2011 Gift Guides: Gifts for Geek

Unsure of what to buy for your favorite geek this Christmas? Well here is an inside look at some of the best gift ideas for geeks and nerds alike.

10. Star Trek: The Original Series 365. Sort of like a word a day calendar, though it's in a full length book form, with photos and stories from the cast and crew of the series that started the phenomena that has stretched more than 45 years through films, TV, books and more. The only problem with this book is that it's too short, every true Trekker knows that the Klingon calendar has 284.2 standard earth days.

9. Hi-Tec Art U.S. Map. Well what can I say, it's a light up map, complete with light up push pins. With this large size wall map, every geek in the house can pretend that they are going to take over the world, complete with battle plans and all.

8. The Star Wars Franchise on Blu-Ray: Sure you're average geek already owns probably two different versions of each film on DVD, and depending on their age they may own a VHS copy or three as well. However, the Blu-Ray version was just released in October, and can be purchased in one of three versions. The versions include the original trilogy, the prequel trilogy or a version with all six films. Whether you buy the two sets separately or the combined larger version the extra features are the same. Bonus gift for the Star Wars fan, a 22 minute short film called Lego Star Wars: The Padawan Menace was recently released to very little fanfare and your favorite geek may not even be aware of it's existence yet.

7. An Arcade Game. It could be your nerd's favorite game, but any arcade game will suffice. Word of warning here though, this gift is best for people with the space to enjoy it properly.

6. Nerf Stampede Gun. This gun is not your father's Nerf gun. The stampede comes with a shield to hide behind in case your friends also have one, this is the gatling gun of foam dart guns.

5. Star Wars Chop Sabers. Ok so Star Wars gets two entries on the list, I may be biased, but what is cooler than eating Chinese food with chop sticks that are designed to look like miniature light sabers? The answer to that will come quicker than one would think, just look down to the next gift idea.

4. Star Trek Enterprise Pizza Cutter. The twin warp nacelles serve as a handle, and the saucer section serves as the cutting blade, complete with the call letters of the Enterprise engraved. Your favorite geek will enjoy a five year mission to explore pizzas and to discover strange new toppings while seeking out new cheeses.

3. Kindle Fire. E-Books have recently overtaken the sale of print books for the first time in history, and the Kindle Fire is the best e-reader on the market at the moment. It does everything that the older models of the Kindle did, but also has Internet access, and the capability to do hand held gaming, stream videos and do all manner of other cool things.

2. Kuru Toga Pencil. Sure, some might think it's just a pencil, but it's a highly engineered mechanical pencil that actually rotates the tip as you are using it so that the lead never never forms a chisel point.

1. RockPaperRobot Float Table. Just as it sounds, it's a table that levitates, no batteries required. Using advanced engineering and natural forces of magnetism this table is fully customizable, and just downright cool. Beware the price on this one, the simple designs start our at $2,000 before shipping is factored in.

My comic book Confession.

   Today, I'll admit to you all a secret that I've kept from the nerd community for a long time. I'm a wannabe, a know-nothing, a fake, fraud, and whatever other insult that you want to include.  What it boils down to is this.  I claim to be a well rounded geek (feel free to insert random fat jokes if you must.) yet I've barely read any comic books in my life before the last year.
   Growing up comic books were not accessible to me, there were no local comic shops in small town rural Temperance, Michigan. I know I claim Monroe, that is where I was born, and lived until about age 7, but after that it was all Temperance baby. But I digress, unlike past generations of nerds, I had many options of where to spread my geek to. I got to 'watch' my comics as there were more animated shows based on comic characters than ever before, many of the stories were ripped right out of the comics. Comics were expensive, and I grew up sans the silver spoon needed to properly feed my nerdy obsession.
   Video games were huge in my generation as well, sure there was the Atari before us, but most advancements in home gaming game happened during my generation as well, that meant another thing to split my time with.
   Then came the internet, and soon after wikipedia. I know that it's not a good source for a journalist or a research paper, but it's great for a nerd. Mostly it's edited by the more nerdly among us, and we self moderate our selves and and massively fact check each other. The great thing about wikipedia is that it allowed me to catch up on years of history in a few hours, and very cheaply.
   Unfortunately that meant I still didn't dive into comics as much as I wanted to, and it allowed me to sound knowledgeable among the community I so wanted to be a part of, simply because I knew the story lines, and if something were mentioned that I didn't know, I'd simply claim to not remember, or that I must have missed that issue.
   Pre-2010 I had probably read less than 20 comic books in my life, and maybe 5 or 6 trade paper backs. A lot of that has changed in recent years, as I've figured out I can get TPB's from the library, and that the library has deals where I can get books from just about anywhere. I'm loving it.  I currently have 33 trade's checked out, and I rip through them in about an hour each.
   I'm catching up mostly on Batman and the Flash right now, but I will soon move on to catching up on more stuff. Please leave me a comment and let me know your suggestions of what I should check out. And please don't chastize me to much, for being 'in the closet' for so long with my secret. I'm out now, and looking for help to fix the whole in my geek playbook.