In the office this week we were discussing the differences between a Geek and a Nerd. I am not a Nerd, I’m a Geek. My Mac’s dictionary defines Geek (with an adjective) as a “person with an eccentric devotion to a particular interest.” I will refine that definition. To me a Geek is one who does not look at something from a surface level, but instead delves down to the inner workings, finds weaknesses and corrects them. That’s what I do.
People can be all kinds of Geeks. The aforementioned computer geek is a popular choice, but one could also be a building geek, a sound geek, a video geek or even a cooking geek. That’s right, cooks can be geeks too. Some of my favorite are on America’s Test Kitchen, where they will take a common recipe, figure out what doesn’t work, break it down, test variations and prefect it until it works. True geek-ness.
So how does this play out in real life? Allow me to give a few poignant examples from my own Geeky life.
A Balanced System
A few weeks ago, our house felt cool. It could have been because it was 5 below, but I suspected there was more to the story. In fact, only some rooms felt cool, while others were quite comfortable. Most people would have adjusted the thermostat up. As a Geek, I knew the heating system was not balanced properly. So I started lifting ceiling tiles in the basement and uncovering the duct runs. First, I learned that no one ever installed insulation at the rim boards wherever there was a heating boot going to the main floor (apparently because it’s a little hard–idiots!). So I fixed that.
Then I proceeded to trace down every duct run and determine where it went. I found the dampers and made some adjustments. I also found one run that apparently went to the living room, and into a wall that no longer exists. Instead of removing the duct from the trunk and sealing the trunk, they merely shoved fiberglass into the floor boot, creating pressure and turbulence problems for the whole trunk (idiots!). I removed the run and sealed the trunk, along with another unused vent.
After a few hours of adjusting dampers and monitoring airflow levels, I was satisfied. The house is now pretty comfortable and evenly heated. And I didn’t raise the temperature 1 degree.
Geek Factor: High
The Blog
After I moved my Church Tech Arts blog to my own server (and off the free Wordpress site–a geeky task in itself), I noticed my traffic was down. I also noticed that I wasn’t getting as many search engine referrals as I used to. Believing that what I write there benefits all mankind, I set about to remedy this malady.
After spending most of the morning writing a Media Shout 3.5 review, I started to educate myself on search engine optimization. I ran a scoring tool on my blog, which told me my current score: 52–not good. I learned all about metadata, keywords, crawlers and other techniques one can play around with to up the score. I spent most of the afternoon and much of the evening on this. By the end of the night, my score had improved to 57.
After spending some free time over the last 2 weeks (and the residual work done that first Monday), my score is now 67. My traffic is up, and I’m getting more search engine referrals. Also, several of my articles have been submitted to Digg (I learned how to code that option in).
Geek Factor: Very High
The Shoveler
We don’t get a ton of snow here in Minneapolis, but when we do it’s important to get it cleaned off quickly. If you don’t, it packs down really hard and can turn to ice if the temps get into the high 20’s (which they do sometimes). So I’ve become rather obsessive about keeping the walks and driveway clear. To that end, I’ve tried no less than 6 different ways to shovel the driveway. Shoveling the drive is a lot of work, but it’s also good exercise. It can be murder on your back however, so I try to minimize the time spent bent over, as well as the overall time of the task.
My current method–which I’m quite pleased with–is to divide the drive in half lengthwise with a simple plow-like push of the snow (it’s a 2-car wide drive). This gives me a path to walk on. Next, I start at the top on one side and using the length of the shovel and my arm, push the snow toward the edge of the drive. This will usually leave some spillover but I don’t worry about that for now. I keep taking shovel-width passes, working my way down the driveway, standing straight and using as much reach as my arm and shovel give me.
Next, I’ll work my way back up the drive cleaning up the spillover. Sometimes it takes a third pass if we’ve had more than a few inches. Now all the snow is piled up within a foot of the edge of the drive. I’ll start at the top, bend over and assume a comfortable stance and begin a smooth rhythm of scoop, throw, step back and reset. This is repeated all the way down the edge and when I get to the end, one side of the drive is clear. Repeat on the other side.
The whole process takes less than 20 minutes, yet only 2 minutes of that is spent bent over. The technique works well here because the snow is cold and light. If we get even the slightest amount of sun, the remaining snow evaporates (it doesn’t melt here, it evaporates!) by the end of the day and I’m left with a perfectly clear drive.
Geek Factor: Disturbing
So there you go. In case you were wondering (which you probably weren’t), I’m a Geek. And I’m proud of it. The Geeks are the ones who solve the problems that make ordinary life annoying. And I’m glad to play my role (and I just know some of you are going to try my snow shoveling technique!).
