OK. After having heard so much about The Office, we rented it.
Awful. Simply awful.
My weird part: I don’t want to laugh at people contemptuously. Just don’t have the inclination or sense of humor or whatever. A given caricatured character is either someone I can feel sympathy for or else not. If so, watching them make bad fools of self is wince-producing, and not funny. If not, watching them make annoying jerks of themselves just makes me resent them onscreen just as I would resent them in person, it’s not entertaining.
I like the other characters; get rid of the office-boss and the series stands a chance. But he inhales too much oxygen. I’m not amused to watch him. I don’t like him enough to wince on his behalf but I don’t get any entertainment value out of watching his antics drive him to personal destruction. I just want him dead, I don’t want to watch him suffer in slow motion.
I’m tallish, so I generally walk up stairs two at a time. However, if there’s an odd number of stairs, I have to step up only one at the end, which feels horribly inefficient to me. I hate doing that.
So, I remember which staircases have an odd number of stairs, and then I do one step at the start of those so I can finish on a double step. It’s not really more efficient, but at least that way I get the inefficiency out of the way at the start.
Other than that, I’m reasonably OCD free (except when playing Starcraft - if one of a group of twelve zealots gets damaged so he’s not all green anymore, I have to replace him, even if he’s only lost one hitpoint).
I do something a bit worse. When sleeping in the bed with my fiance, I’ll occasionally cuddle him while sticking my Icy Toes of Doom[sup]TM[/sup] under his butt. Yeah, there’s a reason why one of my nicknames is “Tasha Icy Toes.”
I have to arrange for any bills that can be paid automatically to be paid because I have periods that sometimes last days or weeks when I just can’t stand the thoughts of checking my mailbox.
I’m not bothered by letting the telephone ring without answering. Drives my family (especially my sister, who is usually the one calling) batty.
At one time I had seven alarms set for wake-up in the morning. I’m now down to three alarms and one amphetamine. (I found out that my inability to wake up in the morning is tied in to and in fact the most major symptom of my narcolepsy= now I wake, pop an amphetamine, go back to sleep and wake again with alarms 2 & 3.)
I have a tendency to change accents constantly when nervous or awkward. I may begin in regular speaking voice but go through various British, middle eastern, Yiddish, little boy and German accents throughout the conversation even if it is a serious conversation. I do this less when I’m comfortable around the people but even so it takes conscious effort not to do so and I sometimes have no idea that I’ve been speaking in a Cockney dialect while discussing recipes for barbecue sauce or whatever.
I have reverse stage fright. Speaking in front of a group of several hundred people, whether in theater or giving an academic presentation, could hardly bother me less. Speaking one on one to a stranger I’m alone with in a car or break room makes me nervous as a pregnant nun.
My grandmother says, “el español cuando canta, o rabia o no tiene blanca.” When a Spaniard sings, he’s angry or broke. In my experience it’s not restricted by nationality.
What’s wrong with having played every Civ out there? I actually own all of them except III (that CD… broke! Waaaaaaaaaaah!) Yep, I have the diskettes for the first ones, which is kind of funny because my current computers don’t have diskette drives.
Sampiro, to me direct payment is the normal kind. To all of Spain, actually. Having to carry cheques around is one of the things I didn’t like about living in the States.
All those people who can’t use earbuds are making my ears feel much more normal. Earbuds are nasty.
I’m a female engineer. And I insist in using ingeniero and not ingeniera. To me the point is that I can do that sort of job, not what’s between my legs. Whenever I run into people who tell me I have to say ingeniera I get this impulse to smash their head against a wall and then say something like “that’s OK, honey, you tell me what to call myself, and I tell you you can call yourself Imbecile, capital I.” Good thing those morons can’t read minds… or maybe not.
When I’m eating M&Ms or Skittles, or something else with a group of similar objects with some differing property, I always eat them so as to try and make the numbers even. For example, if I have a bunch of M&Ms in front of me, 5 red 3 yellow 2 brown 2 green, I will eat 2 red, then 1 yellow and 1 red, then 1 of each, then 1 of each. I don’t have to do this (indeed, I occasionally break the pattern just to make sure), but it’s a fairly strong compulsion.
The Tashaboy likes cold, and he’s a heat generator, so he actually LOVES it when I’m freezing (I have the most gawdawful circulation EVER) and I cuddle up to him - it cools him off. But he still hates it when I steal his covers. We’re seriously considering investing in an electric blanket for me.
I kinda do this, too - but it’s not random. If I’m in New England, around a bunch of Rhode Islanders, I start talking like a Rhode Islander - very well, and unconsciously. If I’m talking to someone from Georgia or Alabama, I start talking with a southern accent. I can’t help it - I pick up accents and start using whichever one is predominant in the area I’m in (this was quite amusing when I was surrounded by the Pennsylvania Dutch). I think it’s a survival mechanism of some sort - I can’t help it.
Part of it, for me, is not wanting to go through the reams of junk mail that I get.
Some of our banks offer online payment. You have to find the bill and pay it online, but at least you don’t have to find checks, envelopes, and stamps.
I do this too, sort of, but it takes a while. I can’t hear most accents because I’m tone-deaf, but if I can hear an accent, and if I’m around people speaking it for a long time, my own voice starts to sound strange to me. I expect to hear something more like the local accent.
This worried me once in college. I had a calculus professor that I really liked who had a Taiwanese (I think- that’s where he was from) accent. My voice sometimes sounded weird to me after his class. I was always afraid that he’d call on me in class and what I’d say would come out in my version of his accent, and he would think I was making fun of him.
I have popsicle toes, too. A doctor once told me it’s not poor circulation in my feet- it’s just something that happens with some people. My grandmother had it, too.
I get those dreams quite often as well, especially where I look in the mirror and discover I’m missing several teeth. I have heard before that reoccuring dreams such as these can be indications of overall health, and as I have had dreams about health-related issues that became apparent later, I don’t disbelieve the theory.
When I was little, the right knee in my pants would constantly wear out. (I have yet to figure out why, though I have ridiculous theories abound, involving such things as acid glands and radioactivity.) After this happened I would always wear the pants backwards, so the hole was behind my left knee.
I cannot stand the feel of matte surfaces, or the sound of them rubbing together. When I hear the sound of people’s winter coats or snowpants as they walk, I often can’t help but shudder.
Cool! Are you a mirror twin? I had friends in middle school and high school who were mirror twins, but I don’t know if either of them had situs inversus.
When pledging allegiance to the flag (assuming you do), do you put your left hand over your heart?
If you offered to exchange “your left nut” for something, and the other party accepted, would you suddenly rip out your right one and offer it up, saying, “GOTCHA! I have Situs Inversus Totalis!”
I am fascinated with makeup. If I have two hours to get ready, two-thirds of that time is spent on makeup. I play with it, wash it off, re-apply it until I get it "perfect"and yet…natural.
I love Madonna. I’ve watched her videos, interviews, and movies since she appeared in the pop culture universe and owned every bit of music she’s ever released on media ranging from vinyl to cassettes to CDs. I’ve lost some of it over the years. I don’t like all of her movies or every single song she’s ever done, but I do get a wee bit defensive when someone expresses dislike for her.
I like to watch Blue’s Clues whether I’m with my kids or not. I feel that Steve should not have left, and I don’t really like his replacement. I also like Spongebob Squarepants a lot, and I wish I could imitate Spongebob’s laugh.
After 20 years, I am still hopelessly hooked on The Young and the Restless, a daytime drama that I watched with my grandmother when I was little.
I wish I had either a little dog who could live inside the house with me and go wherever I go in a little puppy purse or an inside cat who could lay on my lap and love to play with little kitty toys.
When I lay down at night to go to sleep, I can make myself feel like a giant. Like in the fairy tales. Not like in the Guinness Book of World Records. As I lay there in the pitch dark and the graveyard quiet, I can trick my mind into thinking my body is huge, and I can imagine that the bed and pillows are all very small. If there is any light, this won’t work because I can see that everything is normal size.
I’m curious if anybody else has this one; I occasionally meet somebody who knows exactly what I’m talking about and we have that “YES!” moment, but most people can’t relate.
I can’t eat leftover meat. There is a “taste of the grave” to it that I just can’t tolerate. It’s awful, whether cold or hot. My refrigerator is a holding camp for the trash because leftovers almost make me nauseous no matter how their reheated or who does the reheating. A few people will know exactly the taste I’m talking about but most will not.
I can eat leftover meat and such, but I can’t eat anything that’s been sitting for more than, say, 3 days, even if it’s well before the expiration date, because then it seems “old” to me. I also can’t stand leftover potatoes or gravy.
I also can’t eat most things in a condition it was not meant to be served in. If it’s supposed to be served hot, I can’t eat it cold and vice-versa. The very thought gives me the willies. There are exceptions – meats, mostly – but for the most part I can’t do it. (Yes, this especially includes pizza)
I have a weird jewelry phobia. Rings, necklaces, bracelets, etc., especially gold or silver chains make me hyperventilate and then freak out if i touch them. Or get anywhere near touching them.
I yawn when i’m nervous. A lot.
I don’t like syrup because it’s sticky and i won’t eat oranges bc they have a weird texture. I like orange flavored things though.
I like old fashioned foods that are almost unknown:
-lamb: i love it, but my kids won’t eat it (teenage daughter says “its gross!”
-Indian Pudding (new England traditional dessert): nobody else likes it
-tapioca pudding; almost nobody makes this anymore
-an old New England drink called “switch”: molasses, white vinegar, and cold water-very refreshing-my kids won’t touch it!
