5 idiosyncrasies
Pretty weird.
I reallly like this meme. I have so many idiosyncrasies, I could go for days listing them all. These are the first five that popped into my head.
1. I can't sleep at night unless my comforter is very neatly turned down, with the sheet folded down straight over it. It has to be the same amount on each side of the bed, and evenly folded. The sheets can't have wrinkles, loose corners, etc. I must have two pillows -- one thick and fluffy, one thinner and hard. The thin hard one goes on top. I never make up my bed during the day, but it has to be just so before I get in it or I will toss and turn all night.
2. I'm deathly afraid of anything with thin, membrane-like skin or webbing. Things like frilled lizards are the worst, but it also extends to a fear of moth wings, fins, or any type of flat fish. Even plants with large flat leaves give me chills. If something is flat and thin, the more fluidly it moves, the more it freaks me out. Or if it is so thin and crisp that it looks like it might break if you bent it? OMGJAKLJSKASDJ!! I have chills right now, trying to describe it. Sometimes just looking can make my eyes actually water.
3. When I eat a sandwich, I always eat the outside edges first, saving the juiciest middle bite for last. I can't do it any other way, and it always makes a horrible mess -- the last bite MUST have some of everything in it, and be the best one. Likewise, if I'm eating a meal with different side dishes, I have to eat them so that they all match up with exactly one bite of each to end with.
4. I can't listen to music if I'm doing anything else. It totally distracts me. I get into the music so hard that it's difficult for me to think of other things. This is really a problem at work, since we have satellite radio playing all of the time. I get odd looks when sometimes I blurt out something like "That's the third time they've played this same rotation today!" ahhahahaaa! Apparently no one else ever notices the music but me. On sunday afternoons when they play improvisational jazz, it makes me feel more than a little crazy. Seriously. I don't understand music that has no discernable rhythm or tune, so my mind spins even faster while trying to sort it out. I usually end up having a very bad headache on sunday afternoons.
5. I sometimes get patterns stuck in my head. Often it is something I've been repeating to myself over and over again for hours before I notice it. It may be a word that someone said that was highly unusual -- sometimes I'll realize I've been repeating it continuously and spelling it both forwards and backwards for hours unconsciously. I know it's fairly common to do this with songs, but I do it with just one line of a song. Or maybe it's a phrase or a string of words that appealed to me for some reason. Or a rhythm. I tend to make patterns with my toes, or sometimes by clenching and unclenching my jaw. If I realize I'm doing it and try to stop, I have to finish out the pattern first or I guess my brain would explode.
And a bonus one:
I have extremely weird dreams. They are often very detailed and symbolic and sound too fantastical to be real. I work out problems in my dreams. Sometimes its to very complex emotional situations, sometimes it's a project from work that's stumped me. I've written music in my sleep before. I can lucid dream -- if I like a dream, I can make myself continue it for the rest of the night. Or if I don't like it, I can usually change the outcome. I'm almost always aware that I'm dreaming. On rare occassions, I've been able to get into a half awake/half asleep state where I could actually describe outloud to someone else what I was dreaming, as it occurred. When I go to sleep, I usually go straight into REM sleep. I can doze off in about 60 seconds and if you wake me, I'll already be dreaming.