On Fri, May 31, 2002 at 09:18:12PM +0000, Andreas Johansson wrote:
[snip]
> What nice people you're surrounded by. I've been declared insane by
> classmates bescause I willingly read books in my spare times. And what I was
> reading back then was mostly Biggles books etc (plus of course history and
> popular books on quantum mechanics - I never claimed I was average).

When I was in highschool, I would study chemistry for fun. My classmates
thought I was out of my mind. It didn't help that one day, I discovered
that there was an A-level book on organic chemistry sitting in the
library. I would go to the library with a notebook and actually study that
book and take notes. Just for the heck of it. (In fact, I was so much into
it that one day my dad bought a copy of that book and gave it to me. :-P
Boy was I happy!)

Another hobby of mine in highschool was con-creaturing. I had an entire
series of "alphabet monsters", each deriving its shape from a letter.  I
would come up with the strangest-looking yet cute (at least to me)
creatures for art class. Some of these sketches eventually became to basis
of epic storylines (unfortunately never written and since forgotten --
although fragments remain).

> And even at Uni (where I study Technical Physics and Electrotechnics with
> some German courses) I've got some really strange looks for saying that I've
> learnt some phonology at home for my own entertainment.

When I was in university, I did calculus at home for fun. I thoroughly
enjoyed making up difficult integrals and seeing how much of it I can
solve. I even derived a formula for the Fibonacci series using only
eigenvalues and matrix powers. My housemates thought I was out of my mind.

Oh yes, and since I was about 12 or so, I programmed for fun. The other CS
students in my class thought I was insane for actually *liking*
programming so much I'd do it for fun. They'd go, "are you writing a game?
can we play it?" and I'd go, "not really, I'm implementing a linked-list
library." "What?!?! What on earth for??"

> Telling people that
> I invent languages does not, on the whole, seem to be a course of action
> that would enhance my social status.
[snip]

Personally, I've come to realize that, at least for me, social status
means very little. I wouldn't force myself to be someone I'm not just for
the sake of recognition or acceptance. I don't go around proclaiming my
odd interests; but I don't take offense when laughed at for them, either.


T

--
Don't modify spaghetti code unless you can eat the consequences.