poisonwood's Diaryland Diary

Date: Mar. 29, 2008 . Time: 2:54 p.m.

senator clinton, again Entry:

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senator clinton, again

The WSJ on gender wars.

But even some women who don't support Sen. Clinton express unease about the tone of some attacks on her. "Why is it OK to say such horrible things about a woman?" asks Erika Wirkkala, who runs a Pittsburgh public-relations firm and supports Sen. Obama. "People feel they can be misogynists, and that's OK. No one says those kinds of things about Obama because they don't want to be seen as racist."

At the nation's largest 500 companies, women account for 50% of managers, but hold just 15.4% of senior executive jobs, down from 16.4% in 2005, according to a survey by Catalyst, the New York research firm and women's advocacy group. Almost three-quarters of these senior women are in jobs that rarely lead to the corner office. The number of senior women in "line" jobs that involve running a business, with responsibility for profits and losses, dropped to 27.5% last year from 29% in 2005, according to Catalyst.

In the latest Wall Street Journal/NBC poll, conducted this week, Democratic women favored Sen. Clinton over Sen. Obama, 52% to 40%. Among Democratic men, the results were reversed: Sen. Obama garnered 52%, versus 36% for Sen. Clinton.

Some young women who support Sen. Obama -- sometimes to the chagrin of their pro-Hillary mothers -- say they too are troubled by the gender gap in the workplace. But many say they don't feel comfortable being called "feminists," and that they look to different role models than Sen. Clinton.

"It isn't easy being a woman in academia," says Amanda Moniz, a 36-year-old Ph.D. candidate in history at the University of Michigan. "I want a woman candidate who is strong, but also feminine, and who doesn't feel she has to be tougher than men to succeed," she says. "Although Hillary has achieved a lot on her own, she wouldn't be where she was if not for her husband -- and that isn't an inspiring lesson."

People talk a lot about Hillary being where she is because she married Bill. What they forget is that she graduated high school in 1965, the same year as my mother. The doors of most prestigious universities were closed to her (H and my Mom). My Mom has told be frankly unbelievable stories about the sexism she experienced in the workplace as a computer programmer in the 70s, so the fact that Hillary got to where she through any means - marriage or otherwise - is extraordinary. On another day, I'll share some of my Mom's experiences. People say - there are so many qualified women. I'd vote for one of them. Or, I like Michelle Obama better. To which I say, why aren't these women running for president? There were 9 original Democratic candidates and 11 original Republican candidates (see Wikipedia for a full list); of these 20, 19 were male. 19 were White. Given that our country is 51% female and 67% non-Hispanic white, these are interesting numbers. All 11 of the Republican candidates were white males.

2:54 p.m. - Mar. 29, 2008

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setting up shop

I was feeling isolated today, despite the fact that I'm taking care of one furry mutt. I heard through word-of-mouth about a friend I'd lost touch with - living in Boston. Everybody and their brother lives in the Northeast. If I had a spare weekend and I was living out there, I could pop down and visit family. (I remember living in Ire*land and being able to visit family in Dub*lin on the weekends; it was really nice.) Anyway, the Northwest is just feeling a bit like the middle of nowhere this weekend.

On the other hand, I've gotten really attached to certain aspects of it, such as the great outdoors, the cool weather, the city, all the water and the islands - so I don't really want to leave.

I so often hear about friends here or there, and I realize that I'm now putting down roots here. In some ways, I'd like to pick a spot and really set up shop, but I'm just not sure the NW is the right choice.

12:17 a.m. - Mar. 29, 2008

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air kiss

A lot of people have been getting tossed from campaigns lately for saying what they really think. Some might say that it's because of a rise in political correctness. No doubt that's a factor. I think the digital age is more important, though. It's one thing to say something; it's another to say it, have a video of you saying it put on Youtube and played a million times. You can't hide. The tone, the facial expression - exactly what you said - it's all there for everyone to see, and so it's a lot harder to forget. I think accountability is good. Has it gone too far? Maybe, but maybe that's necessary when you're dealing with, in 2008, the first serious candidates that aren't white men.

Also, I was amused by by these photo of Bush and others awkwardly or not-so-awkwardly air-kissing and such.

I remember well my trip to France. I spent a few days in Paris staying with a French friend from Ge*orgia Te*ch. He introduced me to many, many of his friends. I have never kissed so many people in my life. It made me very uncomfortable, especially kissing a bunch of strange guys. Some of my Dad's European friends like to kiss as well, and I remember getting smooched (and we're not talking air kiss here) many a time in my teens rather to my chagrin. Personally, I'm partial to handshakes.

7:43 a.m. - Mar. 27, 2008

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herstory

It's easy to forget how short the history of mainstream women's sports is. When I was in Catholic school, boys sports always got priority in terms of gym time. I remember it clearly. I wonder if that's still the case. I'd like to think things have gotten better. I often think of the 60s and before as the days of sexism, but as far as sports are concerned, that's not really the case. Thank God for Title IX! When I think of my school experience, sports stand out as the things I can think about probably most fondly, at every school I ever attended.

I was reminded of all this as I was perusing Dyestat. Dyestat tracks high school running on the national level. Some people like to follow Sports Illustrated; I like reading about running on Let's Run and others.

Anyway, Dyestat has a history of US junior performance internationally. The first thing I noticed was that the men's history was a lot longer than the women's. In 1974, they introduced a Junior men's (boys?) cross country race. You'd think that in 1974, if they were going to introduce a race for the boys, they'd have had one for the girls as well. Hadn't we already had feminism and equal rights and so on? Apparently not. A girls' race wasn't added until 1989, 15 years later.

I assume most people know the story of women's distance running in the Olympics, but maybe only runners know it. They introduced women's running at the 1928 Olympics. Some women were "exhausted" at the end of the 800 m, and so all running events for women longer than 200 m were suspended until 1960! (The winner won in about 2:16, which is quite fast, incidentally.) Finally, in 1960, the 800m is reintroduced.

Here's the timeline. Note that during this time, men ran the following events:
100m, 200m, 800m, 1500m, 5000m, 10,000m and marathon.


1928: 100m, 800m
1932 - 1936: 100m only
1948 - 1956: 100m, 200m only
1960: 100m, 200m, 800m (won in 2:04)
1964 - 68: 100m, 200m, 400m, 800m (won in 2:01)
1972: 1500m added (~100m short of a mile - won in 4:01)
1984: 3000m, marathon added
1988: 10,000m added - same # of events as men for the first time
1996: Women run standard events (5000 rather than 3000m)

That's right, folks. Women didn't run the same number of track events as men until 1988, and they didn't run the standard events until 1996!! That's just a year before I finished high school.

12:00 p.m. - Mar. 26, 2008

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a few good knocks

An interesting perspective on our generation with a few good knocks on Obama thrown in for good measure. (Oh how the WSJ loves to bash Obama.)

2:06 p.m. - Mar. 24, 2008

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taxes and running

Yesterday, B and I chugged through 13.1 miles, per Google Earth, in about 2 hours and 1 minute. I felt OK. As with my last long run, I really struggled mentally during the first half. I just kept thinking - it's too far, I'll make myself sick, I won't be able to go any farther, and I'll be miles from the car. During the second half, I felt better, though I was very glad to get back to hour starting point.

That's about 9:15 pace, which is still at least 45 seconds per mile slower that I'd hoped to run in the race. I'm continuing to wonder if my goal is realistic, though I did do it before. The course is supposed to be hilly, but I'm not sure how hilly, and weather conditions will be important, too. Oh well. We'll see. The worst case scenario would be walking to the finish line (well the almost worst-case scenario).

My ankle, which I sprained a month ago, is still bothering me a bit. Running doesn't make it hurt worse, so I continue to ignore it. Hopefully this isn't foolish. After the race, I'll take a week off completely.

I did most of my taxes just now. I used the most basic version of Turbotax via a Fidelity link (35% discount or something). It turns out that the most basic version has everything I need to enter investments, mortgage interest, etc. They keep recommending their more expensive versions, but the basic version seems to have everything I need. Of course, it helps that I can call my parents if I have a question. They volunteer and do taxes for poor people, and they used to run their own business, so they're basically tax experts.

Today, it's raining, raining, raining.

12:05 p.m. - Mar. 23, 2008

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