Monday, October 10, 2011

Lady Words That Men Don't Know or Use


JFK was reputed to be the fastest speaker in the English language. Whereas expert typists can tap out 120 words per minute, JFK could string over 300 words in a minute.

JFK is the recognized champ, however my fast-talking mother could have whipped the Boston-bred president like a red-headed step-child, mostly because women have a larger everyday lexicon than men.

16,215 versus men's 15,669.

Feeling has to be one of them.

Men only say that word singing the song FEELINGS.

Here's a sampling of words listed by The Magazine which will never cross our lips.

Book club: A female dominated affair, perhaps because women read more fiction, or perhaps because men aren't very good at talking about it.

Accessorize: If men were ever to use this word it would only be in the context of cars.

Empowering: Men never use this word, perhaps because for the 200,000 years humans have been on the planet, men have had all the power.

Burlesque: Something involving strip-tease that can apparently involve the above.

Size zero.

Home birth.

Pilates: Men in the UK, particularly, seem to have no interest in building up their core strength.

Pomegranate: Men seem ill-equipped to understand the significance and full range of superfoods.

Absolutely beautiful: The words women often use to describe friends who are not.

Breastfeeding.

Emotional intelligence: Something that men usually do not possess, instead preferring the kind of intelligence that involves dates of battles.

What are you thinking?: The classic female condition check.

Feminism: If even veteran feminists can't agree on what this means then it's probably best avoided by men.

Airbrushing: The process by which magazine picture editors oppress women in an underhand way.

Babies.

Superwoman.

Why: As in "why do you never call?" Now that I think of it, JFK never used any of these words, because he was a real man. Just don't tell my wife I said that.

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