[ ok... so this was pretty awkward. in the future, Gerry was going to definitely be a little more discerning as to who he called "boring".

but that didn't mean this guy wasn't a secret philosophy buff, did it? ]

Let me rephrase that. Are you secretly passionate about the works of ancient Greek philosophers that only people who've spent ten years buried in mountains of books have heard of?

[ there we go. much less awkward. ]