Word geeking.

I'm a word geek. My parents are to blame, as they were both college professors, but that doesn't change the fact that I'm still a geek.

At 12, when I had decidedly less money than I do now, I discovered Shakespeare. And wanted copies. Couldn't afford them, but notebooks were cheap. I *hand copied* every single play into spiral notebooks. I didn't do the footnotes. But the plays? You betcha. Which probably explains my love for the works now. My mother claims I must have been Shakespeare. Me, I think I was just a geek.

My mother also, upon reading a very old manuscript of mine, said: "You do love words, don't you?" She didn't mean it in a bad way. She didn't mean it in a good way, either.

Which is all a lengthy (see? word <3!) way of saying:

I've just discovered that there's only a single letter's difference between defiant and deviant.

I find that very profound.

(And yes, it took me this long to get that. *Really* get that.)

Stop staring. It's not polite.