You know you have an Austen problem when:

You forget to pick up your dry cleaning, but you can recite Captain Wentworth’s letter to Anne Eliot by heart.

Your friends carry pictures of their children or significant others in their wallets. You carry on your cellphone a screen shot of Colin Firth as Mr. Darcy (or Matthew MacFadyen, depending on your personal taste).

Your house is on fire. You leave family photos and computer behind and grab your Jane Austen action figure, Mrs. Darcy t-shirt, and map of Georgian Bath.

While your friends fantasized about being at the final game of the 2006 World Series, you were wishing you could be in Tucson at the Jane Austen Society’s annual general meeting.

You’re behind in your work, homework, housework, (fill in the blank with your own scenario) because you spend half your day on Austen forums arguing about whether Fanny Price is the admirable moral center of Mansfield Park or the most tiresome creepmouse in literary history.

You spend the other half of your day on Austen forums arguing over whether Colin Firth or Matthew MacFadyen is the hottest Mr. Darcy on film.

Your friends’ idea of wealth is a house in the Hollywood Hills. Yours is a first edition of Pride and Prejudice, or at the very least a leather-bound set. Let’s face it, we’d be thrilled to own a set of the Cambridge Editions.

You’re in a crowded, maddeningly loud club and someone asks you to dance. Your answer: “At an assembly such as this, it would be insupportable.”

You are prone to involuntary spouting of quotes from the novels and films, frequently mangled (see above).

Your friends’ idea of exercise is hiking or taking a yoga class. Yours is English country dancing. That is, if you could get another human being to take lessons with you. Your best friend thinks you’re joking, despite having seen the latest Pride and Prejudice movie twice. She, unlike you, has no problem separating fiction from reality. Your significant other informs you that he would rather locate your preferred brand of long, thin, medium-flow, unscented, no-wings maxi pads at the local supermarket (his idea of a no-win, failure-is-the-only-option errand) than engage in such a fundamentally uncool activity.

You have secret Austen-related nicknames for important people in your life. You even name your pets after characters in the novels. Your boss, for example, is Mrs. Norris. My cat’s middle name is Georgiana, in honor of Georgiana Darcy. My husband is “Captain Harville” whenever he pulls out the toolbox and builds a bookshelf or hangs a picture. (He has begun to refer to himself in this way, too, though he has never read Persuasion.)

You forever relegate the actors in Austen film adaptations to their respective roles. For example, I was unpleasantly reminded of the 1995 Persuasion when I saw Ciaran Hinds portraying a pedophile in one of the Prime Suspect series. Captain Wentworth would never do such a thing, I stormed, instantly ejecting the DVD from my player. Shame on you, Jane Tennyson!

(Taken from janeaustenaddict.com)