so who do you want to be today?

I was talking to someone the other day quite excitedly about a book I'm reading about (ahem) the checklist. The book is basically talking about implementing checklists and the impact it has had in various different industries such as the lives it has saved when hospitals use it for various different procedures. Now I know that sounds like a really boring topic for a book but it's actually really interesting and because it's fascinating me I was getting quite excited talking about it. I had just finished my description when they laughed and said you're such a nerd and really, I was going to defend my position but I realized it's actually true. I might not have acknowledged it before now but I am fully fledged book nerd and I don't think its bad thing.

Don't bother engaging me in conversation about science fiction or video games because I will look at you blankly. Those topics hold about as much interest for me as sport (which is very little in case you were wondering). But I will happily enthuse over Malcolm Gladwell's books or a theory I once read on human behaviour. I don't find it strange that I think this is interesting but I don't understand why other people don't find it as fascinating as me. 

In recent months I have read a number of non fiction books and I've actually taken notes from one or two of them ( because they were really interesting, okay) on topics like introverts, using economic theories to study human behaviour (freaknomics) and the science behind paranormal phenomenon but I try not to gush too much about the stuff I've learned when I'm done because others don't really share my enthusiasm (weird, right?) and I've also read a few on the food industry that talk about what's really going into our food and honestly, I can't understand why more people don't want to know this stuff. I actually read two books on sugar (fat chance and sugar,salt, fat) which talk about the negative effects of sugar on our health and they ways the food industry has used to keep us buying bad food. I think they touched on a nerve because I had stopped eating sugar for a few weeks and was experiencing some pretty odd side effects. But I refrained from sharing the horrifying insights with most people as experience tells me people prefer to not know where their food is coming from and I might be a little more concerned than most. Like for instance I have known for a while now that gelatine is made from cows hooves (as a vegetarian, can I just pause and say ewww) but ever since someone I know shared a photo depicting quite graphically what the process that takes it from foot to jelly looks like, I haven't been able to eat a jelly.

I've also noticed that if I read something that interests me I will often remember it for months or sometimes years after I hear it no matter how random it is and yet I sometimes have trouble remembering people's names so clearly my brain has it's own system of prioritizing. 

Another slightly nerdy (completely unappreciated) trait is that I am somewhat pedantic about spelling. Now I am sure I make the odd spelling or grammatical error ( truth be told that really bothers me) but I actually cringe when someone is writing to me and it's peppered with text speak or spelling errors. I am trying to refrain from correcting these but sometimes I can't actually help myself.  It really bothers me that so many people either can't or don't take the time to spell and considering most computers and smartphones have built in spell check a large part of it must be pure laziness. Is grammar Nazi too strong a word? quite probably. Although I did see a hilarious The Oatmeal comic that explained how to correctly use words like your and you're. Coming to think of it , the fact that I really enjoyed a comic strip about grammar probably speaks for itself