How women feel about calling themselves or being called "girl" certainly depends on the woman in question, boo boo, and I agree that calling women "girls" is so common that many people don't think much about it.
However, the history of people calling women "girls" as a derogatory, patronising, dismissive term is one that feminists (women and men) in the 70's fought against for good reason to try to raise awareness of the underlying sexism toward women, and that underlying sexism still exists, so it is good to look at contributing factors and symptoms of it (such as terminology used to refer to people).
An example of sexism in our culture: women are still underrepresented in a variety of professions and are often paid less than men in equivalent jobs. U.S. Department of Education data show that "a year out of school, despite having earned higher college GPAs in every subject, young women will take home, on average across all professions, just 80 percent of what their male colleagues do. A decade out of college, full-time working women who haven't had children still make 77 cents on the male dollar."
Young Women, Newsweek, and Sexism - Newsweek. So, the question is "Why?"
This is not a trivial issue, I feel: being treated as less than a capable and valued adult is the history of women in the workforce (as well as in relationships), and
calling women "girls" was a way to limit their progress and still may contribute to some women's and men's lower expectations of women and their capabilities. I recommend the above timely Newsweek article about the limitations women experience in their lives due to their gender.
Words themselves are not so important, but the intent and meaning behind them are. You may feel calling a woman "girl" is nice because you feel it means she is "young," but not all women will feel flattered by this, not only because being categorized based on age may feel demeaning, but also because, in contrast with your experience, I have observed that people often don't call men "boys" but do call women "girls" in professional situations.
Perhaps if more women were paid equally to men, the sign of the worth of their work, and if women worldwide weren't often treated as girls lacking equal rights and social privileges of men, hearing people refer to women as "girls" wouldn't rankle so.
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