On Swearing

My first year in grad school I roomed with a Biochem grad student. He was a decent guy, but his choice in friends was somewhat questionable. One guy in particular, let's call him Assface, was a real piece of work. He was your average let's-drive-drunk-and-crash-a-freshman-dorm-party-to-pick-up-chicks kind of guy. You know, a real quality character.

One night, as my roommate and his friends are pre-partying in preparation for a night of underage booty scavenging, Assface tells me that I shouldn't swear because, get this, it isn't ladylike.

Now, I am rarely what I would call ladylike. It's not really high on my priority list. But the reason this comment really chapped my adorable behind is because Assface definitely cursed plenty, as did my roommate, all his friends, and pretty much all human beings between the ages of 12 and 35. It was clearly not the cursing that bothered Assface. It was the fact that I was a girl who cursed/curses like a grizzled old truck driver.

So of course I told Assface to "F*cking bite me".

**Fastforward 7 years.**

I'm in the office of my boss, Dr. DNA. Dr. DNA mentions that her neice, who works as a technician in a lab on campus, has been having problems with a certain biochemistry grad student in her lab.

Is his name Assface? I ask.

Why yes! Dr. DNA replies. How did you know?

So I regale her with several stories of Assface-related chauvinism. ...and one time he told me I shouldn't swear because "it isn't ladylike!"

Dr. DNA considers this but briefly. Well I don't think you should swear, she says, but that's because I think there are so many more descriptive and eloquent ways to express yourself.

Eloquent perhaps, I respond, but when I say that all this insurance bullshit is making me balls-to-the-wall batsh*t f*cking crazy, I think you understand exactly what I mean.*

*Disclaimer: Actual real life response to my actual real life boss may have involved significantly less bravado and fewer curse words. p-value << 0.005