Monday 3 September 2007

I Think They're Appalling

For this one, we need someone more stern than the amiable and drunken Judge Roy Bean, self-styled Law West of the Pecos, who never hanged anybody.

We need Judge Isaac C. Parker, Fort Smith, Western District of Arkansas. Here are some of his Judgements. Hang 'em high.

In the Dock below is Tim Gunn, American "style guru", awaiting Judgement.

1) The hair is parted to the side. It is not worn en brosse. Except in Sweden, France during the Revolution, and Russia before the Revolution. You are a Robespierre, an anarchistical terrorist, or a Swede? No, I thought not.

2) The collar fits to the neck. Buying a size too large in the interests of comfort is unacceptable. Warren Beatty, Jack Nicholson. These gentlemen, in their maturity, exhibited rolls of neck over a tight and starched collar ("Dick Tracy", "Chinatown" et passim) with insouciance. 'Nuff said.

3) Nobody wears a "gent's hank" in their jacket pocket, unless they are a Spiv or a Swede. Or Prince Charles, in which case there are the proper number of points on display.

4) Most Spivs don't wear a bright blue one. Those who do are invariably and deservedly gunned down in the sordid "washrooms" of Italian-American restaurants after a brief and unsuccessful attempt to "muscle in on the numbers racket".

5) A striped pink tie. The angle of whose knot approaches forty-five degrees from the vertical. People will think, "metrosexual" --- or worse.

6) A bright blue hank and a pink tie. Words fail me.

7) Iron grey suit, light grey check. In America they call it "gray". Either way, it would be better to walk abroad in yellowy-purpley striped pyjamas and a fez, with an elephant following on a leash. At least one could plead insanity.

8) Side pockets. Do not slope. When entering a room, think "flies, flaps, face"... and hope you don't have a pair of these flaps. If you do, feign illness and exit immediately.

9) On a two-button jacket only the lower one is buttoned up, unless you want to look like you sleep in, or worse, with, your suit.

10) Perfectly adequate trousers can be made up by a tailor, or purchased from a clothing store. Folding swatches of cloth round the lower limbs in the hope that they will resemble trousers, as in the nightmares of a schoolboy before the first day of term... you take my point, I hope.

BROWN SHOES with a --- BROWN SHOES with a grey (note to sub, pls finish, I must take my apoplexy tablets).Verdict: the Little Black Dress is of course a classic. I am not surprised that the former inhabitant has bolted, leaving Mr. Gunn to face another lonely evening with only a Pot Noodle Tikka Masala and a copy of "Your Fate and Fortune" magazine for consolation.

11 comments:

Anonymous said...

Are you looking for a new outfit

Anonymous said...

And here's the stray question mark ------> ?

Chertiozhnik said...

No, I'm dissing somebody else's - much more fun than shopping.

But frankly I wouldn't be seen dead in a getup like that, so I laid into it. Style guru indeed. Feh.

Wickedred said...

Oh my - Are we smacking down TIM GUNN (brown shoes/grey suit nonwithstanding)? Dapper gentleman extrordinaire who sassily guides the feeble designers of Project Runway through the trials and tribulations of their design challenges?

I know not what to say. I think perhaps I must retire to a candlelit bath with a bottle of bourbon, and spend the rest of the day on my fainting couch in my elephant pajamas and my fez.

Anonymous said...

spend the rest of the day on my fainting couch in my elephant pajamas and my fez.

Have you been peeping through my curtains?

Chertiozhnik said...

Dapper, I have defeated in detail.

And brown shoes, grey suit --- notwithstanding?

One simply doesn't.

I will write to him and suggest blue serge, double-breasted, with black Oxfords, a plain silk tie and no ornaments. I am not slapping him down, I am trying to save him.

Chertiozhnik said...

Also, if you are going to pose, you have to know what to do with BOTH arms.

Just letting your left arm hang dead as if it didn't really exist, and hoping nobody notices, is not a strategy.

I feel a TV show coming on. The Hopelesses --- we help celebrities BE celebriable.

All I need is a Judas Goat.

Anonymous said...

You know, if he had held the middle finger up instead of dangling his hand - it would have given a whole new meaning to the photo.

Wickedred said...

I'm silently weeping "uncle" out here. I give up. I'm trying to make the brown shoes/grey suit thing okay in my head, but I, alas, cannot. sigh.

I'm heading back to my fainting couch now...

Chertiozhnik said...

Oh dear, now I feel all brutal, as if I have been going about crushing butterflies and puppies with my Doc Marten aggro boots.

He's probably a very nice man, and giving the bird with his spare hand would put me in my proper place.

Wickedred said...

Well - I'm not sure if you deserve that - but it would make for a funnier picture.