Gender: Male & Female
From the Washington Post Style Invitation,
in which it was postulated that English should have male and
female nouns and readers were asked to assign a gender to a noun of their choice
and explain their reason.
The best submissions:
| ZIPLOC BAGS | male, because they hold everything in, but you can always see right through them. |
| SWISS ARMY KNIFE | male, because even though it appears useful for a wide variety of work, it spends most of its time just opening bottles. |
| KIDNEYS |
female, because they always go to the bathroom in pairs. |
| SHOE |
male, because it is usually unpolished, with its tongue hanging out. |
| COPIER | female, because once turned off, it takes
a while to warm up. Because it is an effective reproductive device when the right buttons are pushed. Because it can wreak havoc when the wrong buttons are pushed. |
| TIRE | male, because it goes bald and often is over inflated. |
| HOT AIR BALLOON | male, because to get it to go anywhere
you have to light a fire under it... and, of course, there's the hot air part. |
| SPONGES | female, because they are soft and squeezable and retain water. |
| WEB PAGE | female, because it is always getting hit on. |
| SUBWAY | male, because it uses the same old lines to pick people up. |
| HOURGLASS | female, because over time the weight shifts to the bottom. |
| HAMMER | male, because it hasn't evolved much over the last 5,000 years, but it's handy to have around. |
| REMOTE CONTROL | female... Ha! You thought I'd say male. But consider, it gives man pleasure, he'd be lost without it, and while he doesn't always know the right buttons to push, he keeps trying. |