Round House Duck Canvas Bib Overalls. For heavy chores around the house or helping my friend slaughter chickens at his farm, I put on my Round House overalls. This Oklahoma company has been making jeans and overalls right here in the state for over a century. Their duck canvas bibs are tough, comfortable, and functional. What sets Round House apart is that despite being made in the USA, they’re really dang affordable. The duck canvas bibs are currently on sale for $60. If you need workwear that can handle actual work without breaking the bank, Round House delivers.

Freaks and Geeks. I missed this cult classic when it originally aired for a single season in 1999, but we recently watched it as a family and really enjoyed it. It follows a group of high schoolers in suburban Michigan in the early 1980s, and producer Judd Apatow nailed what the time looked and felt like: the clothes, the home decor (wood-encased TVs!), and the pop culture references. For our kids, the show was a window into teenage life before the advent of smartphones. The show and its characters grow on you as the season progresses, and there’s a human, good-natured vibe to the whole thing; the show is kind to its characters, even when they make boneheaded decisions (here’s looking at you, Lindsay!). The episodes don’t tie things up neatly or pretend teenagers always learn their lessons, and I could tell our kids were often thinking through and evaluating the choices the characters made in a healthy way (that’s the power of fictional storytelling!). The show is frequently hilarious, though the humor is so subtle you hardly know why you’re laughing (it’s often out of sheer awkwardness — Apatow’s speciality). We were all bummed when we made it through all the episodes — I wish they’d made more seasons!

90% of Men Are Not Toxic. We haven’t talked much about “toxic masculinity” on AoM because I’ve always thought the panic around it was overblown. My working assumption has been that most men are solid dudes, and the a-holes are just a small, loud minority. So why focus energy on the dumb-dumbs and treat all men like they’re inherently terrible? A recent study out of New Zealand confirmed my hunch. Researchers analyzed data from over 15,000 men, measuring eight markers of toxic masculinity — things like hostile sexism, narcissism, sexual prejudice, and opposition to domestic violence prevention. Using statistical modeling, they found that only 10.8% of men displayed clear signs of toxic masculinity. The vast majority of men — nearly 90% — aren’t toxic. They’re just regular guys trying to do right by the people around them. 

Do the Work by Steven Pressfield. We’ve had Steven Pressfield on the podcast several times, and while his historical fiction is top-notch, I keep coming back to his books about the craft of writing. While they’re focused on writing, the advice applies across domains. Do the Work is my favorite; it’s a short, pithy book that I revisit whenever I need a kick in the pants. Pressfield’s central concept is “Resistance” — an internal force that keeps us from doing our most important work through procrastination, self-doubt, and distraction. Pressfield emphasizes that you don’t need perfect conditions or complete clarity to begin; you just need to start and trust that the work itself will reveal what needs to happen next. At under 100 pages, it’s less a book you read once and more a short manifesto you return to whenever you need someone to tell you to quit overthinking and just do the damn work.

On our Dying Breed newsletter, we published Sunday Firesides: No Regrets and Don’t Just Read the Great Books. Read Schlocky Ephemera, Too.

Quote of the Week

Every human being is intended to have a character of his own; to be what no other is, and to do what no other can do.

—William E. Channing

This article was originally published on The Art of Manliness.