In our November 2002 issue, Esquire ran a list of "Things a Man Should Not Know." The list served as a strict and imposing doorman, a Patrick Swayze keeping the undesirables out of the Double Deuce that is the sophisticated man's mind. We gave a thumbs-down to knowing both "the date on which the Olsen twins become legal" and "what happens to the little cows before they become the delicious veal on his plate." We eighty-sixed information out of male panic ("how to cross-stitch"), out of practicality ("his best friend's salary"), and out of equal parts of both ("a single lyric from any song by O-Town"). We stand by this list. One thing a man for sure did not know in November 2002 was how much information his brain would soon be deluged with. That Nokia phone in his pocket would become an iPhone that was never not in his hand. He would have a world of information at his fingertips, and a critical fact he would learn too late was that it absolutely blows to have a world of information at your fingertips. He would get every piece of news as it happened, and moments later he would get every idiot's opinion on that news as it formed. Our brain bouncers need to be Jake Gyllenhaal jacked if we're going to keep our temples tidy. For the Too Much Information Age, here is the updated edition of "Things a Man Should NOT Know." Enjoy it over a nice cross-stitch. |
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I've dedicated much of my life to the search for the perfect pair of jeans. They're the backbone of any great wardrobe, so it's worth the hunt. I've spent seasons breaking in a single pair of raw selvedge denim from boutique labels, stocked up on mall-brands, scoured the internet for vintage gems, and experimented with every fit imaginable. Don't get me wrong, I still have a few nicely broken-in pairs of fancy raw denim I cherish, but when push comes to shove, the jeans I return to most, much like my Esquire editors, are the ones I bought for next to nothing. I've worn through more Wrangler Cowboy Cut jeans than I can count, and nothing beats a pair of vintage Levi's 501s—many of which you can still find for under $50 if you're willing to do a little digging. |
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Judge not George Bell. He doesn't need your judgment. Matter of fact, your judgment is about the last thing he needs. George Bell suffered cruel and careless judgment when he was nineteen and without warning the white arm of the law smote him with the shock and force of a lightning strike. That day of judgment could have ended his young life—the prosecutors tried to get him the death penalty. But the truth is, George Bell was judged long before that, just for being a Black kid from the wrong part of Queens. The truth is, George Bell was judged before he was even born. They said he killed two men, one of them an off-duty cop. That's what happened when he was nineteen, a legal adult but still a kid. They said George and two accomplices ambushed the men one cold morning as the stores and businesses on Astoria Boulevard were opening for the day, and shot them both. They arrested George on Christmas Eve, sent him away for life after a trial in which no one seemed much interested in evidence or in whether it was even a Black kid who had done this. |
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I swear you can feel the difference the second you slide your foot into a pair of really well-made shoes. There's something about the sensation that's just different—better—than the one you get when you're putting on middling footwear. It's the texture of the leather. The shape of the last. The sturdy sole underfoot. Yeah, sure, I'm getting a little poetical here. But when you're shelling out serious dough for new oxfords or loafers or what-have-you, it's nice to be able to take solace in the fact that you're parting with your hard-earned cash because you're investing in quality. That's how I felt when I stopped by the Carmina store in Midtown Manhattan and first tried on a pair of the Spanish shoemaker's plain-toe derbies. I was in the market for a pair of shoes that could do pretty much anything. Dress up with a suit. Dress down with jeans. Play nicely in the middle with pleated trousers and a nice jacket. Well, I found exactly what I was looking for. And if you're also currently hunting for the most versatile shoes a guy can keep in his rotation, you might have just found your next pair, too. |
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It looks like Star Wars is firmly back in the father-son business. That was my initial reaction after Lucasfilm unveiled the first teaser for director Jon Favreau's The Mandalorian and Grogu and filmmaker Shawn Levy teased the start of Starfighter's principle photography with photos of Ryan Gosling looking very much identical to his 14-year-old costar Finn Gray. But as Obi-Wan Kenobi told Luke Skywalker in the 1977 original: "Your eyes can deceive you. Don't trust them." Gosling and Gray actually play uncle and nephew, according to sources, and the silver-masked bounty hunter obviously isn't any kind of blood relation to his little green ward. Still, both relationships add up to something close to the same: a battle-hardened older protector leading the way while a headstrong young sidekick tries to find another path. Just as Darth Vader had his humanity restored by a son who refused to follow in his footsteps, smart money says that both Pedro Pascal's Mandalorian and Gosling's bruised and shaggy-haired protagonist will learn something even more vital than what they pass on to their brash and inexperienced mentees. That's part of the DNA of Star Wars. But, as in nature itself, repeated traits become vulnerabilities without evolution. Stories can go from tried-and-true to tired and irrelevant if they don't change things up. We won't know the full scope of how these two movies intend to vary the formula until The Mandalorian and Grogu debuts next May and Starfighter arrives the following year in the spring of 2027. Apart from slight variation in the parent-guardian relationships, these stories already have something different from the original trilogy that founded this universe almost 50 years ago: Their heroes, both old and young, are stuck with each other. |
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Every other Friday, my wife and I grab dinner and beer at Pasqually's Pizza in West Philadelphia. The no-frills eatery has, in my opinion, the best selection of craft beer in the city, which enhances its perfectly serviceable Italian American fare. So we dish about our workweeks over stromboli and a can or two. As is tradition, I pull open the stuffed coolers and reach for a high-ABV double IPA, usually from Grimm or the Alchemist. As is also tradition, my wife comments on how gross IPAs are before picking out a syrupy sour or Mexican lager instead. I've heard similar comments hundreds of times from dozens of folks: IPAs taste like battery acid! They're disgusting! And so pretentious! Despite the style's overwhelming domination of the American craft-beer scene—I dare you to find a local brewery that doesn't make one—IPAs are subject to intense dislike. But the attitude is decidedly uncool, like snobbishly refusing to listen to Taylor Swift or watch Yellowstone. Why despise something so beloved by many? "There's no such thing as a person who doesn't like IPA," says Nate Lanier, founder, CEO, and head brewer of Tree House Brewing Company, based in Charlton, Massachusetts. "There [are] just people that haven't had the right one yet." |
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