[fishing] with friends

if you've followed this blog for the past year, you'll know that boothbay harbor is one of our favorite towns.  we visited it for the first time a year ago, when my wife had to work the [fishing for fashion] event during the annual boothbay harbor festival.  when she was asked to host the event again this year, we decided the only thing that could make boothbay harbor better would be to invite four of our friends along. as the weekend unfolded, that assumption was correct.

as weekends with good friends normally go, two days together created a million little anecdotes and inside jokes between all of us, but one of the more memorable moments involved all of us on a boat along with a freak rainstorm.  halfway into taking the boat taxi into town we got drenched by a spontaneous deluge of rain.  we were all soaked from head to toe.  thankfully boothbay harbor is a tourist town with lots of souvenir shops which allowed all six of us to buy boothbay harbor hoodies and sweatshirts to have something dry to put on when we got off the boat.  so there we were, all six of us walking through town, enjoying restaurants, listening to bands and drinking at bars looking like a living advertisement for this fantastic city.

and i think we were all ok that.

[autumn] attire

it's a fact.

i look better in fall clothing.

i love shorts...i enjoy wearing them...i enjoy being comfortable in them when it's hot.

i don't however enjoy being seen in them. (i have weird legs)

that all changes in the fall however.  put me in some jeans, boots, a nice button up, and a light jacket, and you give me a chance to hide my "fat" a little better.  also, there's a good chance the temperature is cool enough that i wont be sweating like i just thought about jogging a quarter mile.

if i have to meet someone, for the first time, i'd prefer it be in the autumn months.  the way i look and dress in the fall is a way better first impression then i could make in shorts and flip flops.  you never want to have someones first impression of you to be,

"whoa, those are some weird legs"

This is why, no matter what the temperature is, as well as general professionalism, i've always worn jeans or slacks to a job interview. i'd much rather the interviewer see me sweat and curious if i had just run a marathon before our meeting, then burn into their brain a vision of my weird legs.

i feel like inland maine and i are very similar.  since moving here, the majority of my exploring has been on the coast.  i haven't traveled "into" maine much.  last sunday is decided to change that with a quick trip around sebago lake.  the trees were at peak foliage and the reflections off the lake were amazing.  i drove completely around the lake and spent two hours in awe.  i'm not sure i would have had the same feeling if i would have seen sebago lake for the first time this summer.

i might have noticed weird "coves" or something.

[reel] fashion

i enjoy creativity in all places.  

the other weekend i saw creativity combined in two places foreign to me; fishing and fashion.  i attended the aptly named "fishing' for fashion" event during the boothbay harbor festival. an event requiring designers to use items and materials usually found on boats to create dresses.  among the materials used to create gowns were netting, woven nautical maps and even sea glass!  as an architect who enjoys using local context and materials for inspiration, i found this event incredibly fascinating.  i enjoyed seeing the imagination of the designers to find materials normally used for one specific purpose and envision them in a completely different way.  a quality i not only enjoy in architecture but any creative field.

living on the [wedge]

last week i joined my friends for dinner at one of our favorite local restaurants.  looking through the menu we noticed several new items many of us decided to try out.  along with the entrees i noticed a new side dish called a wedge salad.  not thinking much of it, i ordered one.  when my meal came out i was surprised to find a very symmetrical salad starring back at me.  i had no idea how to eat eat it, so i picked up my knife and fork and preceded to indulge into this intriguing iceberg item like a steak.  not only did it have an interesting shape, but it kept everything nice and neat and away from my cuban chicken sandwich. a feature a very much enjoyed.  needless to say, i was immediately smitten with this salad.

the next day, i made a joke referencing the salad on twitter saying,

"i like to pretend i'm a cultured, well traveled person, but its obvious i'm not, as last night i believe i ate my very first ever wedge salad"

little did i know of the can of worms i had just opened.  the responses and information that followed were not only entertaining, but extremely educational.


first i learned the wedge salad is nothing new.  it turns out this type of salad was actually extremely popular in the 50's and 60's in most restaurants.  naturally, this escalated my already high feelings for this food.  next i discovered the decline of the wedge salad came about during the 70's and 80's as people discovered more exotic types of lettuce such as romaine, leaf, boston and bibb, making iceberg look boring.  the lettuce for the "unrefined".  not surprisingly, the decline of iceberg lettuce seems to be inversely proportional with the rise of the "yuppie".  not only did the wedge salad loose popularity during this time, but i also discovered a large amount of "wedge" haters on the interwebs. several blogs are devoted to dishing on this dish, solely blaming it for the decline of american cuisine.  although i think they're being a bit dramatic, i can see how its modest ingredients might anger a few.  remember however, this was the 50's, a much different time than we live in now.  a time before trader joes or whole foods, when the availability of fresh produce to any location in america was a miracle in itself.  just like the classic meatloaf, its simplicity is what scares a lot of people, but simple is not a bad thing, so quite hating...hating is bad.

lastly, i learned the wedge salad was making a comeback, even to the point of being considered "trendy". however just like it's decline, its sudden rise in popularity makes sense.  we're still coming out of a terrible recession, a time finding people rediscovering talents and simpler practices our grandparents knew by heart. ideas our baby-boomer parents kicked to the curb with the promise of mass consumerism. activities such as home gardening, canning, couponing, thrift store shopping, cooking from scratch, knitting, up-cycling, and "do-it-yourself" projects.  things considered by many to be "lowbrow" just a few decades ago, now are popular.  the classic iceberg wedge salad, once considered unrefined, now is the leafy mascot of the recession.

just like everything else in this world, that which is old becomes new again.  if you wait long enough everything comes back into fashion.  well....maybe not my "mc hammer" pants, but who knows.

re[boot]

i'm not what you'd call a [fashionista]. fashion is just something i don't spend a lot of time thinking about.  my wardrobe tends to be based more on comfort than style.  that being said, i live my life by three simple rules when it comes to fashion. 1. never under any circumstance wear pleated pants.  not only have i heard they're unfashionable, but i really hate the way i look in them, appearing as though i'm wearing a diaper.  2. never give or receive any form of clothing as a gift.  there are too many variables when it comes to clothing; color, shade, fit, stitching, size, texture, feel, look, any of which, when wrong, leads to failure.  these factors make it hard enough to shop for myself, how is anyone else suppose to do it for me? i'm sorry, but clothing as a gift rarely works out. 3. never ever buy the [exact] same thing i'm replacing.  not only is this rule in place so it forces me to always to try something new, but it's an easy way to keep up to date with fashion, without much thought.  well, one of these rules was broken recently, and here's a hint, i ain't wearing pleats.

several years ago i bought a pair of clarks original desert boots.  i saw them at the store, thought they looked nice, they were comfortable, so i bought them.  little did i know i had just purchased my favorite pair of shoes.  i wore them everywhere.  they were nice enough to wear to work, and casual enough to wear out at night.  they matched with my old busted jeans and looked great with a nice pair of dark ones.  heaven forbid, they even looked good the few times i wore them with khakis.  the more i wore them, the better they felt. being made of soft suede, they packed well, leading me to take them with me everywhere i traveled.

winning me over on looks, comfort, and function i researched the shoe a bit.  it turns out they haven't changed much since first introduced in 1949. everyone from british soldiers in cairo, to beatnik's, to mods, to hippies had worn these shoes.  much like eames lounge chairs and ray-ban wayfarer's, the style of this shoe had become [timeless].  if i hadn't already been crazy over these boots, the nostalgia factor put me over the edge.

wearing these shoes as much as i did, i literally wore a hole in them. i was heartbroken. not ready to give them up, i found myself limited to wearing them only when i thought it wouldn't rain, occasionally ending up with a wet sock.  what was i to do? break my rule, and buy a new pair, or try my luck with some other brand and style.

i had been agonizing over this dilemma for months, when finally, one of the rules was broken.  christmas morning i opened a package from my parents and inside found a brand new pair of boots.  i was shocked,  because i knew my parents were well aware of rule number two, but was thrilled they had decided to break it.  a HUGE [thank you] to my parents for their incredibly thoughtful, very surprising, much needed, rule breaking gift.  i love them...and now that i've photographed them, i can finally start wearing them.

what's in a [wallet]

i'm in a predicament...and any answer to this little quandary, i fear will cause me to have to spend money...which i hate.

let's take a look at this "denim dilemma".

first of all, i can't remember the last time i bought a pair of jeans. i will wear a pair of jeans until they literally fall off of me...which happened once in college. i hate shopping for them, i hate trying them on, and i hate having to pay for them. the whole experience is just one big ordeal, that i'd rather just avoid.

secondly, i have a slightly large wallet...alright.... it's huge. i might as well be hauling around a purse in my back pocket. it's your typical george costanza wallet. it has however been an amazing accessory. i bought it in colorado, back in high school. i'm not sure what magical warehouse eagle creek makes there wallets in, but i wish they'd also make cars, because this wallet looks just as good as the day i bought it. it was exactly what i was looking for at the time. i had started driving a few years back and wanted something "grown-up" to house my newly acquired drivers license in. it had lots of little pockets and zippers to house all sorts of items...which they've been doing steadily for 12 years now. over the years it's been the lead suspect in the cause of death of many pairs of pants, with the back pocket disintegrating completely off, rendering the rest of the pants useless.

thinking i could solve this problem simply, i started placing this canvas brick in my left pocket instead of the right. this only caused my world to fall into all sorts of chaos. i constantly felt like i had lost my wallet, i'd continually reach for it on the right side, and i discovered that i couldn't sit straight in chairs. i never noticed this when it was placed on the right side which can only mean having this wallet in my pockets over the last decade, had actually formed an ergonomic divot in my backside, which is as scary as it is funny.

changing strategies i decided to remove all unnecessary items that probably didn't have to be housed within it's velcro borders. this list includes:

a fifty cent piece
a sacajawea dollar
a colorado fishing license dated 7-11- 2000
my college i.d.
some old photos
gift cards from three different stores and two restaurants
a block buster card
a small stack of my old business cards
business cards from nearly all my friends
a punch card from a coffee house in manhattan, kansas
a punch card from a coffee house in portland, oregan

sorting through and removing the unneeded items successfully thinned the wallet down, however the stretched out pockets could no longer tightly hold the remaining items. after realizing a simple clean out might not be the answer, i now see myself having two options.

maybe it's time to get a different wallet. send the old wallet to the back of the closet, hidden away with my collection of "hard rock cafe" t-shirts, and get one of those really thin wallets all the "hip" trendy kids seem to love. it'll be less to carry around, and possibly save some wear and tear on my jeans.

or option two. i just admit to being [that guy]...you know...the [huge over stuffed and sometimes hard to fold, velcro wallet guy]. i'll keep using my current wallet as some sort of fashion barometer, keeping me up-dated when it's time to get a new pair of jeans. i'll spend my days at the boccie courts, with the rest of my peeps, arguing over which crooner is better...perry como or frank sinatra.

who will save your [sole]

i have issues with letting things go.....

i hate throwing things away.....

i was taught this from and early age. everything can always find another use. just ask me about bread sacks and "math" paper. in my apartment, i have movie stubs from high school, as well as a pair of argyle socks my grandfather gave me in middle school, and i'm almost certain i'll be the only person returning to the 10 year reunion in the same car they drove in high school.

it's one thing to reduce, reuse, and recycle, but it seems the "reusing" part of the equation leaves a lot of items laying around waiting for their coveted "second use".

is this wrong? it seems we live in such a throw away world, it's almost contagious to start thinking nothing has value. what happened to quality, what happened to craft?

well, last week i came across an article discussing the salvaging of dress shoes. the article stated most people rid of their dress shoes after a little wear and tear and go out and by a new pair reflecting the latest style. very few people take the time to get shoes repaired by a shoe smith.

no joke, a few days after reading this article, pondering how to make a blog out of it, the heel feel off of one of my work shoes. seeing the irony in the situation, i was not upset, and used the time it took me to hobble home to think about the title of this post.

looking through the yellow pages i found the address of a little shoe shop my family has gone to for years. i was pumped, i finally i had my own broken dress shoes to take! it was exciting.

it was only nailing a heel back on....nothing even close to refurbishing a pair that might have seen the inside of the dumpster, but it's close, and sort of ties into the article. so, like always i took some pictures to add some visual interest to this blog, and because i was in a refurbishing mode tonight, i polished up another pair of shoes.

but what is the line? when do you decide to try to mend the repairs? when is it time to throw away? when will i be able to wear my sweater vests again, and not get made fun of?