Shecky's Girls' Night Out, Part II

In case you're just tuning in, you can find below a post from last week in which I itemized the contents of a goodie bag I received at an event a few weeks ago.

A good friend had heard about Shecky's Girls' Night Out, an evening that promised shopping, drinks, food and whatever else it is that women love to spend their money on. For $25, we thought it would be a hoot. Upon entering the giant site of the event, we knew that whatever it was we were expecting, this was not it. To set the scene, the giant room was filled with rows of tables where vendors (of clothing, makeup, handbags, etc.) were hocking their wares. At the far end of the room, there were two bar stations set up, one with bottled beer selections and the other with cutely named vodka cocktails. Oh, and women. Hundreds, if not a thousand or more, women. Here are my observations, in no particular order:

• There was no one "type" that stood out more than another. These women were of all shapes, sizes, ages and ethnicities. The only constant was, of course, gender.
• I've been in a number of "open bar" situations and, regardless of circumstance, there is always a long line at the bar. In this case, there was a small line for the cocktails, but relatively no line for the beers. Each time I went to get one. In contrast, the lines for the only "food" being offered [bite-size portions of Lean Cuisine paninis hot out of the microwave] snaked through dozens of tables. Worth the wait? Definitely not.
• People in crowds move slowly with no regard for those around them. Removing men from the equation does not change this annoying fact.
• I likened the quality of sound in the cavernous, estrogen-filled room to a beehive. Many indoor-appropriate voices that never, ever stop. This was very different from a mixed sex crowd.

After three beers and no more than an hour, both my friend and I agreed that we had seen enough. We picked up our goodie bags and headed to the nearest bar. It was there that we spread out the goodies and found that the contents could be divided into two piles: products targeting women that have sex, and products targeting women who don't. We laughed and laughed while dividing them up, but in re-examining the freebies I thought about how this tied in with a theme that recurs in the collective like clockwork - the dualities present in every woman.

As for the items themselves, here's a couple examples to illustrate what I'm talking about. Most are pretty straightforward, but almost all could be assigned. Women who have sex: the bikini cream, the mini-toothbrushes, the Alka-Seltzer hangover pills. Women who don't: the microwave brownie, the romance novel, the sunblock. Some even had counterparts - bulky maxi pads for the sexless, ob tampons in their own discrete carrying case for the sexed.

And, of course, this leads to the question of whether they're for two different women, or two different sides of every woman. To cite another Mad Men example (my present obsession), there was an episode where they were coming up with a new ad campaign for Playtex, who wanted to tap into the sexiness of Maidenform advertisements. One of the lesser characters came up with an inarguably good idea - to play on the idea of all women fitting into one of two archetypes (Marilyn or Jackie) and having a bra for each. Don, being the brilliant heartbreaker that he is, added the twist that each woman embodies both of these personality types.

But is that the case? There seems to be an obvious answer -- that within each of us exists both sides of the coin. But, I'm not so sure that I buy it. Sure, our behaviors and attitudes at any given time might fall into either category, and of course there is a spectrum rather than a dichotomy, but when I look around at my friends, and myself, I have no trouble assigning a type.