Das Ubergeeken

Ubergeek: n., /oo´ber·geek/

An Overgeek. A geek who is either extremely geeky, or highly admired by geeks with similar interests. It is sometimes used as a humorous spoof of the German word "ubermensch" (a person with great powers or abilities).

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=ubergeek

I’ll admit it, I have no problem being a geek. In fact, if you ever see me in Staples, OfficeMax or Fry’s and call me a geek, I will probably smile and thank you. You see, in computer circles, there is no greater title, no greater badge, no greater position than ubergeek.

We wear lanyards for companies or organizations that we got at CES, Comdex, DefCon, or QuakeCon. We drink coffee and Mt. Dew almost exclusively. We walk around wearing t-shirts that no one understands except us, and we find them friggin’ hilarious! Our inside jokes make no sense to anyone who isn’t in the know. We turn into giddy kids when we learn something new about scripting. We are the people that make the world based on electrons function.

But that’s just a small sample.

The truth is that everyone is a geek in there own right. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with it. The sooner you admit it, the better off you are. Everyone who has a passion that they delve into full bore, to the point where they have become a near expert on the subject is a geek.

Anyone who can recite the list of the Oscar winners for best supporting actor is a movie geek. If you remember all the calculations involved in sabermetrics, you are most definitely a baseball geek. If you have all ten seasons of ‘Friends’ on DVD AND the ‘Friends’ board game, you are a TV geek.

Take myself for example. I have always had a (at times unhealthy) love of military aircraft. Until I learned that my eyesight wouldn’t get me near a plane, all I ever wanted to be was a fighter pilot. There is something almost spiritual about being strapped into the nose of a machine that can surpass 1400 mph. I have never had the chance to fly in a fighter jet, but I have sat in a cockpit, and even at 0 mph, I could feel an adrenaline rush.

You know you are a geek when you turn to your brother in a movie and say this…

‘Man, they would NEVER use that type of missile on an apache helicopter!’

‘You idiot, they are shooting at Godzilla! They don’t HAVE to be accurate!’

I have always had a passion for the sciences, specifically theoretical physics. The things that I have read about that can be shown mathematically go beyond science fiction, and defy imagination. Picturing superstrings, membranes, wormholes, and ten physical dimensions in ones head seems dull to most, but fascinating to me. Writing a college thesis on ‘Three Popular Motion Pictures and their Adherence to the Laws of Theoretical Causality’ was the most fun I ever had in comp 102. And anyone who understands the title knows what I mean!

Anyone who knows a lot of any information about any subject, and is proud of it, is a geek. This is true whether the information is pertaining to your profession or not. If you enjoy being a lawyer, you are a law geek, plain and simple.

Love it, be proud of it, embrace it, cherish it, and accept it. Then say it with me…

‘One of us… one of us!!!’