My, what big ears you have my dear…
April 9, 2006
I was surprised to read this week that a Hindu textbook for 14-year-old students in a northern state of India compares housewives to donkeys. The comparison is not favorable either, so they are either the world’s biggest sexists or they really like their donkeys over there.
The textbook states: “A donkey is like a housewife…in fact, the donkey is a shade better, for while the housewife may complain and run off to her parent’s home, you’ll never catch the donkey being disloyal to his master.” Boy, if a donkey could only cook.
I couldn’t resist forwarding this story to my loving wife’s office, and I took the liberty of signing it “The Master”. She ignored my visions of grandeur and earnestly asked if I thought that men could really believe such a thing.
I stupidly replied that having never owned a donkey, I could not hazard an evaluation of their attributes, so I must plead ignorance. Needless to say, that was the wrong answer, and her reply made mention that while she knew very little about “swill guzzling swines”, she was pretty sure they had more in common with husbands than donkeys do with wives.
In short order, I started digging into donkey (eguus asinus) tidbits to see if they had any wifely tendencies. I quickly found one, for unlike most beasts of burden the placement of a donkey’s eyes enables it to see all four of their feet at all times. Astoundingly, a wife can also see their feet at all times! Except for Dolly Parton (boobus giganticus).
While donkeys have a reputation for being stubborn, in reality their taste for self-preservations just makes them appear bullheaded when their master wants them to do something dangerous. Wives will also put the brakes on if their husband attempts to coax them into following him on a crumbling path above a raging river. Is that just a coincidence, or the beginning of a pattern?
If you sneak up behind a donkey and poke his rump with a stick, he will kick you to Aunt Mabel’s house. Try the same thing with your wife and see what happens. You may not make it to Mabel’s, but I’ll bet you make it over the neighbor’s hedge.
Hmmmmm, I’m beginning to think those backwoods Hindus are onto something. Just to be fair though, I’ll see if husbands and pigs have anything in common.
Well, pigs have a very curly tail. As luck would have it, husbands do not!
Hogs seem to have a chronic flatulence problem. Husbands, on the other hand, have access to Beano.
A swine would rather roll around in the mud than do anything else, except eat. Nine out of ten husbands, being little more than boys with bears, would choose the mud over the food.
They would, however, be very happy to crawl out of the mud and find a donkey standing there laden with baskets of chips, dips and beer.
Well, I think I have made my case. Funny thing though.
Why is it that I’m the one who feels like a jackass?