092 - Red

092 - Red, originally uploaded by gingerpig2000.

After attempting to encapsulate various ideas into pictures, here is one I took for fun for Flikr Group Roulette. The theme was 'red mania', and since those red trousers had already done stirling service this weekend, out they came again. Or down they came again.

As a bonus, because my wife is away on business in New York, I was able to send her the link to my photostream so she could enjoy what I have been up to this weekend.

Note the boots, they were hard to find here in Poland, but they are fun.

091 - Moptown Classic

091 - Moptown, originally uploaded by gingerpig2000.

I didn't notice today's Flikr Group Roulette task until I had already finished my other pictures, but I decided to get dressed up again and, with my theory that given infinite choice anything can appear to be adapted to any other use. The task was to take picture with a mop and bucket, as an aisle cleaning whore, so here is mop-rock!

Who said work can't be beautiful!

My wife has lost a lot of weight this year, and that has meant we have spent a lot of tie buying new clothes for her, only to have her grow too small for them. However, it has also been a lot of fun, and I have had the opportunity to show her why I am so dissatisfied with the narrow choice available to men. Our confidence in what we can wear and what we like to wear has grown, and our understanding of each others needs and desires have grown too.

In this picture my hat, scarf, shirt, tee-shirt and trousers all come from women's clothes shops, which has meant some fun as I try out clothes in their changing rooms. Here in Poland the choice of men's clothes is worse than it is in western Europe or the States. Walking out in this kind of gear gets me some strange looks, the other day a young couple in a shop couldn't do their shopping for looking at me, which was rather nice for an arthritic codger who's gone grey early like me.

What is annoying, though, is that if we were some well known rockers, no one would think it odd for us to dress like this, they would actually expect it, so why can't society in general accept middle aged people of no stage experience to dress like this?

090 - nOT dEAD yET

090 - nOT dEAD yET, originally uploaded by gingerpig2000.

I really am concerned about the slow decline into death, partly because after getting arthritus in my thirties and learning how difficult it can be to simply move around when you are old, it set me to wondering what we are all doing here.

The older I get the more I become aware of people doing things because they believe that their age demands it of them. Why? Women chop their hair shorter and shorter as they get older because, they say, it makes them look younger. No, young women chop their hair short to make them look older - more to the point of women cutting their hair shorter is to help with hot flushes.

Most men always have a problem with clothes, and as they get older and less likely to go into the kind of store that offers something of interest, the more like a unifiorm their t-shirt+jeans or suit becomes.

I might look like a silly old fool to some people, but that is because too many silly old men wear the uniform of their age, and I am more of a surprise because I do not conform. Why should I conform here, I am not at work.

More importantly, my wife does not want an old fogey on her arm, she choses fun over conformaity.

042 - Band in the Hotel Polonez

042 - Band in the Hotel Polonez, originally uploaded by gingerpig2000.

Continuing our fun pretense at being in a band, here we are giving an impromptu performance in the hall of a three star hotel in Poznan, Poland, a city which despite its pretensions within Poland as a city of international fairs, still achieves a mere 'where?' when we mention it to most people outside of Poland.

Still, he there we were, on a voluntary 5-day trip we had organised to the city in order to learn a bit more about the other side of Poland and do some shopping.

Of interest is perhaps the fact that most of what I am wearing was purchased from shops or departments dealing in women's clothes because men's clothes are BORING!!!!

The only question left in my mind is whether Lublin is ready for a balding, greying man to wear these trousers on its streets? Are our grand nieces ready?