I'm 40 and came out of the dark ages about 5 years ago when my gf bought a mindstorms set, so she's OK with it (as long it doesn't become obsessive)

My dad (an ex lorry driver) retired last year and has received technic for his last two birthdays and Christmas. He was really difficult to buy stuff for previously. Seems happy :)

27 years, slow start out of the dark ages like 3 years ago. The people that know about this haven't commented in any bad way. But I actually don't like to spread the word about it. Nearly no one (if any) at work knows but I would guess being a IT programming company there are other guys which also grew up with Lego Technic and would understand.

I find technic the most interesting so I can also "defend" myself with that I'm not playing with mini figures like kids do. Understand me, I don't mind you others who collect minifigs.

Also if it is a sport fan one can counter with some trivia about a certain Swedish Olympic Games gold medalist that also is an AFOL.

I never had any bad or strange reactions to my Lego hobby. Not even when I was an teenager. The power of "creating" your own toys (or MOC's) usually made my friends more jealous than anything else.

Strangely i've had more problems defending my progressive political ideas in a conservative groups of friends..

People usually look at me like I'm a spoiled child when I tell them I collect LEGO sets. Then I tell them the average LEGO set appreciates 12%+ a year and they say, "Really?"

The only thing that I don't like is when people say "You have too much time on your hands". That is one of the most overused phrases in the history of mankind and it simply translates to: "I really wish that I could do that, but I can't"

Honestly, who has "Too much time on their hands?" and who is the idiot that coined this phrase..?

SO TRUE!!!

:thumbup: :thumbup: :thumbup:

And these people often turn up to be the ones who pay big bucks to go see two sweaty big burly men spending the evening touching each other and pretend to be actually fighting ("pro" wrestling)

Another one I often get after I tell them I put in approx. $30K in my collection is "You could have bought a very nice car with that!".I never owned a car in my life; I use a bicycle to go everywhere around the city.

My rebuttal is easy: my collection is easily worth 150% to 200% what I put into it now. I started seriously collecting in 2002; what would a 30K car bought in 2002 be worth today, even if I didn't use it much? 10K tops. Argument won!

The only thing that I don't like is when people say "You have too much time on your hands". That is one of the most overused phrases in the history of mankind and it simply translates to: "I really wish that I could do that, but I can't"

Mate I really do wish I could do that and build like you.

I see Lego as an opportunity to work on the creative part of my brain (I am an accountant). I came out of my dark ages last year in September and of boy do I cop it at work but I say "a real car that depreciates this appreciates".

Jay Leno once said would you rather I come home smelling of motor oil or someone else's perfume. I think this can be translated over to Lego. Life would be almost perfect if I found a nice girl to share this hobby with

I love this hobby and when ever I do mess around and attempt to MOC I do go back to when I was 5 and the earth seemed flat (I'm 25 so no old people jokes thanks) and there were no issues in the world...

The only thing that I don't like is when people say "You have too much time on your hands". That is one of the most overused phrases in the history of mankind and it simply translates to: "I really wish that I could do that, but I can't"

Honestly, who has "Too much time on their hands?" and who is the idiot that coined this phrase..?

Paul, I actually had one of my son's friend's father say that to me when he came over to pick his boy up at our home and I was showing him our Technic collection. He shook his head and muttered "Too much time on your hands" I have a full time job and many weeks work on weekends and I enjoy building and spending time with my boys and this is what we enjoy doing.

27 years, slow start out of the dark ages like 3 years ago. The people that know about this haven't commented in any bad way. But I actually don't like to spread the word about it. Nearly no one (if any) at work knows but I would guess being a IT programming company there are other guys which also grew up with Lego Technic and would understand.

I find technic the most interesting so I can also "defend" myself with that I'm not playing with mini figures like kids do. Understand me, I don't mind you others who collect minifigs.

Also if it is a sport fan one can counter with some trivia about a certain Swedish Olympic Games gold medalist that also is an AFOL.

I can relate to your explanation/vision. In the beginning I wasn't to open about it either. Indeed, explaining it was Technic and you were not playing with it, but building and programming models (NXT).

Furthermore I have noticed that the more intelligent people tend to accept it more easily than the less intelligent people.

At work everybody knows about it. Placing 99 orders (around 12.000 parts!) in 3 months for building the UCS Millennium Falcon and Cavegod's AT-AT, packages were piling up on my desk almost every day

I also work in IT and I know that most IT people really do appreciate Lego. After all, we are all kinda nerds aren't we (nerd = positive imho)

One of my colleagues even bought his first Technic set after several years. One of my friends started collecting Technic and soon his brother-in-law followed, collecting Model Team trucks etc. So I did spread the virus a little bit.

Almost all my friends know about my hobby and I think 90% is really positive about it. The other 10% are too tough or stupid to understand the value of it.

Of course there's the friend who wants to mock you with it in public. Go ahead, make your day.

Most important is that my GF also likes Lego, to some extend. She likes to build the Modular Houses and she really appreciates my hobby, although she sometimes doesn't understand that I am looking at the same pictures on my iPad every day

My birthday is soon and she will probably buy me a really nice Lego set

Fun story; the other day I was looking at Lego in a local store. A guy in the store looks at me and says "I think you even like it yourself", obviously thinking I was buying something for my kid (I don't even have children). We both had a laugh when I answered "It's for myself"

Final thoughts; I am really glad I picked up the Crane Truck 8421 in 2005 which got me back from the dark ages. And I also really appreciate this forum and it's visitors, always friendly and willing to help others. Cheers!

Edited July 26, 201212 yr by Gekke Ted

When I did my live news spot last month, I was setting everything up where they told me to and the weatherman was checking out my cars an commenting on how much he liked them and then while I was waiting to be cued to to do the interview, the weatherman was getting ready to do a commercial break and gave the intro to the next segment which was with me and he said "Coming up next are some technical cars made of Lego, I guess some people have too much time on their hands"

I thought it was kind of an ignorant thing to say considering how 30 minutes ago he was telling me how cool they were and asking tons of questions...

When I got home several people had commented on the weatherman laying a cheap shot on me...

When I did my live news spot last month, I was setting everything up where they told me to and the weatherman was checking out my cars an commenting on how much he liked them and then while I was waiting to be cued to to do the interview, the weatherman was getting ready to do a commercial break and gave the intro to the next segment which was with me and he said "Coming up next are some technical cars made of Lego, I guess some people have too much time on their hands"

I thought it was kind of an ignorant thing to say considering how 30 minutes ago he was telling me how cool they were and asking tons of questions...

When I got home several people had commented on the weatherman laying a cheap shot on me...

Did you kill him?

I bet those hands were twitching when he said it.

Edited July 26, 201212 yr by Alasdair Ryan

Did you kill him?

I bet those hands were twitching when he said it.

LOL... No... My wife gave him a dirty look and said "what an a**hole"...

I think that I also spelled queued wrong up there...

If somebody told me that in front of a whole room of people (let alone on TV) I'd respond "well, at least I have functional hands" then proceed to break his fingers.

Edited July 26, 201212 yr by SheepEater

LOL... No... My wife gave him a dirty look and said "what an a**hole"...

I think that I also spelled queued wrong up there...

I can't explain how hard that I am laughing right now. I watched your interview at your site a few weeks ago. You did a great job by the way for it being live and unedited.

25 as of few days ago... My family and girlfriend undserstand my hobby, and support me, but other people, when i go out and drive the models and record... They are like, cant this thing go faster, or is that Lego? I didnt now Lego could move, or stuff like that... Still as long as family and friends are there, all is fine

35yo here and having a 7yo son is a MAJOR help. Our family is supportive and continue buying my son Lego for presents and I've even convinced my wife to buy ME some for Xmas. I think eyebrows might be raised if I requested Lego off my in-laws or parents though.

Those who say 'to much time on your hands' probably sit in front of the TV watching the football having a beer. I'd rather sit with my son talk about his day at school and build something.

Brendan

oddly enough, the only people who have negatively reacted to my hobby are right-wingers. go figger.

KEvron

oddly enough, the only people who have negatively reacted to my hobby are right-wingers. go figger.

KEvron

Without outright disagreeing, would you care to explain more?

Without outright disagreeing, would you care to explain more?

happens to me on youtube all the time: some right-winger doesn't like my comments, so he starts making negative, dismissive comments about my hobby.

i think "outright disagreement" would be impossible. you'd have to prove either that i receive the same kind of comments from left-wingers or that i don't receive the comments from right-wingers at all. i can assure you, neither is the case.

oh, i never mix lego and politics, but the fact remains that the only negative comments i get come from frustrated right-wingers. i can post the links, if you'd like.

KEvron

Edited July 27, 201212 yr by KEvron

I personally only tell people who are very good friends or close family how much Lego I have. Only because I don't want random people (who know my address) I can't trust knowing how much I have.

I wish I had more time on my hands, but honestly, it's "just" another hobby. Other people spend their time and money going to all the football matches of their favourite club, spend their weekends watching F1 or go bar hopping. While my wife doesn't really understand my fascination with LEGO she sure appreciates the fact that I spend most of my free time at home with my family. The real struggle is in making sure my kids understand what is their LEGO and what is mine.

I take LEGO to work all the time and it makes for great classroom material (teaching English in companies) - most of the engineers love to play with the bits and pieces I bring in and they almost always spark great conversations.

My friends and relatives know of my hobby (90% of what goes onto my FB wall is LEGO), but they are still positively surprised every time I show them a MOC.

I found this very interesting page specifically talking about the insult itself and how it's used against creative people.

http://xanadoodle.wordpress.com/2011/06/13/you-have-too-much-time-on-your-hands/

Nice read

Edited July 27, 201212 yr by Gekke Ted

Great article.

Often I watch Let-Plays of games on YouTube or spend time looking at other peoples creations and my parents think I waste my time watching "boring videos" on the internet. I have often replied, "well its better than watching hours of television!"

tim

I was a paper crafter in my teenage years, and I was pretty good at it. I did it totally on my own, I didn't have internet, I didn't even know this hobby is done by other people. It requires a lot of creativity and problem solving (in different ways than Lego MOCing), just like any inventing.

All I got was: "You have defty hands" or "I wouldn't have the patience to do that".

F*ck you. I never had defty hands and I was never patient.

People who don't create stuff has no idea what it takes to create stuff. And they don't give a damn either.

Edited July 27, 201212 yr by Lipko