{"id":381,"date":"2011-03-30T15:57:52","date_gmt":"2011-03-30T15:57:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.fanagrams.net\/blog\/?p=381"},"modified":"2011-03-31T16:21:36","modified_gmt":"2011-03-31T16:21:36","slug":"just-hangin","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.fanagrams.com\/blog\/2011\/03\/just-hangin\/","title":{"rendered":"Just Hangin’"},"content":{"rendered":"

A previous Fanagram discussed the refined art of puttering, an activity that I have mastered.\u00a0 \u00a0Hanging out is a related but distinct discipline, and one that I completely suck at.\u00a0 Puttering is a solo act that involves some physical activity, while hanging out is a social activity, but one that implies no physical activity.\u00a0 Hanging out is the fine art of doing nothing together.\u00a0 To me, it also implies some level of multi-tasking, where conversation can be interspersed with periods of silence.\u00a0 Further, one of the key ingredients of the successful hang out is that the moments of silence are expected and are not awkward – there is no imperative to keep a conversation going.\u00a0 This is only possible if there is some other easily interruptible activity that you can defer to, such as reading the Sunday paper or watching sports on TV.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

My failure in hanging may be partially due to my general impatience and lack of conversational skills, but I also think that hanging out is more of a male activity centered around sports.\u00a0 We went down to visit our son Ned at college and took a tour through the appalling dump he was renting with 12 other guys.\u00a0 The TV room was set up almost as a shrine; all the room mates had chipped in to buy a huge flat screen hi-def TV.\u00a0 There were two couches in the room, one at floor level, the other elevated so that the seating was tiered, simulating a stadium.\u00a0 Although I think that there had been some effort to tidy up the joint in anticipation of a parental walk-through, I noticed a couple of beer bottles and a smattering of bottle caps in the corner.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

I asked Ned, \u201cDo women ever watch the games with you?\u201d<\/p>\n

He looked at me in total astonishment.\u00a0 \u201cAre you kidding, why would they want to do that?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWell what do the women do during the weekends?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI have absolutely no idea,\u201d he answered with a sad tone in his voice as he contemplated a weekend afternoon without hanging out.<\/p>\n

Now I actually know a fair amount about sports, particularly football, and I can happily hang out with Nick watching football. But if there are several couples, for example at a super bowl party, I feel that my proper place is with the other women who have no interest in men\u2019s sports. \u00a0I remember one party where the men and women had self segregated, with the women in the kitchen arranging hors d\u2019oeuvres and the men hanging around the grill poking at the coals and talking sports.\u00a0 I decided that I would try and break the mold and walked over to join the grill group.\u00a0 They were talking football and I attempted to break into the conversation by appropriately commenting that Charles Woodson was one of the few defensive players who had ever won the Heisman trophy.\u00a0 The conversation stopped dead and all eyes turned to me in astonished horror.\u00a0 The men then turned away without any further comment and continued their conversation.\u00a0 I had been summarily dismissed.\u00a0<\/p>\n

What is the female equivalent of the man cave?\u00a0 Women just don\u2019t sit around watching sports together and don\u2019t really talk about sports, except maybe women who talk about their children\u2019s playing time on the travel soccer team.\u00a0 In contrast, men can put on a random basketball game with some chips and a beer and they are set for the next several hours.\u00a0 Shopping might qualify as female hang out pursuit, but I still maintain that hanging out should involve a couch \u2013 besides I never shop.\u00a0 Perhaps going to the park with the kids, where breaks in conversation can be filled by helping kids on the slide or in the sand box \u2013 but I always found that hanging out at the park was a total bore, and I don\u2019t think that I am alone here.\u00a0 I remember pushing kids on a swing and looking over at other women who had the same weary look on their faces.\u00a0 Furthermore, by the time a child finally learns how to pump by themselves, they have generally lost interest in swinging.<\/p>\n

Taking a walk, with dogs, a stroller, or even a power walk with purposeful strides carrying weights is a frequent social activity, but does not qualify in my scheme, since all involve physical activity.\u00a0 In my paradigm, hanging out at the fitness center is an oxymoron.\u00a0\u00a0 Hanging out with a the Sunday paper either at home or at Starbucks does qualify, but these are gender neutral opportunities, so I still maintain that women cannot hang out as successfully as men.\u00a0 Furthermore, the image of women hanging out carries with it the unattractive whiff of idle gossiping.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Part of my discomfort in hanging out traces back to my mother who simply had no tolerance of any idleness.\u00a0 I grew up when the Cubs only played day games, and I have a distinct memory of her walking through the TV room and saying in a very pissy tone, \u201cCan\u2019t you think of something better to do on a brilliant sunny day?\u201d and then she would harumph and indignantly march off, frequently with a tennis racquet in hand.\u00a0 She loved it when her children brought friends over as long as they were not draped over couches idly drinking sodas and watching TV.\u00a0 So in response she always organized group activities \u2013 \u00a0one summer she organized a volleyball league in our backyard, in the fall there was always a soccer game, and in the winter we would go skating or sledding.\u00a0 Sometimes we would find a gym and play dodgeball.\u00a0 There was one summer where croquet was the featured activity.\u00a0 It turns out that her mother, my grandmother, was a fairly accomplished croquetter and had taught her some basic strategy.\u00a0 Using a \u201csplit shot\u201d she could almost make it all the way around the court on a single turn.\u00a0 She and my father played constantly in their bathing suits.\u00a0 There are couple pictures of him during that one summer, tanned a golden brown in a madras bathing suit, and then I never saw him without a shirt on again.<\/p>\n

My brother-in-law Hank and his family live about 3 hours away in Madison, and we have visited many times with the stated goal of \u201cjust come on up and we\u2019ll hang out together.\u201d\u00a0 This is great for our son Ned and his cousins Nate and Will, but Hank\"\"<\/a>\u00a0knows that these visits make me somewhat anxious. \u00a0But now that I have dissected the art of hanging out, I have much improved.\u00a0 Our last visit was in the spring and I brought along a crossword puzzle book, some knitting and some books \u2013 all the perfect hanging tools.\u00a0 What\u2019s more, the French Open was on, one of the few women\u2019s sports that men enjoy watching.\u00a0 That Maria Sharapova is pretty easy on the eyes and her tennis dress can double as a cocktail dress.\u00a0 And Venus Williams\u2019 surprising choices in tennis attire will get men commenting on \u201cfashion.\u201d\u00a0 Serena Williams\u2019 enormous biceps and other body parts always provoke conversation.\u00a0 For example, Nick and I have debated whether or not you could balance a teacup on her glutes.\u00a0 Even better, due to\"\"<\/a> the time change the French Open was on in the morning, so after a leisurely breakfast and paper reading, we segued to the TV and spent a very pleasurably morning chatting, and not panicking about keeping a conversation going for 4 hours \u2013 we would just default to the French Open.\u00a0 In the afternoon we went for a walk, and then I helped Hank take the garbage to the dump.\u00a0 \u00a0A great weekend.\u00a0 As we left, Hank even complimented me on my new found hanging skills.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The missing words in the following poems are anagrams (i.e. like spot, post, stop) and the number of dashed indicates the number of letters in the words.\u00a0\u00a0 One of the words will rhyme with either the preceding or following line.\u00a0 Your job is to solve the missing words using the context of the poem.\u00a0 Scroll down for the answers.<\/h6>\n

Equality was not Job One when the sexes were ——-<\/p>\n

And sometimes sucking the hind tit is where women are relegated.<\/p>\n

For example, I have always thought that hanging out ——- to the guys<\/p>\n

They sit on the couch, watch sports and endlessly fraternize.<\/p>\n

Once I tried to join the men at the barbecue as they shot the breeze<\/p>\n

But they ——- like I was a leper with a lethal disease.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

*<\/p>\n

*<\/p>\n

*<\/p>\n

*<\/p>\n

*<\/p>\n

*<\/p>\n

Answers:\u00a0 created, catered reacted<\/p>\nFollow Liza Blue on: \"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>Share: \"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"reddit\"<\/a>\"pinterest\"<\/a>\"linkedin\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A previous Fanagram discussed the refined art of puttering, an activity that I have mastered.\u00a0 \u00a0Hanging out is a related but distinct discipline, and one that I completely suck at.\u00a0 Puttering is a solo act that involves some physical activity, … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-381","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-what-words-mean"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p7iVc8-69","post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fanagrams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/381","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fanagrams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fanagrams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fanagrams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fanagrams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=381"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.fanagrams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/381\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":387,"href":"https:\/\/www.fanagrams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/381\/revisions\/387"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fanagrams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=381"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fanagrams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=381"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fanagrams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=381"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}