Nerdiness

Generally considered the most intelligent and mature of the friends, he is also seen as a nerd, and has exaggerated events to make his life seem more exciting than it actually is.

The Friends usually consider him to be correct on subjects such as math and science and look to him as a mature voice of reason.

During his school years, he sampled some marijuana in his room - when his parents came in and smelled it, he claimed Chandler had been smoking it, then jumped out the window to escape. This caused his parents to dislike Chandler (subsequently, Monica did not reveal her relationship with Chandler to them for about a year) until Thanksgiving in 1999 ("The One Where Ross Got High"), when in the midst of one-upping each other whilst ratting the other out, Ross told their parents.

When discussing the time he was mugged by Phoebe as a teenager, Ross claimed to have been mugged by a "huge dude" rather than a 14-year-old girl. This also revealed that Ross had created a comic book, the superhero being 'Science Boy' (who according to him has the superhuman thirst for knowledge, as a power).

Ross only got a 1250 (out of 1600) on the SATs, however, he advertises himself as getting a 1450.

He had a pretend wake for himself when Chandler jokingly posted that he had died in a blimp accident on their college website and no one responded; a beautiful woman showed up and confessed she'd always had a crush on him and that she was sad that she missed her chance, at which point he came bounding out of the other room declaring "No you didn't! I'm still alive!", to which she replies, "You freak! Who does that?"

When Phoebe announced that she doesn't believe in evolution, Ross got so frustrated he spent days trying to convince her, even bringing in bone samples to demonstrate his point.

Ross's friends are bored by his profession and do all they can do avoid hearing about it. In one episode, Chandler says that he can "safely say that [they] all have work issues, family problems and/or are sick" when asked to attend a conference at which Ross is keynote speaker, only to discover it's to be held in Barbados, at which point they are eager to go. Once, when Chandler tried to tell Monica how easy it was to lie, he gave the example "I can't wait to read your book, Ross!"

When the book Ross had published is put in the college library, he is furious to learn that students use that section of the library to make out (even Joey admits he's been there). Ross then takes up guarding the section to angrily chase away any amorous students. Eventually, though, he is so delighted when he meets up with the "one person" who ever checked out his book, that he even ends up having sex with her in that same section of the library.

As Chandler was preparing to marry Monica, Ross vowed that should Chandler ever upset Monica he would "kick his ass". As another example of how Ross is mocked for being a nerd, all of the friends found this threat to be hysterically funny and even Chandler couldn't take it seriously.

When looking through some of his old belongings in his parents' garage, Ross finds an old report card. He boastfully reads out what grade he got for each subject: "History, A; Science, A; Math, A; but when he reads out 'gym' he stops, with an embarrassed glance and put the report away, obviously revealing he was not good at sports, despite his claims to the contrary.