A student just informed me that the biggest problem the Spanish Conquistadors had to face in the New World was surviving the harsh, extremely cold winters. A lesser but still serious problem was the difficulty of growing crops in such a bad climate.

Another student wrote in his essay that if the US had invaded a country that had nothing to do with the events of 9/11, that would have been horrible. But the good thing is that this never happened.

I am now wondering if these students are mocking me or being serious.

Since we are having a boy, he is getting N.’s last name. This is what we agreed on at the very beginning of the relationship. If this were a girl, she would get my last name.

N. doesn’t care what last name the kid gets, and the boy is getting his name. Of course, as my Jewish luck would have it, I do care and I lost the gamble.

Yes, I know it’s medieval to care, but if I can’t be honest with readers of my own blog, then where can I confess the truth? This name business matters to me.

Of course, since N. doesn’t care, I could get him to agree to rescind the original agreement. But this is a matter of principle. We cannot be in favor of gender equality only when it suits us. Equality is too important to be discarded whenever it becomes inconvenient.

After we spent two days creating our baby registry, this is what Amazon suggested we add to it:

 

I’m not sure what it is trying to tell us.

It seems like you need a hurricane to interest Americans in having sex.

A funny church service sign about dying atheists.

“Pro-Lifers Don’t Give A Damn About Fetuses. They Only Care About Coercing Women.”

I’m posting this link for the benefit of N. who does not believe me when I say that in this country brutalizing children is not only not considered a crime but is actually something people brag about.

How many animals per year does a vegetarian save?

Some idiot in IHE is arguing that most profs should be fired to lower education costs because. . . this is a strategy that works for IKEA. Apparently, he sees some value in comparing educating people with assembling crappy, ugly, low-quality tables. And this is a professional publication for academics, mind you.

A fascinating journey across Botswana. If you don’t have time to read, the pictures are definitely worth your time. Look at the funny bathroom sign!

Rutgers self-destructs.

“Take oral health, for example. Unless you have perfect genetics, you need intervention during early adolescence to assure long-term oral health. If you don’t get it, you’re doomed to a lifetime of poor oral health, which has consequences elsewhere — on your immune system, on the health of your heart, and can even cause arthritis.”

How can I complain that my students indulge in describing their emotions in minutest details instead of providing an intellectual analysis when my colleagues are similarly incapable of offering anything but a jumbled tale of their emotional travails? See this story of an academic who was denied tenure but fails to discuss what actually happens, delivering, instead, a list of vague references to karma, pain, suffering, and emotion.

David Futrelle is optimistic: “There’s no feminist alive who thinks women shouldn’t be responsible for any of their decisions.” I used to believe that, too. And then a drove of them descended on my blog. So yes, such people exist. Which doesn’t make MRAs any less stupid, of course.

Women aren’t a mystery. And if something possesses you to say we are, here is why you should stop making a fool of yourself.

There are healthy, normal men in the world: “I am not the best person to discuss the subject of abortion as I do not have a uterus or even one fallopian tube, but what I do know is that I have NO right to tell a woman what to do with their bodies.”