This morning the St.Paul paper had a few choice tidbits that I thought worthy of posting. (This paper contains a good deal of coverage on women's events -- not surprising when you realize that the Publisher/President is Mary Junck and the Managing Editor/News is Mindi Keirnan.) [My comments in next post.]

TAKE MY HUSBAND... PLEASE

The latest edition of _Working Women_, the get-ahead rule book for women on the way up, notes that it's not enough to be masterly, efficient, intelligent and beautiful: You've got to leave them rolling in the aisles, too.

According to Barbara Mackoff, author of _What Mona Lisa Knew: A Woman's Guide to Getting Ahead in Business by Lightening Up_ (Lowell House/Contemporary Books), humor is the 'ultimate polish' for the would-be executive. 'For women, though,' says the magazine, 'getting onto the new corporate laugh track can be a little tricky.'

Some rules of office humor:

* If you have no natural sense of humor, 'if you are certain you have no knack for quips and jokes, a whimsical touch in your office -- like a cartoon on your bulletin board -- is a good way to communicate your humorous perspective to co-workers.'

* Don't use jokes that you need to preface with 'I hope this won't offend anyone, but...'

* Mix humorous cartoons (such as _The Far Side_) 'with your overhead transparencies of charts and outlines.' (The experts remind you to be sure to read the caption aloud.)

* Use jokes when times get tough. Got to lay off 50 workers? 'Momentarily remove yourself from a stressful situation by reframing the event in your mind as a half-hour situation comedy.'"

NO MARKET FOR THE RUBENESQUE

For lo these past two years, the Australian quarterly magazine _Big, Beautiful Women_ has nourished its 30,000 full-figured readers with such articles as 'The Problems of Being Well-Endowed', 'Fat, Food, Diets and Me' and 'Dumplings Are Delicious'. But owing to a shortage of advertising for cosmetics and fashions, the magazine is folding.

'Basically the reaction from these manufacturers would be we don't advertise in anything to do with fat people,' editor Kathy Moyd says. 'They wanted them [the clothes] modeled on smaller women, either size 14 or smaller.'

VIVE LA DIFFERENCE:

According to _The Great Divide_ (Poseidon Press) by Daniel Even Weiss, 60 percent of conversations between women are about personal or emotional topics -- as opposed to just 27 percent of the conversations between men.

TAKE MY HUSBAND...PLEASE

I suppose there are some that will perceive this as "men telling us what we 'ought' to do...again" or possibly that women are being told (again) to "act like men in order to succeed."

If I thought that, I wouldn't have posted the article.

What I think is that over the years certain things have been found to //work// with //people//. It's a fact that most of those people have been men, but it's less of a fact (IMO) that the sex of the people involved matters in all situations.

Anyway, all I'm saying is that I agree that humor is one of the most important things in almost any endeavor. The people I have the very least regard for in life are those that take themselves (and life) TOO DAMN SERIOUSLY.

Remember -- there is NO evidence of any kind that suggests that life is supposed to be serious and considerable evidence that it is not.

NO MARKET FOR THE RUBENESQUE

This is a damn shame on at least two levels. It's a shame that the clothing makers actually //refuse// to target a (pardon the pun) large audience and it's a shame the ("down under") magazine is going under.

Wonder if massive user support could save it??

VIVE LA DIFFERENCE:

I imagine this is cultural as I can't think of anything that would intrinsically make women different from men in this regard. At least not a lot. Pretty impressive stats if they hold up across the general population -- quite a bit more than double.

Opinions on why? Opinions on the relative value of either?

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