My partner goes to the VA regularly for his physical therapy and various appointments. He takes his walker with him and in the basket attached to his walker there are a book to read, a bottle of water, and a sweatshirt.

I'm always amused by the book prominently displayed on those days. At home he reads science fiction, military science fiction, mostly. But when he goes out, he puts on top, where it can be seen by one and all, a geek book.

The most recent is Cognitive Neuroscience, The Biology of the Mind, which he started carrying in January. Last year's book was Kluge, The Haphazard Construction of the Human Mind. Previous offerings have centered around dark matter and the big bang and quantum physics, but neurobiology seems to be more impressive.

He has a Ph.D. in Management, so he introduces himself as "Doctor" and calls his doctors by first name, so as to establish the relationship as one of equals.

All of this is quite at odds with his physical appearance, so I imagine the charade is as obvious to his medical providers as it is to me. Mercifully, none of us call him on it.

I am reading Skin Deep, Blood Red. Quite an excellent murder mystery, with a fairly lurid cover. It contrasts quite nicely with my public persona, if I do say so myself. I see myself as quite ordinary and very much a pillar of society; or at least, not too much a wild-eyed intellectual radical. WYSIWYG? Maybe.

Wad some pow'r the giftie gie us, to see ourselves as others see us....