Specifically, they are employed as actors.

Apparently someone at Grisoft forgot to check their TODO list before the product shipped.

Last weekend, Elizabeth and I were in the US for her 5-year college reunion. The R-MWC reunion events are shared between classes celebrating every 5th anniversary of their graduation, and Elizabeth’s year (class of ‘03) put in a good showing, with a large proportion of the alumna who attended being Reading Program alums, so I knew a lot of them. Photos from the event are up on Flickr: click below for the full set.

Those of you playing along at home will know that R-MWC has been the centre of controversy the last few years, after they suddenly decided to switch from a woman’s college to co-ed (and change their name to Randolph College), cut staff and courses, and sell off prize pieces from the college museum’s permanent art collection to shore up long-running (and long-denied) financial problems. Lawsuits from alumnae groups resulted, but were lost in the circuit courts and last week were ultimately quashed at appeal.

All of this meant that there was a heightened sensitivity amongst the alums to any male involvement in reunion. There were a small number of snide remarks and people jumping to conclusions over the contribution made by male students at some of the events, and several times I was asked by older alums if I was a student. Very few of the older alums had brought their partners with them, but I think it was mainly my closeness in age to the actual students which led people to assume I was one of them. The first time I was asked “Are you a student?”, I simply quipped, “No, I’m a husband” without even thinking about it, and that became my standard response from then on. Later I realised that, in future, some form of branding might be in order:

I’m thinking of making it into a t-shirt.

Beneath the celebrations, a somewhat more glum mood exists