[ul]
[li]I was always the kid that teachers said “never lived up to his full potential”. Almost every one of my teachers got mad at me for not doing my homework and making Ds when “I could be making As with ease”.[/li]
[li]I was tested in the fifth grade for my elementary school’s gifted program. My IQ was a 127… three points short of “gifted”.[/li]
[li]In sixth grade, I scored so high on the math section of my TCAP that I qualified to test the next year for a Duke University scholarship. I didn’t do so well the second go-round.[/li]
[li]In High School, I got a letter to go on my school jacket for playing chess. Yes… chess. Granted, everyone on the team got one but still… I got a letterman’s jacket for being on the Chess Team.[/li]
[li]I was also on the Academic Competition team and won a two year scholarship to Chattanooga State Technical College for being on the team that won the televised competition between sixteen local teams.[/li]
[li]I was on both those teams because a teacher pestered me into them. She was another one of those that thought I wasn’t living up to my full potential and knew I knew how to play chess and had a penchant for trivia.[/li]
[li]I was paid ten dollars a pop to write essays for half a semester in my Junior English class. The average grade given for them was a B-.[/li]
[li]My sophomore year, I had my English teacher sign my yearbook first thing. I had the biggest crush on her and she was the only one I really wanted to sign it. When she called me a “friend”, I was on Cloud Nine for a week.[/li]
[li]I’m an avid fan of Star Trek and of the firm conviction that it rules over all things Star Wars. No amount of arguing will convince me otherwise.[/li]
[li]I own about five hundred books, mostly science fiction and general non-fiction. Of those five hundred, a good three hundred are, what else? Star Trek. I’ve read them all.[/li]
[li]I bought a DVD player for the sole purpose of eventually owning all the Trek DVD Season sets. [/li]
[li]I exchanged a series of emails with the administrator of http://www.ditl.org/, a Star Trek fansite, over his site’s content. When the site is next updated, he’ll revise an entry due to my critique.[/li]
[li]I’ve had three online relationships in the three years I’ve had a computer at home. I’ve had none at all offline.[/li]
[li]I have more online friends than I do offline.[/li][/ul]
That was fun. You guys’ turns. 
Hmmm…
-I have a Star Trek Encyclopedia on the floor next to me, because I wanted to look up the correct spelling of gagh for the Fictional Foods thread
-My idea of a great Saturday is all day at a gem and mineral show, or all day in the gem and mineral exhibit at a big natural history museum
-I really want a T-shirt that says “Life would be so much easier if I had the source code”
-I have and wear in public a T-shirt with the Periodic Table on it
-I took a practice SAT as a freshman in HS, and got a 1350 (I know, I know, I’m bragging…)
-I went to one of those camps for gifted youth in the summer between 5th and 6th grade, and had the time of my life
-I have been known to play chess with myself
-My parents don’t bother with the spellcheck- they just ask me
-I do online text-based roleplaying, and am looking for a good D&D campaign to join IRL
-I read reference books on medicinal herbs, medieval costuming, gemology, Latin and lots of other stuff for fun
-I also read enormous amounts of SF and fantasy
-Have started writing fanfiction about Arcanum, a favorite computer RPG
-I love Celtic and folk music, including bagpipes!
-If you go hiking with me, prepare for an impromptu lecture on any interesting geological formations we happen across
There’s lots of other stuff, but this’ll do for now.
I’m on all the science teams at school–and I do it because it’s fun, not because my teachers want me to (well, they want me to, but I do it for me). And I usually do pretty well at competions.
I hang out in the chemistry room before and after school.
I prefer glasses instead of contacts. I own three pairs of glasses and have never considered getting contacts.
People tell me I’m geeky on a daily basis.
[ul]
[li]I have a very cool Star Trek watch that plays a song and has a little Enterprise for a sweep hand.[/li][/ul]
[ul]
[li]I’ve bought and read a ton of Trek books and fanzines.[/li][/ul]
[ul]
[li]I was the nerdy kid who asked for homework and then the nerdy teen who made the Honor Roll and hung out with mostly a bunch of other nerds, losers, geeks, and fringe-dwellers.[/ul][/li][ul]
[li]Friends are impressed with my computing abilities.[/ul][/li][ul]
[li]I’ve been to Trek/Babylon 5/X-Files conventions–and enjoyed them.[/ul][/li][ul]
[li]Very good SAT scores.[/ul][/li][ul]
[li]I write short SF and have gotten it published in small geeky zines and contests.[/li][list]
[li]I’ve got a growing collection of Trek t-shirts.[/ul][/li][ul]
[li]I post regularly in the Trek threads.[/ul][/li]
Check out my sig!
Dr. Who books
Wrestling tapes
Red Dwarf Tapes
Good ACT scores. (perfect score on the Reading Comprehension and almost perfect on English)
Quiz Bowl in high school. I remember my blinding rage when my team was asked a question as a group, and the Captain (ditz of a girl) misheard my answer of “Knute Rockne” and got it wrong, even after I wrote it down phonetically. It cost us the game.
Took part in a basic cable game show for charity in college and blew away the competition. Take that, Sierra Club!
Drama Club, History Club, French Club in high school, Society of Professional Journalists, Young Democrats in college.
Slash writer
MST3K tapes
Lord of the Rings DVD
<looks at list> Man, I’m pathetic!
Well, just the other night I was racing my web browsers …
I rode my recumbent bike to work today wearing sandals and socks.
Wait, that’s dorky, not geeky…
I know more about the Star Wars universe than I do about how my car works. In fact, I write in an online RPG with several original characters.
I have actually been in discussions as to which is better, Trek or Wars (Wars, no contest).
I have been in Mensa (IQ 140-something), but never attended a meeting.
I have more online friends than real life friends.
In high school, I lettered in Band.
My ex SO still calls me and asks me how to spell things.
As a child, I read encyclopedias for the fun of it.
I’ve been a Trekkie since I was nine, and have been to several conventions.
I have a B5/DS9 chess set that I made myself out of action figures and little model ships.
I can name all the actors who played the Doctor (which means I could nail Vince on the British QAF were I of the right gender).
I’ve read LOTR about 20 times, and seen the FOTR 60 times. My knowledge of hobbit geneology has frightened my parents.
I write slash, and I’ve been to those conventions too.
I am a professional web-geek; I manage a .gov site for a small federal agency.
Evidence that I am a geek:
I was invited to be a member of Mensa, but turned them down
I was on a game show
I still build and fly model rockets
In college I wrote a computer program to simulate freeway traffic. It wasn’t for any class, just for my own fun
I own three slide rules, and know how to use them
I have all The Thunderbirds episodes on DVD
Evidence that I’m not a geek:
I can’t stand Star Trek, and never watched Babylon 5 or Doctor Who.
I don’t play RPGs (anymore)
None of my shirts have logos for any company, and none of them came from conventions
Dia dhuit.
Is mise Bryan.
First date with Hubby? Star Trek Convention
Best Vacation with Hubby? Star Trek: One Weekend on Earth - 30th Anniversary of TOS
Best thing to do outside: Get Inside
Play MMORPG with Hubby and friends as much as possible
Answer the question hotline for State Environmental Agency (and even answer the “I found this insect, what is it” questions)
Wrote a cookbook
Surrounding me are a collection of anime DVDs, a bookshelf with 3 shelves of Japanese comics (only one shelf is translated) and a shelf of Japanese dictionaries (to help with the reading of the comics), a Wonderswan, a flatbed scanner, a tablet, two They Might Be Giants CD collections, a Playstation AND a Nintendo, a microwave and 3 different kinds of instant coffee. And behind me I have 10 RPG manuals (D&D and non-D&D.) But hey, that’s not as bad as it sounds, I’m just planning for DMing a session… oh, wait. 
To think that’s just within a 5 foot radius of me. I left out the bookshelf of Trek novels, the American comic collection, the posters, the doujinshi, the OTHER bookshelf full of manga, the costume for comic and anime cons, the dozen+ textbooks I’ve decided to keep just because I enjoyed them so much, the collection of literature-geek novels and literature analysis books…
I met my girlfriend through a fandom (over a year together, whoo!) and we’ve costumed together at a con. Among the gifts of love we’ve shared are doujinshi (Japanese fan comics) and Forgotten Realms novels. Ours is a love of true geekiness!
She’s a Mac person and I’m a Linux and Windows person (one on each side of me) but we’ve managed to work that little kink out. Mostly.
I have upwards of 200 books, in my room. I have read (or am reading) every single one. Most of them, for fun.
I’m attempting to teach myself latin. For fun.
By fifth grade, thanks in part to my older sister, I had read every book on the 5th, 6th, 7th, and 8th grade reading lists.
I read The Scarlett Letter even after our teacher decided we didn’t need to, because I’d started it.
Best gift I ever got in my life was two magazine subscriptions: Asimov’s and Realms of Fantasy.
I have a DOS rip-off on my Palm Pilot. I also have 35 games on it, and I overclock it.
I taught myself to read when I was three. In kindergarten, they tested me, but finally stopped when I was reading at a sixth-grade level.
I was in the ‘talented and gifted’ program from kindergarten to sixth grade.
Took the SAT in 7th grade. Got a 1300. Sadly, I did worse when I took them in 11th grade.
Spent five summers taking intensive, 3-week long academic programs, at over $2000/summer, for fun. My summer camp memories are of reading Immanual Kant and psychology text books.
I’ve got a leather-bound copy of Douglas Adam’s The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Universe. All five books.
[ul]
[li]I’m currently wearing a t-shirt bearing the emblem of the Mad Scientists Union (Local 42).[/li][li]I have written and produced a LARP game for a con, as well as manning a booth at the same con.[/li][li]I have driven 19 hours to attend a minor LARP game.[/li][li]I’m the propmaster for my LARP chapter. I’m also on the chapter board, write games, sanction games, and produce games. I debate rules revisions and game balance in my free time.[/li][li]There are currently manuals within my reach for D&D (3rd Ed), Shadowrun, Ars Magica, and Nobilis. I’m at the office.[/li][li]I play D&D every Friday night with guys who do PC case mods professionally. Sometimes I help with them.[/li][li]I’m currently designing a D&D campaign to run, because–let’s face it–one night of D&D a week is not enough.[/li][li]I have three active computers in my lab at home. None have covers on them.[/li][li]Yes, I have a room in my apartment that I consider a lab.[/li][li]I write and customize code for a living. [/li][li]The only DVDs in my collection with live actors are X-Men, the Harry Potter movies, and the LotR. Everything else is animated, except for The Dark Crystal, which is all puppets.[/li][li]I have the soundtrack from a computer game (Myst III: Exile, if anyone cares) in the CD player in my truck.[/li][li]I have more books than bookcases. Most are SF, with a healthy leavening of nonfiction and a truly irrational number of foreign-language dictionaries and grammar texts. I like to be able to read everything.[/li][li]I have been known to count on my fingers in binary. Hex, too, but binary allows for much larger numbers.[/li][/ul]
I designed a shirt advertising The Republic for English, . . . and am going to put pi to as many digits as I can fit on the back.
I have 3 bookcases in my room filled with books, a suitcase just beyond my bed also filled, and a large shelf upstairs also filled with my books.
I haven’t seen the floor of my room in around three years bcause it’s covered with books. There’s a large alcove outside of my room that’s also filled with books.
In a few weeks I am going to attend my 5th summer camp session at a Johns Hopkins geek camp. This year: Probability and Game Theory.
In 4th grade, I tested in the 99th percentile on an overall standardized test . . . for 7th graders.
In eighth grade, I pretty much taught our science class, because our teacher didn’t know her subject, and sucked at explaining stuff.
I just finished Latin I, and I bought a Latin II textbook about a month and a half ago to make sure that I would have one when we started Latin II. Except for the vocabulary, I could now test into Latin III.
When I was a small child, I would look at the summer reading list for school and I would have already read almost all of them a few years before. Now, except for the sci-fi/fantasy section, I’ve read very few of them because I no longer read children’s books.
Whenever I read a Shakespearean play, I memorize about 70 lines of it. I no longer read the comedies because the humor is mostly out of date and I don’t think the lines are as good.
I’ve memorized the entire periodic table of elements and all but a few of the abbreviations.
I once memorized pi to 400 places, but I forgot about half of it. I also memorized 1-20 in 48 different languages, but I’ve forgotten 28 of those.
I was going to go from Algebra-Geometry in 8th grade to Calc BC in 9th, but there was no test for Alg 2/Trig at my high school, since they go so far beyond the state requirements. Before that, I bought a calc textbook to teach myself calculus-for fun- and finished most of it before I found out that the registration due date for the AP Exam had already passed.
At camp, I debated Trek vs Wars several times with my friends. (Trek, of course) While I didn’t really win, my opponent conceded that Trek had better villains and weapons.
I’m building a 3d chess set-just to see the logistics of playing on the outside of a cube. Oh, and also to play it. I regularly play chess by myself, but I know that it’s bad for me.
In fifth grade, my teacher said to look a word up in the dictionary if one doesn’t know how to spell it, and several of my classmates said, “Why bother? We can just ask dwalin.”
Every year, I read all of my school textbooks in the first few days of school. Usually, I don’t learn much, if anything.
I’m reading straight through the Bible, and memorizing the books as I go along. When I’m finished, I’m going to memorize the list of popes-all 264 of them.
My mom runs a book-selling business, and we have agreed that I get to read all of the textbooks and encyclopedias she gets unless they’re selling really well.
I bought Chemistry, Biology, and Math IC-IIC SAT II practice review books-just because I wanted to. I was in 7th grade at the time, I think.
Last night, my sister corrected what I said, because I hadn’t used the imaginative subjunctive when I should have. I pleaded that I was tired (it was around 11 PM at the time) and that I always used it when necessary. She accepted my excuse, but grudgingly.
This summer, I’m planning to make binary, trinary, quaternary, up to hexadecimal multiplication tables.
As far as I know, I know every single character who has ever been on X-Men-the cartoon. Name and power.
I’m named after one of the 12 Companions in The Hobbit. By choice.
My classmates ask me if I have a calculator, and I say yes, pointing to my head. Then they give me their problem, and I solve it in a few seconds.
Family weirdness:
My dad played Scrabble in French, against French people-and won. When he plays in our family, he always gets a score of about 500.
My mom knows Latin, Greek, and French-and she shares the title of family math whiz with me.
My sister knows Spanish, French, and Italian, and the only reasons she’s the family language whiz is that she tested into Spanish 2 in high school-not having taken Sp 1-and she learned Italian in about a month. I’m currently badgering her to learn Latin, and she could probably learn it in about three weeks, given that she already knows 3 Romance languages.
My dad benches 420 with a bad back, and nobody in the family ever thought that was unusual until we mentioned it to someone outside the family. (This is supposed to be geekiness, but Ithink this might be acceptable.)
My sister gave me a book on Tolkien’s languages. It was a good present.
Careful, you’ll go blind.
::sniffle:: Fellow geeks! Oh, this is wonderful. A place where I am a red herring among red herring! A place where I can talk (okay, type) about things that interest me and know that other people will not only get it but be interested and possibly respond!
All right, I’ll shut up now.
These are geeky? Ah crap. Or are they not geeky for me, because I’m a geologist??