Creature of Habit

Turns out that I am a creature of habit.

For some reason, I had never thought of myself as a someone who followed patterns of behaviour. I would have most definitely classified myself as a completely random person. And that was how it was. Until recently when I realized that there was method to my madness.

I manage to park my car every single day in the same bay of cars. There might be other spaces, in fact there always is, better placed spaces too, but I just end up parking in the same general area. I don’t park on the same space though. A little bit of randomness still exists. And of course, some thought too. For instance, on the days when we had heavy winds forecast, I made sure to park the car away from any trees or poles that could possibly land on my car, didn’t want to come back to a wrecked car, you see. But still in the same darn bay!

And I’m not the only one. I meet others who park in the same way as I do. We’ve been meeting every morning, so regularly that we exchange our views on the weather, which certainly gives us plenty to talk about, I have to say.

Every single day, I plan to grab two glasses of water, as soon as I get in to work. Every single day, it stays a plan. I sit at my desk, completely forget about the water until I’m so thirsty that I’m gagging. Why?? Today, I did try to break that pattern. We have a huge carton of water bottles that we picked up from Costco sitting in the boot of the car. We always end up forgetting to take along water when we step out and end up buying water. This works out much cheaper, and if it sits in the boot, it is there when we need it. I grabbed a bottle, and have been sipping at it through the day.

Ever day, I rush back into the house, on my way out, to check if I’ve switched off everything, like irons, hair straighteners. I have never left them on, so far, but I can never remember if I have switched off everything, when I am about to get into the car and drive off. So just to put my mind at rest, I come back, open two doors, take off my shoes, go upstairs to check(of course, they are all switched off!), wear them shoes, lock the doors again, and drive off. Why, oh why do I do that!

I’ve been planning to get out of work at lunch time early enough to get hold of some tasty soup. The shop has limited quantities of soup and the popular ones get over rather quickly. So if I go late, it is more than likely that I will not get it. I know this, and yet end up late and missing the soup:( Asking for punishment, isn’t it?

And the crowning bit is, every single time I enter my password to unlock my laptop screen, I get it wrong the first time. And the second attempt is always successful. Every. Single. Time. How is that for consistency!