“35 Seconds!”

“35 seconds!” My mom said. I was visiting with my parents and the unexpected declaration regarding this measurement of time caught me off guard. “It’s been 35 seconds since you touched your hair! A new record!”. Then it came to me.

“Wh-whaaaat?” I said, feigning innocence. Yet another habit publicly exposed along with biting my nails and the rest of my somewhat OCD compilation. I recently started using conditioner and… well the results have made my hair quite succulent to the touch. Little did I know how attractive. I was messing with it every 10 seconds.However, this is not a new thing, it has just recently become more noticeable.

In tracing back my psychological steps to the origin of this habit a wave of memory washed over me. As a kid I loved the book Count of Monte Cristo and when the movie came out it instantly rose to the top of my Favorites List. In that movie Jim Caviezel (playing Edmond Dantes, the Count) is a tall, dark and handsome rogue (much like myself) who is imprisoned, finds treasure, exacts revenge from his enemies and in the end his old fiance recognizes him by how he twists his hair with his fingers.

Naturally I thought… what if I am to be married someday and get locked in prison for 50 billion years and come back out and get rich and need to be recognized by my former bride-to-be? To make a long story short I started twisting my hair behind me ear with my right hand and have been doing it ever since. I have (as of yet) never been engaged, gotten rich or been thrown in prison but I’m sure that fateful day lies just around the corner… and when it does come I will be prepared for it.

Now, I don’t suffer from some kind of disease and I’m not OCD in the least (In fact I’m kind of a slob sometimes) but there’s one other thing I always do. I have a drinking problem (it’s not what you think). When getting a drink from a cup (new or one I’ve used previously) I will always rinse it out three times in the sink before filling it. If I happen to rinse it four time by accident I will make it an even six but not five or seven. Always in multiples of three. Okay now… *retrieving memory from mind dump* the origin of this habit also came from a book I read as a child. In this book the evil King was poisoned by his son who then washed the royal cup out three times before drinking as the new King. Still not sure exactly why I found that important in the least but I rarely find myself NOT washing the cup I drink out of at least three times (just to be safe, I don’t have an evil son and I’m not a King but one never knows I suppose). Weird huh?

I also chew on pens and pencils with a vengeance but enough of MY trivial pursuits. I would like to hear if any of you have weird or even normal habits, especially if you can remember how they started and why and even if you can’t… give it your best shot!

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