42 Reasons for Fish - and other things
Created | Updated Nov 9, 2005
Hats. Every once in a while a person goes through a period in their life when they need hats. It may not be a very long period, it may only last for a few seconds or it could last for years, but every once in a while everyone goes through a period of hat wearing.
It's a bit like that old clothes question. Why does anyone have to wear any? I wear them because they keep me warm, because I like fitting in — if I’m being honest. But the question of hats is quite interesting.
As a child I always had a lot of respect for people with hats: Sherlock Holmes, Inspector Gadget and Doctor Who (the seventh incarnation incidentally). But there are so many different kinds of hats. The most popular in the western world (at least) currently is the baseball cap — a bit like a skull cap, with a peak at the front, and an annoying hole at the back which gives you a nice bit of sticky out hair, which any fashion conscious person would find unacceptable — hence forcing the continued wearing of the cap. Maybe that's why its so popular.
I know I used to wear one quite a lot, even though I've never played baseball and only seen one game in my entire life. But I’ve focused mostly on male hats ... which is quite interesting (in my strange little world at least) because the most famous hats are worn by women. And they always seem to appear around horses for some reason, not riding them but watching them.
I'm not a very horsey person by nature, and only really watch any races when the Grand National is on in Aintree (which is probably near enough for me to actually go to, but why spend all your time waiting for a fleeting glance of a horse, when you can see the whole race in the comfort of your own home). Horses by their very nature do not appear to care much for hats. The people who wear hats around them are either jockeys who sit on their backs and hit them, or women who terrify them with huge monstrosities that make them look like they should be growing out of the ground in a wood far away from anywhere, or wealthy owners whom they are probably indifferent about. So you could probably understand it if horses were a little unsure about the strange breed that wear hats. By hats I am stretching the term to helmets, which may not be completely accurate, but what the hey, horses probably don't care, so why should I (I should point out that there are many answers to that question which could be quite insulting to my intelligence levels, and most of which would be completely accurate, but for the moment we shall pretend I am a 'good' columnist for the h2g2 Post and carry on where we where in our merry lives ... dum de dum).
Anyway, Hats! They are a most peculiar item of clothing. They should in theory be very simple creations. They are there to keep people's heads warm. The first one I probably came in contact with was when I was a baby, wearing some sort of blue head covering (while I had no hair, before I had this short mane of black hair). The second was probably my grandfather's flat cap. I used to love wearing it for some perverse reason. Until I became a teenager (when virtually everything including breathing is uncool), then I went on to caps, and then nothing — except on holidays. But I think I’ve covered the subject of baseball caps enough for now.
Hats used to be a symbol of class. The aforementioned flat cap was usually a symbol of the working class — which perhaps suggests where my backgrounds lie. The top hat, usually accompanied by a walking cane and flash suit suggested immense wealth, the likes of which considerably less than one percent of the entire population of the world would see.
Now hats (unless you are a wealthy woman, wear a baseball cap, or are a member of the emergency services) suggest that you are probably a tad weird.
Which brings me to the inspiration for this weeks musings (this week I will mostly be talking about hats — in case you haven't noticed). I bought a hat. Not a baseball cap, which is my usual fare. But a 'proper' hat. Actually I'm probably going over the top a bit. I've been on holiday, and I saw a hat and bought it as a souvenir. The real reason I probably bought the hat was to look like Indiana Jones. Since I was a child I always thought it would be great to be a doctor who didn’t just go along with the establishment but went out and actually went on adventures. And hence the hat.
Whether it looks like an Indiana Jones hat, I don't know. Its black, which might discount it, but it has a certain element to it which struck me as a hat that would be worn by Indiana Jones. Whether I look like Indiana Jones in it is a completely different matter. And quite frankly I would be very disturbed if it did make me look like Indiana Jones. Any hat that can change someone's appearance is surely unnatural and unsafe. Nonetheless, I have bought this unholy hat, and am currently wearing it as we write. Whether I will wear it in public is completely another matter.
Which is perhaps what intrigues me the most. What is it that makes things acceptable to wear? In the past entire populations would have moustaches in a certain way, simply because the monarch of the day had one. In modern times the 'monarchs', or popular music/entertainment stars, as we call them, tend not to have moustaches. And the hats they wear tend to be either baseball caps, or something that is the current fad.
What this all has to do with fishes, though, God only knows.
