T Shirts, Fashion Taboos and Bears

Dear Blog,

I abide by the rules I read in a fashion book by Esquire while in my twenties. One of the principles it gave is never to wear anything with text on it, or that advertised anything. This was not for gentlement to do. (God knows I needed some way of being more gentlemanly. This is not really true but it seemed so at the time.)

But today Max asked me if he bought a t-shirt that said "I have been to Russia and there are no Bears" or something like that, would I wear it around the office for a day.

I only conceeded because he is relentless, and because, before I break one of my solemn fashion taboos, I believe that I can lose five pounds before someone sees me in a t-shirt. While I have no confidence in losing the weight, I have it in max's ability to wear me down, so I acquiesced. It was either that or delay dinner for another twenty minutes, so the torture was sufficient to gain my compliance.

I can probably claim duress, and get out of it, but I think that I'll have some fun with it.

Curt