Manolo says, it is Monday and you are back at your desk working in the coal mine, going down, down, down. Working in a coal mine, whop! About to slip, doooown.

Or, at the least, that is how you feel, like the put-upon working person in the catchy song, although, now that you think about it, it is this song which perhaps best expresses your current mood…

Strangely, watching that video (while you are on the company time) cheers you up because it was introduced by Dinah Shore, who was the sort of Oprah before there was such the thing as Oprah, but without the mawkish hand-wringing and the clubbing of books.

And then you remember that your mother loved Dinah Shore because was the great singer and the sympathetic and entertaining conversationalist, plus she dated the Burt Reynolds who was 20 years her junior, back when Burt was still regarded as the serious actor and the hairy-chested hottie, before he became the punch line to many jokes. Burt and Dinah, they were like Demi and Ashton, if you imagined those people as intelligent and talented and not annoying.

And then you are wondering, why is there no room in our culture for such peoples as Dinah Shore, graceful, charming, relaxed, sexy peoples?

In the stead, we have nothing but grasping, annoying, conceited peoples, shoving themselves into our faces, and importuning us with their bothersome antics.

Look! Shoes!

Lace Ankle Booties from Oscar de la Renta, exactly the sort of shoes Dinah would wear with her long velvet ball gowns, were she still around.