What is your #1 special interest?

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I've had a hard time trying to define my number one interest because I seem to like a little bit of everything. After thinking about it a lot, I think maybe my number one interest is knowledge. I spend my days trying to find more information about things. I have vast quantities of knowledge stored in my mind that I've acquired for no other reason than I wanted to find something out. Someone on here said a few days ago that their special interest was research, and I think that's kind of the same thing for me. But defining it as knowledge makes more sense for me because it can even include my obsession with tv and movies. I watch shows and movies to find out more about the people involved, I want to know where the story is heading, where it will end, what happens along the way. I just want to know things. I just want to know everything!

A few: Medical knowledge, languages (currently Romanian), photography, music, philosophy, severe weather...probably the first three are the most prominent right now, but they fluctuate a bit.

~Kate

Linguistics!

I have this book (in this dialect) and I have read it through many times:

http://www.harrypotterbooksonline.co.uk ... p-277.html

The dialect (Low German) looks like a weird mixture of German, Dutch and English. The grammar tends to be rather simpler than standard German - lots of the endings have been lost.

I love being able to read it and understand it ... and I am getting more and more fluent. I realise that it was written for 11-year-olds, so the language isn't all that challenging. But the translation is actually a great translation, much better than the High German translation. The guys that did it were playwrights for a Hamburg theatre and they made an excellent idiomatic translation. I also have the book on CD, read by an actor from the same Hamburg theatre they worked at. And I have the second HP book too, which they translated. I also have quite a few other books in this dialect, including two written about Sydney (Australia) by a Lutheran pastor who was posted here for seven years, then went back to Hamburg and wrote about the experiences in his local dialect. It is amazing reading about your own city in your beloved foreign dialect. I also have DVDs of a north German TV show where the two reporters travel to various parts of the world to interview ex-patriots who speak Low German. One of their shows was set in Sydney. I also have dictionaries and a grammar book, and so on. And quite a few readers and some school textbooks in Low German from Hamburg and from Schleswig-Holstein (and a complete bible in Low German). I even have a Low German calendar in my study. But my favourite book is "HP un de Wunnersteen".

I studied standard German all the way through high school, and I taught myself Old English (Anglo-Saxon) in junior high school. I loved anything to do with the Germanic languages, but chiefly English and German. When I discovered Low German (which is sort of like the "missing link" between German and English), I fell in love with it and - when the Internet came along - I found that I could buy lots of Low German books from Germany (amazon.de and plattschapp.de - an online Low German bookshop that is itself written in Low German). I am now more fluent in Low German than I am in High German. It has been my very special favourite interest for many many years now - I have had the HP book for about 10 years, and I first started looking into this language and trying to learn it back in the 1970s. So this isn't a flash in the pan - this is a serious love affair!

I think I was attracted to Low German partly by the fact that it was obscure and mysterious - lots of books mentioned that German came in two varieties, High and Low, but they all only ever described High German. I wanted to know about this other, never-described variety ...

As you can see, I love talking about it too, I just don't get the chance that often.

Thank you for all of your posts, so far. I enjoy getting to know my fellow members.

Astronomy.

Especially this guy:

music!! then catfish then trees, past ones cicadas

That's a tough one. My interests tend to fluctuate quite a bit. I would have to say children's literature is a big one of mine. I can sit in the children's section of Barnes and Noble for pretty significant stretches of time, making my way through various picture books.
Recently, my Harry Potter obsession has been active, whereas it had been less active for a while. I suppose that loosely falls in the category of children's literature, though the later books in the series are definitely aimed at a somewhat older target readership. I'm currently rereading the series for the umpteenth time. Seriously, I've lost count of how many times I've read these books. There are some books in the series I've read more than others. I'm presently rereading the third book, which is my favorite in the series. My copy of that is falling apart from having been read so many times.
I also go through periods of obsession with the education and development of young children, which does relate to my interest in books for young children. I'm also interested in various "differences," especially those that are not immediately apparent. This includes, but is not limited to, learning disabilities, psychological problems, and autism spectrum conditions. I have various other on again/ off again interests, but those are probably the most prominent. The majority of my other interests are related to one of those in one way or another.
Sorry -- I couldn't narrow it down to just one. Anyway, I'm off to look stuff up on the Harry Potter Wiki.

For me, it's video games. Which game/series I'm interested in tends to change a few months, but right now it's Pokémon again since the new Heart Gold/Soul Silver games were released. Before this, it was Earthbound.

And, to be specific, I find myself oddly researching glitches in my current video game interest. For some reason, I just really like playing around with glitches. I guess that might be a good thing, since I'm going to college for programming...heh.

tied at the top are "information" (which i gather from the internet, books, newspapers, magazines and occasionally even people), "fiction" and "japan."

others include spanish, french, chinese, braille, sign language but it's kinda difficult to tell if i'm really interested in these languages or if i just want to learn them because they give me more access to information. aside from my top three everything else gets pushed around in terms of its importance and i regularly pick up a new interest. just picked up bicycle commuting, which means i've begun another avenue of research.

World War II and Cthulhu Mythos (but not necessary a mix of the 2 ).

I love a lot of things, however if I had to narrow it down to three things it would have to be musicals, especially the Phantom of the opera, Les miserables and the songs from any others! The second thing I REALLY love are derelict buildings. If I had £600 or more, I would run out to a shop, buy a digital SLR camera and take pictures of them ALL day! I don't though so I have to make do with an old film SLR... The third thing at the mo is Doctor Who. Yesterday when the new episode was on I couldn't stop bouncing around for about 2 hours! Previously I have had a major interest in rabbits and although I no longer have the urge to constatnly research them, I still love them...

I lied, I have to narrow it down to four...

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I have HFA, ADHD, OCD & Tourette syndrome. I love animals, especially my bunnies and hamster. I skate in a roller derby team (but I'll try not to bite )