I currently have the great pleasure and privilege of serving as a consultant to Third Sector New England, which means that I get to spend a fair amount of time with the three distinguished gentlemen of TSNE's information systems team:  Wayne Glynn, Arthur Prokosch, and Neil Currie.

Now, ever since the Boston Technobabes organized themselves, my buddy Wayne has been dropping hints that he'd like to be a Technobabe or at least hang out with us.  So for the last few years, I've been teasing him (and other persons of the guy persuasion who have expressed the same wish) about starting a Gentlemen's Auxiliary. 

When Wayne recruited me to take on the project at Third Sector New England, he knew just how to elicit my enthusiasm and dedication to the task:  he told me that the information systems staff wanted to get beyond being an all-male team, and that they wanted me to spend time on-site being (in effect) another staff member.  Of course, this was an offer I did not want to refuse.  He then dropped a hint that he wanted to see if we could get the Technobabes to visit TSNE and its Nonprofit Center.

Well, of course, I live only to serve.*  I love it when people ask me to arrange things, but especially when fulfilling the request is easy and fun. 

So on Monday evening, the Technobabes gathered at TSNE and met Wayne, Arthur, and Neil, whom we declared our official Gentlemen's Auxiliary for the evening.  Neil had to leave early, but Arthur and Wayne took us on a tour of TSNE's domain.  I was sorry that Neil, who is the system administrator, did not have the amazing experience of watching nine Technobabes go through the server room, demanding information and offering suggestions about every item on the racks, not to mention the cooling system.  Wayne and Arthur also treated us to a peek at some of the rooms downstairs in the Nonprofit Center, including a videoconference center.

And then it was on to Ginza, an outstanding Japanese restaurant in Chinatown.  Wayne and Arthur got into the true Technobabe spirit of dining, with the former passing his miso soup to me, and the latter allowing me to pass some of my ginger ice cream to him.

I see Wayne and Arthur (who have been buddies of mine for several years) and Neil (with whom I became acquainted more recently) as wonderful role models for our Gentlemen's Auxiliary, should we ever decide to organize one along formal lines.  Working in adjacent cubicles with them over several months, I am continually impressed by their dedication to user support.  While they each toil over longterm projects that require painstaking attention, they are equally zealous and attentive when a TSNE staff member visits the information systems office to ask for help with a printer jam.  Anyone with a technical support question is met with smiles and a practical response by all available team members; nobody shrugs and says, "that's not my job."  They care about the people they serve, and they care about TSNE's mission.

In other words, they are honorary technobabes.