After being glued to the TV watching Don Draper and his band of  Mad Men, and seeing NINE, I’m all about the skinny tie of the sixties. Oh, yes, I am.

Pointy end, square end, just bring me the skinny little tie. You can view a gazillion of them here.

Today, I’m combining my lust for the skinny tie with @LdyDisney‘s Friday Happy Dance of Joy! I loved this song from NINE so much that I put it on my iPod, and made it the ringtone on my cell phone.

Kate Hudson singing and dancing Cinema Italiano is a delight. This is pure entertainment — Hudson and all those guys sporting skinny ties, skinny suits, and pointy shoes. Enjoy!

TGIF, baby!

Elen

That being said, we’ll be taking care of business. Note to self: throw A Knight’s Tale CD in the drive for a little Bachman-Turner Overdrive. Oh, yeah.

First, I’d like to kiss thank Askimet, courtesy of WordPress, for catching those 1,137 spams since Could Be A Blog became — well — a blog. You are fierce.

Second, I’d like to thank my readership for coming day after day to find out how to tie The Dimple in your tie. You’re the best. The Dimple, It’s a Tiebreaker… has had the most hits of any of my posts. It’s one of my favorites, too. Unfortunately, neckties.com took that link down. So, I’m going to give you their instructions here. Now. I don’t wear ties — often — but I buy ties, and I love looking at all the funky ties they have at their site.

This tie has the dimple...

Instructions:

1. After you’ve tied your knot but before you tighten it up to your throat, neatly pinch the fabric directly underneath the knot.

2. Keep pinching as you tighten the knot; make sure the dimple’s locked in.

This tie does not.

Third, I can hardly credit what happened last Thursday on So You Think You Can Dance. C’mon. Will? I thought he would be in the final two. I can’t even put up a poster this week. Had to get that off my chest.

Is this post beginning to sound like the summer edition of any newspaper? You know. When all the columnists go on vacation and  n o t h i n g  is happening, and we’re reading  f i l l e r. Yeah. Thought so. I should stop now. Stopping.

Elen

I’m not. I’m sitting here in my office dreaming of a flat screen monitor — and now a Roomba, thanks to Vonda Sinclair over at Fierce Romance — and thinking about men in neckties. The latter is work-related, so I can count that as productivity!

One of my current characters turns into a little mush puddle over a tie-clad guy. I totally get that.

There’s something about a man in a tie. Oh, men are fascinating in general, to be sure. And, they look great dressed down, dressed up and, well…….. in all states of dress and undress. But, a guy in a tie — oh man.

I’ve been reading about the necktie recently and have come to realize that there are perils to wearing this accessory. It’s easily entangled in machinery, it’s a walking bacteria fest — the least cleaned item of clothing, who knew! — and it can constrict the flow of blood at the neck. The list goes on. So FYI all you guys out there, you need to wear that tie with some respect.

The perils notwithstanding, there’s just something about a man in a necktie. Well, hello handsome. It’s the zing factor. There’s that little mental zing! hum! hello!………… yum! Necktie or bow tie — hoo boy — it matters not.

Did you know there’s more than one way to tie a necktie? At Neckties.com there are about a dozen, ranging from the Half Windsor (not to be confused with the Half Nelson) to the Plattsburg — why is that a turn-on? — plus the bow tie and the ascot. Hey, how many of you guys out there know how to tie your necktie a dozen different ways? My guess is not too many. I can tell you that Mr. G, honey knows maybe two, tops. Go. See. Click on how to tie a tie. I don’t know what knot this fella’s wearing, but it’s working for me.

But, my favorite new factoid about the necktie, thanks to Neckties.com, is The Dimple.

Whether one chooses the four-in-hand, the Windsor, the half-Winsdor, or the Pratt (Shelby) knot, each should be tied so that there is a dimple or crease in the center of the tie just below the knot. This forces the tie to billow and creates a fullness that is the secret to its proper draping.

Note: For instructions on how to put the dimple in your tie, please see my July 29, 2008 post — Too Quiet.

It’s not bad enough that you guys run around with those cute little dimples in your cheeks and the yummy little clefts in your chins. No. Now you have dimples in your ties.

We’re toast! This is my character’s favorite tie-clad guy.

Yeah, baby. It’s all about the tie!

Elen