May just sent me a really nice article about “nerds”. After reading, I concluded I'm a “meta nerd”; I'm such a sad case that nerds would probably react to me the way “norms” react to nerds.
Let's take a look at it:
Actually, I'm not such a good programmer, or sysadmin, or anything. I know what computers can do, and I see ways in which they're not doing it. I like to design software, more than write it. In fact, if nerds program to solve a problem — in most cases, I lose interest in a project after I'm happy with the design, because I already “solved” the problem I was interested in.
“Norms” see me as a nerd.
“Nerds” think I'm full of vapour.
I like proportional fonts. I like moving, I'll move across cities, states, countries, continents if I can. I like changing jobs. Do I have control issues and need to live in an artificial “system” I build? Sure, like any other nerd. However, I like to build those systems too. When I get tired of my system, I tear it down.
“Norms” think I'm batshit crazy.
“Nerds” think I'm batshit crazy.
I rarely bother with it long enough to solve it; just long enough to understand how it works so that I could potentially design a variation. In fact, as I'm learning it, I'm already designing a variation in my head — which 9 times out of 10 gets discarded afterwards, as it was only a mental exercise.
“Norms” think I'm a nerd.
“Nerds” think I'm not.
Jury's still out on that one.
Must... concentrate... and... finish... writing... post...
Ah screw it, I'll watch another 15 minutes of the movie first.
Ok, back. Anyway.
I'll do 10 things at the same time, and in a way, they will be related to me. Even if it's a way that's impossible to explain.
And yeah, I don't keep much in my head. I think my brain is full of hyperlinks by this point. About one year ago, I'd say I'd panic if I lost my browser bookmarks. Now, I can say I'd reconstruct them in about two hours.
“Norms” think I'm hard to follow.
“Nerds” think I must be dumb or something.
The article says most nerds have a “flag word” that indicates he's not really paying attention because his system has already flagged the conversation as irrelevant.
I don't. I go do something else. Or interrupt.
“Norms” think I'm fucking rude.
“Nerds” think I'm fucking rude.
Meanwhile, life goes on.