Byzantium's Shores: chronicling the misadventures of an overalls-clad hippie

I don't typically take those "personality tests" that are proliferating around the Web and particularly the blogosphere; I've found that in most of the hypothetical situations that are the basis of the questions, what I would really do is never one of the options. I do recall a rather devious IQ test that consisted of page upon page of math and language questions; after a while you start to realize that the questions are repeating, and soon thereafter you realize that the test is unending. Sure enough, when you quit, the test sends you an e-mail which calculates your IQ based solely on how long it took you to catch on to the joke. I don't recall my personal result, but it wasn't very good. It caught me on a day of high gullibility, I suppose.

My favorite all-time personality quiz, though, is the One Question Geek Test. (I have no recollection at all of where I encountered it first, except that I'm pretty sure it was on a Usenet group.) The test is elegant, clever, and witty when you realize the joke. The single question is this:

1. Pronounce the word "coax."

I love that one.