I can’t watch anyone cook without steeling myself from mentioning their risky knife grip, mess-inducing lack of flow, slapdash mis, etc. 😵‍💫 On the positive side, I always call my status (“behind”, “hot”, “knife”, etc.)

My second job was a bagger at a grocery store, which included getting carts. I tend to just collect them if I pass by some just sitting in parking lots on my way into grocery stores and bring them in. On my way back to my car, if I have a cart but notice the corral is just a mess from people just half-ass pushing them in at just whatever angle. I can’t stop from just un-fucking all of them so they are able to be brought back in by workers, or at least so that more will fit correctly. Just really bothers me to see them all tangled up and possibly roll back into the lot to hit cars.

One of my other jobs a while ago was doing lab billing information corrections so we could bill insurance (would take the stuff that was missing random stuff like part of the insurance, diag codes used, and like missing parts of addresses). When I started they said that we would likely see so many insurance numbers/prefixes that we would start seeing prefixes on things like license plates. This was very true (would see the letters at the beginning and be like “UHC” or whatever), and took a long time to not see them.

Though in a personal life going into my professional life (I work on people’s computers). I have an OCD kind of habit to just disable all the easy anti-user stuff in Windows settings and add uBO to browsers. Might not even be why the stuff was brought in, but most users don’t know to ask (or if things can be done) and either just go through using their PCs without all the random shit, or are just so happy that things run much better. I make a point to note that an adblocker was added so they can ask about it, or remind my peers that do the check-ins and outs to mention them and show them how to turn it off if a site doesn’t load something. Also means that I notice when settings get moved around or more anti-user options show up. Which keeps me sharp in both professional and personal life.

i worked for starbucks in the late 90’s and the trauma from its popularity at the time still leaves me w nightmares from time to time 30 years later. lol

Graduated a couple years ago with an English PhD: when I go to read anything, I always pick up a pen or pencil as if I’m going to annotate it. I still have to hold one but don’t click it out, like a security blanket, otherwise I feel immensely guilty.

I’m in IT. My personal laptop is perennially broken because I. cannot. stop. tinkering.

I think being a professional cook inculcates or at least intensifies an already present hyper vigilance because there’s always something else I could be or should be doing and it’s a nearly constant list of tasks and any moment not filled by a task is filled with thoughts of what am I not doing right now that I should be.

At least Christmas music doesn’t fill me with hate anymore

I make little typing motions with my fingers

Decades of working IT in various capacities including a lot of support roles at various levels have led me to usually suspect that anyone coming to to me saying that they can’t get something to work is doing something wrong, regardless if it’s IT or something else completely unrelated.

This is often combined with me trying to suggest possible solutions whenever someone complains or vents. This one drives my wife crazy sometimes and she’s had to teach me that sometimes she just wants emotional support and solidarity rather than possible ways to fix whatever she is venting about.

Professionally, my ethics dictate that I speak up and force a change whenever I see any action that can lead to a catastrophic failure. This didn’t make someone popular.

Used to play Trumpet.

I still do the fingerings when thinking about music once in a while.

I’ve been the electronic security game for about 25 years and I swear I instinctively notice and look directly at every video camera in every building I enter, and I swear if anybody noticed they’d think I’m casing the joint.

I’m a software developer. I get very agitated when I have to sit next to someone who operates their computer slowly.

I’m extremely sensitive to changes in noise levels. Whether it’s a very loud and short noise, like a door slamming, or some change in background noise, like a furnace turning on, I’m just acutely aware of it.

The unconscious urge to post up in a bouncer position when I’m just waiting for someone in any casual situation. I can’t imagine it makes me look like a chill person

Used to work in underground mining, every time there wasn’t enough light, I’d reach for my cap lamp on my head

We also used left hand drive cars in a right hand drive country and when I went home I’d get in the wrong side of the car