March 19, 2008...8:34 am

Dating Nerds 1.0: Meeting Nerds

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DC Hero To The Rescue

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So let’s say you’ve read Dating Nerds 0.1, and you’ve decided you’re going to woman-up and date a nerd (or a geek, I’m really talking about both groups because they’re pretty much the same for our purposes). You are going to buck the trends and go against what is biologically natural in hopes of becoming a nerd queen. I say, good for you. One of the points I forgot to mention in the primer is how nerd’s friends aren’t assholes and will have a “wow, a girl” reaction to your presence thereby making you a nerd queen. Don’t get me wrong, this will require a little effort, a lot of patience, and a lot of molding (once you find your nerd target), but what girl doesn’t like a good challenge?

Now, the main problems you’ll encounter in your search for nerd love will be finding nerds (they NEVER go out), picking out the real nerds from the players who pretend to be nerds (this is becoming a great pickup tactic), and finding a nerd who is suitable boyfriend material (there is no hope for many nerds, and some of those who there is hope for have already been snatched up by nerd-mining hotties like yourself who will almost never lose their nerd to another nerd-miner because nerds are loyal to their girlfriends).

The good news is that there are more dateable nerds out there than any other man category. And if you’re comfortable with some of the negatives I discussed in Dating Nerds 0.1, you should be able to be happily with one in most North American cities.

Nerds almost never go out. They take pride in not going out. They buy everything online (including their groceries), they rarely exercise, and some nerds have embraced what is becoming very popular in the nerd universe: they brew their own beer. This allows them to accomplish two treasured nerd activities: not going out and arguing about what makes “the best” beer. Nerds love arguing about what “the best” of anything is, I covered that already.

So wait, if they don’t go out, how are you going to fill your nerd love cravings? As far as I can tell, nerds only go out regularly for one reason:

  1. To eat (nerds will rarely cook)

Nerds have little to no culinary experience. Whenever I’ve eaten a meal prepared by a nerd, they have tried to follow a recipe to an absolute T, and usually fail because they don’t understand some fundamental part of cooking that isn’t in the recipe (pre-heating the oven, defrosting the meat, etc.). Therefore, they can be found at chain restaurants like Subway, Quiznos, or Applebee’s surprisingly often. And the key there is how they will frequent the same restaurant day after day (nerds love routines) so you can meet them back there after you find one the first time. It’s like clockwork.

Other than that, a nerd’s life is often consumed by video games, online forums, developing open source code, fantasy sports, watching strange and awful movies for often inexplicable reasons, building massive audio/video systems they don’t really need, singing songs from Monty Python, and watching anime pornography (which isn’t that bad, by the way).

Ok, now here’s a list of nerd activities where you can meet nerds to bang it out with. Note that this list isn’t like the list above because items on this list only apply to subsets of nerds:

  1. Academic conferences (GREAT place to meet nerds)
  2. RPG conventions (GenCon)
  3. Trivia contests
  4. Anything else you think is weird and stupid that has a lot of attendees

If you manage to meet a nerd, you will have to ask him out because he won’t make the first move. Make sure the date isn’t somewhere that’s too far out of his comfort zone, and you should hook him pretty easily. I think I’m going to continue this little series with Dating Nerds 2.0 later on, stay tuned.

22 Comments

  • maybe a good way to flirt with a nerd is to have a wikipedia battle, and constantly change the page for star wars or lord of the rings.

  • Great write-up. Most nerds do make the first move, but only after you’ve gotten to know them a bit and already feel like you’re in the friends zone (they have horrible timing). I have no problem whatsoever finding nerds either. Just go to any online gaming forum and look through the inevitable “post your pictures” thread.

    There are some seriously hot nerds! Especially the English-speaking ones from Europe. Getting the love of a cute European nerd means you get the sweetness, gentlemanly chivalry, and the nice bod (European nerds tend to get into more physical activities). There’s a French ASP.NET programmer at my work who is super hot, has an Adonis-like body, and an amazing accent. What’s not to love? Too bad most nerds like these are already taken.

    Asian restaurants attract nerds, too. I’ve never met a single nerdy guy that didn’t like Asian food. I do take issue with your assertion that nerds can’t cook, because I cook great Asian stirfry dishes (though that part might be partially genetic). Nerds can generally excel at anything we put our minds and energy to pursuing, including cooking, exercise, dancing, oral sex… you get the idea.

    P.S. Every one of you that has a blog is already nerdier than the average person. Able to manipulate HTML code? You’ve gained 1 point on the nerd scale.

  • Ava: very funny, could work.

    Hope: you’re right, bloggers are +1 on the nerd scale. And I was referring to man nerds as those who can’t cook. Nerdettes are surprisingly good in the kitchen. I’m giving you another commenter point for effort and diligence in the comment section.

  • 5. Comic book stores. Every Wednesday, when the new comics are released. I’ve seen nerds hit on girls there (awkwardly), but never girls hitting on nerds, so someone could probably do pretty well there.

    And do nerds really quote Monty Python, anymore? I think The Simpsons might have replaced it as the go-to for dependable quotes for any situation.

  • Ditto on the comic book stores! I’d also recommend specific geek things, for example my fiancee is not only a comic geek but a beer geek and guitar geek as well, so I’ve gotten to spend a lot of time in specialty places that are full of geeks! :-)

  • I’m a nerd queen! My subset is computer nerd musicians, I love those guys. Creative and nerdy, all at once.

    I’ve found that having every episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer on DVD makes me a Gisele in the nerd-dating universe.

  • [...] My Hero Wearing Everyday Clothes to the Gym Dating Nerds 1.0: Meeting Nerds [...]

  • I’m giving you another commenter point for effort and diligence in the comment section.

    Woot!

    Now I feel like even more of a total nerd, because I read a lot of comic books (American and Japanese manga) and like Buffy the Vampire Slayer, too.

    I think The Simpsons might have replaced it as the go-to for dependable quotes for any situation.

    I’d try South Park quotes for any nerdy guy under the age of 30.

  • Nerds are sometimes hot as well, I was engaged to a nerd. However, I was way too independent for him.

  • Let me also suggest juggling clubs as a place to meet nerds and geeks. Juggling is the nerd’s workout, because it involves arcane math (ask about “siteswaps”, a complex notation for describing a juggling trick), and involves patterns and numbers. The DC club meets Friday nights at 7:30 at Chevy Chase Community Center. I mean please — Friday night! (And yes, I juggle. But I’m old and married.)

  • How geeky is your geek and what sort of geek are they?

    http://www.brunching.com/geekhierarchy.html

  • I object: I make a mean dish of Chef Boyardee.

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  • I think you forgot to mention that nerd just love to quote things they love. For example Monthy Python, sounds of orches in WoW etc. And they will often be found be battling of who can make it most perfectly. The one who wins will be the nerd king by his friends, for the week. In that week that nerd king is allowed to pwn everyone else without any repwnage because he has won the latest battle of quotation and imitation.

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  • “I’d try South Park quotes for any nerdy guy under the age of 30″

    In my experience Family guy

  • …i’ve never heard of the pwnage rule for the week..but I’ve definitely done and seen such battles…sometimes they last quite a while…

  • This really is becoming a great pickup tactic!

  • Seinfeld nerds need love too!

  • Oh my god what is white liquid the boy is squirting on the other boy!


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