Tuesday, December 4, 2007

Fun With Race

OK. One more post about racial stuff. Being a black man in a white man's world is not generally easy, but it does have one big perk: I get to make white folks feel just a little bit uncomfortable about race every once in a while. I get to make racial comments at the office or with friends of mine that make them wince and that is good, clean fun.
  • I'm the last in my office to get a flat panel monitor? It's because I'm black.
  • Someone gets a warning instead of a ticket for going 45 in a 25 zone? I would have been Rodney Kinged.
  • My order comes up last at Panera? It's because I'm black.
Fun stuff. I'm usually mostly kidding, but sometimes...

The Renovation
The last base cabinet arrived today, so we are ready for the granite tomorrow. The GC also squared off the slanted area that is above the place where the stairs go down to the basement. This gives us a nice, flat bottom for the corner of the pantry. Plus, the refrigerator and microwave/convection oven/hood arrived this evening. The fridge will really make The Wife happy.

Tomorrow: paint and granite

The Day
  • Workout: hills
  • Music: The Crystal Method

2 comments:

Guy said...

Hi Paul. Nice Blog. Say, do you still get dissed due to race in NoVa? Reading your blog, I would suspect that it still happens on occasion... true? Just interested.
I get occasionally dissed here as an American, but generally from low-wage types. It mostly comes in the form of aping my accent. They think their being smooth. I usually ignore it.
Guy

reston kid said...

Race comes up in some interactions with folks. It's rarely a case of being overtly "dissed," but rather a case of people having biases or preconceptions. Many of these are subtle and don't have any deep impact on me, while others are more significant.

It's not like NoVa is a hotbed of racism. It's just that having less overt racism does not imply that racism is gone.