It's been too long.

Me and Chester.

Here's a borrowed cap. It belongs to my wife, Linden. She got it when we were at Wurstfest in New Braunfels last month. It was the last one they had. None for me. Made in China, it's 70% wool and 30% nylon. It's an 'Official Oktoberfest' cap. I like it a lot. Loden green is my color.

Standing behind me is a bronze statue of Fleet Admiral Chester A. Nimitz, Commander in Chief, United States Pacific Fleet (CinCPac), for U.S. naval forces and Commander in Chief, Pacific Ocean Areas (CinCPOA), for U.S. and Allied air, land, and sea forces during World War II. He's wearing a nice cap, too.

The statue stands at the National Museum of the Pacific War in Fredericksburg, Texas (Nimitz's home town). Behind his statue is part of the old 'ship-like' Nimitz Hotel that belonged to his father.

Straw man.

This is the why: 93°F, 64% relative humidity, at 2 p.m.

Gad zooks! A new hat!

A couple of years ago (or less), I gave my mesh-back cap to my nephew living in So-Cal... sort of a talisman. He's in the tv/film industry, he admired my cap (Cooper's Old Tyme Pit BBQ, Llano, Texas), and so I gave it to him.

I've been half-heartedly keeping my eyes open for a replacement, but nothing suitable presented itself. Until today.

Made in Viet Nam (further blurring of the line between victory and defeat). All black, 1/2 mesh, hook'n loop closure strap... and a simple logo design that is graphically striking.

Dzuik's Meat Market is in Castroville, Texas, and is a Texas-Polish butcher in a Texas-Alsatian town. We went there today as my birthday treat. We got a steak, some chicken fajita meat, a couple of dried beef-and-pork sausages (regular and jalapeño), and a pound of parisa.

Nice hat from Dzuik's (pronounced GEE-ucks in Polish... Zooks in Texan).

Editor's Note: I have been informed by a young lady of the Dzuik family that they pronounce Dzuik as "Juke." Well, there you go.

Modeling.

Pop crowns Princess Claire. When asked for a comment, the new princess stated, "Pop's silly."

Documentation

Original art: June Anne LaGrone

The Regime Strikes Back

Scala Campaign hat. I saw it at Whole Earth Provisions. Thick, hard, fur felt. The brim is so stiff, Odd-Job could have utilized it as a weapon. Dudley Do-Right could have saved a maiden from a train. Black Jack Pershing could have captured Poncho Villa.

In America, 'want' is the same as 'need'.

Das ist ein interessanter hut!

On our recent trip to New Braunfels for Wurstfest, we visited Naegelin's Bakery for a cream horn. They had this ball-cap in the same Game Guard West Texas hunter's camo as the Cooper's BBQ cap I recently featured. This one doesn't have a mesh back, and isn't 'distressed'. I like it a lot.

I also like Naegelin's Bakery a lot, too... mainly because they are the oldest bakery in Texas (since 1868).

Coolsville

It's the first cold day of the season. Whereas I usually wear a hat to prevent a sunburned scalp and possible skin cancer, this kind of weather requires a hat of some sort to prevent brain freeze.

This new one is a cotton cap made in Bangladesh. Comfy, unstructured, and basic-black stylish, this is a suitable cap for any occasion... especially for forays into Austin to remind them that the town sucks at jazz.

You can have one too for only $10 a month! Plus, you get to support one of the best jazz radio stations in the land, Trinity University's KRTU (San Antonio).

Smokin' Hot Pop

The temperature was 105F today. An appropriate hat is the 'trucker' hat I picked up in Llano at the first of the month. I don't usually like these mesh-back style hats, but this one had four things that won me over:

1. Texas-themed camo, featuring live oak and prickly pear cactus.
2. The mesh in the back of the cap is soft to the touch, unlike all the previous trucker caps I've tried.
3. The cap is well ventilated (due to the mesh).
4. It promotes Coopers Old Time Pit Bar-B-Que.

Yee-hah, pardner!

Straw Man Cowboy Hat

Nothing is quite as iconic as a straw cowboy hat in black & white. The ventilation works. Those are the Mexican Chisos hills behind me, rising above the Rio Grande at my back.

The hat is Bangora paper-straw, made in the U.S.A. by Beaver Hats ("Since 1860").

Return engagement.

The Panama returns to the Williams Tavern in Washington, Arkansas (the Hillbilly Williamsburg).

Had the $4.49 Cheeseburger Plate Special (cheeseburger, fries, corn poppers, or twice-baked potatoes, iced tea). Good, too.

There was a painting of an early proprietor hanging over the fireplace. Comments were made.

Editor's Note: Well, it actually was a different Panama I wore here before.




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Location:Jackson,Washington,United States

The Italian Job

Surely this has been featured before, but here it is again. It's a lambswool ball-cap made in Italy. Very soft, very comfortable, very handsome. I added a small badge/lapel pin, that I purchased at the Dallas Museum of Art, to the cap's front that reads,

miso·ne·ism : n. \ˌmis-ə-ˈnē-ˌiz-əm\  : a hatred, fear, or intolerance of innovation or change 

 Some think it fits me. The cap certainly does. 

P.S. This shot was taken this morning in the lobby of my local MINI dealership, waiting during my third visit for the same service issue.

Keep calm and wear a hat.

An unstructured 'ball-cap' sourced from the same online retailer as the previous cap, BBC America. Nice long visor for blocking the sun. Nice cotton material to allow some evaporative cooling. My Anglophilia is showing.

An Anglo-Irish Tragedy: the Black Sheep

This is a black lambswool Donegal tweed cap made in County Tipperary, Ireland by John Hanly & Co. Ltd. I bought it at a deep, deep discount (75%) from BBC America, size XL (my usual Euro size, and often my USA hat size... I wear a 7-1/2 to 7-5/8 hat, 60-61 centimeters).

This hat was listed online as an XL. Inside the cap, it says; 7-5/8, 62, XL. It's a 62 centimeter, and just a tad too large for the pumpkin atop my neck stem. But I like it, it's soft and warm without being too heavy, and a needle and thread should take up the slack.

Keep calm.

New hats ("The Early Spring Collection!") will be arriving soon.

Star gazing, or: Sometimes, a hat is just a hat.

I attended a baseball game at Minute Maid Park between the home team Houston Astros and the visiting Texas Rangers (my home team, still) last weekend.  I asked a couple of friends to join me. I chose the Houston location primarily because it's in an air conditioned ballpark, in downtown Houston. Both of these are important considerations to me. Houston's transfer to the American League West this year is something that gives me great pleasure.

On my list of things to do at the game (in addition to paying too much for a Saint Arnold beer) was to purchase a Houston Astros ballcap, now that they have returned to an older-style logo. I have long admired the cap for its simplicity of design: orange cap, blue star, with serif H.

I will no doubt wear my Astros cap often, because it is orange and unstructured. But for the game, I wore the cap I proudly wore into the ballpark... as did about half of those in attendance.

P.S. The game was the best of both worlds. The Rangers won convincingly, and I got to see the choo-choo train move across the left field parapet.

An infomercial

A classic.

My membership perk for supporting my local Classical Music station was a choice between a canvas tote and an unstructured cotton ball cap. Selecting the tote (the standard gift for supporting public broadcast stations since about 1868) might also be construed as lending tacit support for the city of Austin's socialist-driven plastic bag ban. Selecting the ball cap would allow me to protect my scalp... and post to this blog.

Easy choice. Freedom from sunburn, nanny-state tyranny, and pop music!

Killer Rabbit

In the mid 1960's a bunch of mostly Dallas-based guys, including David Witts (my dad's lawyer at the time), Wick Fowler (of chili mix fame), Frank Tolbert, Carroll Shelby, and commercial artist Bill Neale, all got involved in promoting a land project in the Big Bend area of West Texas.

It was near the ghost town of Terlingua. Among other things, they used/promoted/founded to sell land in the desert was The World Chili Championship and Carroll Shelby's Ford-sponsored racing enterprises. Bill Neale designed a logo for the Terlingua Ranch that combined the style of a medieval heraldic crest lion with a West Texas jack rabbit. This became the logo for the Terlingua Racing Team (which was seen on Ford Shelby Cobras racing and winning in Europe).

I've long been a fan of the Terlingua Racing Team (which kinda actually existed/exists). It epitomized the elements of the Texas Legend I find most appealing.

On a trip to Alpine, Texas (the gateway to the Big Bend), I ran across an outpost of the Terlingua Team at a place called The Stable Performance Cars (run by the retired regional director of the US Border patrol). They race the Terlingua Racing Team Carroll Shelby Mustangs, and they sell stuff.

That's where I bought my Official Terlingua Racing Team Cap.

1967 Shelby-American Mustang at The Stable Performance Cars in Alpine, Texas.