be the dedication of Giants fans, or the perfect weather (69 degrees, sunny), but the likeliest motivator was the free aloha shirts given to the first 20,000 to enter Oracle Park.

Someone close to me suggested that I could leave after obtaining the colorful garment. No sirree, if I left now these would be the most expensive aloha shirts in the closet at $100+.

Besides, I'm not just a fair-weather fan. Admittedly, the weather is pretty nice...

Update: the Giants won 2-1 on a balk in the 8th inning:

Former Giants reliever Jandel Gustave balked home Wilmer Flores with the go-ahead run and San Francisco held off Milwaukee 2-1...Crew chief Bruce Dreckman said plate umpire Pat Hobert noticed a “start and stop” by Gustave in his motion, terming it a “textbook balk.”

Casual Insouciance

Despite impressions from news reports, Northern California residents have not been subjected to one long, unrelenting heat wave.

Which means some early morning walks start in the 50's (sweater on) and end in the 70's (sweater off).

The WSJ helpfully offers tips on how men can look fashionable while lugging around a superfluous garment. [Note: blogger's comments in italics.]

1. The Not-So-Cold Shoulder

Consider this preppy option, which also suggests that your childhood hero was Stan Gable, the preppy hero in the "Revenge of the Nerds."

Sure, the look is cool, but a lot of heat is trapped by draping the sweater over one's shoulders. A classic case of form over function.

2. Tied and True

Master this casual classic by knotting your sweater just above the hips with the back folded.

Bonus: it acts as a built-in cushion for those slab-like outdoor coffee-shop benches.

This is the easiest-to-tie and coolest, in a temperature sense, option. However, the knot will loosen several times in an hour.

3. Chest Bet

Favored by the TikTok set, a knit that's knotted across the torso says "I'm carefree and stylish." Plus, if you injure your arm, say, skateboarding, you've got an instant sling.

Not only is this the most time-consuming configuration to affix properly, but it's only worth the trouble if I were trying to impress those who are 50 years younger. "But when I became a man, I put away childish things (1 Cor 13:11)."

4. Draggadocious Approach

Relaxed and utterly unsanitary, this tactic relays that you're so chill (or absent-minded), you don't care if your knit gets caked in sludge. Wearing a sweater post-drag is not advised.

Given the number of Bay Area creatures that have zero gastro-intestinal discipline when using the sidewalks, you'd better be wearing a single-use sweater if you employ this technique.

A Fundamental Principle of Their Own Profession

Starting to get holes, literally and figuratively.

Two years ago the college bookstore sent me the wrong T-shirt, but I decided not to return it. For $20 I got a comfortable cotton shirt, plus people might think I went to a prestigious law school as long as no one asked me any questions about the law.

The institution's star has fallen, so I'm not going to wear the shirt any more.

Progressivism and woke-ism have made inroads ("taken over" would be too strong) into Yale Law School.

David Lat (YLS '99) writes:

in an academic community based on free expression, there are limits to how much [Progressives] can act on the view that their opponents are Bad People. Progressives can’t shut down duly organized events because they disagree with the speakers. They can’t weaponize anti-discrimination policies to punish the protected speech of their opponents. They can’t make up and spread lies about professors with unpopular views (or the students who dare to associate with those professors).

Freedom of speech is not only a bedrock right embedded in the Constitution, it's fundamental to the operation of the legal system. The arguments for opposing sides are accorded a respectful hearing despite the raging emotions that may surround an issue, and one's notion of justice doesn't prevail because of feelings. It's very disappointing that elite law students don't understand a fundamental principle of their own profession.

And I didn't have to go to law school to figure that out.

A Soupçon of Pleasure

Out with the old (left)

Sometimes it's useful to take a break from big, complicated projects and work on something that can be completed in a small amount of time, e.g., clearing the paperwork on a desk, weeding a patch of the flowerbed, etc. And so it was that I finally took care of an irritant that consumed a few minutes every week.

The plastic shoe rack in the garage was old and flimsy. Pulling items out too hastily caused the whole thing to fall over because one of the posts was cracked.

A light-metal $25 rack was ordered from Amazon and put together in an hour. The old rack was trashed and every item transferred.

Completing this trifle rewarded me with a shot of dopamine, and it still gives me a soupçon of pleasure every day when I walk past the new rack.

And after two months it has never tipped over.

Laundry Inequality

(WSJ photo)

When we stretched our finances to buy our first house--it had three bedrooms--over 40 years ago, we had to sit on bare floors in the living room and two of the bedrooms.

Despite the lack of furniture our first major purchase was a Kenmore washing machine and dryer from Sears. The time wasted driving a half-mile to the nearest laundromat and waiting in line for a machine on the weekends (each of us was working more than 40 hours a week and driving at least a half-hour each way) was at least half a day.

Compared to the nearby coin-operated machines in college or the apartment complex, the time-sink was intolerable.

Never had we derived such pleasure from new equipment--and we're talking about a time when we got our first color television and our first microwave oven (both gifts). It's not much of an exaggeration to say that having one's own washer and dryer is a big step to achieving the American dream.

We were reminded of that distant past when we read about a new problem, a coin shortage, that has afflicted the appliance-deprived: [bold added]

Now I need quarters only for San Francisco parking
meters,which currently charge $2.50/hr. minimum
(and I'd rather not give the new meters a credit card).

The scarcity of spare change—brought on as people leaned on digital transactions and fewer coins circulated—has pushed the quarter-dependent to extremes. Many have spent hours trekking across their cities in search of coins they used to easily procure from local bank branches. One couple hauled four loads of laundry across several states where they could use a relative’s machines. And in some buildings, the yearning for clean sweatpants has resulted in neighbors forging closer bonds.

The flow of change first slowed in the spring of 2020. Restaurants and retailers posted signs encouraging digital and credit card payments and even asked people to exchange spare coins. The problem eased toward the end of 2020 but made a comeback in March as businesses were preparing for an influx of cash transactions after vaccination rates ramped up. Around that time, coin requests from banks began to outpace deposits, according to the Federal Reserve, which provides cash to banks through its regional banks.

Now there isn’t enough coin to go around, and the central bank is limiting orders on pennies, nickels, dimes and quarters. Banks and other financial institutions deposited about 15% fewer coins at their local Fed banks through mid-July compared with the same stretch last year, the central bank said. Coin deposits were 45% below 2019 over the same period.

Some bank branches are saving coveted coin rolls for their customers, according to apartment dwellers who have asked for quarter rolls at banks where they don’t have accounts. Other banks are telling would-be washers that they have no change to spare....

Digital options, such as reloadable payment cards or smartphone apps are gaining ground, but quarters have long been the default payment option, said Matt Miller, president of Coin-O-Matic, which outfits laundry machines with a variety of payment systems.

Demand for machines equipped with digital payment capabilities has roughly doubled since the start of the pandemic, Mr. Miller said. The most popular digital payment method is an app that users load money for laundry and connects to laundry machines via Bluetooth. Washers and dryers that accept credit or debit cards are less common because they require real-time Internet connections, which can be difficult to guarantee in the basements where many laundry rooms are located.

Wealth inequality manifests itself in housing, transportation, health care, and diet, but take it from one who's been there, the washer-dryer gap is more important than everyone thinks.

Wet Blanket

Drying a wet blanket in the hot Hawaiian sun saves money on dryer expenses and is environmentally virtuous. (We noted the benefit of using clotheslines ten years ago and again in 2017.)

In enlightened California drying clothes in the sun has not been widely accepted. For example a homeowners association in a new development near Sacramento explicitly forbids clotheslines in its bylaws:

Sure, make people turn off their air conditioners and suffer in the heat, ban cheap, sturdy, moisture-proof plastic bags in favor of unsanitary reusable containers, but clotheslines? They make Californians look lower-class, even Third-Worldish.

Hawaii is far from perfect, but here appearances matter much less. Hang 'em high.