Monday, March 9, 2009

Parades, Part II: Girl Stereotypes

This weekend I went to Old Town for the St. Patrick's Day parade. I don't go to Alexandria often, and I'm always a little overwhelmed by the stark contrast with Arlington. My current hometown teems with young 20-somethings, most of whom are on the prowl, whereas Alexandria is like the next chapter in the book on growing up. Everyone has a dog, a baby in a stroller, or - as I happened to witness at least 2x on Saturday - dogs in strollers. It's a weird world over there.

Speaking of dogs though, I gotta say I just don't get the rationale behind dog clothing. It's one girl stereotype I just don't really get. Maybe when I have more disposable income, I'll be intereted in buying teeny sweaters and raincoats for a Shih Tzu but right now it's just a little left of absurd. In the interest of full disclosure, though, I must admit that I am trying to expand my knitting skillz past scarves, hats, and arm or leg warmers. The first sweater I make will probably be for my mom's miniature poodle; I have this awesome pattern for a grey sweater with a shark fin on it and I figure it's small enough that I won't get discouraged and give up. And Cassidy, bless his little puppy dog heart, will do pretty much anything for attention. He's the ultimate lap dog and I think that explains why a few summers ago, I had absolutely no trouble getting him to sit still for this:

Eh, dogs are colorblind anyway.

But, there is one female stereotype that I cannot fight - there is something about a man in uniform that just drives my gender wild, and I'm not immune to that one. There are of course lines of distinction. For example, the image on the left does a lot more for me than the image on the right. God Bless America - but the one in 2009 more so than the one from 1789.










Just like the dogs in clothes, though, men in uniform are much more "look" than "touch" to me. Nifty little dating cliches like "Don't trust a man with two first names" and "Never date a man in uniform" come with correlating tales of caution to back them up. Like the really hot cop in my town that was at all the pre-prom safety events for my senior year. He was hot enough that he still came up in conversation on college summer break - especially the year he was in the newspaper for severely injuring his mother with brute force. It would only have been better if his name was John Davis or Steve Craig.

2 comments:

Unknown said...

perhaps if you were born in the late 1700s you would feel differently about the men on the right. in fact, i think you might have swooned. that's right, SWOONED! ;-)

Princess Rain-in-the-Pants said...

Hahaha, thank heavens 18th-Century-Me never leaves home without her smelling salts.