hmph.
Brent, that I work with, is constantly amusing but also a jerk.
We torment him a lot, I must admit. But he started it!
He's very narcissistic (sp?) and is constantly refering to people as not terribly complimentary names when they're not around. So we took to wondering what he calls us.
I pretty much nailed mine- "That nerdy city girl"- he has an undisguised scorn for me, one, because I'm a nerd, and two, because I'm a 'city slicker'. He also added a tag onto mine "...that doesn't believe in premarital sex" but I'm not sure where the hell he got THAT as we were all discussing early marriages (Crystal's friend is getting married next summer) and I said that I think people should for sure live together before getting married. Anyhow. He hasn't come up with a good one for Crystal yet (other than "that rude girl who can't throw"). He had one for Niki, but he wouldn't say it while I was there, and Crystal said it was too mean to repeat. I'm not surprised.
At first, his whole scorn-for-the-nerdy-city-girl thing was funny, but it's starting to get annoying. I asked him what made someone a city girl instead of a country one. He started "How much have you dealt with livestock? Ever mowed, raked, baled? No? City Slicker."
But when I brought up the observation that most of the GIRLS in the country don't seem to get to do any of those things and instead end up cooking for the guys, he didn't pass a comment.
It seems like, although the girls are expected to be able to do a lot of the hand work (livestock handling/feeding, cleaning out pens, berrying) they're not neccesarily expected to (and sometimes actually discouraged from) driving any of the large machinery. The boys are only expected to know how to do the heavy work. None of them seem to be able to cook. Most of them don't know how to do their own laundy (Brent has a month's worth of clothes that his mom washes when he comes home from university).
Anyhow. With most of them, it doesn't seem like a big deal- it's just everyone helping the farm run or whatever. The tractor/machinery thing isn't really about boys vs. girls, but some weird attachment that the farmers seem to have to their machinery (Dad's not even a farmer, and Shane hasn't gotten to drive the 'new' tractor yet).
I don't really think I AM a city slicker, to be honest. Maybe I'm not a country girl either, but I can garden, I can cook, I know what the important parts of my car are called, I can name plants and weeds and grasses that Brent has NO IDEA about...and I'm willing to LEARN. That boy just thinks he's RIGHT all the time.
I'm not sure why I'm irritated over this. I guess I just really like it up here, and it sucks when he starts making me feel like an outsider. Sure, I kind of am one. Yeah, I don't know how to rake hay. But I don't make fun of him for being a hick- and he lives closer to Amherst than I lived to any real town.
At least he's honest about his scorn. None of the popular-boy-talking-behind-your-back crap.
Other than Brent, so far I like the country boys. Kevin is like, the nicest guy I've ever met, and Stephen and Dwight seemed pretty cool too.
Sorry for the random ranting.
We torment him a lot, I must admit. But he started it!
He's very narcissistic (sp?) and is constantly refering to people as not terribly complimentary names when they're not around. So we took to wondering what he calls us.
I pretty much nailed mine- "That nerdy city girl"- he has an undisguised scorn for me, one, because I'm a nerd, and two, because I'm a 'city slicker'. He also added a tag onto mine "...that doesn't believe in premarital sex" but I'm not sure where the hell he got THAT as we were all discussing early marriages (Crystal's friend is getting married next summer) and I said that I think people should for sure live together before getting married. Anyhow. He hasn't come up with a good one for Crystal yet (other than "that rude girl who can't throw"). He had one for Niki, but he wouldn't say it while I was there, and Crystal said it was too mean to repeat. I'm not surprised.
At first, his whole scorn-for-the-nerdy-city-girl thing was funny, but it's starting to get annoying. I asked him what made someone a city girl instead of a country one. He started "How much have you dealt with livestock? Ever mowed, raked, baled? No? City Slicker."
But when I brought up the observation that most of the GIRLS in the country don't seem to get to do any of those things and instead end up cooking for the guys, he didn't pass a comment.
It seems like, although the girls are expected to be able to do a lot of the hand work (livestock handling/feeding, cleaning out pens, berrying) they're not neccesarily expected to (and sometimes actually discouraged from) driving any of the large machinery. The boys are only expected to know how to do the heavy work. None of them seem to be able to cook. Most of them don't know how to do their own laundy (Brent has a month's worth of clothes that his mom washes when he comes home from university).
Anyhow. With most of them, it doesn't seem like a big deal- it's just everyone helping the farm run or whatever. The tractor/machinery thing isn't really about boys vs. girls, but some weird attachment that the farmers seem to have to their machinery (Dad's not even a farmer, and Shane hasn't gotten to drive the 'new' tractor yet).
I don't really think I AM a city slicker, to be honest. Maybe I'm not a country girl either, but I can garden, I can cook, I know what the important parts of my car are called, I can name plants and weeds and grasses that Brent has NO IDEA about...and I'm willing to LEARN. That boy just thinks he's RIGHT all the time.
I'm not sure why I'm irritated over this. I guess I just really like it up here, and it sucks when he starts making me feel like an outsider. Sure, I kind of am one. Yeah, I don't know how to rake hay. But I don't make fun of him for being a hick- and he lives closer to Amherst than I lived to any real town.
At least he's honest about his scorn. None of the popular-boy-talking-behind-your-back crap.
Other than Brent, so far I like the country boys. Kevin is like, the nicest guy I've ever met, and Stephen and Dwight seemed pretty cool too.
Sorry for the random ranting.