-..and the doctor said, “I cannot operate on this patient, because he is my son.”-

That is the end of a riddle designed to flush out male chauvinists. And I am here to tell you of new one I stepped into, on a recent date.

The woman told me she coached hockey and softball, and do you know what I said, a few minutes later?

“So, how is the field hockey team doing?”

At that moment, the entire region got blasted with cold weather. Coincidence?

Ice hockey, she answered flatly, and I thought of the sound Mia Farrow's Rosemary makes when she finally sees her baby.

Field hockey is played in the fall, she added.

Impeccable logic, I said, and tried to change the subject.

The father died in the crash, and the doctor is the boy's mother!