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The Elements of Fashion Sauce; rain garden update; upcoming Author's Tier pieces
🕑 Added 2024-11-18 21:23:02 +0000 UTC
Good morning. It is 11:24am as I begin this, this momentary diversion on the road to whatever it is you and I are doing this afternoon. This is probably nothing more than a journal entry; or is it a powerful and precious shield against the intrusion of yet another news cycle into your already-vexed and -incredulous temporal lobe? But there I go, subtly suggesting what you ought to think, like some kind of insidious news cycle. I sometimes wonder, when I am outside and gazing into the rain garden which now holds copious autumn water, if the two greatest forces invented by mankind are (1) the concept of time, and (2) the news cycle.
But you will find no more of that heady talk here. This is a distraction, an Instagram reel of your favorite type of person dancing in a swimsuit, but in textual, cerebral form. Take my weird hand, reheat your flagging beverage, and read on.
The Author’s Morning Habit
I awoke this morning around seven a.m. This isn’t typical, but we entertained twice this weekend, and I’d fallen asleep a little earlier than usual, just after midnight. I’m experimenting with a large-dose CBD edible before bed and it knocks me out right away, which I love, because I have never been able to fall asleep in anything like an acceptable timeframe. One of the many reasons I liked to drink heavily in college was that it promised a much more reliable bedtime. At some point I may naturally harmonize with whatever internal rhythm nature has plumbed up inside me, but that time is not this week. Mama N made me chemically antisocial and that project is going to take some kind of spiritual month drumming a bongo on a Sedona butte-top.
I did a little deep breathing, but not enough to count as discipline, and brushed my teeth so that I could taste the morning’s coffee without interference. I switched to decaf many months ago, as it results in deeper sleep and no more pesky crepuscular trips to the loo. Breakfast of a single fried egg, yolk popped and flipped in olive oil, and slid onto toast, was enjoyed at the dining room table, looking out across the street to the house of the neighbors who only wave hello if prompted to do so. I will not allow this neighborhood to be one where we blank each other, so everybody gets a wave and a verbal greeting if I see them. If elementary human warmth is a thorn in their side, perhaps they will grow the pearl of artificial affection around it, and soon come to recognize its appealing lustre.
Option: Sauce
A podcast recommended a walk around the block, so I did that, after putting in the effort to assemble an outfit. I have been giving considerable processing time to the concept of “sauce” lately, as it pertains to building the day’s costume. It’s easy to fall into a safe and easy, inconspicuous clothing rut.
Sauce, as I define it, means including an element of risk, incongruity, or potential derision in your outfit. It’s a delicate thing: Not even Adam Sandler can pull off a top hat with his voluminous basketball shorts and oversized 1990s short-sleeve button-up shirt, and nor would anyone want him to. But what if you wore a non-theatrical hat that’s on the brink of contemporary usage, with clothing that wasn’t thrown out the back of a Goodwill? Today I wore a new wide- and flat-brim fedora that almost comes off like a Trilby, which Lauren got me last weekend in Poulsbo, and the barista at Extracto gave me multiple compliments on that, as well as the rest of the ensemble, which was a cardigan over a strange bright red polyester cowboy shirt buttoned all the way up. Normally I’d feel painfully conspicuous in such attire, but I try to remind myself of the dashing Italian men we saw everywhere on our honeymoon — men who could not give two fucks about what some black-hoodied Americans in a sodden suburb thought of their sprezzatura — and I am reminded how attractive boldness and self-confidence is. There will always be grouches whose internal monologues are filled with disdain for tall poppies, but that is their poison vessel, and it shall burn them out from the inside if they do not soon decant its bile.
Next time: choosing your outfit’s Statement Piece.
Rain Garden Update! The Empire Expands.
After arriving home from the walk I stopped and pondered my rain garden for a while. The heavy skies lately have filled its main pool, and yesterday I spent a calm and reflective while just watching the drops spatter and ring its surface. I realized that I was enjoying the experience quite a bit, so today I perambulated the remainder of the yard, scoping the footprint where its sister pool will lay. A yard ideally needs two rain gardens, so that the existence of the first doesn’t come across as some precious and vain anomaly. Two rain gardens says, “I know what I’m doing.” One rain garden says, “I’m a dabbler of little consequence.”
Gym time.
12:56pm. I have also been chatting with Hayden this whole time. He wants to open an Etsy shop for his jewlery, which is, in keeping with his own sauce, quite meticulous and luxurious-looking. Kid has a much better sense of color than I do. If we get that project off the ground, you will hear about it here, you can be sure of it.
In the works for the Author’s Tier:
I am editing down a big story about the true time I worked at a marketing firm where everybody went crazy. I think the statute of limitations has passed on talking about it.
I am finishing my honeymoon installments.
I’ll be privately posting a first glimpse into the finished studio art pieces I’ll be offering for sale.
I am willing to post pictures of my Fashion Sauce, but only if some kind of petition is filed.
Comments
Nicholas Williams
It is also a surreal and hilarious read, one of the few cookbooks I’ll just flip through for a word fix.
Nicholas Williams
If you flip to his recipe for, say, a nice roast beef sandwich, you will quickly discover that it requires the completion of multiple subrecipes, some of which take literal days. At his sandwich shop in New York he of course has all these delicacies mise-en-scened for expedited sandwich construction, but the home cook is fairly fucked. If you can see one through, however, the results are magnificent. One sandwich contains slow cooked beef, fried clams, tomato muchim, and grape jelly mayonnaise.
Chris Onstad
I applaud this venture into mullet territory. Mullets are having a moment, and I often see their warrior element, in the right lights and on the right heads. What's the cuff opening on those Levi's? Smart money is on the CCOI (Common Cuff Opening Index) soaring to nearly 18" this year.
Chris Onstad
I have not, but I welcome the sharing of a detail or two about this book, particularly the super-upsetting aspects.
Jacquelyn R Walters
Seconding this. You can't tell us that much about your fashion choices and not show us.
Nicholas Williams
God man meatloaf is the fucking best. Have you read the wonderful cookbook by Tyler Kord called “A Super Upsetting Cookbook About Sandwiches?” It contains an excellent meatloaf recipe, not to mention some serious Achewood energy.
Julie (HiDeeHoGal)
I forgot to say that creating local community is always a good idea but now it seems mandatory. So keep saying hi to and getting to know your neighbors so that if you need to band together to fight the fascists you at least know who you can trust.
Spyguitar
PS also that meatloaf looks to be perfect
Spyguitar
Yeah man, let's see the 'fit. I type this wearing a too-large (and thus properly-cozy) hoodie and just basic Levis, but my fashion risk lately is that I asked the lady who cuts my wife's hair to give me a mullet, and she obliged. So far it's working out: the folks who like it, like to let me know, and the folks who don't can pound sand
Chris Onstad
Thanks for sharing that back. My quick response is that while I generally support “dowhatchalike” as a liberating mantra, it is a dangerous idea in the hands of the sartorially inexperienced. I urge initial research and emulation for the neophyte awesome person.
Julie (HiDeeHoGal)
Man that meatloaf looks bomb diggity. I don't know Kenji's recipe but it looks strictly classic and to be chunked up for sandwiches on hoagie rolls in a day or so. It's nice to see standing water and green plants just about anywhere now to be honest. As far as the sauce and sartorial questions, hearken back to the Digital Underground song "Dowhatchalike" and wear what ya like. I moved my dad into memory care this weekend after nearly losing him to heart failure the week before so such fripperies as meatloaf, gardening, and clothes are SO welcome.
