Annealing Things
I’ve been taking glass arts for at least three years, and I’m an active member in my art department. I’m not highly skilled at working with glass, but at the very least, I know how the basic equipment works. I also know how some of the more “advanced” equipment works too, if you can believe that, given my gender.
Today I was in the shop, in part because another friend (also female) had a big collaborative project that was going to require a lot of extra hands. I helped her organize her kiln space, had an extensive conversation with her about her annealing cycle (the process that prevents your glass from cracking as it cools down), and offered a lot of other suggestions as to how to make the project go smoothly. For the most part, the other advanced students agreed with me.
A guy I’d never seen in there before must not have been paying attention. One of my other friends was making cute animals out of furnace glass, and I immediately claimed it.
“Sure, as long as you don’t mind that it’s probably going to explode.”
“Throw it in the damn annealer!” I responded. You know. So the glass doesn’t crack as it cools down. This is very basic as far as working with hot glass is concerned.
“Oh, yeah, that’s a good idea!”
The aforementioned guy who, in my three years there, I had never seen before, targets me specifically and says, very condescendingly, “You have to put glass in the annealer so it doesn’t explode!”
Admittedly, I was taken quite aback. After a few awkward seconds, I managed, “I know how the annealer works.” I had, after all, just suggested to a friend that he should USE IT.
Unfazed, he continued. “You have to cool glass down slowly or it will crack-“
I cut him off, “-because it’s highly susceptible to thermal shock and as the outside cools down faster, the tension causes it to fragment, and, in extreme cases, explode. I know how the damn annealer works.”
It didn’t do the trick. He proceeded to explain to me for another 10 minutes about different kiln cycles, how different types of glass have different coefficients of expansion, and how that means you can only load a kiln with like types of glass. This is all stuff I learned my first semester. Eventually, it was time to start the project, which is good, because my temper wasn’t annealing well.
In his defense, I told myself a lot of the glass students earn street cred by one-upping each other with technical knowledge, so I figured he was just new and excitable. I found out a few hours later he hasn’t ever taken a glass arts class, he’s just roommates with another one of the beginning students.
Actually, given that most of the students are historically male, maybe glass doesn’t like mainsplaining either?
Mansplaining Your Sexual Orientation For You (because clearly you couldn't know)
So one of my Uni man friends and I were discussing the new Galaxy ad today and I was trying to make clear my utter pleasure at the work that went in to creating the 3D rendering of it and in doing so said “I nearly jizzed”.
My man friend, in reply, actually jumped back and made dramatic and over-the-top noises in reaction to this. At first I thought I’d overstepped social bounds and offended him and so started to apologize but he interrupted me by saying that I had just been surprised to hear me say it, as I was the least sexual person he had ever met. Asexual, even.
Which, okay. Asexual, nothing wrong with that. I’m actually bi but okay, whatever. But also I have ladyparts and don’t ‘jizz’ so I’m a little confused as to what that comment had to do with my sexuality. When I asked, he clarified with “I can never imagine you having sex. Or wanting sex.” THEN proceeded to clarify in what asexuality was (incorrectly and rather condescendingly).
He proceeded to list off people we knew whose sexual orientation he had considered and how I was nothing like any of them and …well, he continued on for a while.
He was extremely defensive about his opinions on my sexuality, at any rate. He also took the time out of his busy dissection and dissertation on my own sexuality to clarify how this definition was different of that of the psychological definition which is actually androgyny. I’m a psych major; he knows it. When I corrected him, he just continued on his merry way, explaining the world of asexuality to me and why I was one.
The kicker was that he was a Freshman
During my first week of graduate school I decided to check out the dining hall to see if the food was any good. Well, I sat down at a booth facing a boy sitting at this table. I nodded and then began eating. Out of nowhere he tries to engage me in a talk on linguistics, proudly showing off everything he knows. I nod along because I’m just polite to a fault. Then he gets up from his table and takes a seat next to me in my booth. He’s practically touching me. I’m not comfortable with this. He sees that I have a Latin book and then proceeds to lecture me on Latin grammar, after admitting he had never taken Latin before. On the other hand, I had three years worth of college Latin under my belt. But I continue to nod along.
Then he suddenly starts talking about Spanish and I mention I know Spanish. He then gives me a fifteen minute lecture on Spanish, my first language. And then proceeds to explain culture in Latin America to me. I’m Guatemalan and he’s not Hispanic. I’m very irritated by this boy but can’t seen to find a way to tell him to go away. It wasn’t until he claimed he was an expert on Spanish that I finally got up the courage to walk away. Thanks dude. I don’t know how I could have understood my own language without you. The kicker was that he was a Freshman too.
