My history in fandom

I got this from dargie:

1. What was the very first fandom you got involved in?

That's a hard one. If you define 'fandom' as active participation in creative activity which involves people other than myself, it would be "The Man From U.N.C.L.E." when I was twelve. If you look at things I loved which became active fandoms later, it would be the books of Dorothy Dunnett and of J.R.R. Tolkien, both discovered when I was in my mid-teens - and of course X-Men, discovered in 1963 when I was ten. If you define it as widespread organized fandom, it would be my attendance at my first fannish convention, a comic book con in Toronto when I was 18. (Stan Lee was there, and Barry Windsor-Smith. Barry Windsor-Smith! Stars in my firmament.)

If you define it as 'getting involved in slash' it would have been joining the local Star Trek club when I was 27, and being asked the fateful question, "Do you like slash?".

My answer of course was, "What's slash?"


2. What is the most recent fandom to catch your interest?

Firefly


3. Fandom you've stayed loyal to the longest?

X-Men, Dunnett, Tolkien. But I tend to be loyal to all fandoms - never fully leave, just burn out eventually on active participation (i.e., writing). The exception perhaps is X-Files, where it felt like a painful divorce or betrayal.


4. Fandom(s) you're most passionate about?

Currently I am utterly passionate about Smallville, but my love of Firefly and The Lord of the Rings is strong and bright too. I guess I've been passionate about X-Men for four decades now.


5. Fandom(s) you wish you could get into, but can't?

Hmm. In an abstract sort of way I wish I could join my friends in their love of "Stargate-SG1" because it looks as if they're having fun, but no, I don't really feel a desire to get into it - if I did, I would. One fandom at a time is more than enough for me and I'm feeling stretched right now with an embarrassment of riches - a new X-Men movie, a new LOTR movie to look forward to, another season of Smallville coming up, a potential Firefly movie -fannish life is pretty full and certainly good.


6. Fandoms you're curious about, but never had the chance to get into?

Mutant X. Maybe. Oz. Sharpe. Or various aspects of yaoi.


7. Fandom that's been the most fun to be involved in?

They're all fun.


8. Fandom that's been the least fun to be involved in

Uh... no, they've all been fun, or I wouldn't be into them. That's the whole point. I've never been in a fandom that didn't have good people in it. Horatio Hornblower was a little problematic in that my chosen pairing wasn't the most popular one, and I came into it at an awkward time, and my first experience of Horatio Hornblower fandom wasn't good. But I still had lots of fun and then some. I found people who shared my passion for my pairing, and had a wonderful time with them. I also found a wonderful local group of HH fans, people whom I would never have met otherwise.


9. Fandom you're ashamed to admit you were involved in?

Shame? What's that? My credo is: if I like it, it's worth liking.


10. Are you looking for a new fandom, or actively avoiding getting sucked into something new?

Neither. I am happy with the fandoms I have, but I wouldn't close my eyes to the next thing. I wouldn't wanted to have missed the joyous discovery of Firefly, which is maybe the best show I've seen on television.

Shame....

I looked again at the question "fandom you're ashamed to admit to" and realized there is a partial answer: Queen of Swords. I am not the least bit ashamed of having written slash about Colonel Luis Montoya (Valentine Pelka) and Dr. Robert Helm (Peter Wingfield) because they are everything I would want in a slash pairing, and historical (sort of) to boot. I love historical slash.

But the show itself was awful, which was a pity.

A peek inside my brain

Another interesting item gakked from dargie -

Your Brain Usage Profile

Auditory : 55%
Visual : 44%
Left : 42%
Right : 57%

My first impression is that these numbers are strangely balanced - I would have thought my left/right brain difference would be greater, mostly since I consider myself highly verbal but non-mathematical. This probably means that I don't really understand the difference between the hemispheres - does anyone?

Here's what the text says to explain it - I'll put my interspersed comments in italics:

fajrdrako, you show a slight right-hemisphere dominance with a moderate preference for auditory processing, an unusual and somewhat paradoxical combination of characteristics.

Paradoxical? that sounds about right.... Yeah, I'm paradoxical. I've been told that before often enough.

You are drawn to a random and sometimes nonchalant synthesis of material.

Nonchalant? I'm not quite sure how they mean that.

You learn as it seems important to a specific situation, and might even develop a resentment of others who attempt to direct your learning down a specific channel.

Oh my goodness. That is so true. I love to learn, but I want to learn what I want to learn in my own way and on my own terms; I hated school (despite good marks) because they wanted to direct my learning down a specific channel. I didn't like their channels. Not in the least.

Your right-hemispheric dominance provides a structure that is only loosely organized and one which processes entire swatches of reality, overlooking details. You are emotional in your reactions and perceptual more than logical in your approach, although you can impose structure and a language base when necessary.

I can't argue with any of that.

Your auditory preference, on the other hand, implies that you process information sequentially and unidimensionally. This combination of right-brain and auditory modes creates conflict, as you want to process data more rapidly than your natural processes allow.

Yes. Didn't I say a while back that my primary personality flaw was impatience?

Your tendency to be creative and free-flowing is accompanied by sufficient ability to organize and be logical, allowing you a reasonable degree of success in a number of different endeavors.

Success - what a nice word.

You take in information methodically and systematically which can then be synthesized rapidly. In this manner, you manage to function consistently well, although certainly less efficiently than you desire.

You got that right!

You prefer the abstract and are a theoretician at heart while retaining the ability to be practical.

Being practical isn't my best thing.

You find the symbolism in a great deal of what you encounter and are something of a "mystic."

I'm not sure this is immediately obvious about me. I thought it was a sort of private thing.... Not exactly a secret, but not something I often talk about.

With regards to your lifestyle, you have the mentality which would be good as a philosopher, writer, journalist, or instructor, or possibly as a systems designer

How did "systems designer" get into this list?

or social worker. Perhaps most important is your ability to "listen to your inner voice" as a mode of skipping over unnecessary steps to achieve your goals.

And sometimes I have to be careful, or I skip over too much and have to backtrack....

This seems almost spooky in its accuracy.

Comparing this with dargie's results, we're the same exactly in left/right dominance (this doesn't surprise me) but inverted in auditory/visual.