little bitty girl

Stefan and I have this thing that we argue about. Every time someone asks me what he does for a living, I stammer and sputter and then say,"....something to do with computers. It's internet based but he's not really a programmer although he can do that, but I am pretty sure he does something more complicated than that and really it's all beyond me, so I don't really know. Would you like me to give you his email and he can explain it himself?" And he gets really, really insulted by that.

Well, let me tell you something, it's not like his job is really easy to describe. I know he looks pretty and he's really pretty jocky also, (He's so FUCKING well rounded, it's so sick. If I wasn't dating him, I would spit him in the eye!) but all that is to cover up his BIG BRAIN! I really had no idea he was so smart, up until a couple of years ago. It was all a ploy to sucker me in and by then it was too late and I couldn't leave him.

When A Beautiful Mind came out, I was really gung ho on math. It's my whole curiosity thing. (Sidenote: I am always changing my mind about what type of career I ultimately want. It's that damn "Jack-Of-All-Trades-Thing") It was just after I had also finished reading, Fermat's Enigma, a math theorum mystery-quest by Simon Singh. (Excellent, excellent book even for those not into math but into suspense-mysteries.)

So, I was all talking about going back to school and wanting to solve all these Math theorems. I mean, although my strength has always been in English and Social Sciences but being Chinese, I had no choice but to take Math all the way throughout school. I did pretty well, not without tremendous weeping and wailing, but I did get A's and I have always been fascinated by the whole structure of it all. There is no fudging in Math and everything is pretty black and white.

So Stef was telling me how I shouldn't go into Pure Math as you needed to have such a strong foundation and how Applied Math would perhaps be more up my alley. I looked at him incredulously and then said, "Stef! I was just joking! Who the fuck has a Math degree anyways?" He then replied drily, "I do actually, I have an Honours Math Degree."

Turns out, the boy has an Honours Math degree and a minor in Economics. Oh, and he also fulfilled all the requirements of some other thing that's basically some form of cryptography. HOW WAS A GIRL SUPPOSED TO KNOW? I had only been dating him for two years then. No wonder I never understood a word he was saying!

So, yesterday my friend Marie's boy, Bernie was in town and we went out for dinner. Bernie asked what he did because he thought I had told Marie and Marie just didn't bother to remember. Errr...no! Marie got my standard answer. (see above) Stefan then proceeded to explain it to Bernie and Bernie seemed to understand. I am hoping he will translate it to Marie and then she will, in turn explain it to me next week when I am in Vancouver. (Marie! Take notes when Bernie tells you, ok?)

The point is I am really proud of Stef, no matter what he does. I may not know exactly what he does but I know he does it well and he loves it. And really, he should undertstand, I mean he never seems to "get it" why I am in ecstasies over Alexander McQueen's or John Galliano's latest collections. He just nods and looks really interested when I know he's not really sure what I am raving about. The point is, he does cool things with his stuff and I do cool things with my stuff and we both think the other is pretty cool.

Oh, and Mrs. Williams (my Calculus teacher), you lied. There has never been an instance where the differentiation of a trigonometry function has ever been relevant in my life. Nice try!