Life at the Nerd Tables, Part 3: "We've Picked the Flowers for Our Funerals"

Fact:  People involved with technology-related fields have very stressful lives.
Fact:  People involved with technology-related fields belong to at least one fandom, more than likely space related.
Fiction:  People involved with technology-related fields have absolutely no life outside of the computer.

Because if we had no lives outside of our computers, we wouldn't have had as many wonderful, hilarious spoken conversations every day at lunch and supper.  And trust me, we needed this humorous break from the everyday stress of life.  I mean, I wasn't one of the tech people at college, but I hung out with them, and they had so many stressful projects going on at any and every given moment, it's a wonder they didn't end up in the insane asylum or dead from the stress.

Although, if they did die in the line of technology duty, several of them did have the flowers for their funerals already picked out, and they would mention it every once in a while.

I guess I should mention that one of the reasons the techies often find themselves stressed out is because of the gigantic social overlap between techies and drama people.

The high case of overlap is likely due to the fact that without the techies, the drama people wouldn't be able to survive.  They wouldn't have lights or sounds for their plays.

Actually, everyone needs the techies.  It's just that the drama people seem to realize it the most.  Maybe the music people too.

By the way, I should clarify what a drama person and a techie are in these instances.

Drama Person:  Someone who is night unto constantly is involved with plays and dramatic productions, whether onstage or backstage
Techie:  People who are good with computers, more than likely have working with them as their work study program

"Which are you?"

Well, I was in one play as a freshman--one play.  I kept trying out for more, but I never made it in.  So I guess I'm not a drama person, really.
I can solve the majority of computer problems "on my own," and typically by the time I would take Baby or Mater or Herbie to a tech guy, he'd be like, "Yeah, something is seriously wrong."  Plus, people would ask me computer questions, but really...I'm not a techie.  I just know what do with my computer.

Yes, I use a PC.  Yes, I'm still unquestionably a nerd.  No, I don't think Apple is evil.  No, I'm not planning on getting a Mac.  No, I can't just fix the problem on your Mac.  Yes, okay, I can fix that problem, but not most of the others.

So I somehow ended up being neither yet really understanding both.

Okay, "understanding" is not the right word.

I did understand what it was like to have all that stress of having a play coming up and still needing to get all your homework done because I've been there.  I understood virtually every word that didst proceed from the mouth of the drama people.

The techies, however...that is a completely different story:

The above picture is actually highly accurate.  Except for the fact the guys should outnumber the girls by a LOT more than what I drew.  Like, seriously, the technology world is extremely full of guys.  Sometimes, my friend Hillary and I would be the only girls at a table full of guys.  If there was a third girl, more than likely it was Jeff's girlfriend, now wife, Kelli.

And by full, I mean, there's only supposed to be about eight chairs at each round table, but then stuff happens, and you're squished at a table with, like, twelve or fifteen people.

But, seriously, this group was one of my favorite groups to eat with.  I mean, yes, sometimes I felt very lost and confused among  these extremely smart tech-savvy guys, but you have to remember that fortunately, they usually were surrounded by drama people.

Me in costume

And drama people are also an extremely stressed-out but hilarious group of people.  I blame it mainly on the sleep deprivation and having to spend half their days pretending to be someone else.  Or more than someone else if they're both in a play and in a class that involves acting.  Like freshman year when in the play Pilgrim Dreams I had to play two citizens of Vanity Fair as well as my "main role" (actually, it was a bit part) as the Wife of Giant Despair (in which I stormed on stage, yelled at a voice over, immortalized the word "nincompoop," and left) and also in speech class recite part of a speech by Daniel Webster.  Why I decided to do a speech by one of America's greatest orators, I still do not know because he was impossible to live up to.

Also, my freshman speech teacher normally sat with us, which was probably fortunate because that probably attracted even more drama people.

Because seriously, if that table was all techies all the time, I probably would have gone crazy or something.  Because if it was just them, well...it kind of ended up like that comic above.

I guess you could say this group was almost the epitome of the term "nerd" or "geek" or whatever you prefer to use.  A lot of the things we would talk about were quite similar to what we talked about over in "Nerd General," but this table even to me just gave off a nerdy aura, whereas the other one just seemed more normal, which shows you how crazy my definition of "normal" is.  But, yeah, these people were just...what you think of.  And I was one of them, so I'm not ashamed to say it.

I guess the best way to summarize it is what Matt said one day at lunch:
"Where's Wyatt?" (Looks around) "Oh, he's over there with the jocks.  Why's Wyatt with the jocks?  That's like Katrina eating with the jocks!"

Although, you know, some day the jocks will realize how much they need the nerds.  And ZEN VE VILL TAKE OVER ZE WORLD!