I am such a geek that I could ramble on and on about Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers but I won't. Tolkien is on the "respectable" side of geekdom, but I have a feeling that the number of geeks now is probably around the same number as it always has been. (Well, since the invention of geeks around the 1950's.) But it's just that more people are "out of the closet." For instance, it's hard to find people who don't like the Star Wars Trilogy (the original), and shows like Star Trek have come into the main stream. And most people nowadays are impressed with people that know a lot about computers (and want to learn themselves).

I'm guessing it's because of the nature of youth society today, based on video games and collectible trading card games and television. Yeah, we as a nation need to be more active. But the side-effect of our laziness is that not only is the pasty-faced, weak-muscled, bespectacled kid accepted, it is the majority.

Except in low-income neighborhoods, of course. And that's another topic....