rogues+brogues : May 2020

, by Ian Megrath

paper sparrow| traveler's company notebook

My interests have shifted a lot since I started my blog.
While I still like fashion and grooming etc, I've embraced my stationery obsession, reading about it, listening to podcast and watching YouTube reviews.
As I mentioned in my previous post, as much as I live digitally, the appeal and tactile joy of writing with an actual pen on real paper is hard to beat.
I thought I'd introduce my favourite piece, something that Caelan kindly gave to me for Christmas: the Traveler's Company notebook.

The traveler's notebook is a customisable folio, a leather cover offering personalisation in terms of organisation, use and style.

A simple enough concept; a leather cover with inserts attached by elasticated bands and the possibility for arrangement is limited only by the size of the cover and your budget.
My current configuration includes a Midori sketchbook, dotted note pad and an emphemera pocket and zipped pocket insert.
Composite pieces like the notebook or sketchbook are relatively inexpensive so it's not going to break the bank to buy a new piece every so often.
My fear in writing in a new notebook is that my handwriting will be messy, my notes not important or my doodles looking awful. However, with smaller, less intimidating sizes and a lower price point per insert, I feel more free in using it.

The Traveler's pen is a famous piece of kit; a compact needle point ball pen, usually in a brass case, designed to weather and wear through use. Like the soft leather of the cover; scratches, marks and scuffs on the pen show that a well used pen is a well loved pen.

The traveler's notebook also has its own stationery pieces, designed to fit the scale and functional needs of the notebook and its user.
I currently have a brass ruler and stencil housed in the zipped pocket for drawing out boxes and shapes for journaling.

If you are thinking about getting into journaling, bullet journaling (this is a whole other subsection of journaling with its own cult status) mindfulness writing or sketching, investing in something like this is a smart decision. You can adjust the contents to meet your needs, adding and expanding as you wish. Removing completed books is easy, and in themselves, make a stylish shelf stack and story.

...

Hopefully this will be the start of a new, regular-ish stationery feature on the blog. Let me know if you have any favourites I should check out

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, by Ian Megrath

lifestyle

that was then|this is now

I announced my return to the world of blogging last August. While I said I would be writing on my own terms and to my own schedule, I hadn’t anticipated that would mean an 8 month gap...
That break was almost as long as my intentional hiatus in November 2018!

Truthfully, I felt I didn't have anything to say or rather, what I could say perhaps didn't need documenting. Before, I felt a pull to the keyboard, to report or critique or catalog every little thing that I did or experienced. However, capturing a moment through a camera lens rather than living it isn't really experiencing it so I kept these things to myself.

...

Since we last spoke, I've turned 38. Compared to most male bloggers, especially ones like myself who wrote on style or fashion, this is old. I do still enjoy fashion but as I touched on in my last post, I struggle to find clothing that inspires me on the high street - not that we can actually go to the high street at the minute anyway.
I always joked that I dressed young for my age, but I'm no longer interested in the trends. Yes I'm older but I'm not quite ready to give up, my tastes have just simplified and I'm happier with my style than I have been in a long time.

During lockdown, I'm avoiding joggers and loungewear. It's a psychological thing, it makes me feel sloppy or sick or sad so it's denim every day.

I also lost 2.5 stone (although I didn't quite kick the holiday mode after Christmas and during lockdown so I regained around 1 stone) and while size shouldn't matter in terms of style, I did feel happier having lost weight. I felt more comfortable and found more clothing options. This is a sad state and reflection on the industry; we are embracing different body shapes more but as I've spoke about on the blog before; most plus size styles for men are only offered to the big and tall, not the big and short.

So I will return to "fashion" blogging, but more edited, more considered and hopefully more personal than before.

...

Of course I've not addressed the elephant in the room. We’re currently in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic which has changed daily life across the world. This is unlike anything most of us will have experienced - and hopefully will be the only time we experience it - but the pandemic has put a forced downtime on the majority of our lives.

Does this look like I could have just done it with felt tips? A little.
Do I care? Not even a little.

I've been on furlough since 23rd March and I'd love to say I'd got a six pack, mastered conversational Mandarin, completed all the odd jobs around the house and read a book every 48hrs but I haven't.

Obviously.

It's taken me 6 weeks to write my first blog post during a time when I have nothing but spare time.

I have accomplished some things though:

I re-jigged our patio; lifting flags and planting border. Our patio gets very little sunlight and it looked bleak for years; bare concrete flags because what plants we did have were either eaten, excavated or engulfed in urine from the 2 dogs. I took up an L-shaped section of slabs and planted hardy border plants like heathers and lavender. A couple of clematis to cover the back wall and hopefully it will look more like a garden and less like a carpark by the end of the summer.
I read 3 books. I got a lot of books for Christmas and I've been trying to work my way through them. However, my focus and concentration is fleeting at the minute so any progress is progress.
I improved my skills on Procreate (these are still very remedial but better than they were). I haven't drawn since high school when I had to choose between GCSE Art and Business Studies due to timetable conflicts. I chose Business Studies and regretted it since. I loved to draw as a kid and have found Procreate and the Apple Pencil a more forgiving and less intimidating medium than pencil and paper. See image above; which leads me to my next point...
I made notes and ideas for a new writing project. I have a few projects that have bounced about notebooks for years, most will never come to fruition due to my attention span or lack of confidence. However, my imagination doesn't stop and I like to get ideas out of my head and onto a page every so often.
I ate a lot of biscuits. This is self explanatory.

However, all this is does not need to be quantified; nobody is going to ask for a report of my activities when I go back to work.

What you do is up to you. If you want to eat a full packet of biscuits; go for it. If you want to do sit-ups 47 times a day; go for it.

It is an alien time and each persons reaction to it will be different..

So even though I've not done a lot, I'm happy to keep my head above water and take each day as it comes.

that was then|this is now.

now what?

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, by Ian Megrath

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