March 6, 2008
the nerd handbook
Behold the nerd psychological blueprint, which is more accurate than I care to admit . Most notable is this little part, which has done wonders in helping my friends understand my behavior:
Your nerd has built an annoyingly efficient relevancy engine in his head. It’s the end of the day and you and your nerd are hanging out on the couch. The TV is off. There isn’t a computer anywhere nearby and you’re giving your nerd the daily debrief. “Spent an hour at the post office trying to ship that package to your mom, and then I went down to that bistro — you know — the one next the flower shop, and it’s closed. Can you believe that?”
And your nerd says, “Cool”.
Cool? What’s cool? The business closing? The package? How is any of it cool? None of it’s cool. Actually, all of it might be cool, but your nerd doesn’t believe any of what you’re saying is relevant. This is what he heard, “Spent an hour at the post office blah blah blah…”
You can be rightfully pissed off by this behavior — it’s simply rude — but seriously, I’m trying to help here. Your nerd’s insatiable quest for information and The High has tweaked his brain in an interesting way. For any given piece of incoming information, your nerd is making a lightning fast assessment: relevant or not relevant? Relevance means that the incoming information fits into the system of things your nerd currently cares about. Expect active involvement from your nerd when you trip the relevance flag. If you trip the irrelevance flag, look for verbal punctuation announcing his judgment of irrelevance. It’s the word your nerd says when he’s not listening and it’s always the same. My word is “Cool”, and when you hear “Cool”, I’m not listening.
Information that your nerd is exposed to when the irrelevance flag is waving is forgotten almost immediately. I mean it. Next time you hear “Cool”, I want you to ask, “What’d I just say?” That awkward grin on your nerd’s face is the first step in getting him to acknowledge that he’s the problem in this particular conversation.
Cool? We good? Hug it out?
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17 Responses to “the nerd handbook”
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is everybody trying to get me killed?
I’m watching you.
Christ. I think I just gave the juju away.
My bad.
Cool!
fuck, tracy just stole my response.
One ‘cool’ per post, bitches.
So, does this constitute your “Meet the Flockers” post, Jeff? If so, welcome!
My two are “fantastic” or “fair enough”
I think mine is cool. I’ll have to ask Amy.
Mine (though I don’t apply it universally) is: “That’s an idea.”
I also like, huh.
“Sure”
Am I supposed to do a “Meet the Flockers” post, India? ‘Cause I want a re-do if so.
Mine is, “yeah.” I don’t recommend it, because it has the unfortunate side effect of signing you up for whatever is being mumbled at you.
Jeff: It is customary to do so. Deron’s supposed to tell you these things before the hazing starts.
He did warn you about the hazing, right?
Deron mentioned something about being duct-taped to a Wendy’s drive-through blah blah chainsaws blah blah no more hair. Whatever. Didn’t sound important so I just kept saying, “cool.”
He did, I’m sure, omit the bits about a customary post, but it seems I’m well in violation at this point. Sigh.
there’s still time, Jeff. say hello.