A male thing, my mother said...

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Today my mother went on a long rant about how the men at work never tell her they should restock on things when supplies are getting low, they wait until they completely run out and when my mom or someone else needs them. She's told them they should inform her they should get more of something when they are nearly but completely out of it, and the say okay but then they act as if she had never told them. She told me this was "a male thing", apparently women make sure they don't run out of things before getting more. She also told me that she has a pen on her desk that comes in an antique-style holder that is very easy to see but when guys want to borrow a pen they never notice it but women always do. She says it's because guys lack the gathering instincts that women have so they're less observant or something.

So while was saying all this I was wondering to myself if women with Asperger's may have a harder time noticing something obvious that's right in front of them because usually when somebody tells me to pick up some object on a desk or table I often get clueless and my eyes wander all over until I find it. On the other hand, I usually restock on more things when I start getting low, like cat food or milk. Anyway it's things like that that make me wonder how men and women can actually get married and spend their rest of their lives together at all.

I think its kind of like a brain yin/yang thing. Evolution-wise we needed to partner up with people who can fill our ability gaps. Women often have to pick up after or organise their men and tell them what is rude in social situations etc.

With autism there seems to be less of a line between male and female- I'm good socially like I "should" be (ie I know what is polite and strive for it) but that's where the similarities end.

I think the pen thing is to do with how men and women often categorise things differently. For instance, men would have visualised the object first then looked for it, where women would have looked at the items and thought "pen" until they saw one.

I can see why autism is called the male brain when you look at this. I tend to do the male thing of visualising first and focusing on one particular area of the desk. Sometimes I think I have completely cleared the coffee table then come back to find half of it has crisp packets or plates all over it that I didn't notice before!

I don't know. I think it's a bit of a generalization. I've known women who didn't bother to order things until they were completely out of stock. Some women have a tendency to think that men are useless and any mistake they make the woman will say, "oh, it's a man thing," men do the same thing to women.

A funny thing happened in an office I worked in years ago. My female colleague complained that men never fill the kettle up to the top after they use it. In reality it was me, a female who was not filling the kettle right up to the top because quite frankly it's a waste of electricity to boil a whole kettle of water for just one cup. Fill it as you go is my motto. So women who say only men do x,y and z are not always correct.

Men do men things and women do women things neither party can understand the other side, they can try but fail to understand thats just the way things are, men aren't as simple as women perceive them to be neither are women as simple as men perceive them to be that is how it is.Men cannot figure women out but neither can women figure men out they think they can but they cannot.

I have trouble finding things that are "right in front of me." I doubt it if it's a gender thing.

I alternate believing it's an ADHD thing and an autism thing.

not typically male, just typically lazy; not bothering to notice the prescence (or lack) of items.

i myself have the opposite: i always notice things like that (pens in holders, in halfopen drawers and what have you), even when they are only glanced in my periferal. i will know that there is a pen in that one drawer even if i never opened it myself.

also, i always keep mental stock of all depletables, so i can easily know if something ran out or not, without paying attention. if i grab sugar from the closet, i automatically, passively, realise that there is only one more pack of coffee left, so when asked, i will just 'know' things like that.

this passive stock-taking memory combined with "periferal hearing" (where i can hear clues without paying attention, and still chime in) make me valuable when taking stock, if the supplier is about to get a new load and asks what is needed while i am within earshot, i can typically provide a list on the spot

If someone tells me to get something from a desk for example and my mental image of the item does not match the actual item then I will miss it. If I know it is suppose to be there, I have to clear out my mental image and really look at each thing on the desk and identify it until I find the thing I'm looking for.

The part in your post about your mom saying men do not ask to reorder things until they are out is absolutely true. At my job I reorder supplies for the guys. I really get mad when they tell me their out of something but need it right away. That means the supplies will have to be ordered with next day air shipping apposed to ground shipping which would be a lot cheaper.

Hope everyone is having a nice day

Sitting on the couch scratching his balls and bum and drinking a beer while watching tv is a male thing same with leaving the toilet seat up! Males also fart and burp a lot!