Post your Aspie data crunching habits...

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For whatever odd reason, I could read the dictionary all day long. Fascinates the hell out of me learning new words, how to use them, their synonyms and so on. I go to www.dictionary.com and can stay there for a while. Is this data crunching part of being an Aspie? I have also been known to get stuck for several hours reading highly challenging science material (i.e. Physics / Game Theory)

I've heard Autistic folks really enjoy phone books because of the data so I'm assuming my dictionary thing is related to being an Aspie.

Post your odd habits. Do you study certain sciences for 8 hours a day? Watch paint dry? Post it here.

Dictionary & thesaurus have been real close pals for a lifetime. Sometimes, a bit of context helps the chase: I spent one summer reading every play by Shakespeare because of his advanced vocabulary. Don't regret a minute of it.

I used to read the dictionary when I was in middle school, haven't done it in a while, but I'll sometimes find myself parusing dictionary.com. I also spend very late nights (like this one for instance) watching youtube videos about dinosaurs, paleontology and the historical mass extinctions of earth and just storing the facts in my brain. Tonight I learned that humans owe their existence to a hippo-like half-mammal-half-reptile called lystrosaurus, which was the only surviving link to mammals to make it through the permean extinction where 95% of life died out.

I enjoy reading anything medical.

I can relate. I love looking at dictionaries, too. I sometimes find certain word patterns etc in the dictionary and it's fun. I can spend hours on looking at dictionaries. I also look at the pronunciations there, too. I think it has helped me improve my English a lot.

I tend to associate things with numbers when I memorize things. It's not really always that useful, but sometimes it's kind of useful. For example, as I suspect many people do it, I remember A=1, B=2, J=10, T=20, Z=26. I apply this to other things. So I tend to remember the orders of things. H=1, B=5, S=16, K=19, Y=39, I=53 etc. I guess quite a few people here probably do the same thing. It's not super-useful, but sometimes it's just handy. Remembering not-really-useful things is an autistic trait, isn't it?

There have been times when I spent hours on a certain thing, and I felt kind of scared that I might be a freak to do that. That feeling sometimes stopped me from doing it further. As it turned out, maybe I AM a freak.

oh i have quite a few that i could go on about for far too long here. i recently came up with the analogy of a spider weaving its web or a bird building its nest (a very repetitive process), but i'm doing it with information. on a given topic, i tend to research all the information about something, and then rearrange it into a certain pattern, and then look back on it and be pleased with myself. the information was always out there, but never gathered in such a manner before.

one hobby i'm working on right now is genealogy. at the moment, i'm looking up records for everyone in my family tree and merging the results in a powerpoint file, with plans to share it at the next family reunion. its a never ending process that i've repeated so often for all sorts of different branches of the tree.

another project is exoplanets. i've google searched hundreds of nearby stars (within 10 parsecs, arranged by neighborhoods that i've defined) to find out any interesting pieces of information about them, and gathered the results in a personal wiki. this is to give myself some base awareness of the nearby stars "before" any planets are discovered around them, as i'm certain within ten years we'll have a rudimentary idea of what kind of planetary systems a good fraction of these stars have.

thank God for the lystrosaurus.

(This is to the creator of this thread) - You have a "data crunching" habit for learning new words too?! Ah, someone who I can finally agree with.

One of my favorite sites to come across when it comes to making an expansion/extension to my list of strong vocabulary (which, obviously, I am not really using at this very moment...) is called Thesaurus(dot)com, the name's pretty obvious, yes?

But yeah, if you are actually wondering about how this strange...well...I'm not sure if I should go by the word "Obsession" or not but I am quite...hesitant when it comes to calling it just an interest and all...how would you determine whether or not it is infact an actual obsession anyway? So confusing...

However, let's just get straight done to the point already. Okay, so first of all, let's just put this out there. So, how many of you had heard about or came across the 1989's 'Dilbert'? You know, Dilbert, created by Scott Adams...
It's a off-air cartoon series based on engineers. Well, mostly based on engineers. Okay, well, if you was to ever come across 'work-related' comic strips before, these are most likely similar to the ones you can sometimes find on the back of the morning's newspaper...well, ever since I sort of got obsessed with reading those, I just happened to have a certain linked interest to go with that which has frankly became more of a fun desire for me than anything.

Yes, I'm rambling. I shall stop now on behalf of all the innocent users on here. Who probably see no point in this comment as I don't really either...it's all nonsensical.

I've managed to keep my obsession with warfare fueled thanks to the University of Maryland library I just finished two books on Stalingrad and the history of the AK-47.I think I'm going to read a book about Kursk and the battle Moscow to round out my knowledge.Then on to the Battle of Berlin of course.Oh and 6 credits worth of Military and Soviet history courses next semester.
Then of course I have to read a book about soviet small arms,Then one on german ones.Oh then what about the pacific theater or the western front?Eventualy I'll have to buy a mosin nagant take it apart, put it back together and run through the woods for some first hand experiance.But then I'll have to do the same thing with every other rifle.
I have alot of work to do

Dog bless the Lystrosaurus!

oh, and Dog bless the Thesaurus too!

hehe

I used to read the phonebook for fun.

I sometimes go on Wikipedia and look up something like for example today it was a WW2 fighter airplane(Focke Wulf FW190) and read the entire artical while opening meny of the related links to read meny of the related articals then I moved on the next closest airplane and repete, there can sometimes be no end to this as it just keeps on going.

I also like to keep a few large and detailed information books preferably with lots of pictures and diagrams lying around in convenant places so I can just pick them up have a look when I feel like it, this I have been doing since I was a child. Always special intrest related.

My job as a health and safety manager gives me ample data crunching opportunities; including incidents, hazards, actions, tools and equipment, document control activity, file and photo cataloguing, training records etc. The list is endless. I also get to build entire systems for collecting, capturing, storing and analysing data of all sorts. As a result my ASD/aspergers is a great help in my work. The NTs think I'm a bit of a nut but a very useful nut so they keep me around the place.

one of my more recent obsessions is crochet, which i taught myself, thanks to you tube, and especially crocheting hats of which I've made close to 100. I will spend hours at work, when we have downtime looking for patterns.
i taught myself how to sew (before youtube)and make tribal belly dance costumes, yes i too can dance,another one of my talents, anyways i formed an obsession with the beautiful tiered over 10 yards at the bottom skirts and make them out of recycled vintage saris.
i spent a few years reading only mythology, which i've been thinking of taking up again now that i know more about symbology,another one of my obsessions

I'm currently working on a project involving reading a lot of articles on kids with FASD or kids with PTSD or RAD, and writing on cue cards which tests they used and what population they were studying. I'm planning to use this to compare profiles of FASD kids to non-FASD kids with trauma and/or attachment issues, because I suspect the profile described as typical for FASD is heavily influenced by the trauma and attachment disruptions that most FASD kids have experienced.

This is not schoolwork. I'm doing this just for fun.

How many times the people on the Bachelor(ette) and other similar reality shows manage *not* to say something like "Jen and I's date went great today." So far, Jef from the previous season of the Bachelorette managed never to say it like that, opting instead for "Emily's and my date..." I was so happy to see him win -- my theory is that the reality shows actually tell their contestants to say it the former way rather than the latter, even though the latter sounds more natural to me. At least, I hope that's what is happening.
On Love in the Wild, I was even more disappointed to see that one girl said, "Jack and my's..." but that also seems to provide more evidence for my theory since she caught herself saying it the more natural way and "corrected" it to have the [z] sound. Anyone with a brain knows that "my" is already possessive, and I could actually see her cringe a little when she did that...

I realize this is not the usual reason that people watch reality shows. I must admit that I also watch them in order to understand NT communication better in general since I am not diagnosed yet with an ASD and thus am receiving no counseling to teach me these things.