I will say this - it's hard to get embarrassed about your hobby when the cashiers chat you up about your video game shirt.

Though I do feel a little bit of 'Heh heh, yeah...' when the same TRU employee sees me and my fiancee looking through the Monster High dolls and says, 'Third time this week! You guys come here every day?'

If I wasn't such a wimp with the idea of tattoos, man... awesome.

 

It's definitely a lot easier today to be open about your geek habits.. 15 years ago when I was in school it definitely wasn't... But a theme that has occurred in this thread which I think is pretty spot on is "time and place".

 

Well in my situation I can't let my staff know about my personal intrests if it could be detrimental to my professional circumstances. There are a few friends at work who know I like robots, but if the majority knew then it could allow them to try to undermine me or lose respect for me. While not a problem in my personal life ( I can easily take the 'who cares' stance there) but it's pretty difficult when you're peoples boss.

If I recieved that package at work it could cause no end of problems for me.

 

Not sure if this counts, but when I was deployed I had an Autobot iron-on on my undershirt that I occasionally wore. While filling sandbags for the Battalion Commander (Lieutenant Colonel for those keeping track) we get told to unblouse and go to tshirts while working. I didn't even think twice, until I saw the sarcastic smirk on the BC's face, and the Battalion Command Sergeant Major making a B line directly for me. My Platoon Sergeant intercepted him, and I was told by my section Sergeant to "Bail! BAIL!!!!"

One hell of a close call, and a touch embarrassing.

As far as toys, I had a RID Universe Prowl flown over to me. People mocked me constantly. After about a month, the same people would come over to my bunk to attempt to transform him.

 

Once I was at a Marshall's and had the following conversation:

Cashier: (upon seeing the four Transformers I was buying) "Who's the lucky boy?"
Me: "Urm, me."
Cashier: "Oh."

Awkward as heck.

 

actually...that wasn't awkward. It was AWESOME!

 

I once did a DPCI check at Target and the respondent to my request for customer service was one of the five most gorgeous girls I had ever seen in my life...and the first thing out of my mouth was asking for a toy.

I would have rather paid scalper prices on eBay for ROTF Bruticus than make that kind of first impression. And no, there was no second impression.

 

While I can't say as I've embarrassed myself as a collector, I have tried to embarrass others. My Dad and I used to do a couple auto parts/toy swap meets, and when guys would ask for a bag, we would always give them a Victorias Secret or Bath and Bodyworks bag to carry their stuff around in all day. My wife and her friends supplied is with all the bags, and we'd save them throughout the year just for this purpose. Nothing likes a big burly guy carrying around a distributor or pile of hot wheels in a large pink bag. Good times...

 

I know what you mean. On base, I see different cars with Autobot and Decepticon symbols every day. I can count at least 10 this week. You know those things tend to stand out to us.  

 

  robotkingdom uses those boxes quite often, and I have the same reaction as you when I have to carry it from the post office.
Am I ashamed that I collect transformers? No, but I do mind when people judge because of it, because I don't feel like explaining it to everybody. Not a lot of people know about it, and I don't see any reason to go out and say it for no reason. My collection doesn't define who I am.
The toys are visible all over my apartment.

 

TF32:
Maybe OP works for Mattel?  

 

Well, I grew up with my mother and father who collected Hotwheels and Beanie Babies respectively, so I've never really felt any embarrassment walking up to the counter with a TF or any other figure in my hands.

The first time I purchased an MLP mini figure pack was a tad awkward, but now I just see it as another thing to collect.  

 

The hottest girl that works at my local TRU sees me in there a lot, and has rung me through the register multiple times. It's embarrassing each time, but I know I'm never going to hook up with her, so I've stopped caring lol.

That being said, it's a lot easier to be ashamed of this hobby when you haven't had a significant other in a loooong time.

 

   

Oh goodness, where to start...how about my friend and I carrying 7 foot tall Optimus Prime and Movie character store displays back to mine along one of North London's busiest high streets in the middle of the day?

Or me grabbing a number of UK exclusive Universe Minicon display boxes full of bagged Minicon/sweet packs and brushing off the cashier's awkward nosey questions by saying "They're for a kid's party".

Or shouting "It's not a toy!" at my best mate at the time for dropping my Diaclone Red Tracks.

But in all honesty I've never hidden my love for the hobby, I make posts on facebook all the time about articles and toy stuff, my collection gallery is on there, all my friends and family know how much I love my collection, it's in a detolf cabinet in the front room of our flat.

Amazingly, of all the girls in my life that have ever seen my collection, only one did not think it was really cool and had a look of intense shock on her face. I married her  

All the best
Maz

 

Where are all of these hot target and TRU employees coming from. That said, you all shouldn't be embarrassed talking to them in that context or worry about it affecting any possible future relations with them. This hobby is obviously important to those of us in this thread and if the girl is turned off just because you're buying toys, then she isn't cool with a chunk of your life that is pretty minor in thegrand scheme of things...if she can't get past the toys to see the person, it probably wasn't meant to be anyway. To that end, own your decisions/actions. The maturity/confidence that displays will go a long way in life and relationships