Lifestyle

ings backward to a bygone time, where style was better, design icons were created, landmark achievements that we still refer to, books written, movies released, etc.

Everyone should eat lunch, especially me because breakfast is typically a couple of vitamins, The Wall Street Journal editorials, and two cups of black coffee. By the time both hands on my watch are pointing straight up, my stomach is rumbling. During the week, I have a few spots I frequent, and I eat light—salads with grilled chicken breast or a cup of soup (hold the bread) and a beer. Friday's lunch, however, is different.

In my fourth decade, I’ve finally realized one of the true hacks of manhood: having a florist on speed dial.

Like most people today, I don’t have bundles of time. It is hard to balance life, work, a commute, and the hobbies I hold dear. I was struggling. So by New Year, I knew a change had to occur. Since then, I have made a whole lot of differences to my routine which have helped.

When looking for a new home, we all have a list of our “must haves”.  For some, it’s an open-concept living room. For others, a kitchen with lots of counterspace or a location that’s a short walk to public transportation, good schools or hip bars and restaurants.

For me – as odd as it may seem for someone who’s lived in large cities all his life – it’s a wood-burning fireplace.

Many of us know him – It might sound crazy, but I can say that he lives in the vast majority of Italian homes - L’omino coi Baffi – “The little man with the mustache”. He is the little guy that helps us kickstart our aging corpuses in the morning. He is synonymous with the iconic Moka pot – probably the most iconic coffee brewer in the world.

For decades, many have been fooled into thinking that the James Bond saga is the tale of an MI6-agent, like all of us however Bond isn’t best defined by his day-job. Any long-time follower of Bond will know that the secret-agent persona is just a cover. If Bond is singularly anything, he is perhaps the last remaining member of the jet-set - that all too modernist group of well-heeled, mid-20th century international pleasure-seekers.

I am driven mad nowadays with the need for every possible kitchen scenario to be instantly and effectively treated with a gadget that can only do one specific thing. I got a targeted ad the other day for a handy-dandy countertop egg steamer. “Perfect every time!” it exclaimed at me in bold font. Well, I thought, those poor dears who bought theirs. Surely they don’t have running water and literally any sized pan.

This story originally appeared on the Gents Cafe Newsletter. You can subscribe here. On my birthday in July...