The Sartorialist is right on track with this great post from men.style.com You may or may not agree with all of it, but he’s right on track and the looks are anything but the typical.

We’re at the beach for the next week. If I can get a signal, I will post.

N.B. all right, there is a signal on Mrs. E.’s laptop… for some reason my Mac is being obstinent and won’t join the network… so, I’m getting the hang of this thing… Stay tuned for updates as they occur to me.

I’m a little humbled, excited and perhaps, startled to have been given a “You Make My Day” award by über-stylish Ronda Carman of All the Best. And, as usual, I’m late with my thank you.

Since I can’t send a written note of thanks, I’ll say it here. Thank you! As many before me have noted, your blog is inspirational and I thank you for it. All the Best is a regular read for me, and I highly recommend you, and the others I have noted on my blogroll, to all my readers.

“Life is a banquet,” says Mame Dennis in the stage production of ‘Auntie Mame’, “and most poor sons-of-bitches are starving to death.” Not in the blogosphere, in my experience. We’re lucky to have such a community of bon viveurs, raconteurs, auteurs and errr… chercheurs. It’s all there for the asking.

Now then, instead of resting on my laurels and in the spirit of the award, I wish to announce a contest…. there may be those among you who are thinking about blogging, or writing, or just sounding off, but haven’t yet taken the plunge. Here’s your chance. I’d like to publish your article. Please e-mail me (editor@easyandelegantlife.com) an essay based on the topic “This is Elegance” or “This is Easy, or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Live Elegantly.” Or just about anything else that has to do with my obsessions.

I’ll publish the one I like the best with full credits.

Carpé diem. I wish you all the best.

Well, the idiocy that has beleaguered women for ‘lo these many years has finally caught up with us. Just when the fashion industry decided that having women dying to be models wasn’t the best business plan, we get this.

From The New York Times:

“I personally think that it’s the consumer that’s doing this, and fashion is just responding,” said Kelly Cutrone, the founder of People’s Revolution, a fashion branding and production company. “No one wants a beautiful women or a beautiful man anymore.”

George Brown, a booking agent at Red Model Management, said: “When I get that random phone call from a boy who says, ‘I’m 6-foot-1 and I’m calling from Kansas,’ I immediately ask, ‘What do you weigh?’ If they say 188 or 190, I know we can’t use him. Our guys are 155 pounds at that height.”

For the record, I’m all for “healthy” weight, and a few years ago, size 38 suits weren’t even going to be produced. Size 50 was the new extreme. But even back in the day, the size 38 man wasn’t likely to be 6′+. I don’t think this is about beauty, I think it’s laziness. I think it’s far more difficult to cut mass-produced clothes that are flattering on people who aren’t rail thin. Especially if those people aren’t acquainted with the idea of having a tailor fit your clothing. It’s easier, in the long run, to change people’s perception of beauty… publicize it enough and you start believing the hype. Draping skeletal models has to be easier. You could put them in anything and it will hang better — like on a wire hanger. And an ounce of material will certainly hide a flaw in the figure, if there is very little figure for the cloth to grab onto.

I think the telling statement here is Ms. Cutrone’s, who states that no one wants to “make any statement about what it means to be an adult.” I find that funny, it isn’t about making a statement, it’s about being an adult… it’s tough, it take a lot of work to develop the healthy body, healthy mind revered by the Greeks. Suck it up… literally, hit the gym, suck in that gut and be a man. Look like one, dress like one, and above all, act like one.

Seriously, ladies and gentlemen, who has your vote: a Cary Grant or Sean Connery? Or that guy featured in the article? For that matter, what about an Anne Margaret, Ursula Anders, Rita Hayworth or a Sophia Loren? Or are you more of a Karen Carpenter fan?

Do we all really want to date high schoolers?

And if you answer yes, I expect you to look the part, too.

As the right-minded Mrs. E. puts it: “Anorexia is a rich county’s disease. Eat a sandwich.” You can’t be too rich, but you can be too thin.

Thus endeth the lesson.