Life At the Nerd Tables, Part 2: "If You Read the Books..."

"Gandalf is going to send Jack Sparrow on a dragon through the wardrobe to Tatooine in Warp 5 to kill the Cullen brothers with a Quidditch ball."

The above quote summarizes a little bit too well what went on with this particular group of nerds.  I'll refer to this group as "Nerd General"--a few drama people, a few music people, maybe one or two techies (but put more than two and that completely changes everything), and an overarching group of people who have far too much knowledge about a particular school subject/popular franchise.

For example, I know a lot about Pirates of the Caribbean.  I can tell you how old Captain Jack Sparrow was when he became captain of the Black Pearl.  I can tell you what he did as a teenager.  I can even tell you what he did in those two years before he was viciously mutinied upon.

Similarly, I had friends who had read so much Star Wars Extended Universe, you can't even theorize Star Wars VII's plot line in their presence because this will happen:

You were doing fine there until you said "daughter"

Anyway, the first line of this post is basically the end of the conversation that sparked my Mixed-Up Fantasy World Facebook Note Serial (click the link to read, but please don't read if you can't stand fantasy/crossovers/magic/fan fiction/people who hadn't read Harry Potter when they wrote it or if you like Twilight).  Incidentally, I should probably give ginormous credit for that work to my friend Cutler who inspired it, thought it was awesome, and said he saved it to his computer when he quit Facebook for a while.

Kind of like any five minute conversation when you eat with a bunch of people who are part of "Nerd General."

Yeah, that's oddly probably one of the things they should warn you before you eat with us.  You will lose the game.  Regularly.  I don't know, maybe this happens with jocks too.

"What is the game?" some ignorant to the phenomenon may ask.
It's a game everyone in the world is playing.  Some are just not aware yet. Your only goal is to not think of "the game."  As soon as you have thought of "the game," you have lost the game.  Now that you are aware, you are required to play.  Have a nice life!

Okay, the other thing is, there is probably an expert on some topic within your general facility.

Have a history question?
We got a few of those people.  And we'll give you a hundred extra details besides for free.
Have a Star Wars question?
Over there, those people are.  Wielding lightsabers, they are.


Want to know any details about what the Silmarillion is  and what is contained within its
pages?
The Lord of the Rings fans are over in that direction, huddled over their rings, muttering, "My precious." (Some of them aren't even at the nerd tables.)

Theology question?
Hello, this is a Bible college.  Let's all get together and thoroughly discuss this based on what each of us has learned under our sundry pastors and teachers and own private study.  No guarantee we'll end up with an answer, but we'll be more in awe of God than when we started.

And this could easily go on at any nerd table.

And if you haven't read/watched what we're about to discuss, prepare to be in a world of confusion.  I mean, at the table I discussed in Part 1, I was almost never confused, except when people cryptically talked about conversations that I hadn't been around.

Here, I get confused when the Star Wars people start discussing Extended Universe or, until I read Silmarillion, anything that didn't happen within the pages of The Hobbit or The Lord of the Rings.  Seriously, you ask a Star Wars person a simple question like, "Who is the father of Anakin Skywalker?"  Next thing you know, you're treated to a ten minute dissertation about how midichlorians work and how they possibly could have gotten inside Shmi Skywalker, and just when you think they're about done--BAM!--Darth Bane somehow gets dragged into it because he is apparently, cool.

I know, like, nothing about this guy, but apparently, some people know a lot.

Or, for my own personal example, you ask a simple question, like, "When did Memorial Day start?"
"Memorial Day started with the Civil War when Southern women went to decorate the graves of their soldiers.  This eventually also caught on in the North.  It was originally known as Decoration Day, but over time, we came to call it Memorial Day."
"Why is it the last Monday of May?"
"Hold on; let me Google that...Some general declared it.  And actually Memorial Day is May 30.  The Monday thing is 'Memorial Day (Observed).'"

All that knowledge crammed in my head, and I still struggle finding my way to the closest restaurant that sells shawarma without typing the address into my GPS.

You have no idea how badly I want to be at that table.

So, basically, I mean, it's really hard to explain this group of people to anyone outside of us.  It's just kind of like a random conglomeration of people who all happen to be nerdy about something.  More than likely, we all were nerdy about different stuff, but the fact that society had for some reason classified us as nerds was enough for us to sit at the same table, pull up a chair (And another.  And another.  And another.), and eat a meal together, laughing hysterically and occasionally plunging deep into the depths of theology before rising back into laughter because someone said something totally hilarious that did relate/was supposed to relate to the conversation, but now we're laughing, and the topic has completely changed.

But, like I said, maybe the jocks are like that too.
I wouldn't know, though, because I've never really been one.
And I don't need to be to be cool.
Because being a nerd is way too much fun.  And, you know, considering we have the people that ultimately control the technology the jocks and the regular people use, we will one day rule the world!

"What are we going to do tonight, Brain?"  "The same thing we do every night, Pinky.  Try to take over the world through methods that can't be mentioned on the Internet lest Katrina fall under suspicion if any of them happen."