Knot a Blog: 2007年12月

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12月27日

Happy Birthday and Anniversary, with Sadness

Today was supposed to be a happy day, but life and death have ways of changing our plans. Benazir Bhutto is dead. That's a terrible end to this year... and, more importantly, a terrible beginning for a new year.

Three years ago today, I began a new job at the office of the Tampa Lighthouse for the Blind in Winter Haven, Florida (as always, I do not give a link for that organization, the better to emphasize that it has no official connection to this blog). My brother sent me a congratulatory email, noting that he had seen a reference in some today-in-history site or other that my first day on the new job was Marlene Dietrich's birthday, and with my love for the great actress and icon, that must have been propitious.

There turned out to be another link between Dietrich and my job, a job for which I had to wear a necktie, with emphasis on had to. I was not very happy about the Lighthouse dress code, until about a year later, I began this blog of my daily neck fashions. The connection to Dietrich is that she was famous, or in her day, infamous, for sporting neckties, as well as men's clothing in general. Here she is in The Seven Sinners:

So, in spite of the terrible news today, I could not help feeling festive. I spent the day at the Tampa office of the Lighthouse, where I had the opportunity to learn about computer repair. Such a day requires a special necktie, a tie that I had originally planned to wear on my most recent visit to Tampa, when I wanted an especially festive tie. As you can read by following that link, I decided to wear a necktie that would be appropriate to my work. So, today, this elegant piece of silk by Guy Laroche got its chance. With its glorious flowers and dark background, it became an appropriate commemoration of two remarkable people whom I am glad we have had among us, as well as part of my celebration of a job that has opened my heart and mind and neck to potentials I had never considered.

Dec300

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12月26日

A Conscientious Objector in the Christmas War

It has become a December tradition by now (only the third December) in this blog to comment on holiday greetings and the strange concept of "Christmas war." So much, I suppose, for blessed are the peace-makers. Nowadays, the message seems to be blessed are you when you invade, conquer, and occupy a country for no reason.

December 2008 has been full of happiness and holiness. For Buddhists, there have been Bodhi Day as well as the birthday commemoration of Amitabha Buddha. For Muslims, there has been Eid Al-Adha. For Jews, as usual, there was Hanukkah. Black Americans have Kwanzaa, and pagans have the solstice. Christians had Advent and then Christmas, a celebration which has no Biblical authority and was not even officially celebrated until a few centuries after the event, when it was assigned the date of the birth of Mithra, a Roman god born of a virgin who came back to life after death.

For me, it was a holiday to see my mother, and tomorrow will be one of my special holidays. I decided it needs a special necktie, and so shall it have. I have changed the order of the last three ties, the Metropolitan Museum of Art ties. The one on the left was worn to work on the 19th. The one in the middle was worn to church with my mother on the 23rd, and the one on the right will be worn to work on the 28th. But tomorrow, there will be a special tie for a special day. And then, I'll be getting ready for the big celebration next month.

So, holy happy days and happy holidays to all.

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12月18日

Last Ties of the Year

I shall be working only three more days this year, and so, here are the three neckties I'll wear. All three are Metropolitan Museum of Art ties, silk, from Canada. Since they all have the same details, there is no need to identify them by dates. I'll work and wear a tie tomorrow, 12/19. With a combination of holidays and personal days, I'll be off until 12/27. Then, I'll work 12/28, and I won't be back on the job until 2008. If my nonexistent social life offers more chances to wear ties, I'll post them, and I'll probably be back - tieless - for reflections on an old year and a new year, holidays, and neckties.

Dec250

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12月16日

French cuff day

I have one white dress shirt with French cuffs, so it gets saved for what is my biggest social event of the year, the annual company lunch in Tampa, which is coming up Tuesday. So, the special shirt is ready without much thought, but, as usual, the tie must be carefully selected. (My fellow tie blogger, Will, has recently written about one of his vintage ties, "It was obviously intended for the ubiquitous white shirts of the time from which it came." Nowadays, the white shirt is a once-a-year garment for me.)

Tomorrow, as the program is going for these holiday weeks, I'm wearing Metropolitan Museum of Art ties as a default and special ties for special days. Tomorrow, then, I'm wearing a tie from the Met (silk, Canada), although it doesn't look like the typical Met tie - tasteful but boring, apparently based on bits of decorative details from Met holdings. The label for this one reads "New Directions | The Metropolitan Museum of Art," with "New Directions" in a rather artsy looking script.

I couldn't make up my mind for the tie on Tuesday. I had another Rush Limbaugh tie (as I wore last year) - yep, nothing says holidays like Rush, at least his ties. But, I decided to go with a celebration of my work. This necktie (Computer Gear, silk, China) is perhaps the most subtle of the many computer-themed ties I have worn. Look closely, and you'll see that the design is made up of a series of ones and zeros (or zeroes; I just checked several entries at One Look, and they all gave both spellings). In other words, binary numbers. Did I mention that the lunch is on Tuesday, December 10010, 11111010111?

Dec200

I have a special cause for celebration. Dinosaurs and orchids are recurring themes of this blog and of my ties (well, not that many orchids on the ties), and as you can read here, it now seems that dinos did not live - as scientists have thought - in a world without orchids. Another recurring theme of this blog is friendship, and it makes me happy to thank my friend Valerie for sharing that information with me.

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12月9日

Shocking festivities

As I mentioned last week, for the remainder of the month, I'm going to be wearing some special ties for special occasions, and I'll be filling in on the days between with Metropolitan Museum of Art ties - pretty special in their own right.

So, on Tuesday and Wednesday, I'm wearing two simply elegant, elegantly boring Metropolitan Museum of Art silk neckties from Canada. By the way, I just checked the Museum's store site, and they have only sixteen ties currently for sale, ranging in price from $50 to $75 for non-members.

Thursday, I am going to Tampa for defibrillator training. The gentleman who is organizing it told me to be sure to wear an electric tie. I do have one tie dedicated to technology (other than the computer ties, of course), but I couldn't stretch it to include defibrillators, and somehow it seemed especially tacky to wear a tacky Valentine tie (hearts, get it?) in mid-December. Since I often joke about my office in Winter Haven being so small-town and rural in scope, compared to the main office in the big swinging city of Tampa, I'm opting for a Tango by Max Raab silk necktie ("Americana Series | Country Farm Scene | Circa 1896"), made, appropriately, in the US. This is, I am sure, the first appearance of cows in this blog. I do recall remarking that we poor country cousins have to get to work earlier than our urban counterparts, because the guide dogs have to go out early and milk the cows.

So, after introducing a new species of the blog, how can I follow that up? By retreating to another Metropolitan Museum of Art silk necktie from Canada.

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12月6日

Parrots in a pear tree?

Parrots in a pear tree? Well, where are the pears on this necktie? For that matter, where in that most irritating of holiday songs are the parrots? A friend and I believe that that is a serious omission. These red parrots on a green background certainly capture the festive mood tomorrow, when we have our annual graduation and Christmas party for the people we work for. The parrot tie (Designs by A. Rogers, "Parrots II," Designer: Silk House, polyester, Korea) is inevitable. Since we will be having a variety of special activities at work for the coming week or two, the rest of this year, I am going to be wearing appropriately festive ties for festive occasions, and on just plain work days (there will be some of those), I'll be wearing anything but plain Metropolitan Museum of Art ties, like the one I'm wearing Monday (Metropolitan Museum of Art, silk, Canada).

Dec100

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12月4日

The Enduring Dinos

This is not the first time I've worn dinosaur ties in this blog, and as I've mentioned before, dinosaurs paid my rent for five years, when I worked in a nearby dinosaur park. So, manatees from yesterday and dinosaurs today are part of my life in Florida, although dinosaurs never lived here. Considering the news update about manatees (see the end of yesterday's entry), I hope there is no sad significance here. Dinosaurs are getting in the news themselves. Not bad for critters of their age... It gives me hope.

December075

Both of these neckties feature herbivorous dinos. On the left is a tie by Duomo Milano (polyester, Korea). On the right is an Endangered Species (you better believe it) tie (silk, US).

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12月2日

Manatees

I got started with this current sequence of animal neckties without being aware of what I was doing. As I've mentioned, I'm not as much a fan of animal-themed ties as I was a few hundred cravats ago, but I do still enjoy them. It always surprises me when I find how many critters are still lurking in the unworn archives.

Consider these two manatee ties. I have had several pleasant experiences with manatees. When I lived on the banks of the Alafia River, I sometimes saw, while sitting in my back yard, a gentle seacow floating by. Now, living in a manatee free zone (but the swans of Lakeland, where I now live, go a long way toward compensating for a manatee deficiency), I honor the big beasts with these two ties. On the left is a World Wildlife Fund tie (silk, US), and on the right is an Animal Tracks tie (polyester, US).

Update (12-04-2007): There is debate again about unprotecting this protected species. It would be great if indeed they had come back from the brink, but why take a chance?

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12月1日

A Mixed-up Week

We had Thanksgiving and the day after off, and I took off Monday and Tuesday afterwards. I visited my mother, but she did not feel like going to church, but on Tuesday (27th), I attended a special function with my friend whom I call my Designated Shopper. I wanted to wear a necktie, but I did not want to wear one of the animal ties that I've been enjoying in November. So, I went with a fairly restrained (at least for me) Tango by Max Raab (cotton, US). It is a glorious floral, but again, it is rather restrained. It doesn't scream flowers the way some florals to.

Now, I'm going to skip to Friday (30th). Attending a meeting of fellow computer folks who work for the Lighthouse, I wore just about my most special tie of all. Of course, it has computers on it. It is a polyester Daniel Adam tie made in Korea, and it is very special to me because my niece gave it to me. Thanks, Molly.

The rest of the week was taken up by two predictable large African mammals: the elephant (Wembley Endangered Species, silk, US) and the giraffe (Animal Kingdom, polyester, US). What can I say, when mere elephants and giraffes become predictable... and I'm running a week late with the blog anyway?

Although it has nothing to do with neckties, I could say, Happy Resistance Day, Ms. Rosa Parks! Fifty-two years ago, when you got on that bus, did you have any idea how far we all would travel? How far we would not travel? How far we have come and have not come on another front is very much on many minds today, World AIDS Day, once again. I don't think I can say anything about that.

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