Addition is a serious issue, and geeks are grossly susceptible. Unfortunately for serious geeks, we can have several addictions, each costing about as much as something classy like cigarettes or cocaine. The problem is the hobby begins to feed itself - if you’ve been doing something for 10 years, why stop?

Case in point, I’ve been a compulsive action figure collector for years, amassing a solid 300 plus figures.  I open the boxes, display them in awkward positions, and have oodles of fun.  Recently, my interests, especially financial, have been more focused on video games leaving me less budget for action figures forcing me to prioritize - the new Marvel Legends or dinner.

The problem is my action figure collection is so large, it begins to feed itself.  I want to buy more figures just to justify the figures I already bought.  If I stop buying them, it makes the first 300 look like a waste of money.  And that would be silly.

The challenge is always time and money.  I now have more video games than I have time to play, more comic books than I have time to read, too many movies and TV shows to watch, and obviously no social life.  So it’s always a challenge when I want to buy something else, but can’t figure out where to fit it.

For action figures, I’ve slowed my purchasing, weaning myself off the addition.  I still buy figures I’ve had on my must list for a while like Ra’s Al Ghul and upcoming Despero.  Thankfully Hasbro’s take on Marvel Legends is so crappy otherwise this would be much more of a struggle.  Of course, new Battlestar Galactica figures are just too tempting.

So I’m not really one to help you cure the addictions.  Better to just come up with justifications.  Me, I promise to stop after the I get my life-size Lee Adama figure.

I’m a big fan of instant messaging - I find it the most efficient communication tool. It’s instant (obviously), share files and links, and I can do other things at the same time (which is harder on the phone). I’ve always over analyzed proper manners when IMing someone, and just when I’m getting the hang of it, Facebook comes along and messes up the whole rules system.

Facebook released their own instant messaging service two months ago, built into its social network, meaning if you have a Facebook account, you have Facebook IM. Unlike AIM or Google Talk, you just have to sign into Facebook and all your also signed in friends are shown as available in a taskbar. There’s no need to trade addresses, it’s all simple and automatic.

As a result, I don’t know who wants to use it and who doesn’t, making it hard to know who to IM and when.

Facebook Chat comes readily available on Digsby, my favorite IM client, so I can use the service just like any other instant messenger. Most of my friends use the taskbar on Facebook pages, requiring they keep the page open so as not to sign off. It also makes it hard to see when you get a new IM since your browser doesn’t flash announcing the new message. I’ve often tried sending messages to people who never saw them - they just closed their browser.

Thus even friends I ask about IMing miss IMs. And people I didn’t check with in advance is such a crap shoot - I never know if they saw my IMs and were so offended they ignored me, or if they just never saw them. That’s very stressful on my fragile social psyche.

The other challenge with Facebook Chat is simply knowing who you want to talk to. I have so many friends from high school, camp, and college that I lost touch with on purpose, not to mention the people I’m friends with just because. All these people show up on my friends list. I don’t necessarily want to de-friend them, but I certainly don’t want to talk to them. At least on Facebook they were buried with the other faceless faced masses. On Facebook Chat, I have a constant list (Facebook says they are working on this feature). Unfortunately, not being able to block specific people leads to people IMing me I don’t want to talk to. And since I use an IM client, I always see the IM.

Facebook Chat is still young. Hopefully as more people discover its features and value, it will become a great way of connecting with people, above poking them (which is still fun). But until Facebook Chat becomes valuable, we all need to learn how to use it. Starting with answering your IMs.

There are many dates only geeks are geeky enough to suggest, and some of those are amazing even for non-geeks. But some geek dates aren’t welcoming to the non-geek crowd. But this doesn’t have to ruin the experience. These risky ventures to geek havens can be made enjoyable for anybody with some skill.

Sci-fi and comic book conventions

The sight of women dressed and aliens and fat men in spandex will scare any person, but those less familiar with our culture will be particularly put off. Make sure you dress normal, maybe even a little up (we’ve talked about sport coats as casual wear, this is the perfect event to wear one with a comic booky shirt). This way you show your fun and mature side at once. Spending your time will be challenging - you have to let your date pick what to do based on your suggestions. There should be no waiting on lines of any kind except for food or the bathroom. Unless your date is dying to meet Storm Trooper #6, make your way to the retailers and treat it like a geeky flea market.

Comic book store

I always consider it a right of passage for my serious relationships to see my comic store, mostly to see if it scares them away or worse, if they think Rob Liefeld art is good. If your comic book store is having some big event, like Free Comic Book Day, bring your date along for an innocent afternoon of pizza and geekery. Let them pick something out and buy it for them to try out. No pressure, but leaving a store with something always makes the experience more rewarding.

Gaming tournament

There is no way to make a date fun if you are competing, but if you’re just there to watch, the company can be welcome. Whether it’s tabletop or video games, watching anyone of skill can be impressive and this is the perfect time to talk down your skill and make your date feel better when they play games with you.

Geek movie

Can’t wait to see the biggest sci-fl flick of the weekend? I’d avoid bringing a date. You want to pay attention to the movie, not your date. That’s spells trouble if your date wants to pay attention to you. This is why I had to see Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow twice.

Playing video games requires intense concentration, physical exertion, and mental strain. Being interrupted by hunger can ruin the experience or worse, your high score. Keeping a stash of efficient and fulfilling snacks can be the key to successful, marathon gaming. Important factors to consider are the food’s greasiness (no slippery fingers), healthy (the worse, the better), crumbliness (less is more), and the fullness factor.

Bagel Bites

Filling and bite-sized, Bagel Bites give you the awesomeness of pizza on a bagel. And when pizza’s on a bagel, you can eat pizza anytime.

Peanut M&Ms

They melt in your mouth, not in your hand. Plus, the peanut makes them healthy.

Pringles

The least greasy and best tasting (in this blogger’s opinion) potato chip. Stick with original over other flavors to limit finger discoloration.

Oreo’s

They can crumble and are better with milk, but if you solve lots of problems by keep them in the fridge, then eating each one in one mouthful. It’s challenging and fun.

Wheat Thins

A little healthy, but these cracker treats provide some fiber to offset the other crap you’re eating.

Foods to avoid

Buttery popcorn

Grease, messy, and it gets stuck in your teeth

Anything with a wrapper

Sadly, Reese’s Peanut Butter cups, Rolos, and other bite-sized candies lose out

For the second week of organizing your geek life, I’m tackling RSS Readers after last week’s look at personalized homepages.  These helpful aggregators of all you love and enjoy can quickly become and overbearing chore.  You want to read everything, but all these damn bloggers just write too damn much (sorry).  I subscribe to more than 200 feeds, flooding me with posts by the minute and leaving great, but infrequent bloggers lost in the shuffle.  Here are some pointers on controlling the insanity.

The struggle with RSS readers is how to stay informed but also have fun - don’t stress about unread items and such.  The problem is I don’t want to have to mark each feed read, but I also don’t just want to mark everything read.  This is why organizing feeds by topic becomes unwieldy - it doesn’t prioritize reading.

The other challenge is preparing my reader for ideal mobile viewing.  I don’t want any partial feeds or aggregating sites like Digg.  This led to my somewhat complex tagging system that you can of course tweak as needed.

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My life just wasn’t worth living before the internet.  I had to carry address and date books, buy and read five different newspapers, and put effort into keeping my files organizes.  The internet has removed all the work out of life because when it’s digital, it’s not real.  This series of posts will go over how the internet power user can use the internet to its fullest for work and play and live geekier by perfecting your desktop, news aggregators, social networks, and more.  I will explain various options while highlighting what I do (since it’s the best, obviously).

This week, I’ll begin where it all starts - your homepage.  Personalized homepages allow you control over the information you begin your surfing all conveniently accessible by the home button.

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Most cell phones allow you to link an embarrassing photo with all your contacts.  Most of these pictures feature your friends picking their nose or shocked by the camera flash.  Those are the few you remember to actually get a picture of.  And if you’re a straight guy trying to get pictures of your other straight guy friends, well, weird.  Using this guide, you can put your geekiness to good use and come up with some creative pictures to use for all your contacts.

Star Wars

Only the geekiest of geeks can make put the Star Wars Universe to good use by humorously linking all their friends and contacts with the images of Jedis and CGI icons.  And best of all, if there are people you really don’t care about, there’s always Stormtroopers.

80’s cartoons

Some of your friends are Transformers, some might be Smurfs, and the best of them - Care Bears, of course.  If you have exciting friends, maybe spring for some G.I. Joes.  And cat-lovers are easy - Thundercats.

Super heroes

Why limit yourself to Marvel or DC.  Is one of your friend’s overly wholesome - you’ve got Superman.  Wisecracking class clown?  Spider-Man or Iceman.  Billionaire playboy?  Iron Man or Batman.  And also put him on speed dial, billionaires have all the fun.

Locations

Why do people have to represent people?  Animals can get a little insulting, so settings, whether real or fake can really speak to a person’s strength (and weaknesses) in ways only you know.

Politicians

Best for research nuts, there are 435 members of the House, 100 Senators, 50 governors, and presidents and candidates of all stripes (mostly white men) to pick from.  So get to screening for policy stances, beer drinking capacity, and skeletons in their closet.

This is a blog post meant to be printed out and given to potential dates.  I even recommend pasting your picture on the paper for added effect.  Geeks are often ignored as quality mates in place of jocks and preppies and other people who haven’t grown out of their high school cliques.  Here are some ways geeks makes the best dates.

They’ll appreciate you

Hard to believe, but most geeks don’t go on many dates.  And ever since World of Warcraft, we rarely leave our houses.  Geeks aren’t so much socially inept as they are shy, so once they get comfortable with you, they will shower you with attention.  And since they’re shy, it’ll be hard for them to find someone to cheat, so you got loyalty mixed in.

Great conversation

Geeks are smart.  Sure they mostly want to talk about computers, video games, and comics but many have vast interests (take me for example, with my fashion, politics, and geeky interests).  Some are experts in music, sports, or plant life meaning your dates will never be lacking for things to talk about.

Creativity and imagination

Even boring looking computer code requires creativity.  Just think about how that creativity can be applied other ways.

Bloomed late

My mother always told me geeks suffer in high school and prosper in college.  That was very true for me.  Geekiness was more acceptable in college (if you pick the right sport-less school) and allowed me to network better, finding friends with similar interests.  I even dated a lot, shocking, I know.  As a result, I respected the social life I earned since I had always had to fight so hard to be appreciated.

They’re handy, as long as it has a power outlet

Don’t ask them to fix the faucet or build the shed, but if you’re computer’s on the fritz or you need your wireless router set up, it’s good to have friends in techie places. It’s shallow, but come on, you’d date someone with tickets to _______ just for a good show/game.

They’ll make some money

Smart, tech savvy, hard workers.  Hello house in the Hamptons.

You might be dying to see the new Star Wars convention or check out the opening of an anime store, but not everyone shares our love for standing in line to see CGI or crazy hair. But you can use your geekiness to impress your date by thinking of common interests the average Joe (or Joey) might forget about.

Laser tag

It’s immature, frantic, energetic, and might include little kids running around, but that just proves it’s an excellent first date. It’s casual and lets you interact with your date, while creating good conversation material for the hot dog dinner afterward about who kicked who’s ass (looser buys, and you always let your date win…at least until the third).

Movie/music festival or convention

As long as it doesn’t feature anything called Star _____ or cartoons from foreign countries, this is a great date. The best kind are all day events, found in most cities (scheduling can be a chore) where you can walk around looking at salespeople’s displays of old movie posters, costumes, and other hilarious trivia. Plus, with tons of screenings and shows, you give your date options.

Arcades

Girls and even some guys scoff at arcades, and while they’re hard to find, everyone ends up having a good time because, let’s be honest, video games are awesome. It sucks to spend the money at an arcade when you have every system at home, but for a first date, this is a casual way to have fun and get to know your date. We respect members of the opposite/same sex now don’t we.

Bowling

Take a break from Wii Sports and try the real thing. Maybe you’re game’s improved.

Cartoon characters are cool. And showing off your favorite characters should be just as cool. Unfortunately, wearing a Mickey Mouse or Spider-Man shirt can look nerdy or immature. There are solutions. You can wear Bugs and Daffy to the bar at night or to the bookstore on the weekend. There are ways that you can wear your cartoon bearing shirts and still be a fashion hero.

Body rules

You do not need huge muscles; the shirt should fit snuggly with a nice taper. If the smallest adult size is too large for you, try wearing boy’s or young adult size shirts, which also feature more characters. If you have huge pecks, fashion-wise, you can get away with just about anything.

Dressing up

Sport jackets make the young dignified, the casual mature, and the silly stylish. The sport jacket balances your immature cartoon character with elegance, negating each other. The end result looks cool and smooth.

For matching, work with the color of the shirt instead of the colors in the character. Most shirts work with a black or preferably dark charcoal jacket. With blue shirts, try a gray sport jacket for variation. Black shirts are harder. Gray can work, but the fashion forward might want to try a white jacket, possibly even with some texturing.

Zip ups

Also known as “Gay It Up,” zip-up hoodies validate your nerdy shirt by transposing it to a gay shirt. Often, one might mistake a nerd for a homosexual, so it is a fine line. Zip-ups allow for more variation and more casualness. Certainly you can wear a sport jacket over your zip-up, but I’ll stick with zip-ups alone for now.

Using the same color contrast as the sport jackets, zip-ups are less expensive and you’re more likely to own a white one. Test the height of your zipper for your shirts, depending on the placement of the character. Usually, I will zip to just above my stomach, slightly covering the emblem. I find the affect is lost by keeping the zip-up open.

For a unique example, picture the a Punisher shirt with the white skull embalm on a black shirt. Put on an off-white, light cream zip-up hoddie and zip it just over your stomach. All of sudden, the most macho super-hero is wearing a cardigan. You’re fashionable and funny.

Editing

Funny and dirty shirts work without aids. Cartoon characters do not. So why not make your cartoon characters funny or dirty. Now this is extremely difficult, not for the fashion, but for the writing. With a computer, printer, and iron-on labels, you can edit your cartoon shirts with dialogue and explanations (Note: there are two different kinds of iron-ons - light backgrounds and dark backgrounds. Light background iron-ons are cheaper at around $10 for 10 sheets). Text is easy by using any word processor. Adding images is difficult if you are not versed in imaging programs.

Good fashion should reflect the individual, but that individual should reflect some good fashion. As fun and original as these outfits can be, they are NOT for any business meeting (unless for you work for a comic book company) or for first dates. Yes you should “be yourself” on a first date, but omitting certain things is just normal. Do not be embarrassed by your nerdiness; just understand the prejudice that exists.

(Originally published on EDGEBoston.com)