I am typically a quiet person. I am an extrovert, so I like being in conversations with groups of people. But, I generally steer clear of controversial or sexual statements. As a result, people believe that I just cannot think in such “low brow” terms.
However, once in a while, I surprise myself and others with the kinds of things that come out of my mouth. I have a knack for picking just the wrong thing to say at just the right time.
In my junior year of high school, I asked a good friend of mine, “Tammy,” to the homecoming dance.
As homecoming approached, I coordinated with several of my friends to do a group dinner. We settled on a murder mystery dinner hosted by one of the girls.
Several couples attended the dinner, and we had a blast. I quickly was exposed as not the murderer, but I still enjoyed watching the interplay and creativity of the party attendees.
My wife (fiancé at the time) regularly teases me about my “duty.” It’s my duty to open car doors, pay for dinner, kiss her, and some day, change dirty diapers. And I’m all about doing my duty.
While my wife and I we were “hanging out” (i.e. “not dating”), we went out to eat at several restaurants. About a month or two before we got engaged, I recommended that we go to an Indian restaurant on Center Street in Provo. I’d been to that restaurant several times before--with my boss and coworkers, with my siblings, or on dates. “We’ve been there before” I insisted, while she insisted “No we haven’t.”
After 5 years of being a “menace to society” (over 25 and unmarried), I graduated from attending a “student ward” (Sunday worship that includes only single students) to attending what my religion refers to as a “family ward” (the normal religious gatherings that most people attend). I simply hadn’t managed to get married, so I was consigned to either the “family ward”, or the “adult singles ward” (not where I wanted to be).
I really enjoyed the family ward I attended. The other church members there were friendly and inviting, and I got to participate in the ward as a Sunday School instructor.
Within a few weeks, some key members of the ward realized that I was single. They, of course, wanted to help me overcome this deficiency in my life, and set me up with another member of the ward who was also maritally challenged. Let’s call her Teresa.
Teresa is a nice woman with a Ph.D. who, at the time, was teaching at BYU. She was staying with her sister Jane and brother-in-law Alex. Teresa and I went on several dates and had reasonably good conversations. However, I just was not that interested and I eventually abandoned the relationship. Beside which, I was spending a lot of time with a friend of mine, Dawn.
I occasionally travel to various cities to give demonstrations, present on research, or participate in competitions. In this particular story, I traveled to California to participate in a programming contest called “The Imagine Cup”. The Imaging Cup bills itself as a place for ideas to be showcased and compared with other ideas, but we found it not really to be about ideas, but implementations: our idea was great, but the implementation was not complete, and so we advanced but could not win because one judge hated the user interface. But complaining about The Imagine Cup is not the purpose of this blog.
Because this leg of the overall competition was in California, we convinced the BYU CS department to foot the bill for our travel, lodging, and vehicle rental. My two lab-mates/teammates and I got to travel to and from Los Angeles, CA, and free shirts from the department, to boot!
Whenever I fly, I like to read the emergency pamphlet provided on the plane. Each plane’s pamphlet is different, and although I have never had the fearsome responsibility to actually use that knowledge, I like to review the nearby instructions so that, in the event of an emergency, I might be able to recall some small relevant portion of the instructions. I have reviewed such pamphlets dozens of times, and about half of which before this particular trip.
One value that’s particularly important to me is respecting women. Sometimes, I respect women so much that I just try and stay out of their way. But, when I am around women, I make sure to keep the conversations intelligent, centered on the women as much as possible, and my eyes are always above the neckline.
In middle and high school, my church would regularly rent out the local skating rink for teenage-hormone-safe roller skating opportunities. I had been to various skating activities before, but usually never tried to pair off with a girl: I usually just tried to skate around and buy and consume copious volumes of sugar. Thinking back on it, I’m sure that the proprietors got most of their profits from the concession sales, but that’s beside the point.
Well, one year I was feeling courageous enough to pair off with “Charity,” a nice girl from a neighboring ward, who also attended my school. I knew this girl to be very intelligent, and intimidatingly cute. I mustered all my courage to ask her if we could skate together, and thankfully, she consented.
