I had a long chat yesterday morning with a very funny, animated, livewire of a friend. He is another excellent, excellent writer and a brilliant scholar (yes: PhD, publications, research--the works). It turns out, he and I share at least one ambition that we would like to fulfill before we die: we would each like to write a romance novel.
Why a romance novel? Because it looks like so much fun! By "fun" we do not mean easy, mind you. We're certain it will be difficult. It's just that when you're so used to writing stuff that is heavy, academic, often boring to other people, "with footnotes and all that sh*t", writing a romance novel seems like crazy fun! It seems to offer a venue for cutting loose and tapping into those parts of your psyche that don't really belong in a journal paper or a classroom.
I said that if I ever got to the point where the book made it to print, I'm not going to mention it among my list of research and creative work in my annual activity report (something we have to submit to ADMU every year). He said, I would! I said, well, can you imagine, during the next PAASCU visit, they're going to wonder, what on earth are these books doing in the exhibit??? And under computer science no less!
Worse yet, he said, when my students are listening to me in class, they're minds are not going to be on Java or HCI. Rather, they'll be thinking, so do you think ma'am is writing from personal experience???
Yikes.
Gotta think of a good pseudonym.
But if any of you walk into my cubicle and find stacks of Harlequin romances on my desk, just remember: this is research. :)
