7-4-09: Summertime and the Back Hair is Sleazy

I was at the pool yesterday for the first time this summer. Stripped it down and my cousin (a girl) who was with us said "You're getting a little furry on the dorsal there pal." I've never been a very hairy dude but I've realized as you get older you get hairier and it sprouts out of places that you previously had none - your ear or your back or your butt. When you look at men in their 50s and 60s a lot of them have full on hair tank-tops. I don't want that to be me.

Fortunately I just got a shipment from the folks at Remington who sent me a body and back groomer - just in time for showing off my hirsute-ness. I'll be reviewing it for Be Better Guys later in the summer so if you've got too much hair in places other than your head and your legs...I may just have the answer for ya.

6-26-09: The NBA Draft - Stylish Man or Gawky Teen? Be Better Guys Breaks It Down

Let's analyze the style of a few of the fellas picked up in last night's draft. Be Better Guys will help you learn from what the young-ins got right and what they got way wrong.

Check out ready-to-make-a-huge-impact-now Blake Griffin...doing what a lot of young guys do by doing dark on dark. It's not a very urbane look even though I think Blake's thinkin' he's lookin' real "New York". The problem with dark on dark is that you look like you might be the guy who loads ammunition for Paulie Walnuts. Dark on dark looks very mafioso so what Blake could do differently to fix this look is lighten the look with a lighter checked tie. 'Course a different shirt altogether would be a good way to go. I had a shirt this color years ago that I got a Costco. Certain colors look classy; some look like Costco. This color doesn't look like full class.

And the pocketsquare? Love the 'square - in concept - but as an exact match to the shirt? Don't want to do that fellas. That screams "Syms!" when you wear a matched set of anything other than cufflinks or shoes or socks. Be Better Guys recommends that when you wear a pocketsquare it should be in the same family of color as your shirt or tie (for example - blue shirt and a dark blue patterned square are good on a tan or grey suit) but the full matched set is very JV.

Blake's no longer JV. He could use a li'l BBG to make sure his look steps up to his new contract!
DB

6-22-09: Shopping With Little Children - Shoot Me NOW

I am one of the few guys I know who dig shopping. I dig it for 2 reasons:

1. I like to buy things - clothes certainly - that make me look better and more stately at work and more attractive to my wife. I need the help of good clothes so I'm not afraid to go find stuff that makes what little I've got look a little...better.


2. I love the thrill of the chase. Love it. I can go to an all-day Washington Nationals fan appreciation day just to get a signed baseball from Hall of Famer Don Sutton. I can BUY a Sutton ball for $100. But I don't want to PAY $100. I want to chase this one down....as I'm standing around hands in pocket baking in the concrete sun. And once I chase it down...I'm bored. I want the next new thing. It never ends.

I took my kids shoe shopping tonight. I like to shop for shoes and I'm damn fast at it - efficient I might add. I walk in; I survey. If I find something that looks cool I search size. I try it on. If it's comfortable I walk out with the pair. The chase and the kill are done in under 10 minutes.

Not tonight. My 5 year old daughter - when confronted with "ok honey it's either this pair of white with pink or this pair pink with white...what'll it be" she demurs. And I mean - DEMURS. Like mooshes into herself and CANNOT MAKE A DECISION. I am patient. I switch shoes/hands behind my back. "How about now honey?" She can't speak. She wants them both. Not to own them just the thrill of the chase. Just like Daddy - the "Better" Guy.

My son. Even worse. We need sneakers. "Can I have cleats?" For what? You need sneakers! "These cleats are cool Dad!" And on and on and on and on...

That thrill of the chase? Just go for the kill - ME!

6-20-09: And Now a Few Words From Our President....

I have one vice on the weekend...besides consuming a lot of gin and rye...and it's skimming Parade magazine. I don't follow gossip columns and I don't read People - don't have the time. But the little snippets in Parade you know...I like them. Keeps me up with the beautiful people of the world (besides my wife of course; two points for me on that one!).

Today's Parade article is President Obama's take on being a Dad and what Father's Day means to him and to all us dads. It's a busy time of the year for me and I'm often on the computer more than I am doing anything else these days. Because I'm flooded with work I don't have as much time for my kids. Obama's words are useful: he encourages us to remember that it's easy to be with kids when things are going well and a whole lot harder to make the time when things aren't going well - be it for you or for your kid. And that's when kids need you most...when things aren't always smelling fresh and clean.

Check out the article. It made a lot of sense without being corny or pandering. Being a good dad is a huge responsibility and it's tough to do...especially when you want to make time for yourself and your kids - well - all they want is your time. My Father's Day article from last year sums it up: I just want to have some peace by myself on Father's Day. This year I feel different. This year I get my peace by all of us being together and not by my being by myself to let things cool out. The thing about being a Better Guy is it takes re-evaluation and recalibration all the time. And now's my time to renew my commitment as a good dad since I've been "away" (mentally at least) for a few months.

DB

6-19-09: What People Will Do For A Li'l Color In Their Lives

Look - I know I'm pasty. Not a PATS-y...but PAST-y. White. Translucent. See through. Almost pink. And I recognize people - girls in particular - look good with a tan. I know that sitting out in the sun could kill you. But so could watching the Nationals attempt to play baseball or listening to the dude from Nickelback garble his way through a song.

When I was younger I would believe that if I were pretty deeply tan (mind you I'm pink on a normal day) that I would be luckier with women. That I could walk into a party and a girl...a hot one no less...would think "That guy is seriously tan! He looks hotter than hot! I gotta meet 'im!"

So I would try to get tan anywhere and any time I could. I would lay out in the lawn while bugs flew all around and feel sweat dripping down the back of my calves to get that color.

I would sit on my balcony and re-work the chair-angle every 45 mins to keep all of my pasty body in the sun...all for that tan. And the pool? Hell yeah - no suntan lotion because I didn't want any interference or slow-down of my deep tanning process. See...wasn't always a Better Guy when I was a pup.

Guess what? I did get tan but did girls want to talk to me then? Nope. Bupkus. And I learned - it ain't your color. It's your haircut.

Actually - I don't know what it is that makes women go nuts. But being really tan ain't the answer for most folks. Certainly not for me. Nah - I just got a bunch of bug bites and chaise-lounge markings all across my back. No girls. Just sweat and a wet beach towel.

My buddy Kwame knows. Check out his comic rant about what people will do in search of the sun.

DB

6-17-09: Fellas - Drink Your Pink

I'm a wine drinker. Not a pretentious snot about wine (though I am a pretentious snot about lots of other things...hey all us guys are if you get 'em on the right subject!) but I can tell at a 200-level good wine from cruddy wine. I mostly dig reds (like a lot of guys I know) and whites are fine but I just haven't understood getting seriously contemplative about whites. I've had some good ones mind you but none as yet where I thought "Well damn! That done near blew my mind clean out my head!" like I've experienced with some mouth-smackin' reds. Another wine I don't take too seriously but a lot of guys don't take at all is a rose.

Rose's are made from red grapes but they look like white zinfandel...meaning they're pink. Guys won't go after pink cocktails (ring the bell for the death of the overly-sweet Cosmopolitan) and most won't go after pink wine either. Pink tanktops on girls? Sure. Pink wine. Forget it.

Big mistake. A rose is a great wine when the weather's too hot for a poppin' intense red and you want to go for something other than a white. They're not real complex but a number of them have a ton of flavor and they're great to sip when just lazin' around on a summer weekend. Our Sexy Sommellier - Lisa Kennelly - on Be Better Guys did an article on roses you should check out and the Washington Post wrote about 'em today.

Get one and give it a shot - it's not going to match up with a steak off the grill. No. Instead it will match up with your girl on a blanket by the beach or with your girl on your deck or balcony. Get it? Yeah you do.

DB

6-14-09: What Is WRONG With People?! Again...

This Saturday Brian and I were the Be Better Guys hosts of the Daddy and Me fashion show at Macy's in Downtown DC. Really fun event - kids looked great and got to "walk the runway" with their dads...who also looked a lot crisper in their Macy's clothes than the clothes they walked into the event wearing! Lots of poplin suits and sandals; bright purples and greens and plenty of printed sweats and tees on the dads. Also a lot of popped collars - not something I'm a fan of but I didn't dress these fellas (I just had to talk into a mic about them).

Today - Sunday - my wife and I went to a play. "Midsummer Night's Dream" all in dance...no talking..s-e-x-y cast. It's the Synetic Theater here in DC. My favorite small dance troupe. Great show - energetic and saucy and certainly the fastest 90 minutes of my year thusfar. But the old blue-hairs sitting right behind my wife started uncrinkling a throat lozenge or some sort of thing you suck on. And because it's dark the woman can't fully see what she's doing so she's fumbling and the crinkling is about as loud as a Joe Perry solo in an arena of rockers. This was during a rather intimate moment in a NO SPEAKING PRODUCTION so when there's no noise - people there is NO NOISE AT ALL IN THE THEATER!!

Except for grandmama behind me dorking with her lozenge wrapper. Lord have mercy - she gets it open. And starts to suck on it. Like it's a pacifier...sluuurp; smaaaack; schloooosh. JESUS LADY! And then she starts opening another one! Because it's theater seating it's like RIGHT IN MY EAR DRUM! I'm turning around and giving her this digusted half-smirk like "I could punch you now but I'll be decent and just look at you to get you to pick up on the hint that YOU SHOULD STOP NOW."

But she doesn't.

And the Lord spoke. He spoke through who I believe was her husband. Whomever that guy next to her was he said - and quite clearly - "Please stop that now!"

She was done. No more crinkling of the wrapper; no more schlooshing of the lozenge sucking. It occupied 5 minutes of my theater enjoyment but at least the other 85 minutes were silent...as the Synetic intended.

Fellas - do NOT do this in public. Come on. You know what's right. Tell your grandma in case she forgets.

DB