I'm of the opinion that if I applied myself properly to one particular classically nerdy speciality of knowledge I might well be able to call myself a Nerd. (I already fulfil the 'loner' aspect.) And similarly I would very much like to have a more geeky background (IMHO, geeks can only be geeks in amongst other geeks, one can't be one by oneself... saving the variety with the chicken fixation, at least.)
Despite being in lieu of the opportunity to fully qualify myself to the world as a whole as a either of the above, I still tend to describe myself as either one or the other (depending on who I talk to), at least when I don't encompass my whole being in the phrase "I'm a computery-type person".
I think it's all in the eye of the beholder, anyway. And as I sit here, headphones on listening to silence (I need to go back upstairs to cue the next radio comedy, and haven't yet hooked up the remote control to the other PC that's broadcasting them down to me), no room lights on but lit only by the glare of the three screens (showing Bay12 forums, Urban Dead and KOL; with obscured windows or tabs for XKCD, a MUD's noticeboards, two spreadsheets tracking socially irrelevent data, the .18 DF folder, the 0.16 DF folder and the root directories of three separate USB external drives and a directory within which I have some OpenData information regarding the topology and geography of large tracts of mainland Britain, ready to be converted to a more usable form once I get a handle on the various data formats being used) all highlighting the nigh-on characterless keyboard on which I type (most of the alphabetic keys having had their print worn off through overuse, and some of them with even the plastic of the key worn through to reveal a hole into the hollow interior in one spot or other) and one other partially rebuilt computer base unit within reach, I'm just not so sure whether I'm a geek or a nerd at all...
Maybe if I was an actual success with any of it, I might change my mind, but I often examine myself and find myself in the middle of so much unfinished geek-worthy or nerd-worthy activities, and distracted by pseudo-social activities such as posting to forums like this even while keeping at least two steps back from waxing lyrical about all the real life issues that affect me...
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Topic: Are you a nerd? (Read 6979 times)