For years, the Madden football video game series depicted Peyton Manning with the wrong facemask on his helmet. To most people–“normal” or “sane” people, I hear is what they’re called–this fact probably never even registered. Most virtual football enthusiasts probably never gave it a thought. But frankly, it bothered me. I mean, I didn’t boycott the game over it, but every time I saw the virtual Manning, it annoyed me a little that he had the wrong facemask.

Everybody has things about which they can pick out small details and other things about which they know nothing. In writing my post about how I know nothing about architecture, I realized that there are probably many people (who are not even professional architects) who feel the same way if someone calls a Victorian house an Edwardian house as I feel when a virtual football player wears a mask with four horizontal bars when in reality he only has three.

A lady friend of mine once told me about how women can perceive all sorts of differences among various kinds of shoes, to which men are completely oblivious. I actually tried to research and comprehend the different styles of women’s shoes, but in vain. It is a closed book to me. Whereas, without even consciously trying, I learned all the different facemasks. (The Rex Ryan jokes write themselves here.)

So, is there anything you notice every little detail about? Or anything that some people you know notice all the details of, but you don’t?