Know what I have learned to love recently? Caps. Not the kind of caps I use to pin a sucker's wig back, or the set of porcelain caps that have earned me the titles of "The Writer with the $75,000 Smile" (according to Teen People magazine) and "Phony Shitface" (according to my last several girlfriends). I mean the kind of caps worn by gentlemen and chimney sweeps.

Several years ago, during the cold months, I was known to wear a grey wool Kangol cap, screwed around exactly 185 degrees into the "Tarantino" position. This was an update on my cold season style in high school, which utilized a grandfatherly tweed cap rotated into the exact same position. I couldn't imagine wearing my caps any other way. To screw it back around, bill facing forward, seemed a great compromise of fashion. One sweeping gesture would transition my style from Slick Rick to Andy Capp, and I was having none of it.

My Kangol cap has been in retirement for about three years now, replaced by a more youthful flexible knit Kangol cap. As my hair has grown up and out, it has become harder and harder to stuff the whole mess underneath my winter cap but I make do. Occasionally, if I'm feeling especially coquettish, I'll leave one errant lock peeking out from beneath the bottom edge of the cap, and allow it to curl itself like ivy back up toward my head. Is it adorable? Do you need to ask? ("Cuter than a tightly sealed plastic bag of kittens." - Peter Travers, Rolling Stone Magazine)

Getting back to the cap, I had to bring it out of retirement recently because my knit cap was overdue for a darning. Before clamping it down tight on my head, I made a very mature decision. I decided it was time to crank it back to the front, and switch dials from "25" to "31" years old. It was a little depressing at first, but I was actually really pleased once I got my hair jammed inside it. (and this was not easy; with thick wings of black hair sticking out of the sides and back i started to resemble one of the Sweathogs with a non-speaking role.)

To award myself three extra points for "dashing" I even cocked the cap at a jaunty angle. This was an unpexpectedly magical touch, actually. It was like when Tom Hanks found that volleyball in Castaway and for a long time it was just a regular, junky piece of sports equipment. Then, when he saw that his bloodied handprint made something resembling a face, that one little detail flipped the volleyball from playground equipment to BESTEST FRIEND EVER!! That's what the hat was like. At first I was sort of loathe to wear it, and embarrassed about having to face it forward. Then, with the addition of a cock, everything was better. ("Condescends to audience with flagrantly gay double-entendres." - POZ Magazine)

The only negative side effect of my new cap style is excessive whistling. You see, with a cap like this, worn at such a rakish angle, I've suddenly started imaging I'm an upbeat scoundrel from a Charles Dickens novel. I think this is probably a very common disorder. After the first day wearing my cap, I began blackening spots of my face with lumps of coal and addressing my neighbors in a thick, ridiculous Cockney accent. Today was even worse. Before leaving my flat, I tied a farthing to a retractable string to grift the chap who runs our neighborhood fruit stand. (interesting fact: the fruit stand guy takes farthings as payment, but still refuses my canadian quarters. i should wonk him a right good thump on his brasso beaner!) You blame the cap; I blame the cock. ("Just what America needs!" - Terrible Idea Monthly Magazine)