I'm in the same boat, there are very few Linux people where I live, and no Slack addicts. I ran Debian proper for several months but recently blew out my Debian install and now have two Slackware work stations and one Ubuntu box.
I've run Slackware since 10.0 and love it. Slackware is the perfect distro.

As far as knowing other people who use Linux...

I work for an IT company. We have around 8 network engineers, and I'm the only one who knows Linux, but I am going to be training one of my co-workers so that he can back me up on one of my clients that has some Linux servers.

My brother-in-law is a Linux user, and I have one other friend who is a dedicated Linux user. Other than that, I just have several friends and relatives that I've tried convincing to "at least give a live Linux CD a try," but they're mostly people who just want to surf the web and read email and don't care enough about OS's to put any effort into trying anything different.

I got Slackware from a magazine cover and decided to install it alongside my installation of Fedora and XP. I had heard of Slack before, but had never really considered it. Once it was installed, I knew I was in for a learning experience from the word go. But I was like so many other Linux beginners...I was trying to use Linux the way I used to Windows -- just point and click, and Fedora allowed me to that. Slackware was different. I could see right away that I would have to know something about Linux if I was going to be proficient with this distro. I am very glad I did...I have never looked back.

I just finished a Linux from Scratch project (hasn't quite worked yet), but I would have never attempted something like that if it hadn't been for Slackware.

In a nutshell, Slackware taught me to use Linux like Linux, and stop using Linux like Windows.

I also have to give my gratitude to this forum. I have received a lot of help here...

Bob

Yes, Slackware does encourage you to really learn Linux. I'm happy I use Slackware. I love the simplicity of Slackware! A few days ago I was re-arranging my home LAN and needed to switch monitors on my Slackware boxes. I love that Slack defaults to run level three, and allows you to easily re-configure your monitor settings with xorgconfig.
I also greatly appreciate the very generous help I've received from the gurus here! I like to solve my own problems, but, it is comforting to know that there are other Slackers willing to help me out when I'm in a jam! LQ rocks!! This is a great forum:-)

The speed of help here is something to be commended too. The amount of times I see a thread where I can help only to see that there are already 3 or 4 posts with various answers (always one of them being my way) just aint funny! But at least I am browsing other peoples threads for problems

I just also wanted to jump in the breach and say how much slackware is THE distro to go. We are having SUSE9.2 and SUSE9.3 at the work and it sucks! Your nursed like a baby and your mommy never changes your undies

The way i came to slackware is trough a magazine with four distros on it. Knoppix Suse, Slackware and i think debian.
Tried knoppix. To slow while booting. For sure its a livecd.
Tried Slackware. Easy installation. Nice help on the original Slackwarepage for the first problems that arise like network and alike.
The other two distros. I did not even try!

Great thread alienmagic!

No matter what distros I try (and have tried over the lsat year or so) I always "come home" to Slackware. I just feels comfortable to me

That's "coup", fogie...lol

heheh no psell I mean spell checker here