Tag: Things of beauty

Art, music, whatever

Castles

Architecture, Beauty

Here’s yet another of those “Pick One” posts.  In this case, it’s castles.  If you had to live in one (and assuming that you could set up a decent shooting range / clay station on its extensive grounds), which one of the following would you choose?

  • West Dunbartonshire
  • Powys
  • Exeter
  • East Dunbartonshire
  • (ignore the one in Fife because it’s basically just a pile of rocks)
  • Wigtownshire
  • Aberdeenshire
  • Northumberland

Assume that all are actually habitable (not always a given in Britishland, regardless of price), and have decent insulation, electricity, hot water and so on.

As always, resist the temptation to say “I’m just happy with my lil’ ole place in Tennessee / Texas / Montana / wherever, and I don’t wanna live in Communist Britain.”

Play the game.

Missing Comfort

Food & Drink, Guy Stuff, Traditions

As any fule kno, I am partial to the occasional visit to a pub.  [pause to let laughter die down]

But  not just any pub.  I have strict rules for places which charge me far too much for the pleasure of indulging myself, because if I am going to be hit with a $7 (or more) tab for a single beer (!!!), the establishment had better offer me more than just a pint.  Here’s a short list of necessities:

Decent beer.  Any bar in the U.S. which doesn’t give me a choice of at least three British-ale equivalents won’t see me after a single awful American beer, and never again as well.  (Curiously, I find Mexico’s Negra Modelo  to be the closest thing to a decent ale, although I do have to pour it from glass to glass a few times to get rid of the appalling and excessive fizz.)  If they serve Fuller’s London Pride or Boddington’s, then we can be friends and they can be assured of a follow-up visit (or two, or three).  And if the beer isn’t up to snuff, they’d damn well better have a decent selection of single-malts or gins, or else it’s to the door I’ll be heading.

No loud music.  I’ve talked before about my hatred for this piece of modernism, whereby the acceptable noise of drunken people having a good time has to be drowned out by music — any kind of music, really, not just the revolting  thumpa-thumpa  of hip-hop — as though the background noise of simple conversation and occasional laughter are somehow incompatible with drinking pleasure.

Loud TV programs.  I can live with this if a.) it’s a “sports” bar or b.) there’s a big game being played (e.g. Bears vs. Packers or Chelsea vs. Arsenal).  But if I walk into a bar and there’s a large-screen TV showing ESPN’s SportsCenter (i.e. people talking about sport instead of playing it), I turn around and walk out.  Don’t even get me started if it’s CNN, Fox News or (gawd help us) Oprah Winfrey (I had to endure that once — client lunch, so I had no control — and it took me days to recover).

A foot-rail at the bar counter.  This may seem a strange one, but it’s a critical part of drinking that’s too often overlooked.  Note this otherwise-excellent setup (in a private house, withal):

But the Arrow Of Accusation points to the missing piece, and the whole pub is ruined by the glaring omission.

It’s a simple thing, really.  I (and many others) actually prefer to drink standing up, and especially around the bar counter, where space is at a premium.  It’s the one time I don’t mind being in a crowd, because I am in the company of people with a common goal, that of getting a good buzz on and enjoying life, and I far prefer a crowded bar to a nearly-empty one, which is depressing.  If one is enjoying the company of a lady, standing close to her bar stool makes the whole activity more intimate, too.  But if you’re going to stand, you must have a rail to rest a foot on, because otherwise you get tired of standing.  (I don’t know why that it, but it’s a fact nevertheless.)  Look at this place:

That picture simply screams out that I’ll be there till closing time, or later (don’t ask; I’m still banned from The Blue Cow which, needless to say, served about five excellent ales — all of which I sampled extensively —  and had a brass foot-rail).

Decent decor.  I hate modernist interior design, as all my Readers know well, but while I prefer the traditional pub style, it doesn’t have to be that.  Here’s the inside of the fantastic Randolph’s Bar at the Warwick Hotel in Manhattan:

…and yes of course it has a foot-rail at the counter.  And yes, I have been tossed out of that place too, several times, but always gently as I used to be a frequent guest there (hi, Carlo!).  On each of those occasions, the company was excellent and much disposed towards trying to finish all the Scotch in the place, but the atmosphere and decor did no harm to the attempt, either.

Here’s yet another of my favorite haunts, the Coq d’Or at the Drake Hotel in Chicago (where I do not have a tempestuous history, albeit not for lack of trying):

It’s a little hard to see (bottom left), but yes, there is a foot-rail, and it’s brass.

All this bar talk is making me thirsty.  And now, if you’ll excuse me, my post-birthday hangover needs a little TLC and that gin isn’t going to drink itself.

Now And Then

Fine Art

Sometimes, I wonder why we bother trying to create any new art at all, when it’s not only been done, but been done better.  In my wanderings along the Intertubes, I happened upon this little Art Deco piece:

It’s called The Swing, and was painted in the 1920s by Georges Barbier.

Alert Readers may recall that there’s been another artwork on the same topic (and title) featured on these pages, to wit, the one painted by Jean-Honoré Fragonard back in 1767:

Sorry, but I prefer the rococo playfulness of the later over the spartan coldness of the former — and I love Art Deco, generally speaking.  (For those interested, I talked about the Fragonard piece here — note the post date.)

That’s not to say that Barbier is a bad artist, of course.  Note La Jambe  (“The Leg”), for instance:

I’m not generally into sketches, but I’d have that one on my wall in a heartbeat.  And his Le Grand Décolletage  (“The Backless Dress”) is absolutely brilliant (and the man’s expression is priceless):

See what I mean about Now And Then?  That “fashion” is very popular nowadays with celebrities;  but they did it back then too, and better withal.

Self-Comfort

Beauty

At one point not long ago, I remember that we had a huge sofa that needed to be carried down the stairs — the only people around to do the job being me and the Son&Heir — and in discovering that I no longer had all the considerable strength I could once have brought to bear, the task was made tolerable only by the fact that the Son&Heir had grown up to be a strong man himself.  It was a sobering moment, and for a while I was quite depressed.  Then I thought about it, and realized that age was starting to have its way with me — I think I was sixty at that point — and trying to replicate feats of strength from my youth was not only pointless, but possibly quite dangerous:   heart attacks among men of my age trying to do heavy lifting are not uncommon.

I could have gone two ways:  hit the gym, manically try to build myself back up, or just accept the situation and realize the reality.  I chose the latter, even though it was quite a blow to my self-esteem to come to terms with this new reality.  No longer could I get into barroom brawls, no longer could I lift or just push heavy objects into place;  my life (and more correctly my body) could no longer tolerate any of that strong-man stuff.

Nowadays everything’s all about “self-esteem” and “self-realization” and self-this and self-that.  Hence the title of this post, which stays away from all the negative implications that have accrued to terms like “self-confidence” (boastful), “self-aware” (self-centered), and instead makes the case for being accepting of oneself and even more so, doing it gracefully.

Age does worse things to women.

While I agree that too much emphasis is placed on a woman’s appearance and especially her weight — and as Loyal Readers know, I lean more towards the “Nigella Lawson”-persuasion than the “Cameron Diaz” type — I think there is a great deal more to be said for women becoming what used to be known as “being comfortable in your own skin”:  coming to terms with who you are, what can be changed by things like diet and exercise, and what can’t be changed because of genetic heritage and advancing age.  It’s not a carte blanche to “letting oneself go” (another old expression) and becoming hideously bloated and sloth-like, but it does presume a more realistic attitude towards one’s appearance and capabilities.

No better example, I think, can be found than in the case of Kelly Brook, the one-time Page Three model.  In her teens and twenties during the late 1990s, she was the very picture of “beauty” (as defined by, well, everyone):

Then came age, and two children, and by 2007 she’d got bigger:

…and into 2018: 

To me, that’s a lovely woman.  In fact, “womanly” is the best way to describe her, and I cannot stress enough how attractive that is to me — how attractive that has always been to me — and I know that I am not alone in this.

Of course, a lot of people went to the Insult Dictionary, calling her “bloated”, a “whale” and all the other unpleasantness, and no doubt it hurt her a great deal.

But at some point, she got a grip on the situation, realized that what was being asked of her — staying with a sylph-like teenager’s body — was not only impossible but ridiculous, and she said so, plainly and quite succinctly.

Nowadays, she seems to have cut back a bit, but she’s still the same womanly size 12 woman she became:

Oh, I could go on (and on, and on, and on…) but I think you all get the point I’m trying to make.

Off The Shoulder

Beauty, Grooming

In today’s post I’m going to sing the praises of an article of women’s clothing which alas seems quite unfashionable these days, whereas it should be as perennially popular as blue jeans:  the loose, baggy, off-the-shoulder sweater.  Here’s an example:

The wonderful thing about this garment is that it looks sexy:  that slightly impression of wantonness  coupled with (in some cases) a tantalizing glimpse of the breast whenever the lady leans forward makes, for me at least, a hugely-erotic sight.

It’s completely ruined by the appearance of a bra strap, by the way;  the whole essence of the thing is near-nudity, even under so large and thick a garment.

Now I know that Not All Women Can Go Braless… but actually,  a loose floppy sweater does an excellent job of concealing loose, floppy breasts, for example, so what would be unthinkable with any other garment top is not at all out of the question with a wide, loose-topped sweater.  Here’s one with a very loose neck:

In each of the above cases, the model has a fairly modest bust — but a larger one would make the garment quite sensationally sexy.

While I quite like the Victorian “below-the-shoulder” (i.e. both shoulders uncovered), it’s a little more overt (albeit also very sexy too):

…but this one is definitely reserved for the Young ‘N Perky Set because of its tightness.

But a big ol’ floppy sweater falling off one shoulder?

Have mercy.

 

From Pretty To Peculiar

Beauty

There’s this TV show called Love Island, where pretty young heterosexual things of all types get to hang around in seclusion somewhere and bonk each other.  (I may not have got this quite right, as I’ve never actually watched the poxy thing, but this seems to be what happens.)  After the season ends, the cast go on to make all sorts of money from endorsements and Instagram appearances and so on.

Nice work, if you can get it.

And to get it,  you need to be pretty, regardless of whether you have a pleasure pole or a love socket.

The men, needless to say, don’t do much to make themselves look more attractive to the women — ’twas ever thus, except for men of the Elton John persuasion — but the sluts women certainly do.  And of course, by today’s deplorable standards of beauty, a girl needs to have an ass of Lopez/Kardashian dimensions, and a face that… well, see for yourselves.

Here’s an article which shows Before / After pics of some of the girls’ faces.  Most of them are fairly plain, but one stuck out as particularly sad:

She went from being quite stunning to looking like a RealDoll.

Yes, that’s a RealDoll.  I challenge anyone to contradict me.

In describing my despair at our modern life, I often say that I’m just a 1911 man trying to live in a 2020 world.  And I’m not exaggerating.

Here are three famous Edwardian beauties (Gladys Cooper, Lily Elsie and Marie Doro).  Compare them (and their contemporaries) with the grotésqueries  in the above article, and I think you’ll get my point.

 

Not a stitch of cosmetic surgery anywhere.  And if you didn’t fall instantly in love with one or all of the above three, I don’t want to talk to you anymore.