Post Graduation

Yesterday was Edwin's post-graduation ceremony. The omen's were strange. Walking past the Corn Exchange, we passed a foundation stone inscribed, "John Death laid this stone." In his gown and robes, we went with Edwin for a coffee before the ceremony. A woman on her own, but dressed in the blue and gold robes of Edwin's university, followed us into the arcade, then caught up with me. "Is this the way to the Corn Exchange?" she asked to my surprise, for she must have been studying in Cambridge for at least three years, and had walked past it to follow us.

Ann mentioned that her bag was very heavy, because she was carrying water and a folding walking stick in case I needed them. I commented that she'd have to fit a folding wheelchair in when the time came, but she wasn't amused.

At dinner in The Ivy afterwards, I kept looking at a strange optical illusion: a reflection of the back of a man with a black hat. He was like a ghost figure that people walked in front of, behind, and through. I got up to find the cause of the reflection; it was of a picture on the far wall. Then in an alcove I stared at a couple carrying gender equality to a new level. They were identically dressed in black suits, and homburgs that they didn't remove all evening, like a pair of Jehovah's witnesses matching a front view of the ghost image.
  
The ratio of women to men entering medicine is close to 60:40, and is probably similar in veterinary medicine. The biochemistry ratio seems higher, and in the Arts, Law and Social Sciences Faculty it runs at up to 4:1 on some courses. It does begin to seem like the feminist battle has been won, and now they're just mopping up minor pockets of resistance. 

News item in The Times: Feminists object to the name "Gentleman's Relish".

Story in The Telegraph: After more than sixty years Kleenex is phasing out the Mansize tissues name, deciding instead to call the disposable handkerchiefs "Extra Large" tissues following complaints by active feminists.

Next to fall will be ladies fingers; we should just call it okra. At this rate, all differences will be eliminated, and we will wear identiclothes. There will be no more gentlemen's outfitters, or ladies fashions, just clothes shops; and women's magazines and those glossies promoting male bodybuilding must merge on the alter of true equality.