Kicking 2012 Off...In Flannel Pajamas

The first three work days of 2012 have been blessed mania. Hygiene holiday hunker down in a baseball cap mania. I’ve been writing case studies for a strategy project and as usual—have been under the deadline gun. I was gonna tidy up the last bits of it during the Christmas holiday in South Carolina but then my mouth blew up and everything was on hold.

With the exception of donning an old pair of LL Bean flannel lined khakis and going to the bank to deposit an expense check, I’ve been self-exiled…sequestered…put away…sent to my room…literally, since last Sunday night. It kinda reminded me of grad school when I would hyper focus for thirty-six hours straight and maniacally write a soon to be due paper—thinking the entire time as I pulled the words out of my a_s, that this was gonna be the time that my procrastination and ADD whateverishness had finally caught up with me. But then I’d get a smokin’ hot good grade on the script. I’ve lost the boxes that contained most of my schoolwork. But I do have one paper that I wrote on the Geisinger Health System in Pennsylvania. My professor initially gave me an A-minus on the paper. But then he crossed it out and put “A+…You captured it perfectly.”

So a maniacal three days of writing isn’t anything new. Butcept this time I remained at home in my favorite pair of Brooks Brethren flannel pajamas for 100% of the time excepting the trip to the bank and the post office. Baseball hat and pjs and soup—I’m so freakin’ tired of soup. After I hit “send” on the email that jettisoned my out-of-the-butt panic writing…seven attached pdf files, I felt like I’d just been sprung from prison. And my Brooks pjs were gamey to say the least.

So I showered, shaved and layered on a dose of ADG sartorial absurdity and headed to Brooks Brethren in Georgetown. It was sixteen degrees yesterday morning and the skies seemed to say all day that they’d be offering snow. 

So I wanted some color to go with my layers. The resultant shodding and horizontal hosiery screamed … “look everyone; ADG’s been pole-axed by a gay Dr. Seuss!” Shut up.

And it was certainly cold enough for my Ralph Camel Polo Overcoat.

 My Christmas present to self Drakes/Flusser scarf tightened this rig up just right.

 And by the way, if you haven’t visited the Georgetown Brooks, you should. It’s a great store and I’d rather have it as the replacement of Larry McMurtry’s old book shop than the Pottery Barn that was there before.

While at the Brethren, I phoned a friend and proposed…not THAT kind of proposal…that we meet thereafter at Bistrot du Coin for an early dinner—given that my jaw has sufficiently recovered to graduate from soup to roast chicken. She laughed at my update on going to the Brethren and declared that I needed no clothes. No shit. After making her aware that I’d been living in the same pair of flannel pjs for three days, she without pause said…“Get two”.

But alas it was not to be. The flannel pjs are on sale and they are pretty much gone. They had a pair of extra-large but on my best, puffiest chest day, I’ll not fill those bad boys. And this was a situation of wanting it now. None of this “let me call around to the other stores and have them sent to you” thang. My gamey ones have now been sandblasted and detoxed—ready for another flurry of Occupy CasaMinimus.

I had some time to kill before heading over to Bistrot du Coin so I stopped in at Sky Valet on upper Wisconsin to check on the status of my Edward Green Westminster double monks that I ordered in October. Please go and visit these guys. They are a pedal oasis in an otherwise style devoid town. As much as I love my Gotham jaunts and sartorial finds in other cities, I’m gratified to transact some business with local merchants who purvey tasty goods. Alden, Edward Green and Crockett & Jones represent the bulk of their mens offerings. Oh, and they are shoe makers by training and do expert repair work. And right now, all of their Crockett & Jones and Alden shoes in stock are 10% off.

I’m not impatient. The Sky guys told me that special orders were bottle-necked at Green’s Northampton works and given the two-week factory shutdown at Christmas, it would be January or February before they rolled in. I didn’t figure they’d be in but it was a good excuse to stop by and say hello. Why the custom/special order? Hello. Did you forget whose freakin’ blog you’re reading? I wanted the lighter, reddish-yellowish tan/brown suede and I wanted a Dainite sole.

So the Bistrot du Coin roast chicken and pommes frites…swimming in a thin roast chicken gravy…was perfect…even though I had to gnash every bit of it on one side of my mouth. Worry not. I pre-medicated with a Kir Royale and then accompanied the one-sided gnashing with a twenty-four dollar bottle of a white Burgundy--no need to go overboard. There’s nothing better to sooth me, short of Roxanne Burgess, than French country comfort food.

Onward. Into 2012 full-bore. Reveling in the fact that I had the time and energy to cobble such quintessential randomanalia. And wearing hats like the one my mama made me wear in the picture above when I was three. Kind of a piccolo Stormy Kromer. It's cold here.

ADG II