Here’s a fun list of stuff about which I am pretty passionate, about which I know at least slightly more than the average person and about which I am constantly in fear of talking too much.
Over at Stainless Steel Droppings, Carl posted this thread. Fun exercise…
Pre-skull-hardening:
1) Legos. I’d spend virtually hours sitting on the floor with my big blue bag of legos, sorting them meticulously. I’d sit there so long, my legs would go all numb, but still I would search for the perfect pieces. Legos were instrumental in helping me hone my obsessive compulsive disorder. After a model was completed, I remember I had this odd routine where I would stare at it, blinking a certain number of times until it looked just right on display in my closet. Yeah, let’s move on…
2) Star Trek: The Next Generation. I was so into TNG that I called it “TNG”. I went through a 12 step so I’m better now. See below.
3) TNG technical paraphernalia. I had (by “had”, I mean “have”) the Technical Manual; the dang-near-life-size Enterprise D cut-away poster, showing decks and away vehicles and such; and the Enterprise D die cast model with working separation between the engine and deck portions.
4) Star Trek: The Next Generation books. Yep, I read the books too. That Trek was in print was embarrassing enough. It was quite another thing explaining the occasional titles to people. Metamorphosis: The Giant Novel clocked in at probably under 150 pages. They actually had to include the word “giant” on the flagship books to convince their readership of its legitimacy.
5) Basketball. Played since I was 7 or 8 I think. I practiced every morning from 6:30am till the school bell rang.
6) Star Wars role playing. Jimmy can tell you all about this. He and I used to make up whole episodes the ongoing saga in his basement with our action figures. Great fun. He even had an audio cassette of one such episode, but I think it’s dead.
7) Going to bed and rising early. I remember waking up so early on Saturday morning for cartoons that the stupid color bar test patterns were still on the TV!
8) Black & White outlook. Things are never quite as clear as through the eyes of a child.
9) Single-piece wardrobe. I loved my green shirt and blue jeans. That’s all I ever wore, I think, if it weren’t for my mother.
10) Girls. Girls were gross, and I would rather be caught dead than caught looking at one.
Post-skull-hardening:
1) Girls. You can’t tell me God’s not a guy. “Wo, Man!” were the first two words that Adam uttered after his rib-ectomy operation. And gauging the male comments on a recent Percolations.net post, it’s safe to say that I have much company.
2) Debate. This is one that, if I’m not careful, I will embarrass myself silly. I’ve argued myself into corners and tend to get way too emotionally invested and defensive. But I love to argue and I’ve been told that I’m contrarian.
3) Spirituality & Doctrine. I think it’s extremely fun to wax poetic about The Big Questions.
4) Using big words. It’s a raging habit that embarrasses me after the fact. It’s a sure sign of pretense and compensatory for a weak intellect. Oops, I did it again!
5) Quality sci-fi like Firefly and Battlestar (remake), and of course Star Wars and lots of other stuff.
6) Indie music. One word: podcasting. FM radio annoys me. It makes me furrow my brow (except NPR). Top 40 is music for the masses. I don’t want to be part of the masses. Give me underground music, or give me death. Life without The Shins, Innocence Mission, The Gerbils, Clinic, or Wilco would be a bummer. They’re the best music you’ve never heard.
7) Indie movies. You’ll often hear me go on a tirade of how studio-driven, committee-marketed movie drivel sucks. The cure for all of that is independent filmmaking. It’s fresher, more sincere, lower budget, non-formulaic, unpredictable, and zanier.
8) Documentaries. Of all the movies I’ve seen (logged 1280 movie ratings on Netflix), probably 25% of them are documentaries. I tend to get really worked up about them and feel a little embarrassed when I throw the word around too much. I’m afraid people will think I’m “one of those arty snobs.”
9) Netflixing. Not only have I been a member for 5 years, but I have over 1200 ratings, 350 movies in my queue, and I even use a special client program for my computer (a Mac, see below) called Netflix Freak which gives me more control over my Netflix account.
10) Macs. I’m a computer “power user.” That means I don’t just write email and play solitaire. I know how to maintain them and tweak the interface and repair them. Having to do that enough times on the PC with any Windows OS flavor is enough to drive any sane person to other platforms. Tried Linux, BeOS, but settled on Mac OS. I own a PowerMac dual 1.0 GHz machine. It’s sexier than your PeeCee and you know it. What can I say about Macs vs. PCs that hasn’t been said before? It’s summed up more eloquently by this great comic strip from Nickel Arcade: Penny Arcade
Leave a Reply