Geek's a Verb?

So, being that its Memorial Day, its kinda slow around work. Not as slow as say Thanksgiving or Christmas would be, but it is slower than usual. That's giving people a lot of waiting time, which most of them are filling with just reading stuff on the internet.

Overhearing someone talk to one of the supervisors, he basically summed up his boredom with the phrase "I'm being paid to geek!"

To geek? A verb?

Let's try and find a verb form.

First, from Merriam-Webster's site:
geek. noun
1 : a carnival performer often billed as a wild man whose act usually includes biting the head off a live chicken or snake

Umm.... lets not make that word a verb for this sentence...

2 : a person often of an intellectual bent who is disliked

Sounds like a word that could be used, but we're talking in a room of "intellectual" technicians, so that doesn't fit either.

3 : an enthusiast or expert especially in a technological field or activity

There's our word, but it's still in a noun form. No verb form from Webster, let's see what Dictionary.com has to say.

The nouns are pretty much the same as on Merriam-Webster, but Dictionary.com does have a verb form for us to work with:

tr.v. geeked, geek·ing, geeks - To excite emotionally

So he's getting paid to, uhh, get exited emotionally?

I dont think thats what he was trying to say.

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Date posted: 28 May, 2007
Tags: anecdote linguistic
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