trois choses.

Thing 1: Come to our school!
After I wrote that spirited entry about supporting my college football team, I received an email from the computer science department at ASU. Apparently, they're making a brochure to try and tempt other people to come to their fine school, even geeky people who probably duck whenever a football comes near. They wanted information from me, basic stuff like my job and employer and a smiling photograph. I've been feeling pretty good about the quality of my education since I got this new job that requires me to actually use things I learned in college, and so I've even written a cute little testimonial that will tell prospective students that ASU is a good decision. Of course, they may not use my cheesy blurb, but I wrote it, unasked, just because I was feeling frisky.

I started thinking about the people they might have contacted for this assignment. Obviously, they're limited to the people they're still in touch with, and they probably didn't track down any flunkies. But the more I think about it, the more I think I got this email because I'm a girl. "Please, come to our school! You, too, ladies! This chick went here and look, she's only a little manly!" If I wanted to be really egotistical, I could toy with the idea that I might be bait for computer science boys. "Please, come to our school! We have girls that will understand what you're talking about, and they're only a little manly!"

I don't know why there aren't more girls in computer science. Maybe it's a gradual thing and other women are shy of entering a field where they'll be the minority. Maybe there's something to that "girls are bad at math" thing. I don't know. But I guess I'm doing my part now, a smiling female representative of the Appalachian State University computer science department. I'll try not to let it go to my head.

Thing 2: Bang!
I've completed another step in board game geekdom by actually purchasing my own obscure board games. My favorite is a spaghetti western game called Bang! I've played this with my sister-in-law and two nieces and it's always a good time. What's really funny is that you shoot people by playing a Bang! card against them, at which point you can say "I banged you." And then everybody giggles at the silly double entendre.

We were playing one night and my sister-in-law played a Bang! against my niece. "I banged you," she said with such sauce that we all giggled more than usual, except for my twelve-year-old niece, Sarah. There was a pause, before Sarah said confidently, "I know what that means." We laughed out loud at that.

Thing 3: Recipe exchange.
I participated in a recipe exchange recently. It was like those old chain letters I did when I was ten, except for a couple of differences: it was for grown-ups and I actually continued the chain. It was one of those things that threw me into a tizzy because of my lack of domesticity. Not only do I not know many good recipes, I don't know that many people that cook. So forwarding on to twenty people was out of the question. But I scrounged up an easy, but yummy recipe and eight or so people I thought might know how to use an oven. I felt very womanly in a truly unenlightened sense. I was even feeling bold enough to cook some salmon from a recipe I received in exchange. The grease burns on my arms were enough to put me back in my place, which ironically, is apparently somewhere outside the kitchen.