I would just like to say for the record that I am NOT a dumb girl! Yes, there are some VERY dumb girls in the world… but there are also some friggen smart women out there…
I LOATHE when people assume that just because I’m a female, I don’t know anything… Let me explain. I have a background in construction and design. For the last 5 or 6 years, that’s what I’ve been doing. Designing interiors of homes, making structural changes, renovating… So it’s not new to me. I know what standard sizes are for sink cabinet cutouts, standards for countertop and cabinet heights… standard clearances and I can think on my feet on the fly when faced with the question ‘how would we renovate this area to do XX’.
So when I’m in my 13 hours of construction walkthroughs yesterday, I was very off put by the fact that some guy who is the sales rep for the equipment we’re installing, seemed to think he knew more than me about construction and had to DRAW ME PICTURES! When really, he has no idea what he’s talking about… to the point that he didn’t see a problem with putting a bar fridge in the cabinet UNDER THE SINK! It was INFURIATING to be treated like a dumb girl, when I am very knowledgable in my field and my expertise goes beyond what color you should paint the walls!
I don’t understand why in this day and age of equality and acceptance that women are still pigeon holed into this role of being unknowledgable in the trades, when in many cases we know just as much, if not more about construction than the men! If men can cut hair and be decorators and do things that used to be a ‘womans domain’ then howcome I have to FIGHT for men to believe that I might… just MIGHT know what the fuck I”m talking about!
I think maybe his snotty tone this morning had something to do with the fact that he asked me out yesterday and I turned him down, but if you’re going to talk to me like I’m a stupid child in front of the group of people, then I might say this to you:
” Rob, we are not renovating your kitchen. This is a HOSPITAL. We will be required to meet BC Building Codes and Fire regulations on everything that we do. You can not put plumbing and electrical that close together. This will not be a ‘jimmy’ job, it will be done properly, so can you please leave the designing of the cabinetry to myself and the architect, as that is what our role in this project is. Your role, as I understand it is to make sure that we have the proper requirements such as power and cable for the equipment and ensure that we have left enough clearance for the drawers to open. From what I understand, you’re the sales rep from the manufacturer? Not an architect or a contractor?’
GAWD!
~P’Cess
