I'm a Viking!

Conversation overheard behind me as I'm leading 6th graders on a fieldtrip at work yesterday:

Kid#1: She has an accent. I wonder where she's from?
Kid#2: Who? The guide?
Kid#1: Yes, of course. She talks like someone from another country.
Kid#2: You're right. I think she's like ... from Europe, maybe?
Kid#1: I know. She's from one of those countries way up there, in the North.
Kid#2: You mean, like a Viking?
Kid#1: Exactly. She's a Viking.

Party-poopers

Warning, this is a bit of a curmudgeon-ly post: you've been warned!

Here I go:

At social gatherings (a.k.a. parties), I do not care to stand around listening to a bunch of guys "male posturing". Because to me, men bragging about their cars, fishing trips, business successes or anything else is just posturing -- they may as well be comparing the sizes of their dicks!
They just go on and on about themselves! No matter where the conversation leads --politics, science, the weather even-- this type of male (type A personality?) just likes to bring the conversation right back to himself and what a hotshot he is!


Myself, I rather go over and see what the ladies are talking about. I don't care about shopping, fashion or make-up, but more often than not, sooner or later they do get around to talking about some stuff is that close to my heart: children, education, family, health... But no matter what the topic, women tend to be more consensus-building, self-disclosing, yes, they're more likely to listen. Most importantly, they don't blatantly think of themselves as the center of the universe!

The question begs: is it all just basic Darwinian evolution at work? Men competing for power and access to females, while women are nurturing their young? Or did I spend too much time in graduate school taking courses in evolutionary biology?

Maybe I'm a bit biased -- just a teensy bit...

Phew, got that off my chest!

Photo credits
http://static.zsl.org
http://www.grg.org

Men, Women & COMPUTERS

A SPANISH Teacher was explaining to her class that in Spanish, unlike English, nouns are designated as either masculine or feminine.

'House' for instance, is feminine: 'la casa.'

'Pencil,' however, is masculine: 'el lapiz.'

A student asked, 'What gender is 'computer'?'

Instead of giving the answer, the teacher split the class into two groups, male and female, and asked them to decide for themselves whether computer' should be a masculine or a feminine noun. Each group was asked to give four reasons for its recommendation.

The men's group decided that 'computer' should definitely be of the feminine gender ('la computadora'), because:

1. No one but their creator understands their internal logic;

2. The native language they use to communicate with other computers is incomprehensible to everyone else;

3. Even the smallest mistakes are stored in long term memory for possible later retrieval; and

4. As soon as you make a commitment to one, you find yourself spending half your paycheck on accessories for it.

(THIS GETS BETTER!)

The women's group, however, concluded that computers should be Masculine ('el computador'), because:

1. In order to do anything with them, you have to turn them on;

2. They have a lot of data but still can't think for themselves;

3. They are supposed to help you solve problems, but half the time they ARE the problem; and

4. As soon as you commit to one, you realize that if you had waited a little longer, you could have gotten a better model.

The women won.

Credit for this goes to Anonymous (I got this as an email forward from California)!

Valentine's Special, anyone?!?

I admit that I recycled this post -- but not only is it perfect for Valentine's Day Eve (and I'm too tired to think of something original tonight), it also shows that I'm not always serious, and that I too, have a glib side:

In these hard economic times, people are always looking for ways to save money. Here's a helpful hint for Valentine's Day (if you're in the market...)

We do some of our shopping at a big warehouse store (Costco), where you'll find multi-packs of many household items: double, triple, even sixtuple the normal amounts of ketch-up, coffee-filters, tampons, or whatever else you might be looking for -- often you get twice of what you need for half the price!

Today the Prof, my husband, saw an announcement that you can pre-order Roses for Valentine's Day. SPECIAL: 35 roses for $65
Who needs 35 roses? A cheating husband, of course! What a deal, we both chuckled and simultanously said that: "Perfect for the guy who has a wife AND a mistress or two!" Only at Costco...