Knotty engineer

As a California-residing, code-writing Sun engineer, I don’t have a lot of sartorial restrictions beyond the standard requirements for coverage. It’s been a bit of a shock, therefore, to co-workers and long time customers to catch me wearing a necktie. The most common question is “Are you interviewing?” Which, given that whole writing-code-in-California bit, isn’t very appropriate—this isn’t standard engineering costume out here.

I think the easiest way to understand it is as an eccentricity: I’m working my way through Fink and Mao‘s The 85 ways to tie a tie. They identify thirteen suitably aesthetic knots, nine of which are in some sense novelties, not being the standard three or four. Each day, I’ve been working my way through another one of the aesthetic or historically interesting knots, by tying it on and wearing it through the work day. My head hasn’t popped off yet.

Tie knot: Knot 7 (Half-Windsor).