ON THE PHILOSOPHY OF SHOPPING IN CAMBRIDGE

It's been said that the definition of a professor is someone who knows more and more about less and less until one knows everything about nothing. But most students see their professors as human Zippo lighters that ignite waning intellectual wicks. Perhaps it's no surprise, then, to find that these foaming fonts of knowledge prove just as resourceful in tantalizing salivating hedonistic palates as academic ones.

For readers' scanning pleasure, here lies the quickie Unofficial Guide to Life at Harvard Faculty Style. Six profs, five specialties and five ways to get some food, some liquor, some drama, some movie action, or to just plain get a little sumpin'-sumpin'.

ON THE STAGE

Who: Professor Stephen Greenblatt, English Literature

Teaches: English 124c: "Shakespearean Conjuring"

Best place to scope out the Bard's work:

Greenblatt claims to be too new in town to be down on this one, but he does proffer lavish kudos to the student-run Hyperion Theatre Company for their rendition of Hamlet. "It was brilliant and rivaled the marvelous production I saw several years at the ART [American Repertory Theatre]," quoth the prof.

How to get some Shakey, baby:

Hamlet closed just two weekends past, but the Hyperion players will be staging their traditional al fresco performance in the Yard during the spring ARTS FIRST Weekend. Stay tuned.

ON VODKA

Who: Professor Svetlana Boym, Slavic Language and Literatures

Teaches: Slavic 145b: "Russian Literature in Translation: The 20th Century Tradition"

Best brand of vodka:

Not to be a traitor to the Motherland or anything, Boym says she prefers sake to vodka. But if it's going to be vodka, it's absolutely Absolut. "Because I like the name," explains Boym. Although when she's expecting guests or grad students she says she buys Stolichnaya, just to "live up to their expectations of Russian-ness."

How to get Absolut-ly smashed:

A trip to Blanchard's in Alston will do the trick for either Absolut or Stolichnaya connoisseurs. Though Boym drops a little caveat, warning that "in Russia itself there is a real vodka crisis going on at the moment, with many counterfeits at the market and rising prices."

ON THE MOVIES

Who: Professor Alfred Guzzetti, Visual and Environmental Studies

Teaches: VES 50: "Fundamentals of Filmmaking: Studio Course"

Best venue for movies:

As the shrinkage factor between the big screen and a little TV just doesn't float his boat, Guzzetti practically never rents movies. When he goes out for a relaxed night at the theater, he patronizes either Coolidge Corner, the Kendall Square Cinema or the Museum of Fine Arts.

How to get two thumbs up:

The most recent film Guzzetti enjoyed was Benoit Jaquot's Seventh Heaven, now playing at the Coolidge Corner theater. It's all about a neurotic Parisian, her paranoid husband, eastern Feng Shui mysticism on how to rearrange furniture, orgasm deprivation, and other dysfunctional artsy stuff. Guzzetti highly recommends it.

ON CHINESE FOOD

Who: Professor James L. Watson, Anthropology

Teaches: Foreign Cultures 62: "Chinese Family, Marriage, and Kinship"

Best place to sample Chinese cuisine in Boston:

His kitchen. "The only thing missing in our Cambridge home is dried grass and charcoal fire," Watson says. During their first village study in the Hong Kong New Territories (circa late 1960), Watson's wife and fellow anthropologist, Rubie Watson, learned to cook authentic country-style Cantonese food. Watson hastens to add, "I do all the buying, chopping, cleaning, polishing, and washing-up afterwards."

As for the Chinese chow here, Watson says, "The quality of Bostonian Chinese food is dreadful. Completely, unquestionably ghastly. All my favorite restaurants are in Hong Kong."

How to get some delicious chow mein:

(a) Charm a dinner invitation to the Watson's.

(b) Plane tickets back to good ol' H.K. are going dirt cheap right now.

(c) Experiment with an episode of Yen-Can-Cook and that totally illegal dorm room hotpot.

Those without mad skillz using stir-fry woks probably ought to hail the "Chinese Kitchen Food Truck." It's stationed just north of the Science Center, 35 Oxford St. Large box meals go for only $3 to 3.50. Tempt fate with by capping off your meal with two fortune cookies (25c for the pair).

Watson has his favorite fortune framed in his William James Hall office.

"You are a person of culture," reads the cookie's all-too-appropriate

strip. "As an anthropologist," Watson says, "I was very glad to hear that."

ON SEX

Who: Professors Irv DeVore and Marc Hauser, Anthropology

Teach: Science B-29: "Human Behavioral Biology" (aka "Sex")

Best way to procure condoms on the sly:

Hauser openly claims to have won a lottery providing himself with a lifetime supply of condoms. "This cuts out on the embarrassment of being seen at Hubba Hubba by my students," says Hubba Hubba Hauser.

DeVore was a little more reluctant to disclose the source of his "french envelopes." But upon being pressed, he revealed the root of his secrecy. His condoms are fashioned from "the appendix of a nearly extinct breed of sheep, now raised in only two remote villages in the Caucasus," which are gossamer-thin and known for their "great tensile strength."

Oh, the scandal! But that's not all. According to DeVore, these appendices of such rare and delicate quality are conveyed by diplomatic pouch to the U.S. and distributed through the Washington-Harvard network to only eight select Faculty members. "As you may imagine, the number of such appendices annually available to each of us is not generous," said DeVore, "But alas, I find my quota sufficient for my needs."

Fair enough. But who are the other lucky seven?