Are You A Geek?
When I was at school, being even remotely nerdy required a health warning. It meant you were part of an entirely undesirable social substrata. It meant the ‘cool’ kids would punch you in the back of the head without provocation. And it meant verbal abuse was commonplace.
Today, however, things have changed. In fairness, it’s probably more to do with the fact I left school 13 years ago. But nevertheless, something about geekiness seems to have become more acceptable. Maybe it’s thanks to the iPod generation. Maybe it’s something to do with the success of graphic novels at the box office. Or maybe it’s just down to the fact we’ve all got internet access. Whatever the reason, though, geek chic is here to stay.
But that being the case, it presents us with a problem. When do acceptable levels of nerdiness cross the line into genuine geek? Below, we’ve highlighted some sure-fire ways of telling if you’ve ‘gone too far’.
You’re definitely a nerd if.
. you’ve ever studied so hard you’ve fallen into a state of perpetual anxiety that’s resulted in a prescription of xanax.
. you’ve ever found yourself feeling ‘fruity’ at the notion of getting it on with Gillian Anderson.
. you’ve ever dismantled a PC to add extra memory or fit a superior graphics card.
. you used to thumb through the lingerie section of the Littlewoods catalogue.
. you’ve ever settled down for an evening of World of Warcraft, wearing only underpants and accompanied by little more than three Red Bulls and a big bowl of cheesy Wotsits.
. your ambition from a young age was to become an accountant.
. you’ve ever queued outside HMV at midnight to get your hands on the latest Call of Duty.
. as an adult you read and, worse still, enjoyed any of the Harry Potter books.
. you’ve since gone on to justify reading Harry Potter by using words like ‘dark’ and ‘scary’. This being the case, congratulations, that hole you’re digging just got deeper.
. you’ve ever owned a pair of Dr Martens.
. you have an alphabetised DVD collection that includes Anime.
. there’s nothing you like more on a Sunday morning than watching repeats of Scrapheap Challenge on More4.
. you know by heart your wireless router’s network key.
. you end up nursing a semi on the train when the pretty girl sitting opposite brushes your foot with hers.
. you deconstruct your lunchtime Mars bar – first by nibbling away the chocolate, then the caramel and finally the nougat.
. you serialise the bank notes in your wallet into chronological order.
. you’ve ever bought a magazine that allows you, week by week, to build your own 1:24 replica Spitfire.
. your ‘online gamer tag’ includes a reference to either a mythical beast or a ninja.
. you understood Deception at the first time of asking.
. your birthday and Christmas lists comprise of nerdy gifts like super-sized Japanese Star Wars figures, T-shirts with a ‘witty’ phrase and an industrial-sized box of Wham bars.
In all honesty though, when it comes to gifts for geeks, chances are they’ve already downloaded most of what they want. So one suggestion is to get over to Gone Digging and take a look at some of the nerdy gifts available to personalise. You’ll find mugs, posters, jigsaws and alike, all readymade for the ?ber nerd.
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