(Found on the Internet, author unknown)

You Know You're Obsessed With the Civil War When...

-Your shoes are blue and grey

-You argue with battlefield tour guides

-You win the arguments

-You have Civil War related T-shirts

-Everyone thinks you were a Civil War general in a former life

-You have one of those weird Civil War hats, and you wear it constantly

-You’re convinced that you’re being followed by Confederate sharpshooters

-When you forget your homework, your excuse is, “Mosby’s Rangers took it!”

-You run down the street screaming, “Forward, Army of the Potomac! CHARGE!”

-Everyone thinks you should be a battlefield tour guide

-You take your Girl Scout/Boy Scout troop camping on a battlefield

-You want to legally change your name to “Antietam”

-You’ve written Civil War stuff that people think you should get published

- Five battlefield trips, one roll of film

- Five rolls of film, one battlefield trip

-The photo developers know your rolls of film from all the battlefield photos

-People are terrified of you

-When you say, “Wanna hear about the battle of Antietam?”, the room clears

-You get calls from around the country asking for Civil War information

-Instead of posters of movie stars, rock bands, etc., the walls of your room are covered with pictures of Lee, Grant, Chancellorsville, Appomattox, etc.

-You’ve been to a summer camp where you spent 3 weeks studying the Civil War

-You were the most obsessed person in the class

-Your teacher sends your classmates to you when they have Civil War questions

-Your idea of a great time is a long hike on a battlefield, in any weather condition

-When you say, “Forget about the Titanic- it happened a long time ago!”, people say, “Then how do you explain yourself?”

-Your parents start calling you “General”

-You think the San Diego Chargers should move to Gettysburg

-You tell your Geometry teacher that the only angles you care about are the ones at Gettysburg and Spotsylvania

-You remember important dates by the battle anniversaries they’re on

-You have a sign on your door that says “Army of the Potomac Headquarters”

-When you go on a road trip, you cheer whenever you pass a Civil War site

-You’ve ruined pairs of shoes from touring battlefields

-You manage to work something about Chancellorsville into your science homework

-You correct your teachers when they mention an incorrect Civil War “fact”

-You have signed the guestbook at Antietam, “George B. McClellan- I’m back, and you blame me for too many things!”

-You have left a lemon at the Stonewall Jackson Shrine

-Whenever you see a picture of a walrus, you automatically say, “Burnside.”

-Whenever you see a picture of an elephant, you say, “Poor General Sedgwick.”

-You’ve memorized a fairly detailed chronology of the Civil War

-All of your in-class doodles are Civil War related

-On St. Patrick’s Day, you wonder why there are so many Union II Corps badges hanging around

-You’ve eaten hardtack, complete with weevils

-You can spell “Chickamauga” without thinking about it

-People tell you to “Get a life”, and you say, “I can’t. I lost it in the Wilderness.”

-You think General Sherman should carry the next Olympic torch

-You drive from Winchester to Cedar Creek, then you change your car’s name to “Winchester”

- You have scared people off of battlefields

- People have threatened to leave you on a battlefield

- Those people follow through on their threats

- You have gone around the entire city of Frederick, MD on all fours, looking for a Lost Order

- Whenever you see someone holding a lemon, you scream “STONEWALL LIVES!”

- Some of your closest friends are Civil War soldiers

- You want to go to Gettysburg and time yourself on running Pickett’s Charge

- You throw a hissy fit when you find out that 3rd Winchester battlefield is now a playground

- You break down sobbing when you find out how many battlefields are endangered

- You send hate mail to people who want to develop battlefields

- You are able to successfully load and fire a Civil War cannon

- Your e-mail address is something like “FstBullRun@aol.com” or “Antietam91762@hotbot.com”

-You don’t have e-mail— you have a telegraph instead

- You are on nickname terms with General Bob Ned Lee

- You have paid enough money to battlefield preservation groups that you own a whole battlefield

- When you visit a Civil War site, you are the definitions of “obsessed” and “hyper”

- You have stumped reenactors with your quiz questions

- Reenacting groups beg you to join them

-On any given day, if it’s a siege anniversary at all, you know to date exactly how many days that siege had been going on

-You celebrate the birthdays of Civil War Generals

-On major battle anniversaries, on things that need to be dated (tests, checks, etc.), you accidentally write the year of the battle instead of the current year.

- Your term for “The End” is “Appomattox”