May 25^th is Geek Pride Day, so to honor this momentous global celebration, the Mudbug Media team thought we’d let our Geek Flag fly and share some of the things that cause us to regularly geek out.

I think it should come as a surprise to exactly no one that most of our graphic designers, programmers and Google specialists can proudly flaunt a ton of geek cred.  We have five iPads.  That means we’re not only early adopters, we also won’t be satisfied with just one example of the latest and greatest in internet technology.  We have to have five.

Our very own interactive media specialist Vasu Tummala has even figured out how to play Super Mario World on his iPad with a Wii controller.  So yeah, we’re mega smart geeks too.  00110001001001111.  Get it?  We do.

We’re very passionate about what we do, and that passion extends into some very geeky pastimes outside of work. But it’s that passion that makes us good at what we do.  We have a complete schematic map of the U.S.S. Enterprise in our conference room.  Don’t you?

Here are a few other things we geek out on, like jokes told in binary aren’t enough.

Michael Misshore »
Application Developer:

I geek out pretty hard on anything having to do with cars. I’ve probably spent over 100 hours easy modifying cars over the 5-6 year span of owning cars. I just love modding cars in general. From force induction mods to small things like switching out the antenna for a shorter one. I have been to some pretty nice car shows. However, when I was younger, I missed out on probably the biggest one to ever come to the Superdome, Hot Import Nights. I don’t think they have been back down here in like 7 years.

Antonio Felguerez »
SEO and Analytics Specialist:

I geek out pretty hard on Google. I’m a pretty big fan of most of the Google products (Reader, Analytics, Trends, Insights for Search) as well as my NXS1 phone. I take pride in my Google Analytics certification, and I have a really sweet Google t-shirt.

Sean McCann »
Web Technology Director:

Though my interests are broad, I am endlessly fascinated by how people move from place to place. Here’s a short list of things that never fail to capture my attention and imagination:

• Maps
• Urban Planning
• Public Transportation
• Traffic Engineering

Data visualization (i.e. graphical representations of information) is another big one for me. These two pursuits (data + moving people) are evidenced by the “map” of 2009 Internet trends superimposed over the Tokyo Metro. It’s still in my old office.

Adam Clarke »
Application Developer:

I am a big time music geek (possibly bordering on snob). I’m also really into building my (vinyl) record collection lately via buying limited edition 7″ records by bands that no one’s ever heard of.  And…dare I say…I enjoy the hell out of D&D and Magic: The Gathering, and pretty much any board/tabletop game.

I feel like most of us in the programming dept are also into (in my case at least) coming up with idea for applications to develop personally (with varying levels of success in actually implementing those ideas, but boy do I love to come up with them).

Clovis Mello »
Programming Manager:

I’d consider myself a pretty big football geek. I’ve loved football since I was about 10, but have always been pulled more to the scenarios, stats side than the X’s & O’s of actual gameplay. By the time I was 12, I completely understood the NFL tiebreaker system and would spend the month of December looking for the ways the Saints could get into the playoffs (usually only to add to my aggravation when we wouldn’t). In high school, I traveled with the football team my Junior year as the statistician, before playing football (badly) my senior year . Several years ago, when LSU was in the middle of the BCS madness, I got impatient waiting for the BCS standings to be revealed on Monday, so I created a web app to plug in the computer rankings myself and get a sense of what the standings were early.

Other things I feel I’m pretty geeky about:

• Music
• Magic: The Gathering
• Trekkie in training
• Transformers (old school)

Melanie Johanson »
Graphic Designer:

I am extremely geeky about anything having to do with Martha Stewart. I DVR her show daily, and sometimes am lucky enough to catch “Martha’s Garden” and “Martha’s Kitchen” as well. I subscibe to Martha Stewart Living and absolutely looove Martha Stewart Weddings. I make her Easter project every year, and try to organize my house based on her suggestions.

Roy Mumaw »
Application Developer:

My geeky points, probably in loosely descending order of geekiness:

Webcomics

• I have probably close to 50 webcomic sites that I check/read on a weekly basis (several update daily, and yes, I read them daily)

CCGs

• Magic, The Gathering (tail-end of Arabian Nights through Alliances)
• Legend of the 5 Rings (I was a late-comer, but have a decent collection at home, mixed collection of decks and sets)
• 7th Sea (Swashbuckling Fun)
• Star Trek (but only during high-school)
• Pirates! (If you count plastic built pirate ships sold in packs as a “CCG”, and I never actually played any games…)
• Mage Knight (stop laughing)

RPGs

• AD&D (is there anyone who hasn’t?)
• Spelljammer
• Shadowrun
• Tales from the Floating Vagabond
• And looking into the Fate System for my own nefarious reasons

Hydroponics

I have created

• NFT Aquaponics system
• Ebb and Flow Aquaponics system

Shiniest thing I’ve seen:

• The Omega Garden (it is a cylindrical, rotating hydroponics garden)

Urban Planning

• Arcologies
• Autocompetative Mass Transit
• Walkable Communities

Carl Fink »
Application Developer:

If there’s anything I geek out on, it’s movies. I love collecting them. I have about 1,500 DVDs, but haven’t been buying very many since Blu-ray was introduced. I’m now up to about 150 Blu-rays, even though I don’t have a Blu-ray player, or even an HDTV. I know I’ll get one eventually, though, and in the meantime, I still find it satisfying to personally own a high-quality copy of a movie, secure in the knowledge that I can watch it whenever I want, without having to worry about the studio making it unavailable (lots of titles that were once available on Netflix streaming, for example, no longer are) or replacing it with an inferior version (I can name several out-of-print DVDs that are superior to the currently-available version, if one is available at all).

Amy Morvant »
Graphic Designer:

I’m pretty sure I am a type-snob. I own a t-shirt with lorem ipsum on it and wear it. In public. Beautiful type makes me dance like Snoopy on the inside. I am pretty good at keeping calm on the outside. I can admit to blurting out opinions about good and bad typography, whether to someone or myself. If someone says “mind your p’s and q’s” or “out of sorts,” I proudly explain the origin of those phrases. They come from typesetting you know…

Chris Cook »
Media Strategist:

I think I’ve geeked out on my vegetable garden. I spend a lot of time in there but I find it fascinating watching things grow. I also haven’t used any fertilizers so I guess my thing would be “organic backyard veggie gardening”.

Although, it’s not like I’ve named them or anything – that would be crazy.

Brad Huber »
Application Developer:

I would say I’m geeky about a few things:

Football:

• I have been a Saints fan my whole life, season ticket holder for 5 years
• I wore out the videotape from my copy of NCAA VCR Football (a board game that used a videotape to simulate plays) because I played it so much
• I had a huge collection of football cards
• I own about 12 of the 20 versions of Madden football
• I did football stats for the football team in high school, even going to all the away games
• I’ve played fantasy football for about 14 years now, and am currently working on creating my own fantasy football site using rails.

Star Trek:

• I’ve seen every episode of TNG, DS9, and Voyager (and in TNG and DS9s case, most episodes I have seen two or three or more times)
• I also played the customizable card game in high school, mentioned by Roy, and probably spent thousands of dollars on it. (I even bought a few packs recently for nostalgia’s sake, and because they were on sale at Dollar Tree for $1)
• I own the Star Trek Technical Manual, as well as a Klingon Dictionary.
• I’m still considering buying a Star Trek uniform, but cant decide between TNG era, or DS9…
• I also have a copy of the Star Trek TNG VCR board game… not from when Star Trek was popular, but that I bought a few years ago just to have it.
• Yes, this is all normal stuff for any Trekkie, but I compared to the normal populace, it could be quite geeky

Geek-level devotion to a few bands, like REM, They Might Be Giants, and Weird Al

• This includes owning every single album by each band, along with every concert or documentary DVD, as well as several CD, cassette and vinyl singles, rare and imported albums, etc, as well as a few books, t-shirts, etc…
• I’ve also planned vacations/cross-country trips around concerts by each artist… For example, when moving to NY for grad school, I got an apartment in June, but didn’t move up until July, and routed my trip through Columbus, Ohio adding an extra day to my trip for the sole purpose of seeing TMBG… But its not like that was my only chance to see them- I already had tickets to their Albany show anyways, I just wanted to see them twice. I also saw REM twice in two days in NYC with some friends, where we stayed up for about 48 hours straight so we wouldn’t have to pay for a hotel room between shows. I even bought the Laser Disc version of a 15 minute short film from 1987 called Arena Brains solely because it has a 30 second cameo by the lead singer of REM, Michael Stipe, despite not having a laser disc player. I’ve only been able to watch it once, in a library, on their laser disc player.

Please post your geeky pastimes in the comment section.  We’d love to know what you geek out on.

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