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A woman’s hobbies in a modern world

Written by Laur
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A woman’s hobbies in a modern world

hobbiesThere is too much going on in a modern woman’s life. Education, lovers, job, husband, competing with men, children, another husband, feminism… to name just a few highlights. But no self-respecting modern woman would let any of the above define her in any way, shape or form. After all, individuality is her most prized possession, one worth fighting whitened tooth and polished nail for. And what would define you better than your hobbies?

But not just any hobbies, God forbid. Knitting? That’s a man’s job now. Shows his sensitive side, you know. No way you go fighting since the industrial revolution to get equal treatment just to pick up those needles again. Even book reading is sooo passé, although you’ve only been allowed to do that for a couple of centuries or so (a blip, historically speaking). No, we’re talking real hobbies here, showcasing your personality and suchlike, no sissy stuff allowed. “I’m a woman, hear me ROAAAAR!” kinda stuff. Ahem.

To help you along in your quest, I have compiled here a list of hobbies that no modern woman would be ashamed doing. Or bragging about in front of her less enlightened girlfriends. I feel compelled to add, also, that each and every entry on this list has been carefully researched, and is 100% certified female hobby material.

  • Martial arts. Always a favorite with the ladies, this hobby has the distinct advantage of improving not only your fitness, but your power of concentration as well, not to mention your mood in general. Plus it enables you to kick some serious tail, so much so that you’ll actually begin to look forward to PMS. Also works well as a motivator – “get off that couch or else” – and it makes for a great conversation starter – “yeah, I’ve been Tae-kwon-do national women champion 5 years in a row. So what’cha doin’ tonight?” A sure winner.
  • Welding. Not just for guys any more. Getting up close and personal with a piece of metal while yielding a 3000°C blowtorch tends to put the rest of the day’s problems into the perspective they deserve. Plus now you get to make all the flower pot stands and candle holders you want, and nobody can comment about their abundant presence around the house. After all, they’re your creations.
  • Pottery. An alternative to welding. You basically replace the blowtorch with the potter’s wheel. The end products will be remarkably similar too; only the material will differ. Not to mention that ever since Demi Moore got sandwiched between a lump of clay and a lump of Patrick Swayze in “Ghost“, pottery is one sexy occupation.
  • Driving. Yes, driving. And I’m not talking daily commute, go-get-your-groceries-and-get-back-home kind of driving. I’m talking about the serious, pedal-to-the-metal, rubber-burning kind. Be sure to know all there is to know about injectors, nitrous, turbochargers and the like. And get yourself a Subaru Impreza WRX. If you don’t like the looks of it, any serious car will do; just remember to leave a pair of sneakers in the trunk, as stiletto heels are not very handy for serious pedal work. And get ready to watch their jaws land on their laps as you do a handbrake-assisted second gear launch at your next traffic light.
  • Puzzle solving. Demonstrate your superior intelligence and observational skills by solving puzzles. Any kind of puzzles. Rubik cubes, enigmas, jigsaw puzzles, sudoku, IQ tests… nothing is too big, nothing too small for you. Be sure to have plenty of witnesses as you cruise down the Mensa lane. Bonus points if said witnesses just failed the same tests and/or asked you for help.
  • Hunting. Men no longer need be the only providers in the family. Prove your prowess by putting meat on the table with your extraordinary track and aim abilities. You don’t necessarily have to shoot anything; a quick stop at the butcher’s before heading home is just as efficient (hubby does it all the time after all). Just be sure to polish your storytelling skills.
  • Yoga, Pilates and the like. A bit old-fashioned, maybe, but still popular with your Starbucks crowd. Use with caution.
  • Witchcraft. Every modern woman has at least once in the course of her life though about being (or becoming) a witch. Because you got tired of kissing frogs, and now you want to get into the frog manufacturing business. It’s tiresome, but rewarding, and it looks really great on your CV. “I’m a high priestess. Hire me, or forever be cursed.” That’s the spirit.
  • Blogging. This is the ultimate modern hobby for the ultimate modern woman. It’s just like gossip, but on a global scale, and since it’s nicely written down, you get to call it “journalism”. Or just journal. Or whatever, as long as you get to brag about it. Blogs away!

This modest attempt at categorizing is by no means exhaustive, nor does it pretend to be. I am painfully aware that I merely scratched the surface of the life-defining hobbies of modern women. I will be sure to continue my research in this fascinating subject. After all, men should also have hobbies.

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The right to read

Written by Laur
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The right to read

Readers
Yesterday, in Romania, something amazing happened.

It was a protest meeting, right in front of TVR, the Romanian national television station. About one hundred people, give or take, gathered there, sat quietly on the sidewalk, and read.

Yes. Each and every one brought a book with him (or her), and read quietly, thus protesting the termination of two cultural shows on the national television – “Lumea citeste” (The world does read) and “Nocturna” – due to be replaced by political talk-shows, these being much more interesting in the current leadership’s views. The protest was initiated by well-known cultural Romanian blogger Lucia T. and was attended by bloggers in Bucharest, as well as a few well known authors. It took only five days to organize, and the word was spread exclusively through the Romanian blogosphere.

So bloggers met. So what? You’re presenting this as if this was a huge deal, I mean, flash mobs have been seen before, and what’s so special about people reading on the sidewalk anyway? Yes, except for the fact that:

  • it never happened in Romania before
  • it was a flash reading mob, the first of its kind, as far as I know
  • it was about culture, people. Culture!

This East-European country, fresh member of the European Union, has known its fair share of protesters. Come to think of it, there’s always something to protest against, from the price of daily necessities to the meager social protection to the low income of certain members of society (such as teachers, the ones who are supposed to lay down the foundation for a new society… but I digress). This was a benign demand for culture, a spontaneous, grassroots, completely apolitical way of asserting one’s country’s need of something more than the famous Roman recipe “panem et circences”1.

It may not be much, world. But it’s a start. This news managed to put a big smile on my face.

  1. means “bread and circus”, if your Latin is a little rusty [↩]
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The daily commute

Written by Laur
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The daily commute

TrafficHaving a company car is one of those double-edged perks that a decent job delivers. I mean, it’s great, don’t get me wrong: the gas prices are at most an indifferent topic for you, ditto for insurance, and you don’t get too mad if someone puts a dent in your door. Ok, I lied. Pick two out of those three.

But it’s not car ownership that got me thinking today. It’s that personal hell, that home-away-from-home (at least, if you were born in a caravan, that is), that quality time you get to spend with your fellow nine-to-fivers, namely, the daily commute.

Thinking about it in pure practical terms, it’s an absolute waste. You get to drive daily for an unspecified amount of time (x2), burning fuel and wasting away those minutes with nothing more intelligent to do than holding a wheel and dodging fellow commuters. An occasional trucker may liven up things a little by overtaking on a two-lane road, but all in all it’s a pretty dull experience. Oh, it WAS fun, at least for the first couple of months, while you learned the best time to leave home or work in order to miss some of the worse jams, or, say, those little-known shortcuts that you just had to share with half the office. Yes, they do seem more crowded nowadays, wonder why… But I digress.

After a while you even get tired of the little games. Like calculating in your head the statistic probability that the driver that’s tailgating you is actually a woman. 12.57%. Of which there’s more than 86.12% chance that she’s a lesbian, or a man trapped in a woman’s body as a dire consequence of weird transcorporalization exercises. Unproven, of course. You even get tired of playing around with the cruise control (did you know that you can actually engage cruise in 1st gear? Eat this, creeping traffic!). Reading books or gaming are both out of the question, being either to dull or too dangerous for early morning traffic. So… what to do?

Fortunately I compiled a list of things that may liven up your commute, and help you survive those dreaded, creeping minutes (that feel like hours, really) when you’re stuck in a jam and doing a stepping workout with the clutch and gas pedal. Here it is:

  • Rock-paper-scissors. The easiest is to play with the fellow motorist driving alongside you. Especially great when negotiating right-of-way. Only applicable for traffic jams.
  • Random radio. Listen to every station you have on your presets for exactly one minute. You can use the car’s digital clock to time it. If you don’t have one, use the car’s odometer, and listen to every station for exactly one kilometer. For extra points, try it on the hour (DJ News).
  • Legal road warrior. Most drivers mentally add 5 to 8 km/h to the legally allowed speed limit on a given road, because they know they can get away with it. Don’t be corrupted by these speed demons! Drive legally! (And watch them boil in frustration in your rear view mirror.)
  • Math-fu! Calculate the highest power of 2 that you possibly can IN YOUR OWN HEAD! For bonus points, recite the value to your coworkers once back in the office, and ask them to check its accuracy. This one I stole from Orson Scott Card – he uses it in Ender’s Game.
  • The driver’s salute. During my years as commuter I noticed an intriguing phenomenon: it seems that certain people do notice that they’re being watched (when overtaken, for instance), and they actually turn their heads to look at you in turn. Honor these people with an Army salute. If you don’t feel confident enough to perform the salute, start with a courtly nod and work your way up. Don’t do this in a mocking manner though; people are easily ticked off and serious consequences may ensue from the subsequent road-rage attack on their part.

There are undoubtfully other, more interesting ways of livening up your daily commute. They may or may not involve water pistols, cue cards or masks of dead presidents. All I’m asking is that you check if whatever you decide to use is legal in your place of residence. I hear math may soon be outlawed in certain states, along with the theory of evolution.

Drive safely!

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