My Seven Most Embarrassing Habits

Recently I responded to one of Craig’s posts with a confession about a really bad habit I have. Upon reflection I realized that I have a lot of really bad habits that tend to get me into trouble. Here are seven of them including the one I revealed to Craig.

Feeling Myself Up: Sometimes when my mind wanders, I will actually reach inside my blouse or shirt and start fondling my boobs. It starts out that I’m just stroking my neck but gradually for no apparent reason other than perhaps gravity, my hand just descends into my décolletage (fancy-schmancy speak for “cleavage”) and I start groping myself. I don't know why I do it, it's not intentional. I don't even notice it at first. It just happens! I suddenly realize that I've got a handful of breast and I'm like "oh shit!" I guess it’s the female equivalent of scratching your balls. So far no one's caught me doing it. Incidentally, I’ve also caught myself with my hand down the front of my pants. Fortunately, this has only happened at home, usually after meals when I’ve undone that top button on my jeans while I’m watching T.V. Michael has caught me at that numerous times and constantly hazes me on it. He says I look like the father on Married With Children. T.V is also a contributor to the next bad habit on the list…

Being Late: I hate being late. But I do it a lot. I know better. I know I should go to bed early but I still stay up. I watch T.V., do chores, read, whatever. Then I go to bed late. So, of course, I get up late. In fact, I’ve been know to get up late even when I wake up early. If I’m supposed to get up at 6am but I wake up at 5:45am I’ll feel like I’m cheating myself out of sleep. So I’ll spend 14 minutes forcing myself back to sleep. Then I oversleep by 30 minutes and have to rush to work. I end up 20 minutes late even when I know I have an 8:15 meeting every damn morning. I walk in late and feel like an idiot. I hate myself for it. I curse myself out the whole drive in. And then I berate myself all day for it. Which leads me to…

Talking To Myself: I do this a lot. I have random conversations with myself. I practice what I’m going to say to other people. Usually it’s an argument I plan to have or something clever I want to say but I want it to sound spontaneous. (How ironic is that?) Only I do it out loud. I try to do it in my head. I even THINK I’m doing it in my head. Only I suddenly realize my mouth IS MOVING, SOUND is coming out and I'm GESTICULATING like an angry Italian. I do it in my car a lot. Sometimes I see people looking at me. Then to cover myself, I’ll start bobbing my head to “music” and pretending that I’m singing with the radio. But sometimes I do it in the bathroom at work or in my office. That’s REALLY bad. I once caught myself doing it quietly in the bathroom while someone was in the stall next to me. I had to pretend I was taking a really hard crap and was only groaning. (Intense bowel movements being only slightly less embarrassing than talking to your ass, I reasoned.) Another time a co-worker walked by my office and caught me staring at my desk having an animated but silent discussion with some papers in front of me. I played it off like I was just reading something I had written back to myself. But he still laughed at me. This habit is a close cousin to…

Making Faces: I make faces frequently and inappropriately. It’s actually an empathic response gone awry. For example, the president of our company is a very dramatic man. When he makes speeches meant to fire us up, I tend to absent-mindedly mimic his facial expressions to the point where it looks like I’m mocking him. I’ve gotten the “angry double take” look a few times. Mostly I do it with T.V. though, I just mimic the actors expressions. I only notice when Michael points it out to me. “Man you really get into these shows don’t you?” Er… yeah. Maybe I have a subconscious desire to be an actor. But I wouldn’t be very good because of my other habit of…

Not Having A Poker Face aka Bad Liar Syndrome: There was this really hot guy in college that I had a crush on. Not a serious crush but a Lust From Afar Crush. But all through college he dated this really gorgeous girl and they ended up getting married. Well a few years after graduation we were all at a mutual friend’s wedding. A bunch of the bridesmaids were gathered around him "ooohing and ahhhing" because he was showing pictures of their newborn son. Well I HAD to see this baby, because the kid had the best DNA in the world going for him in the looks department. Maybe my expectations were too high, but when the picture came to me I was in shock. I have never seen a scarier looking baby. I’m not trying to be mean but let me say that anyone who tells you that “all babies are beautiful” hadn’t seen this baby. We're talking 2 bolts shy of Frankenbaby, folks. The head on this kid was GINORMOUS!!! I was stunned… I couldn’t even muster an appropriate response… I just stuttered… "He’s… so…BIG.” Let's just say that's NOT the ideal reaction to have... especially when coupled with the look of horror that was on my face. From Proud Daddy's reaction I may as well of puked on the picture. He practically snatched it back and shoved it in his wallet. I felt like total shit. I want to note that aside from sheer unattractiveness this kid had no other genetic abnormalities that I could see. And while I am quite certain that the child's genetic code will eventually unscramble itself and he will grow up as gorgeous as God intended, there was simply NO WAY I could have convincingly cooed "oh he's sooo cuuute!!" the way my friends were doing. Needless to say Daddy didn’t speak to me again after that. Which is just as well because I would probably have managed to insult him again by forgetting the kid’s name.

Forgetting Names: I know, I know; everybody forgets names. But I’m special. My brain has a 0MB cache for names. “Hi, my name is Joan.” “Oh nice to meet you.” (3 seconds elapse) “What was your name again?” Seriously, that’s how bad it is. The problem could be partially alleviated by repeating the name; ex. “Oh, hi Joan, nice to meet you.” That would help a lot I know. But for some reason I don’t do it. Even when I do, I still seem to suffer from a 5 minute total memory refresh. So I come off as a disinterested ass. Which is only confirmed by…

Not Listening or Pretending to Listen Unconvincingly: Actually it’s not that I don’t listen. I do. It’s that either I’m doing it too slowly or I really need to say something and you’re still talking. For example you might start telling me about the great new car that you just got and in my mind I’m thinking “that’s expensive... a gas-guzzler too... and insurance is gonna rape you…” Only I'm not saying it out loud because you're so happy and I don't want to be a buzzkill. But by this time you’re asking if I want go for a ride and I’m not responding. So now you think that I think your new car sucks or that I could simply care less, which isn't the case at all. However, it's not that I wasn’t listening it’s just that I was listening DEEPLY to the ramifications of a new car on your life. Other times I really need to talk about something but I don’t want to seem pushy so I ask a question to break the ice. I do this to Michael a lot. I’ll ask him how his day was, when I’m really bursting to find out when he’s gonna have time for me, cause he’s been working so much. But the problem is he now thinks I ACTUALLY want to know how his day was. So he says he’s been working in the yard…yada yada yada… but all I hear in my mind is “I wonder if he’s gonna be too tired to go to a movie tonight, maybe he’ll want to go this weekend, unless he decides to work on the car. Maybe I should wear something sexy to change his mind…” But suddenly he's not talking. I have to say something but I don't know where the conversation is because I haven't been paying attention so I say “so did you work in the yard today?” And he looks at me like WTF? “Are you listening to me?! I JUST TOLD YOU I WORKED IN THE YARD ALL DAY!!” Again, it’s not that I wasn't listening exactly, it’s just that I really DIDN’T WANT HIM TO BE TALKING. Which is NOT actually the same thing. Of course, there are other times that I’m not listening, for real. I always get nailed on this, so I should really stop. I do this a lot when I’m talking to people on the phone and trying to do something else at the same time… like responding to emails, cooking dinner, watching T.V. or … feeling myself up.