Black Dog Blog

I feel sympathy for Anke's hurt at all the crap the media would have us believe about female humans.

Without in any way implying the problem of females in the media is in any sense at all the same as that of males (yawn), it kinda puts me in mind of my Friday evening.

Which I actually spent playing pool in the bar with the guys from work. Yeah, seriously.

Well, one very rusty game and then I confined myself to cheering and heckling, because I can't remember if I'm left or right handed, but still. Fun.

I don't fit in with male people very well. I can yap about work and interesting things I read on the internet, but I don't feel like one of the guys. I'm standing with them in a shirt and slacks, not sitting with the skirt-wearers, but I'm drinking soft drinks instead of beer, and once the conversation turns to football, I start looking over my shoulder for an out. On this occasion I wandered off and got talking for a minute to a couple of other male colleagues, who remarked "Yeah, I think football is just a sort of safe topic for guys." Interesting way to think about it.

The thing is, while this was going on, the girls were passing round Heat Magazine and talking about boys — and that I consider a far worse waste of my time than listening to how Giggs is or isn't in the top ten players of all time.

No. The real thing is, I can fit in with more ease with females. I think women are just more accepting. I don't feel the same pressure to be 'one of the girls' that I do, around males, to be 'one of the lads'.

It's all in my head, anyway; if I didn't want to pretend I fit in for a little while, I wouldn't feel like a failure.

Anyway, for a while this all got me thinking a little unhappily about the whole beer and football thing that you seem to have to do if you want to be a proper bloke. Find the right males and you can substitute other things for beer and football, like Linux, Triumph Stags, bench presses or Quake, but… I don't know. I still feel the same pressure to prove myself. And ultimately, I can't. I don't care about anything normal people care about. Or are meant to care about. And my trigger finger reflex is shite, and I prefer Oblivion or Dungeon Keeper.

I guess that the media image of men is more of an exaggerated depiction, whereas the female… well, I've never been a proper woman either, so I wouldn't know. I wouldn't want to be the ideal media man. I'd just like to be the ideal media woman even less.

And now, a tiger.