"No," I say. "I go to Harvard." Long pause. Okay, I got it over with. I dropped the H-bomb. Let's move on. "How 'bout this Iraq thing--"

"Really?"

"No, I really don't think we can avoid war. Do you?" I ask. Good move, I think. Throw him off the scent.

"No, I mean really do you go to Harvard?"

"Yes, I do. Did you hear about the Soviets at the UN--"

"You must be really smart," Fred says.

"Actually, I'm near brilliant," I don't say. I go on not to recite my GPA, my SATs or my high school achievements.

"Not really," I say. Looks like this one's hooked on the big H. It'll be useless to resist.

"Oh," Fred says. "Are you in a house?"

I love this question. In Harvardspeak, of course, I should answer "Currier." In normal collegespeak, though, I should answer "no," as I'm not in a fraternity. I think he means the latter. "No," I say. "Frats aren't very popular at Harvard."

"Oh, yeah. You guys don't have frats," says Fred. "So are you in one of those eating clubs?"

"No," I say. "We don't have eating clubs." No reason to start explaining the concept of finals clubs, I think--

"Right," he says. "You got those finals clubs, where you study for tests, huh?"

Wrong, Fred. "No, not in one of those." No need to start getting into the fact that little studying for finals goes on in the clubs or the fact that they're not open to first-years or to women at all.

"So do you party a lot?"