Quote of the Day

[andrewducker]

Small talk is the bane of the nerd’s existence because small talk is a combination of aspects of the world that your nerd hates. When your nerd is staring at a stranger, all he’s thinking is, “I have no system for understanding this messy person in front of me”. This is where the shy comes from. This is why nerds hate presenting to crowds.

The skills to interact with other people are there. They just lack a well-defined system.

From The Nerds Handbook
Which seems to be more of a handbook for dealing with nerds than one for nerds to read.

Comments

[hirez.livejournal.com]

I fear I shall agree with that title.

Where do these idiot people come from? The ones that come striding into an industry that's been employing hackers (I am very much not at home to the terms nerd, geek or spod, if only because I fail at being an Aspie, don't think it's big or clever to aspire to the grim stereotype that ESR wrote about in the Hackers's Dictionary, yet still manage to hold down a job bothering Unix boxes. I must be some sort of impostor.) since the late thirties and are shocked and confused when confronted with a surly mob of technical types. I don't know what industry for which they'd be a better fit, mind.

[FX: Deep breath]

Sorry. I don't know what came over me.