Of hats and men.

It's cold as a witch's teat this morning in Manhattan, with pre-climate-apocalypse temperatures and a wind that howls down the avenues and cuts to the bone.

Of course, there are dickwads about--they are everywhere--men wearing nothing but a sports jacket and a jaunty scarf and women in silly open-toe shoes more suited for a lawn party in the Hamptons in August than Manhattan in February.

And no one anymore wears a hat. I grew up with a virago of a mother who beat into my hatless head that 40% of your body heat escapes through your cranium, so keep it warm and the rest of you will follow.

Some years ago, long before our nation was taken over by Russia, I went online and found a site where they sold genuine Persian wool Astrakhan hats of the sort Soviet soldiers on the Eastern Front wore as they were driving back the Nazis.

It's a big boiled wool heap of gray and sits high atop my head, making me appear as tall as an NBA star. Though it kept me warm during the coldest nights and longest walks through the worst snows with Whiskey, I hesitate now to wear it--lest someone think it is some sort of pro-Russian, pro-Trump statement.

That's the world we seem to live in now. Everything--even your hat--can be interpreted as a political statement. So today, rather than guard my noggin against the chill, I am wearing a simple white and red baseball cap--a replica of the caps the Washington Grays, a team in the old Negro leagues, wore back in the 1940s.

I can hear somewhere in what remains of my brain my mother warning me that such a cap will do nothing to keep me warm. I knew that this morning when I left the house. But the sun was shining bright, pitchers and catchers have reported to camps, and, I'll admit, I felt like rushing the season.

Obviously no point this morning. 

Busier than fuck at work and running late. So this is all I've got.

Stay warm.