Lets get on with more of the business: BATTLE OF THE SEXES The truth.... (and some white lies):
WOMEN SPEAK IN OESTROGEN AND MEN LISTEN IN TESTOSTERONE by Matt Groening.
RELATIONSHIPS: First of all, a man does not call it a relationship - he
refers to it as "that time when me and Suzie were doing it on a semi-
regular basis." When a relationship ends, a woman will cry and pour her
heart out to her girlfriends, and she will write a poem titled "All Men Are
Idiots." Then she will get on with her life. A man has a little more
trouble letting go. Six months after the break-up, at 3:00 a.m. on a Saturday
night, he will call and say, "I just wanted to let you know you ruined my
life, and I'll never forgive you, and I hate you, and you're a total floozy. But
I want you to know that there's always a chance for us." This is known as
the "I Hate You / I Love You" drunken phone call, and 99% of all men
have made it at least once. There are community colleges that offer courses to
help men get over this need; alas, these classes rarely prove effective.
SEX: Women prefer 30-40 minutes of foreplay. Men prefer 30-40 seconds of
foreplay. Men consider driving back to her place part of the foreplay.
MATURITY: Women mature much faster than men. Most 17-year old females can
function as adults. Most 17-year old males are still trading baseball cards and
giving each other wedgies after gym class. This is why high school romances
rarely work out.
MAGAZINES: Men's magazines often feature pictures of naked women. Women's
magazines also feature pictures of naked women. This is because the female body
is a beautiful work of art, while the male body is lumpy and hairy and should
not be seen by the light of day. Men are turned on at the sight of a naked
woman's body. Most naked men elicit laughter from women.
HANDWRITING: To their credit, men do not decorate their penmanship. They
just chicken-scratch. Women use scented, colored stationery and they dot their "i's"
with circles and hearts. Women use ridiculously large loops in their "p's"
and "g's". It is a royal pain to read a note from a woman. Even when
she's dumping you, she'll put a smiley face at the end of the note.
COMEDY: Let's say a small group of men and women are in a room, watching
television, and an episode of the Three Stooges comes on. Immediately, the men
will get very excited; they will laugh uproariously, and even try to imitate the
actions of Curly, man's favorite Stooge. The women will roll their eyes and
groan and wait it out.
BATHROOMS: A man has six items in his bathroom-a toothbrush, shaving cream,
razor, a bar of Dial soap, and a towel from the Holiday Inn. The average number
of items in the typical woman's bathroom is 437. A man would not be able to
identify most of these items. GROCERIES: A woman makes a list of things she needs and then goes out to the
store and buys these things. A man waits till the only items left in his fridge
are half a lime and a beer. Then he goes grocery shopping. He buys everything
that looks good. By the time a man reaches the checkout counter, his cart is
packed tighter than the Clampett's car on Beverly Hillbillies. Of course, this
will not stop him from going to the 10-items-or-less lane.
SHOES: When preparing for work, a woman will put on a Mondi wool suit, then
slip on Reebok sneakers. She will carry her dress shoes in a plastic bag from
Saks. When a woman gets to work, she will put on her dress shoes. Five minutes
later, she will kick them off because her feet are under the desk. A man will
wear the same pair of shoes all day. GOING OUT: When a man says he is ready to go out, it means he is ready to go
out. When a woman says she is ready to go out, it means she WILL be ready to go
out, as soon as she finds her earrings, finishes putting on her makeup. CATS: Women love cats. Men say they love cats, but when women aren't
looking, men kick cats.
OFFSPRING: Ah, children. A woman knows all about her children. She knows
about dentist appointments and soccer games and romances and best friends and
favorite foods and secret fears and hopes and dreams. A man is vaguely aware of
some short people living in the house.
LOW BLOWS: Let's say a man and a woman are watching a boxing match on TV.
One of the boxers is felled by a low blow. The woman says, "Oh, gee. That
must have hurt." The man groans and doubles over, and actually FEELS the
pain.
DRESSING UP: A woman will dress up to: go shopping, water the plants, empty
the garbage, answer the phone, read a book, get the mail. A man will dress up
for: weddings, funerals.
LAUNDRY: Women do laundry every couple of days. A man will wear every
article of clothing he owns, including his surgical pants that were hip about
eight years ago, before he will do his laundry. When he is finally out of
clothes, he will wear a dirty sweatshirt inside out, rent a U-Haul and take his
mountain of clothes to the laundromat. Men always expect to meet beautiful women
at the laundromat. This is a myth perpetuated by re-runs of old episodes of "Love,
American Style." WEDDINGS: When reminiscing about weddings, women talk about "the
ceremony." Men talk about "the bachelor party."
SOCKS: Men wear sensible socks. They wear standard white sweat socks. Women
wear strange socks. Socks that are cut way below the ankles, that have pictures
of clouds, that have a big fuzzy ball on the back.
NICKNAMES: If Gloria, Suzanne, Deborah and Michelle go out for lunch, they
will call each other Gloria, Suzanne, Deborah and Michelle. But if Mike, Dave,
Rob and Jack go out for a brewsky, they will affectionately refer to each other
as Bullet-Head, Godzilla, Peanut-Head and Useless.
EATING OUT: ..and when the check comes, Mike, Dave, Rob and Jack will each
throw in $20 bills, even though it's only for $22.50. None of them will have
anything smaller, and none will actually admit they want change back. When the
girls get their check, out come the pocket calculators.
MIRRORS: Men are vain; they will check themselves out in a mirror. Women are
ridiculous; they will check out their reflections in any shiny surface: mirrors,
spoons, store windows, bald men's heads.
MENOPAUSE: When a woman reaches menopause, she goes through a variety of
complicated emotional, psychological, and biological changes. The nature and
degree of these changes varies with the individual. Menopause in a man provokes
a uniform reaction-he buys aviator glasses, a snazzy French cap and leather
driving gloves, and goes shopping for a Porsche.
THE TELEPHONE: Men see the telephone as a communication tool. They use the
telephone to send short messages to other people. A woman can visit her
girlfriend for two weeks, and upon returning home, she will call the same friend
and they will talk for three hours.
DIRECTIONS: If a woman is out driving, and she finds herself in unfamiliar
surroundings, she will stop at a gas station and ask for directions. Men
consider this to be a sign of weakness. Men will never stop and ask for
directions. Men will drive in a circle for hours, all the while saying things
like, "Looks like I've found a new way to get there" and, "I know
I'm in the general neighborhood. I recognize that 7-11 store."
ADMITTING MISTAKES: Women will sometimes admit making a mistake. The last
man who admitted he was wrong was General George Custer.
RICHARD GERE: Women like Richard Gere because he is sexy in a dangerous way.
Men hate Richard Gere because he reminds them of that slick guy who works at the
health club and dates only married women.
MADONNA: Same as above, but reversed. Same reason.
TOYS: Little girls love to play with toys. Then when they reach the age of
11 or 12, they lose interest. Men never grow out of their obsession with toys.
As they get older, their toys simply become more expensive and silly and
impractical. Examples of men's toys: little miniature TV's. Car phones.
Complicated juicers and blenders. Graphic equalizers. Small robots that serve
cocktails on command. Video games. Anything that blinks, beeps, and requires at
least 6 "D" batteries to operate.
PLANTS: A woman asks a man to water her plants while she is on vacation. The
man waters the plants. The woman comes home five or six days later to an
apartment full of dead plants. No one knows why this happens CAMERAS: Men take photography very seriously. They'll shell out $4000 for
state of the art equipment, and build dark rooms and take photography classes.
Women purchase Kodak Instamatics. Of course, women always end up taking better
pictures.
LOCKER ROOMS: In the locker room men talk about three things: money,
football, and women. They exaggerate about money, they don't know football
nearly as well as they think they do, and they fabricate stories about women.
Women talk about one thing in the locker room -sex. And not in abstract terms,
either. They are extremely graphic and technical, and they never lie.
GARAGES: Women use garages to park their cars and store their lawnmowers.
Men use garages for many things. They hang license plates in garages, they watch
TV in garages, and they build useless lopsided benches in garages.
MOVIES: Every actress in the history of movies has had to do a nude scene.
This is because every movie in the history of movies has been produced by a man.
The only actor who has ever appeared nude in the movies is Richard Gere. This is
another reason why men hate him.
JEWELRY: Women look nice when they wear jewelry. A man can get away with
wearing one ring and that's it. Any more than that and he will look like a
lounge singer named Vic.
SPORT ARENAS: Simply put, men can always find their way around stadiums and
arenas. The women usually end up following men.
TIME: When a woman says she'll be ready to go out in five more minutes,
she's using the same meaning of time as when a man says the football games's
just got five minutes left. Neither of them is counting time outs, commercials,
or replays.
CONVERSATION: Men need a good disagreement to get talking, e.g., "Wow,
great movie," "What are you, nuts? No REAL cop would have an Uzi that
size," "Well, maybe he got it because he knew about those Mafia guys,"
etc. Women, not having this problem, try to initiate conversations with men by
saying something agreeable: "That garden by the roadside looks lovely."
"Mm hmm." Pause. "That was a good restaurant last night, wasn't
it?" "Yeah." Pause. And so on.
FRIENDS: Women on a girls' night out talk the whole time. Men on a boys'
night out say about twenty words all night, most of which are "Pass the
Doritos" or "Got any more beer?"
RESTROOMS: Men use restrooms for purely biological reasons. Women use
restrooms as social lounges. Men in restrooms will never speak a word to each
other. Women who've never met will leave a restroom giggling together like old
friends. And never in the history of the world has a man excused himself from a
restaurant table by saying, "Hey, Tots, I was just about to take a leak. Do
you want to join me?"