For the first time in my life, I decided not to give in to the OCD and didn’t manually count all of my syllabi. And of course, the copy center messed up and didn’t give me the number of copies that I requested. I’d much rather have none at all than to have copies for all but 5 students. So now not only do I feel sick, stuffed up, and confused, I also feel embarrassed.
And yes, I always order extras. OCD here! I ran out after distributing all the extras plus my own copy.
I know that this sounds like a very minor drama. But again, OCD. I need to have everything just so. If you’d seen the level of detail in my syllabi, you’d understand.
Clarissa's Blog 
During last year anytime I tried to arrive at the university early it was always a miserable experience with trams not showing up or breaking down and so I gave up and went back to arriving at the last minute and it always worked.
The universe wants you to have OCD (at least about some things) they same way it wants me to arrive at the last minute. Give in.
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The only problem is that now I’m a little OCD about giving up the OCD, so there’s that. 🙂
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You might have had too many students who aren’t registered but who just came in to check out the first class.
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Paper syllabi still exist?
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I count manually my exams.
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And I don’t think this is OCD. This is only the right thing to do.
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In my opinion, OCD would be counting the number of syllabi or exams several times.
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Yes, that’s how it was originally. But I’ve got it under control to an extent. And yesterday it backfired on me.
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Well, it’s great that you got it under control. But I disagree that it backfired. What happened–not having the right number of syllabi–should show you that nothing really bad occurred as a result, right? Sure, you felt uncomfortable, but that’s it, right? I make this point because my OCD generally involves catastrophic thinking about what might happen if I don’t engage in my repetitive rituals.
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You’re confusing OCD with intelligent adult behavior. An intelligent purchaser always counts EVERYTHING that he or she pays for:
When your groceries are delivered, check every egg in the box of one dozen. If any of them are cracked, call the store and complain, and you’ll get a refund for the whole box. (Or if it’s breakfast time and you’re hungry, just cook and eat it right away, and give the store a break.)
Ditto with Christmas cards, or wedding announcements, or whatever. Several years ago, he National Geographic Society had the nerve to send me 23 cards in a box that was supposed to contain 25. When I complained, they knew that it wouldn’t be cost-efficient to open a box and mail me two cards, so they send me a new unopened box (with 25 cards — I counted — giving me 48 cards for the price of 25).
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I had no idea you can do any of this. It’s brilliant!
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An intelligent purchaser always counts EVERYTHING that he or she pays for:
I don’t get groceries delivered because I don’t trust they’ll pick out the right ones, but yes, I check every egg in the dozen before I purchase, because who wants a box full of sticky egg?
Purchasers for stores always count everything in a shipment right when it’s unloaded — especially if the vendors demand cash payment on the spot. What’s fun is when they try to give you groceries that are going to have their best by date pass before the next scheduled shipment. Idiots.
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Well, it happened AGAIN. I just received a big order of frozen meat (steaks, pork chops, T-bones, etc.) from Omaha Steaks delivered via UPS, and almost half of the order was completely thawed because whoever packed it didn’t put in enough dry ice to withstand the Arizona summer heat during the delivery drive from the Phoenix airport to my house in the distant West Valley.
So I called Omaha Steaks, and of course they’re going to send me replacements for the frozen steaks at their expense — the steaks are packaged in boxes containing 4 or 6 cuts, and since the company can’t ship partial boxes, I’ll be getting more steaks back than the ones that were thawed.
I’d rather Omaha Steaks had done everything right in the first place, but I can’t complain about the additional free steaks they have to send me now as a result of their ineptitude.
We’ll see if any of them arrive thawed. 🙂
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I always wondered about Omaha Steaks. Are they good quality? Does it make sense to order? What’s the biggest upside?
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The Omaha Steak meats (beef and pork cuts) are very good quality, but the company’s everyday prices (which they always CLAIM to be marked down from a lined-through price that only an idiot rich movie star would pay, are RIDICULOUSLY high. I buy from the company ONLY when they advertise reasonable sales in popular magazines designed to bring in new customers (usually around a national holiday), or when they occasionally mail me information about a reduced-price special sale.
The biggest upside for me is this: I cook virtually all of my beef steaks and pork chops on my original George Foreman grill, and the Omaha Steaks cuts happen to be precisely the right side, shape, and even thickness to cook perfectly on that grill, which is designed to cook both sides of the meat at the same time. (I’m sure nobody planned it that way, but it works out.) The cuts that I find at my local supermarket are a bit cheaper, but they always need trimming before they’ll cook evenly in the G.F.
If you’re still cooking steaks the old-fashioned way (one side at a time), there’s no real advantage to ordering from Omaha Steaks except that you get the meat delivered directly to your front door. Since it’s frozen, I order in bulk and load up the freezer to eat at my leisure.
Is that information helpful? 🙂
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Yes, very much so. I’m thinking maybe we should grill more. Our grill is very basic but still.
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You may be talking about minor symptoms of OCD, or simply about paying attention to detail, which is usually necessary in most jobs.
True OCD would be counting your copies. And then counting again. And then counting just one more time. Then checking again, just to be safe. CHECKING over and over, compulsively, is OCD. Obsessive compulsive disorder. In extreme OCD,OCD, OCD, OCD, OCD, a person may be unable to stop checking and rechecking.
It can be debilitating, seriously. Seriously, seriously, seriously, seriously . . . unending and incapacitating.
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