Damn Swabbies don't even know how to shine their own shoes... ;)

.. thanks, Harv... it's a lost art it seems...

I confess to preferring the 4 in hand, something about the asymmetrical thing I really like. I can shine my shoes, but don't really. When I was on the Air Force demo thing, one of the crewchiefs finally got disgusted with me and took my boots away for the weekend and shined them his own self.

I don't know what he did, but it's been ten years and they still shine.

Me? I really like ties... I think they look nice. Finished. Professional.

I especially like lumberjacks wearing ties (with white shirts and jeans... and work boots...) but that's a story for another day.... ;)

Ogre - I know *how*, but I just can't get that mirrored look. I took advice all through my Navy years - lots of polish, a little polish, melt the polish with a lighter, polish with water, polish dry & sprinkle water, use spit not water - tried 'em all, along with dozens of variations of brushes & polishing cloths.

I could pass an inspection just fine, but there were always plenty of guys with better looking shoes :-/

That awesome shine comes from using rubbing alcohol with the melted polish....

I wear a windsor knotted tie daily for work, it really irritates me when people wear ties with a different knot in it. To the point that I've been known to change sales people because the way they tied their tie annoyed me.

Real ties are dangerous, someone grabs your tie they can drag you around like your on a leash.
Clip ons come off in there hand and the knot is PERFECT every day, and while he's looking at the tie in his hand you can put a steeltoe boot in his nuts.
But thats just me.

I used to have to wear a tie every day. Thank God those days are long gone. I still can tie a tie without a mirror. But I guess I was always doing a half-Windsor knot.

Now this is one topic I can agree with! I'm always lamenting the fact that men today just have no idea how to present themselves.

Hmmm...I look down and I see what I have on right now:
Tailored black slacks
Tailored white poly-cotton dress shirt (sleeves halfway rolled up)
Button-up black cotton sweater vest
Black tie in a full windsor
Gold tie tack
Shirt garters holding the shirt tight to my black dress socks
Spit-shined black leather shoes

All I need now is for my new fedora to come in and I'm all set!

Should we men, as a collective, forget to look and act the part of masters of ourselves and our world...then we indeed deserve to be treated as the whipped, sloppy, uncaring men we appear to be. Sad part is that it's all a matter of personal choice. Choose to be sloppy, or choose to shine. Ah hell...maybe I've just been born 50 years too late...

I don't do the Windsor. For some reason, that know doesn't cotton to me very much. However, I've been tying the reversed tie knot for a while. You start with the tie upside down(seam out) and then proceed from there. Makes a nice, tidy knot.

I have a firm belief that a well shined pair of shoes requires two things...

A big city shoeshiner slinging a dingy grey rag in the...

"Shave and a haircut, two bits" rhythm.

Hope this helps!

Oh, and of course the environmentally unfriendly substance these big city shoe shiners employ. Which anyone who's anyone knows is rendered from particularly smelly bums.