As many of you are aware, when living part-time in a niche culture you get the worst of both worlds. You're not quite passable as a normal person, because you sometimes use a specialized vocabulary, and get at least some of the references to geeky subjects that out you as One of Those. Yet at the same time you're never quite accepted by Those because you don't know every damned little thing that they happen to know.

With the exception of maybe a few games, I can honestly say I don't know any game well enough to be an absolute authority on it. I just don't have the patience to dwell whole-heartedly in the magical world of Fester's Quest for example, yet one of the first memories I have of this half-in, half-out nonsense was when a then-girlfriend's brother was haranguing me for not playing the game well enough. As if that was the reason I was visiting their house.

It's not just games, of course. An old friend of mine was an absolute Star Trek fan, read all the books, knew the movies and episodes front-to-back. It wasn't a real world for him, but it might as well have been. One day even he ran afoul of the nerd police when he was chatting with a random jerk at a Star Trek convention, who yelled at him for not knowing the REAL reason Klingons suddenly had bumpy foreheads in the movies.

I guess we all need our island to stand on, and human beings in general seem to believe, individually, that they're secretly on to something the rest of the world doesn't quite understand. Hell, I'm just as likely, I know-- But I'll be damned if I'm going to pretend I know something I don't, and I'm still be willing to talk openly about that, and learn about stuff I don't currently know, rather than spend weeks researching before I bother to start typing. That means that I'll occasionally be outing myself as not a perfect geek, or a perfect normal, or whatever goddamned label people enjoy using.

I tolerate the pedantic because I'm interested in learning more about stuff I don't understand yet, as long as they're willing to realize that there's a bigger world beyond their little islands.

Parley concluded. Now, bring us your finest meats and cheeses.