bada bing bada boom

Gender Stereotypes

Around 9 a.m. yesterday morning, Johanna and I were having breakfast when I asked her and Elin to pick their most favorite emoji erasers.  On the count of 3, we all put our fingers on our top 1-2.  When I asked Johanna why she thought her favorite emoji with hearts on her face was a female, she said, "because girls fall in love more".  That was surprising.  Why would a girl who just turned 7 think that?  What other gender stereotypes does she (and Elin) harbor?  So we decided to categorize each of the 23 emojis as male, female and neutral ("either").  The results are in the picture attached, and I can't say I disagree with their selections.  Their reasons are a culmination of everything they've heard and seen at school, with friends, family, parents, teachers, cartoons/movies, books, media et al.  It would be interesting to know at what age they'd form these biases.  According to various studies, children as young as 4 years old can form very strong gender stereotypes.

Here is a summary of their gender selection criteria, with detailed responses below:
Girl characteristics:  fall in love more, longer eye lashes, curved eye lashes, pink cheeks, shiny tongue, wink, day dream, blush (in pink), dimples, big eyes, small mouth, kissy lips

Boy characteristics:  Look cool (or try to), fight, get knocked out, big teeth, look mad, tiny eyes and eye brows, blush in blue (not pink), red eyes, no eye lashes, big mouth

Click to enlarge

J:  Girl because girls fall in love more
J:  Girl because longer eye lashes
J:  It has a bow, lipstick and long eye lashes
J:  Boy because boys try to look cool and this one looks cool
J:  Girl because of long eye lashes
J:  Girl because of pink cheeks and tongue is shiny and is winking
J:  Girl because pink cheeks and when it smiles you can only see the teeth
J:  Boy because it looks like it was in a battle and got knocked out
J:  Girl because it has long eye lash (E: it has a dreamy look)
J:  Neither boy, nor girl because it's not cool, and it's not fancy
J: Boy because it has teeth big, mad open mouth (tiny eyes and eye brows)
J:  Boy because it's blushing blue

E:  Girl because it has a dimple just like the other obviously, and boys don't put hearts on their cheeks
E:  Girl because it's blushing
E:  Eyebrows are too long to be real without make-up
E:  Boy because teeth are showing and tongue is huge and it looks cool because eye brows
E:  Girl because lips too red to be natural (lipstick).  Long eye lashes, and it looks like it's dreaming
E:  That is soo a guy because small eyes and eye brows, big mouth, teeth are showing, big tongue
E:  Boy because small eye brows, red eyes and no eye lashes
E:  Girl because of blushy cheeks and kissy lips, and it has pink and red all over it, and looks like hypnotized by an expensive diamond necklace
E:  Girl because short eye lashes that are a little curved, and a dimple by the mouth and has a dreamy look

Disagree:
E:  Boy because mouth is wide open and teeth are visible, and tiny eye brows
J:  Girl because her eyes are like hearts

The Equestrian World

In February of this year (2017), Helena suggested we enroll the our two daughters in horseback riding classes in San Juan Capistrano.  My first reaction was one of sticker shock.  The cost of 4 classes of 1-hour each was $250 per child.  We can swing this for 1-2 months, I thought, and then one or both would lose interest as is the case with most extracurricular activities they engage in.

Mission Stable where the Bridges Equestrian herd is kept
Click on picture to see full size

The first day of class I was introduced to a whole new world.  As soon as I walked into the Mission stable - pictured left - , I felt like I was on a western movie set.  I've always had a not so favorable impression of the high class equestrian society.  These poor animals were roaming the earth freely until 3,500 BCE when they were domesticated for transportation, agriculture and warfare.  In more developed countries, they are used for sports and entertainment.

The cost of maintaining one horse is ~$2,500 a month for housing, food, farrier (trim hooves + shoeing), health care without emergencies or sickness (these would cost thousands more), and this is not counting training expenses or purchase cost.

Peculiarly, all of the equestrians at this set of stables are females.  In fact, the groomers and trainers are all females as well.  The only sign of males could be found in the occasional stable hand passerby; the ones hauling hay etc.  Why is that??  I did some internet research and found that while female riders dominate the amateur ranks, males dominate professionals in a sport where females and males compete together.  No one knows the reason why, but the fact that males dominate professionals is reasonable given the level of aggressiveness and dominant behavior required to be successful in the sport.  Today, (4-8-2017) I asked Tara, my kids' instructor, about her opinion on the matter.  She thinks it's because males refuse to wear the tight pants required for riding.  Tara has been a part of the Bridges Equastrian since she was 8.  She works there as a full time instructor, and even spends her days off on premises.  She is great.

Dior

On to the next item of interest:  How do horses feel about living a life partially in solitude quarters, ridden at the behest of owners and trainers, and castrated (gelded) to control masculine/aggressive behavior?  It turns out even though horses are herd animals, they can form a bond with humans or other animals, such as goats and sterile donkeys, and learn to live a satisfactory domesticated lifestyle.  The castrating (removing testicles) is not a psychological hindrance either since many male horses (stallions) do not mate in the wild.  A typical herd has one stallion to multiple mares.

And, what is the accident rate and severity in horseback riding?  The rate is similar to motorcycle riding.  80% of head injuries occur while mounted on a horse (the rest are on the ground when the horse kicks, typically the vet or farrier).   The rate of accidents in jumping and cross country eventing is higher than casual riding.  Over 100 deaths occur each year from head injuries out of 7 million riders in the U.S.  There are 10-20 times more non-fatal head injuries.  One study referenced 1 accident per 2,000 hours of riding.  With proper precaution and handling, this sport is less dangerous than many other common sports such as basketball.

A couple of fun facts:  Horses have a an average brain size of a tennis ball, they cannot breathe through their mouths, and they cannot vomit.

Johanna and Twinkle 4-2-2017 - Twinkle was in the movie The Princess and The Pony

Elin and Teddy 4-2-2017

A rare moment to be proud of

7-23-2016:  It's not often I feel proud of my accomplishment, but this morning proved an exception.  As I do on most Saturday mornings at 6:30 a.m., I played one set of tennis against a former Penn State college tennis player as a freshman, Andrew Foley who is 6'6" - yes, with wickedly fast and powerful serves - with the largest shoe size in the department I used to head.  I know his shoe size because we bowled one year as a team building event, and I obtained all 40+ employees' shoe sizes to submit to the bowling alley prior to.

This Saturday morning began typical of many others; neck and neck throughout the set.  Fast forward to 5-4 Andrew ahead, then 5-5, then 6-5 to Andrew, then 6-6 and we go to tie-break.

Tie-break began with 4-0 to Andrew's advantage much to my vocal frustration.  I blew all 4 with unforced errors; very atypical of my game since my strength is consistency which often frustrates my opponents.  I lost the next point, and since I can't remember how, I'm assuming this point was not as regrettable as the first 4.  Now I'm down 0-5.  What is the probability of pulling out a win at this miserable juncture?  It would literally have to be out of my ass, so I scoured the internet for tiebreake probabilities, and here's what I found:

"Seppi trailed Federer 4-5 in the fourth set tiebreaker. His win probability was 34 percent"

34% at 4-5??  That's roughly a 1/3rd chance of winning down by one point.  I'm not sure how to extrapolate that to 0-5, but if I were to use a straight-line method, I stood a 93% chance of losing.

I managed to rally to a 6-4, which in and of itself was a feat, especially since Andrew had 3 overhead chances at the net to put one of those points away easily; I lobbed all 3 overheads, the last of which he was too far to my right at the net to have a chance at returning.  That was easily the point of the match, which I happily vocalized.

I can't remember the rest of the exchanges, but we each had one set point before I won the last two in a row to win the tie-break and the only set we played that morning (10-8?).  Fuckin' ay, now that's something to be proud of.  Andrew was obviously very disappointed for letting this one slip away.  In the past, he has told me some of his bitter losses nag at him at nights when he's in bed.  I'd imagine this experience would illicit a slightly more pronounced reaction then.....

9-1-2018 (a little over 2 years after I posted this original blog entry):  The event I've described above was, until today, a monumental event in my tennis history.  But, alas, over 2 years later I surpassed even that feat!   This particular morning, I was down again 0-5 to Andrew in our only set tie-break when I won the next 7 points to win the tie-break!  And immediately after Andrew, I played Mario who is the best player I've played against.  He was up 5-2 in our tie-break, and I won that one as well, 8-6.

Street car race and Laguna

Elin and I played a street race car game on the curb outside the house until we were both starving.  Then we lay on the ground in front of our door until Helena and Johanna arrived with Blaze pizza.  This is a race car game I used to play in Tehran on Golestan 8th street while I was growing up.  You can play singles or in teams of pairs.  I'd told Elin for weeks I'd teach her how to play this game, but we both kept forgetting on the weekends, until today opportunity presented itself when Johanna and Helena stepped out for grocery shopping and to buy lunch for all of us.

 





After lunch, Johanna and I went to Laguna Beach.  We visited the library first, only to realize to our disappointment the Laguna branch is closed on Sundays.  3 homeless people were sleeping in the library front yard, and this was Johanna's first exposure to the homeless.  She asked a few questions about them throughout.  We stopped by Dolce Gelato, our favorite dessert place in Laguna.  We almost always eat gelato there when we're in Laguna.

Keep out!

When I was looking for houses in the Thousand Oaks area, I visited this community in Calabasas. This sign is posted at the entrance of the community pool. Not exactly a warm welcome...

This instruction manual puts IKEA's to shame

Yesterday, the kids and I attended an Elves Workshop at the Waldorf School of Orange County in Costa Mesa.  There were lots of fun hands-on activities for the chilrdren, and one in particular merits a mention here.  In one workshop, kids had the option to:

a) Build a crystal snow globe - Elin picked this (phew!), or;
b) I was desperately hoping to avoid this:  Build a reindeer out of a towel and some accessories - Johanna picked this.  I tried convincing her to pick option a, to no avail.

Johanna and I before we gave up on following the undecipherable instructions below.  Judge for yourself:

And the finished product after massive help from a 10-13 year old volunteer Waldorf helper: