In re: the post below, Kate and I discovered the BEST STORE IN NEW YORK yesterday, called Holland and Holland. Seven floors of khakhi safari clothes, all of them screaming wordlessly in a a nasal Brit accent: “Towel wallah! Come here and sponge my jodphurs!” Someday, when I discover that I have a brain cloud and I only have 30 days left to live and a rich tycoon offers me a million dollars to jump into a volcano, Holland and Holland is where I will go to purchase the entire traveling outfit, including the shooting jacket, bush hat, and magnificent steamer trunks.

The main sales representative looked like a Thuggee assasin in a tight turtleneck and camel-hair blazer, and followed us from floor to floor, fingering something in his breast pocket (probably an ivory blowgun) There were Welsh knee socks that you wear with your calf-height gumboots, and green plaid walking suits that end at the knee.

And, I’m sure, lots of combs for your handlebar mustache.

As Kate and I were walking out, all five of the sales staff clustered around the first-floor desk. We were the only people in the multi-storey showroom, and one of the staff made the Ferris Bueller sound: “chick-a-chick-ahhhh“. Obviously, I have to keep going back to this store, so I can have some kind of giant Eighties-movie mistaken-identity spy adventure. With safari suits and volcanoes.