The night of the opening party was full of more of the same studied ambivalence: lots of invitees who wouldn't have missed it for anything insisting that they were considering NOT going minutes beforehand; lots of eye-rolling by the faux-luddites in attendance over the many state-of-the-art hightech gizmos; mouths stuffed full of Paul Allen's food and booze mumbling bitterly about the shortcomings of the Hip-hop and Riot Grrl exhibits. Several people commented that it's WAY TOO SOON for the latter; that The Riot Grrl Movement isn't "dead" yet, or hasn't been dead long enough for the glass case treatment. What would they propose, I wondered -- that the EMP tear that exhibit down?

Personally, I was amazed that there was a Hip Hop or Riot Grrl exhibit AT ALL. Not that I'm against it — on the contrary, I thought it showed great foresight. Plus you KNOW that if either exhibit didn't exist the same naysayers would be calling the place sexist and racist. And while I'm no expert on either subject, I didn't notice any "shortcomings." All I saw was tons of STUFF. What was missing? The Fat Boys' underwear? A picture of your sister's band? The one that lasted for 3 weeks? And if there really ARE some glaring ommisions, I suppose the museum could always ADD them eventually, couldn't they?