Great Moments in Personal Nerdery

This is the Paramount Theatre in Seattle. It opened in 1928 as a place to see silent movies and vaudeville shows. At the time it was described as one of the most opulent, beautiful theaters in existence, and the effect of sitting in a seat surrounded by that lavish architecture is striking to this day. It's gorgeous, really.

A few years ago, I sat in that very balcony and watched four men on the stage play D&D to a live audience, complete with live music from comedy rock band Paul and Storm. One of the players: Wil Wheaton.

I regaled this little tidbit on AVClub once, and the late great Lux Lisbon told me it was the saddest, nerdiest thing she'd ever heard:

At some point in my 20s, when I could have been out to all manner of debauchery instead, I spent a New Years eve playing Star Wars trivial pursuit with a friend instead. I went first, and got half the pies before I got a question wrong (which hand does Luke use his lightsaber in).

Hmmmm... what is this "debauchery" you speak of?

Collected explicit runs of John Byrne comics throughout the 80s in hopes of striking it rich in later adolescence. Also, I have been to the Paramount Theatre in Seattle. I saw a ukelele concert.

Is this about Star Wars?

I've had a good many of these, I reckon; highest I ever scored, I suppose, was owning something like 80 or 90 percent of the classic Doctor Who story novelizations from Target Books (my dad often took us to the comic book store on Wednesdays when we spent the night at his place and I'd usually get those). I later delivered them to my fan friend in a massive garbage bag. She hadn't been expecting so many.

Recently, as part of my drawing/comic projects, I ordered a couple of those Osprey Men-at-Arms military costume series which some of you may have seen back in the day in hobby places or the dustier corners of independent bookstores where sweaty, bearded guys occasionally congregated.* One of them was Armies of the Caliphates, 862-1098; I'm working on a comic set in some mishmash of Carolingian France and Umayyad Spain, and expect both the color plates and the commentary (which isn't as helpful post, say, nineteenth-century) to be useful. So not only was it a great moment in personal nerdery, but I also expect I've wound up on some sort of government registry (and it won't stop there; there's Armies of Islam, 7th-11th Centuries, and one on the Moors specifically, both of them by the great David Nicolle, that I'll be ordering in the next couple of weeks).

*I bought Hungary and the Fall of Eastern Europe, 1000-1568, back in my Barnes and Noble days, and my co-workers gave each other condescending stares behind the register as I did so, one of them sniffing, "I always wondered who bought these."

I "liked" it, but it's still such a sad story.

Did you strike it rich?

This was me, 6th grade. Not only was I hopelessly "in love" with a girl in my class (who I hadn't seen since first grade and who remembered I was interested in explorers), but I also had a crush on my teacher. That was one awesome, tortuous world history class.

I waited in line 18 hours for the Wii. Me and my friend showed up like 5 hours before anyone else got there. It is by far my best experience while in High School(helps that like the first six people in line were all from my HS).

I keep a copy of the periodic table in my wallet. In college I had in my regular bookbag a little booklet of the Constitution, Dec. of Independence, some Federalist Papers, etc.

I joined the American Chemical Society just so I could get their periodic table blanket. In my defense, my company paid the membership dues.

I don't even remember what project it was for or what good it could have possibly done, but for something in middle school I drew an extremely detailed map of Middle Earth on like a 24x36 foamboard. I wish I still had it, it's a pain to fold out Tolkien's version from the back of my hardbacks all the time.

I have a blue ribbon at home from when I dipped a toe into the seedy underbelly of... [nerdy drumroll please]... competitive cross stitching.

I really, really want to meet Lifemate.  She's a spinner?  An award-winning spinner?  That's so awesome!  That's one handcraft that has eluded me; many years ago I traveled to a weekend spinning workshop with my mother*, and neither of us did very well at it.  We've whined that just about all the other fibercrafty artisan things we can do -- knitting, stitching, quilting, tatting, weaving... but not spinning.  [/sad trombone]  One thing I managed to learn in that workshop, though, was that the term "spinster" came from how spinning was a chore that would be given to the old unmarried aunt who was too weak to do heavy homestead labor and too uselessly childless to do the childrearing.  As a proud modern spinster I wish I could spin, because it would be fun to be able to connect with my spiritual forebears. 
 
*Hey!  I think I just found my greatest moment in personal nerdery!  Heh.  Although I don't think I'm at all a nerd.  I'm a dork.  There's a big difference.