Something about gender norms

My internship must be getting to me: I'm starting to act like I did when I took my first woman's studies class nearly ten years ago, getting irritated by gender norms and assumptions at every turn. I'd gotten rather complacent and able to let stuff slide more and more the past few years, but being fully immersed again in a place that lives and breathes sexuality and gender has riled me up something major. I snapped at a (straight) (male) friend on the phone tonight, shouting, "You're buying into the gender binary!" Which was true, but I probably could have been a little nicer about it. Sometimes it's hard for me to remember that not everyone spends their days consumed with GLBT civil rights (or LGBT, if you prefer...oh, the arguments that occur over GLBT v. LGBT v. queer v....if you only knew!!).

So yeah. Gender norms. Any thoughts?

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Oh Monday...

What I love about Mitz is how damn ridiculously preppy he dresses, but that he's really cool as shit underneath all that J.Crew and Banana. For instance, today I sashayed by his cube and said, "What ya listenin' to?"

"Common."

See what I mean? He's amazing. And I'm not just saying that cause he'll go down to the basement with me at work cause I'm too scared to go into the publications room by myself. (In my defense, that is how people end up having their brains eaten by zombies...) Mitz is amazing cause he's not trying too hard. He just is.

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Changes are happening

This blog is undergoing some changes. (You've probably noticed a few already.) I'm experimenting with formatting and tags and content and having contributors(!!), all in anticipation of my future career as a professional blogger. Let me know what you like and what you don't like in the comments. Thanks.

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Bounce wit me

Last night in Baltimore, HT pointed to me and said, "You can always tell ATL kids by the way that they bounce when they dance."

And yeah, I was bouncing. (To house music. At a rave. With glow sticks. I don't want to talk about it too much, but I will say apparently the universe has preserved a little bit of the late 90s rave scene in Baltimore. JNCOS, people! And the rhinestone bebe shirt every girl in my high school and every other high school in America sported when I was a freshman in 1997. And did I mention there were actual glowsticks??)

The DC kids with ATL connections loooove to talk about ATL when I'm around. "Remember that one time in ATL? Did you ever go to that club in ATL? Did you ever drink at that bar in ATL? Remember that party in ATL? Where did you live in ATL? ATL ATL ATL..." Which is kinda sweet and cute, all the ATL love, especially since I rep the A pretty hard up here (although I think I should be slapped, personally, the next time drunk casetheplace shouts and signs "Peace out! A-town down!" for no good reason, cause I do it waaaay too much, I'm not gonna lie...), but hey, look, I'm not in ATL anymore, and I don't plan to return anytime soon, and all that's for some very good reasons, and you're not in ATL these days either, so can we maybe not talk about ATL all the damn time? Thank you, 'preciate it.

But, um, while we're on the subject of ATL, here's some funny, funny, funniness. Especially if you've ever been a MARTA rider ("Isn't the Metro so much better than MARTA?" "SmarTrip's like a BREEZE card." "The buses here don't suck like MARTA buses." "I got hit by a MARTA bus once."). Oh, and in case you don't know what HT meant by bounce, there's some definite bounce in this:

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Fresca Friday

Happy Fresca Friday, y'all! Mitz declared today Fresca Friday because yesterday a bunch of us interns were giving him shit about his drinking Fresca.

"What are you, an old woman?" we all said. "Are you gonna start drinking Tab now too?"

Mitz tried to defend his Fresca drinking as not being old ladyish by reading us a printout of the Wikipedia entry for the drink ("Historian Doris Kearns Goodwin wrote that Fresca was the favorite drink of U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson, who had a button installed on the desk in the White House's Oval Office which would summon his military aide to bring the drink. In addition, Fresca was the favorite drink of the expansion teams in the NHL during the 1967 season"...Lyndon B. Johnson, people! And hockey players! They're not old ladies! Oh, and it's been featured in three - three! - episodes of The Simpsons! And The Daily Show!), but then Mitz made the mistake of mentioning that he was going on an evening river cruise on the Potomac next week, and all hell broke loose.

"You ARE an old woman! Look, he's even wearing a cardigan!"

Today, Mitz busted into the office with a stack of Dixie cups and a can of Fresca. "Who's ready to break down some beverage stereotypes??" he asked.

He then distributed the cups, and poured us each an inch of Fresca. I hadn't had Fresca in years, and I have to say, it tastes just as bizarre now as it did in the Nineties. (Sorry, Mitz, but I won't be joining you in old lady soft drink land on the regular.)

A lot of other things happened today, most notably my wiping out at 9:10 this morning on K Street. It was quite spectacular, with the coffee flying out of my hand and the sprawled out landing that slightly twisted my left ankle and tore open my right knee. It really knocked the wind out of me, and it took me a moment till I could let LG help me up. Everyone was all concerned about me being hurt, and all I could manage to get out was, "My coffee..." in a rather woeful voice. My skinned knee would heal with time, but the coffee seeping into the uneven cracks of the sidewalk was gone forever.

And here's a great thing one of my friends said today:

"Do squirrels eat worms? Like, in times of scarcity, do they eat worms? I saw one eating a worm today and I was like, Wow, it must be tough for them if they've moved on to worms..."

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Things my friends say

I'm trying to do a better job of writing down the hilarious shit my hilariously awesome friends say. Here are a few from this week:

"The only 'g' word I love is 'gummy bear' - or 'Ginger spice.' I LOVE her!"

"I had to turn the light on when we were doing it because I forgot what he looked like. (pause) Isn't that bad?"

"I know I'm a gay man, but culturally, I'm a lesbian."

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I wrote the shit out of that midterm

My professor said my midterm was the best in the class (*pats self on back*). I have a whole lot more to say, but it's 1:30 in the morning and I have another long day ahead of me tomorrow and - and - and...it'll just have to wait.

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