The Nerd Confession Thread

[bibliophile birds]

I thought I was just an HP fan, not really a nerd -- and then we went to Universal Orlando, where they have the new Harry Potter section of the park. I was so stupid-excited about the whole thing that I now know I am over the edge. Butterbeer, Honeydukes, Zonko's, the Hog's Head, the owl post, Ollivander's...wow. I have never dressed up (and never will), but I did go to a midnight release for the final book (which was really fun) and will probably do a midnight release for one of the final movies. DD is also a fan, so I use her as an excuse to do such things.

So I'll admit it -- I'm a nerd.

i totally accepted that i'm a HP nerd long ago. i was attending the University of Chicago's pre-collegiate scholars program the summer before my senior year of high school when the 4th book came out. as an under-aged student, we had a strict 11pm curfew. well... i wanted to go to the midnight release, so i snuck out (no easy feat) and went to the party at a nearby bookstore.

i wasn't there 30 mins before i noticed someone looking at me. so i turned around to see my floor monitor (who i'd checked in with at 11pm) staring at me. i was sure i was dead. but she actually thought it was hilarious that i'd snuck out to GET A BOOK- and that i'd only been caught because she was out getting the same book.

talk about Nerds Unite!

 

[Henrietta23]

OHHHH fencing instructor!!

Barb wire, woven wire or picket??

They get at least one call a day for farm or yard fencing!

 

[urban dreamer]

(immitates the professor's voice) Good news everyone! I'm getting a brain slug! I couldn't resist! It's so cute! Thanks WZ!

 

[Wifezilla]

Hee hee hee

I tell hubby we should dress as Professor Farnsworth and Mom for Halloween. He doesn't like it when I call him "dustcakes" though.

 

[abifae]

I have all of Red Dwarf on my drive

I'm a clothes nerd too. Victorian, steam punk, anime, geisha...

I'm dressing my niece for school in victorian too!

In other words... one year from now I'll have completed my fashion design school and you can all email me for costumes.

 

[xpc]

I don't know if I should be happy or sad that in Big Bang Theory episode 12, that Sheldon quoted the book "Flat Land" because not only did I read it I also have a copy handy along with a book on one of the greatest physicists that ever lived that he also mentions in another episode. I put some jars of recently canned hamburger as my watermark.

Flatland was first published in 1884, my copy cost $1.50 in 1992

 

[Farmfresh]

And to think ... you were having doubts about belonging in the nerd club!

 

[xpc]

In '80 I bought a Sinclair ZX-80, it only had 1k of memory, but hey, whataya want for only $200. In '82 I upgraded to a Timex Sinclair 1000 for half the price of the ZX-80. 2k of ram, with the 16k expansion pack, a dedicated tape drive and 12" B&W TV. I still have the computer, and a couple of the programs for it, laying around somewhere.

Sounds like we pretty much had the same stuff and you being a ham probably had some fairly expensive neat'o radio equipment to boot <pun.

I recently bought a 500 gigabyte SATA hard drive for $55 shipped from Newegg and for fun dug out my 1987 40 megabyte hardcard which cost me almost $1000, the 1988 Seagate 40 megabyte MFM hard drive cost $500 at that time. Before 1985 most hard drives cost over $5000. which is why just about everyone including me used cassette tape storage.

500,000,000,000 vs 40,000,000 = 12,500 times larger in storage capacity for 1/20th the price. The 40 meg drive might hold 10 photos from a newer digital camera, the new drive about 125,000 pictures. It would also only hold about 1 minute of DVD quality video, the new drive about 250 hours worth.

About 4 years ago I bought a 1 terabyte (1000 gigabyte) Network Addressable Storage (NAS) dual raid server for $500. When I moved I scraped dozens of MFM and RLL drives and now see that they are selling for $200 or more each.

I think that just about proves that men have more expensive toys, after all how much can a brain slug cost?

Hardcard in the back, 40meg on the left and 500gig on the right

 

[xpc]

* I have about a thousand books and fuss about not owning many books

Probably about the same, I packed them all in totes for safe storage and readying for the move.
They are mostly chemistry and physics books and once had a $20,000 rider on my homeowners policy even though they cost more then that.

* I have about 40 thousand ebooks, just in case I need to be a cyber librarian

I only have a few hundred but do have 160 gigabyte on 40 DVDs of "books on tape" 540 of them including Homer's Iliad and Odyssey.
.

* I use only my computer for television, I don't have cable or even own a TV

Same here no TV.

* I can pronounce "Uranus"

You said uranus

I have to buy 3 more to finish packing all the books.

 

[xpc]

*While my friends were still into hotwheels, I begged my mother for my first chemistry set

That was my request too - in hindsight no parent should ever do this unless they also kept your room in an outside bunker.

*I lauched my first "mouse-ter-naut" in an estes rocket at age 9

Mine was a frog and since their butt is water proof figured it wouldn't be so bad on splash down.

*Edumund's Science cataloge is geek porn

You mean kinda like this but in a more disturbing way?