Hat

Notice the lack of a plastic adjustment strap. (Photo by the so-called “old guy” with the dreaded and utterly reprehensible Nikon D100 camera with flash.)

I’m at mighty Weggers today (Sunday, June 21, 2009).
“Can I ask where ya gotcher hat?” some grizzled Harley-dude asks.
Usual stroke-effect at play here; seconds pass before I can get the words out.
“Scranton, Pennsylvania,” I answer.
“It’s the only place ya can get one without the plastic adjustment strap.”

• The cap pictured is what railroad engineers used to wear. (I’m a railfan, and have been since I was a child.) Not any more. Most railfan engineer-caps are made in China by Chinese child prison-labor in fetid sweatshops. They have plastic adjustment straps in the back. —The original hats, which were also used by farmhands, were sized. The hat pictured is also sized. So far, of all the railfan gifts-shops I’ve been in, only Steamtown in Scranton, PA. had the original sized hats. I bought at least two.
• RE: “‘Old guy’ with the dreaded and utterly reprehensible Nikon D100.......” —My macho, blowhard brother-from-Boston, who is 13 years younger than me, calls me “the old guy” as a put-down (I also am the oldest). I also am loudly excoriated by all my siblings for preferring a professional camera (like the Nikon D100) instead of a point-and-shoot. This is because I long ago sold photos to nationally published magazines.
• “Mighty Weggers” is Wegmans, a large supermarket-chain based in Rochester we often buy groceries at. They have a store in Canandaigua.
• I had a stroke October 26, 1993, and it slightly compromised my speech. (Difficulty putting words together.)