How to be Geeky

Weird Al's White and Nerdy

This of course is in no way designed to be the end-all, just a humorous romp through some very.... nerdy... things.

First, the background.

You see, to be geeky, you have to know geeky things. I'm not necessarily talking about quarks and quantum physics. I'm also talking about the sub-culture of internet memes and crazy things that are fun and get referenced quite a bit. That way, you can pull from the same database of weird and wonky things and know what we mean by them. So, if someone fakes an accent saying "H'OK, so. Here's the Eaaarth" you know it's from The End of the World.

Next, you gotta play the part.

This is doing stuff like making awkward gestures, being unsettled in non-nerd social groups, and wearing coke bottle glasses. No, wait, that's the stereotype. Actually it's more about what you do when you find out the person you're talking to is a nerd. The vast majority of nerds can in fact blend in very well with their environment. The trick is to find other nerds and then nerd out together. For example, talking about games is OK since even jocks play games (otherwise EA wouldn't exist). The trick is if the other person says stuff like that they play World of WarCraft (or WoW, get with the lingo dude), then you might be on to something. Except for me, I don't play WoW. The real trick is if they play other stuff or are known to be extremely awesome on their server. Even better if they are into game design, as in have ideas about how to make games better, but aren't actually in the field. OK, they can be in the game industry, but that just makes them professional geeks that make money.

Then, now that you have revealed their geekiness, reveal yours. Often, geeks get extremely emotional about stuff they like. Thus, the whole Star Wars versus Star Trek feud we make fun of so much. So, get into it, start throwing around more geeky language (LOL pronounced 'lawl' is a quality and popular one), even if you don't know anything about what they're talking about. Just appear interested. Sometimes you can trick us if you just probe us and keep us talking. I'm serious. I've goaded many people into 30 minute rants while I sat and ate dinner.

And Finally, get street cred.

The thing about the nerd community is it can be very tightly networked. So, as your nerdiness spreads, other nerds will pop out and recognize you as a nerd. Unless you're one of those sneaky people who never post pictures of themselves that can be traced back to their forum screen names and so will only reveal themselves by telling you their screen name and then you realize you've been talking with that forum moderator that you keep having flame wars with on that one forum. That was a joke in case you were wondering.

Something to help you along is to surf YouTube. It is incredibly geeky. I'm not talking about those emo kids talking into their webcams, I'm talking about viral videos of crazy. Like this one:



See? They can also be AWESOME.

Well, have fun. Geeks can be fun to be. Just don't go too far, I'd rather not know you as that person I have to have a ban hammer ready for every time people start to talk about Mac versus PC and you complain that everything isn't Linux. Not that I have anything against Linux, it's just that there are some very, very whiny Linux people. =]

Laterz