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[Ricky]

Two books, both given to me for Christmas last year:

Everything and More: A Compact History of ∞
How to Start a Conversation and Make Friends

EDIT: I have only read the first one.

why havent you read the second?

[Leonon]

but I still think the geekiest thing I own (and ever owned...) are a few magnetic particles on my harddisk arranged in a way only Dwarf Fortress can be responsible for.

And I'm stumped you all overlooked that in your own lives

Do I get extra points if I have Dwarf Fortress on a Linux USB stick?

[Muz]

Phase shift oscillator I built by hand.

[RedKing]

Let's see...

1. A bookcase with two shelves of obscure books like The Manchurian Frontier in Ch'ing History, Pocket Teach Yourself Welsh and Ethno-Nationalism in Post-Soviet Societies.
2. Said bookcase has one more shelf completely stocked with RPG sourcebooks, primarily Battletech, Shadowrun, AD&D, Rolemaster, and MegaTraveller. The bottom shelf is completely stocked with boxed tabletop games, including the entire Renegade Legion series (Interceptor, Centurion, Leviathan, Prefect).
3. A Qing-era jian sword with the requisite dragon, phoenix and Big Dipper. This one is as much as religious object as it is geek cred.
4. My Commodore 128. It still works, although most of the 5.25" floppies have degraded beyond repair. 
5. My Nintendo 8-bit system, with about a dozen games.
6. Two cases full of Star Wars action figures, well used. I think my AT-AT is somewhere up in the attic.
7. Fourteen photo albums of my extended family, going back to at least 1860-ish. I'm a hardcore genealogy geek.

EDIT: Forgot one more.
8. The children's chopsticks I got for my daughter. They're pink and decorated with dolphins playing basketball. Just for the sheer "lolwut Asian r wierd" factor.

[Eugenitor]

4. My Commodore 128. It still works, although most of the 5.25" floppies have degraded beyond repair. 

Oh those were the days. I remember when I was a kid I was afraid to type "Y" on the "Are you sure" prompt for GO64 because I thought it would screw the computer *permanently*. )

Danced in circles the first time I actually managed to beat Action Biker. Fuck you, Mastertronic. Fuck you.

Emulate the 1541!

[Retro]

I... don't really have anything geeky in my house. Ignoring stuff like computer files and generic mainstream game consoles, I think the closest thing I have to anything geeky would be my large mixing board for recording stuff, but even that feels like a bit of a stretch.

[Schilcote]

Four boxes of Model-7 motherboards. I've had them since I was young. They are entirely useless. Also two broken UPSes, one of which I "rebuilt" and is currently sitting next to my computer waiting for the power to go out or someone to touch it and get electrocuted. Or perhaps it's my BOE-Bot that's acquired a thick coating of dust. Or maybe it's my two old computers which are currently holding up my bed frame. Or maybe that ancient MacOS 5 machine I'm using as a bedstand. Or the cardboard box full of stuff from United Nuclear (thermite, some random pyro stuff, and an atomizer quarter-full of 750PPM gibberellic acid). Or my old bedstand, an "All-In-One CISSP Exam Guide Fourth Edition".

And that's just the stuff I can name without looking behind me.

EDIT:

Oh, and there's a CPU that fits into the Model-7s floating around here somewhere too. I think.

[Puck]

but I still think the geekiest thing I own (and ever owned...) are a few magnetic particles on my harddisk arranged in a way only Dwarf Fortress can be responsible for.

And I'm stumped you all overlooked that in your own lives

Do I get extra points if I have Dwarf Fortress on a Linux USB stick?

If I had any authority on this, I'd even declare you thread winner.

Until somebody comes along and proves they installed linux on their dishwasher or vacuum cleaner.

[Schilcote]

but I still think the geekiest thing I own (and ever owned...) are a few magnetic particles on my harddisk arranged in a way only Dwarf Fortress can be responsible for.

And I'm stumped you all overlooked that in your own lives

Do I get extra points if I have Dwarf Fortress on a Linux USB stick?

If I had any authority on this, I'd even declare you thread winner.

Until somebody comes along and proves they installed linux on their dishwasher or vacuum cleaner.

I got linux on my Ds and my wii...

[Puck]

I dont see how you can clean dishes with a DS but Wii's do suck in dust with the fan.

[RedKing]

Surely somebody out there has reprogrammed a Roomba?

[Virex]

A quick jump into my book collection reveals a travel guide to the universe, a book titled "The search for planet X" about the search for new planets in our solar system, a book titled "Impossible figures" about, well you can guess, several books about dragons, a gemstone and mineral guide, a book titled "the 27 wonders of the ancient world", "A short history of nearly everything" (which I can highly recommend), about half a dozen books by Jules Verne, Dune, a novel about Newton (my mom has another one about Newton I also intend to read), the full Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy collection (in English mind you, all others are in Dutch) and a dozen books related to chemistry and chemical engineering (but they don't count because that's what I'm studying)


edit: Someone said something about reprograming Roomba's?

[Tsarwash]

An aluminium flight case filled with video carts and games.

Or maybe it's the two big boxes of categorised wires and leads.

[RedKing]

4. My Commodore 128. It still works, although most of the 5.25" floppies have degraded beyond repair. 

Oh those were the days. I remember when I was a kid I was afraid to type "Y" on the "Are you sure" prompt for GO64 because I thought it would screw the computer *permanently*. )

Danced in circles the first time I actually managed to beat Action Biker. Fuck you, Mastertronic. Fuck you.

Emulate the 1541!

I still have a cart modem (300 baud!) as well. I think somewhere in my Cold War-drenched psyche, I keep expecting a nuclear holocaust/AI rebellion/zombie apocalypse and thinking "Gee, what things might be useful to rebuild society and/or coordinate the Resistance against our Soviet/cyborg/Chinese/zombie overlords?"

Probably same reason we built a network of tree forts, trap snares and punji pits in the woods as kids. The Red Army might beat our finest, but God have mercy on their souls if they ever tangled with schoolkids. 

[Virex]

4. My Commodore 128. It still works, although most of the 5.25" floppies have degraded beyond repair. 

Oh those were the days. I remember when I was a kid I was afraid to type "Y" on the "Are you sure" prompt for GO64 because I thought it would screw the computer *permanently*. )

Danced in circles the first time I actually managed to beat Action Biker. Fuck you, Mastertronic. Fuck you.

Emulate the 1541!

I still have a cart modem (300 baud!) as well. I think somewhere in my Cold War-drenched psyche, I keep expecting a nuclear holocaust/AI rebellion/zombie apocalypse and thinking "Gee, what things might be useful to rebuild society and/or coordinate the Resistance against our Soviet/cyborg/Chinese/zombie overlords?"
 

That reminds me that on one of the floors in the Helix (main building of the chemical engineering department of our university) there's a cabinet with old computer mouses with a sing asking people to donate more to the museum. All over the place you can also find all kinds of chemical glassware, vials and pots with unidentified and probably toxic solids and god knows what kinds of apparatuses. The electrical engineering department isn't much better. The study association of the Mechanical Engineering department is even said to have their own land yacht, but I've never seen it (I've seen a model of it though.)