Dad jokes

I was thinking about "dad jokes" yesterday - not the jokes themselves, but the phrase. I asked my SO about the origin of the phrase, and they confirmed what I thought: dad jokes aren't really funny, and people good-humoredly just chuckle at the jokes, or roll their eyes, or whatever.
Point is, it's good to be a dad, I guess. Because if you are, then people let you tell not-very-funny jokes, and they chuckle obligingly, or they're just like, "ugh, dad joke". They go along with it because dads have positional power.
But what the listeners don't do is dismiss men for not being funny. "Mom jokes" are literally not even a thing, and that's because women don't even get credit for telling unfunny jokes. I guess women just go back to the kitchen or dining room table, telling the stories that are really funny, and for which women get no credit from men at all.
Although it's annoying that the bar is so low for men, women don't actually need men to say we're funny. So that's an advantage, I guess?

Swan Lake and fouettes

Misty Copeland's a good dancer, but that doesn't mean she's a good dancer in every role. If she can't do the 32 fouettes in Swan Lake, she should turn down the part; emoting and miming well doesn't make up for difficulties with technique.

hate-reading

While I'm sure I've read books before just to tear them apart, I can't remember one I've looked forward to hate-reading as much as David Boudia's new book. Here's an excerpt from the description:
"One of America’s most heralded young divers, David Boudia twice went for Olympic gold, training obsessively and whole-heartedly for success. In his first Olympics, he failed miserably, not winning a single medal. Four years later saw a different story: he mounted the podium twice, winning both gold and bronze. The difference? In the intervening years, he’d changed the focus of his quest from seeking glory for himself to giving glory to God."
Where to start? Well, for starters: coming in fifth isn't failing miserably. I can't even imagine the arrogance that makes a person think they deserve more. I'm hoping that phrasing is from the publisher, not from Boudia.
Also, I'm pretty sure that God had nothing to do with the medals he won in 2012. In related news, God doesn't care who wins reality TV shows, either.
Sadly, I'll have to wait to hate-read this book, because I refuse to buy it, even at a discount. Inter-library loan, after it's no longer a new book, I'd guess.

If it seems fishy, it might be

A committee that makes an effort to have gender, geographic, racial, age, and experiential diversity might want to avoid having two people of the same race, gender, workplace and (roughly) experience on the ballot. That they came from a workplace with influential people in the field makes me think it's problematic: what will happen if both of them win?
The nominating committee should have chosen one person from this workplace, and left the other for another year.

shutting down the debate

I've been following a promising new blog recently. The newest blog post was an interesting reflection on how thinking carefully about race made the blogger change opinions about a new book. That's fine, but it's also fine to have a differing opinion. I've read several thoughtful pieces on both sides of the debate.
So to have it framed as "if you don't agree, you're just not thinking carefully about race", or (as a commenter suggested) that if you don't agree with the blogger's take on the book you don't care about people of other races, makes me angry. It boils down to a difference of opinion about a text, not a litmus test about racism.

manners vs etiquette

I've found myself cranky several times in the past fortnight about matters of etiquette, enough so it has tipped over into a blog post on the subject. For example, I was annoyed that a soi-disant celebrity posted pictures of her wedding the day before her cousin's wedding, and that that woman's mother wore white to that cousin's wedding. I was a bit shocked to read details of one person's misbehavior at a private dinner on a relatively well-known blog; while I agree that the behavior was problematic, why air it in public by naming the person whose behavior was problematic?
There's quite a bit of etiquette that I'm prepared to overlook; for example, wearing white shoes after Labor Day is a victimless crime. But in all of the cases listed in the first paragraph, the etiquette matters. Etiquette is just a handy way to codify thoughtful behavior: manners, in other words. I'd like to see better manners.
(Which is why I didn't post links to any of the people whose behavior I found unmannerly! I didn't want to join their ranks.)

fat ankles?

So. I bought some gorgeous mid-calf boots last week, and today I had a few free minutes and a web browser in front of me, so I looked up tips on good outfits to wear with the gorgeous boots. The dozen tips I encountered on one website were just surreal. Here's why: the website said that mid-calf or ankle-length boots will make one's ankles look chunky, so nearly all of the tips were designed to combat this. This is just so weird to me! The tips that weren't specifically about looking thinner were about keeping legs looking long.
When did people decide that looking thin and tall was the only ideal? It's odd because some people will always look short and stout, no matter how slim they manage to make their ankles look. By the same token, some people will always look tall and thin, even if they (gasp!) wind up wearing chunky socks and ankle boots at the same time.
Weird.