Friday, May 20, 2011

Geek Cred

Every once in a while it comes up in casual conversation that I am a big dork.

Most of the time, my dorky-geeky-nerdiness is kind of simmering under the surface, noticeable if you are looking, but not necessarily obvious to someone I don't know. 

I think, "I've got my geekiness under control.  I am not a nerd, I am cool.  See this?  I am one of the cool kids."

And then someone makes a offhand comment about Lord of the Rings, and my nerdiness explodes like Mt. St. Helens and flattens 230 square miles in minutes.

So this is confession time.

  1. Starting around my 12th birthday, I reread the entire Lord of the Rings Trilogy and the Hobbit at least once a year, every year. This didn't stop until around the time the movies came out, and I reread the books so many times during that period that the last time I got to The Return of the King, I had stopped enjoying it, and thought it boring.  It's been a few years, though, and I have been thinking about buying the series for my Kindle.

  2. I watched Star Trek the Next Generation religiously, and saw all the movies in the theater.

  3. I played role playing games for fun in high school and college.  Dungeons and Dragons.  I thought that somehow I was cooler for playing a cool character all the time.  I also (briefly) played Vampire, the Masquerade, the live action role playing game which took being a dork to new levels.

  4. At one point in my life, I owned every Dragonlance book ever written.

  5. I still think being an Evil Wizard when I grow up would be the COOLEST job ever.  But I would totally have to be Neutral Evil, because Chaotic Evil ends up crazy and Lawful Evil is totally boring.

Something that I have come to realize, though, is that there are a LOT of geeks out in the world today.  We might not have tape in the middle of our glasses (we wear contacts or got Lasik), or wear our pants hiked up to our armpits (unless we are being hipster/ironic), and we hardly ever have a buck-toothed (orthodontics) guffaw that clears a room anymore.  But deep down, we're still nerds.

Are you a nerd?  A geek?  A dork?  Find out with my "Geek Cred Test" (listed below).  Each "Yes" answer is 1 point.

  1. Have you ever used any of the following pickup lines (and expected them to work)?
    "I have a 20 charisma, baby!"
    "I am reaching into my bag of holding and pulling out CHARM!"
    "I tried a saving throw, but you've bewitched me!"
    "Is that 1d20 in your pocket, or are you happy to see me?" (Variations on the dice also count!)

  2. Have you ever dressed up as a cast member of Star Trek and gone out in public on any day other than Halloween?

  3. Have you ever gotten into an argument about whether the Millennium Falcon or the Starship Enterprise would win in a fight?

  4. Do you know what the SCA is?  (Bonus point:  Have you ever considered joining the SCA, been involved in a Renaissance fair as a goat boy, chess monk, dunking wench, etc, or own clothing that would pass at an SCA meeting or Ren Fair?)

  5. Do you still watch Anime?

  6. Have you ever tried, whether successfully or not, to learn a made up language (such as Klingon or Esperanto)?  Being able to write in the phonetic rune alphabet as seen in Tolkien's books counts.

  7. Do you know the answer to life, the universe, and everything?

  8. Does most of your knowledge about Greek, Roman, and Norse mythology come from comic books?

  9. Do you now, or have you ever owned dice to play any game other than Yahtzee?  Bonus point:  Have you ever owned a 20 sided die?

  10. Are vampires in your world evil, mindless, blood sucking fiends that burst into flames in the sun (as opposed to sparkling)?

Write down your total in the comments below.  I promise not to judge you.  Much.

Scoring:  1-3: Mildly Dorky, 4-6: Repressed Geek, 7-9: Total Nerd, 10: SUPERNERD, Over 10: Wanna come over to my house and watch Akria while we play Cyberpunk?

    11 comments:

    Nobody said...

    Afraid I got 9/10. Never did dress up like a Star Trek character. I wasn't sure about the language thing as Ive tried creating my own fantasy language so that just about the same thing. But I will totally be down with Akira and cyberpunk..hehehe

    LeeAnn said...

    1. no
    2. yes
    3. yes
    4. yes bigtime
    5. no
    6. no
    7. yes, of course
    8. no
    9. yes (fishbowl full)
    10. yes
    so....6/10, but I think my awesomeness in a boob-exalting bodice cuts me some slack.

    Tim said...

    I'm at an 8. Your bonus questions all screwed me into geekdom.

    Leauxra said...

    If anyone's wondering, I got 9/10. How is it that Mr. BT Hadley is the only one to score that high? Or is it that he is ADMITTING that he scored that high... Trying to hide your geekiness should count as a bonus point.

    BT: Are you trying to say that you've told girls at bars that you have a 20 Charisma?

    LeeAnn: A boob exalting bodice definitely cuts you some slack... or at least cuts off circulation and airflow, but it doesn't make you less of a geek. Embrace your inner nerd! Also, we have cookies.

    Timmah: I have a hard time believing I scored higher than you. Did I miss some important question of dork-topia?

    Anonymous said...

    um.... is 12 bad? 12 is bad, right? And I can probably get even geekier than that if you wanna talk about Highlander...

    Leauxra said...

    No no, 12 is GOOD hoodyhoo. And about Highlander... I couldn't come up with a good question, there were so many. Does Queen make you want to cut someone's head off? If you get a cocktail sword do you take it out and say, "There can be only one"? Did you watch the TV show?

    I guess what I am saying, hoody, is that you win.

    Anonymous said...

    Answer -- Queen either makes me want to cut someone's head off or I start crying for poor dead Heather (depends on the hormones, I think). Also, what ELSE would you do with a cocktail sword... although I have my own broadsword to play with as well. And I actually like the TV show quite a bit -- that Watcher dude was friggin' HOT!

    Shane said...

    I did most of the above and then some. I just started playing Dungeons and Dragons again, after not playing for about 25 years, and I love love love it still.

    I quit playing because I convinced myself that I would never have a girlfriend if I did (I was fourteen), which was probably true, and it took me until now to decide that what really matters is having fun. Crazy.

    It helps that I live in a German-speaking country, where there is no irony and so the people here don't think I'm a geek.

    My friends in the states think I'm a dork anyway.

    Leauxra said...

    hoody, I totally had a crazy moment where I was picturing Giles from Buffy the Vampire Slayer instead of Duncan's watcher, and was like, "Whaaaa...?" It's OK now. And people stopped letting me have pointy things a while back, but that was AFTER I spent my 20's getting at least one knife or sword from EVERY SINGLE BOYFRIEND I DATED. Seriously, WTF, guys? Do you know me at all?

    Shane: You probably WOULD have gotten a nice geeky girlfriend if you'd only stuck with it. But moving to Germany to hide was an excellent idea. I should have done that YEARS ago.

    Julia said...

    I have NOTHING in common with any of you Dorks! NOTHING hear me??

    Leauxra said...

    Yeah, yeah... keep telling yourself that while you secretly watch Battlestar Galactica and Doctor Who in your basement when no one can see.