I've been chirping all day about a rude email I got this morning and my husband said "don't you have better things to do than put people on your list"? The answer is - absolutely not! I curate my mental list of people who dissed me almost daily - I love my list...

My "list of people who dissed me" is a mental spreadsheet that I have committed to memory. I can sort data chronologically, or by insult issue area, or by gender, or by topic, or by severity of insult...

For example, a Very Senior Male Scholar who came to me after my keynote address at a Very Prestigious University and said "I never expected you to have such a strong accent" - immediately got on the list.

A fellow grad student from my MA program who said that everyone he met from "my region" was feisty - on the fucking list he goes.

A woman I played a doubles tennis match against, who, after we won, at the netpost handshake looked at my doubles partner and said to *her* and her alone: "you played really well." On the list.

Oh speaking of tennis, the woman who on the first day of the pandemic defaulted me from our match since we couldn't play so she could get 12 victory points and advance on our league leaderboard. On. The. List.

The family member who I made plans to meet for dinner in a city while I was conferencing, after I told all my friends I had a family obligation and couldn't do fun stuff with them, then totally stood me up and bailed "because she was tired". Oh, she's on the list.

Oh special list entry for the person who told me I shouldn't have written my book on My Topic because everything good on the Topic has already been written. Oh, this person's on the list.

I mean, I'm sure you can see that I could go on for ever. My list is incredibly important to me. My list is special and a guiding light to my balanced, mature, adult life.