lights on. lights off. lights on. lights off.

This is a true story.

Sadly.

As I'm sitting in my office doing my work thing, one of our graduate students comes in and asks me, "Who do I contact about the lights in the hallway not working?"  Before I have a chance to respond, The Boss Man calls out from his office, "Flip the switch."  The graduate student looks at me a bit perplexed, then ventures closer to the Boss Man's door and says, "Flip the switch?  Where?"  The Boss Man says, "The switch on the wall."  The graduate student still looking mentally disoriented, replies, "What switch on what wall?  What does it look like?"

At this point, I am desperately struggling to keep it together and decide it might be prudent of me to turn around and rummage in the filing cabinet behind my desk while thinking VERY SERIOUS thoughts as to avoid the snorting noise that I fear will explode from my being at any moment.

The conversation continues with The Boss Man saying, "Come here; it looks just like this," and points to a spot on the wall just inside his office door.  The graduate students peers around the corner and sees this.

He looks very confused and says, "What?"  The Boss Man says, "Turn the lights ON!"

The graduate student still has not fully comprehended the fact that THERE IS NOTHING WRONG WITH THE LIGHTS THAT A FLIP OF A SWITCH WON'T RECTIFY.

In the meantime, I am doing everything in my power to keep from 1) laughing so hard I snort coffee out my nose or 2) jump up and poke said graduate student in the forehead with a very sharp fingernail and say, "Are you fucking kidding me?!"

The graduate student stammers, "I don't understand.  Where is the switch?"  The Boss Man has reached the point where he's close to 1) laughing so hard HE snorts coffee out HIS nose or 2) pokes said graduate student in the forehead with a very sharp fingernail and says, "Are you fucking kidding me?!"

But being The Boss Man he's a bit more diplomatic and says very patiently, "The light switch is in the hallway."  But apparently the graduate student has never actually had to employ a light switch within the vicinity of the light(s) he would like to illuminate or darken and says, very moronically, "Which hallway?"  The Boss Man and I look at each other then simultaneously slowly turn our eyes and stare dumbfounded at the graduate student.  Momentarily the graduate student realizes that perhaps the light swtich to opearate the lights in the hallway could perhaps?  maybe?  possibly?  be in that very same hallway.

The boss man has by now decided that this kid will pay for his stupidity and says in all seriousness, "This has been a test."  And the graduate student replies very morosely, "And I have failed completely."

This is what he was looking for and I'm hoping eventually found.

No, it does not look identical to the one previously shown him by The Boss Man.  I am hoping the dual switches did not present such a quandary as to cause his brain to explode.

ocd

There are some folks out there who have referred to me as OCD.  Mostly in a joking manner.  Mostly.

I know I have issues with having a clean house.  (It's a nice house – I'd like to keep it that way, thank you very much.)  We can blame a lot of it on my mom.  There were times we girls were down on our hands and knees cleaning the baseboards with Q-Tips.  No, I am not kidding.  As OCD as I can be, I've never been that bad.

So, I thought I'd share some of my OCD tendencies with you.  Probably some of you have the same compulsions.  Or not.

• The toilet paper roll must always be left with fully intact new sheet all neat and tidy like.  No straggly pieces of paper can be left dangling for the next person to deal with.  Dangly pieces of toilet paper cause the weight of the roll to be off balance and could cause undue stress on the roll holder, which leads to undue stress on the wall, which means the wall could fall off the house.  Or something.

 even I'm not *that* obsessive

• When the blinds are closed they must be straight and the entire bottom must touch the window sill.  No wonky, off kilter blinds are allowed.  Wonky or off kilter blinds have the same effect as dangly toilet paper.  Walls fall off houses.  Or something.

• When leaving the laundry room, the light switch next to the door entering the house (as opposed to the switch next to the door going into the garage) must be in a position to match the light's state.  If the light is on, the switch must be in the up, or "on" position; if the light is off the switch must be in the down, or "off" position.  If the switch is not in the proper position, when switched on or off, the light will become confused and get all strobe-y on me which could lead to seizures.  Or something.

• Books in the book cases are sorted tallest to shortest working from the outside of the case to the inside.  There really aren't any dire consequences of this that I'm aware of; it just "is."  Or something.

There are probably many more but I'm not going to obsess about remembering them.  There are folks out there who will only be too happy to remind me of them.  Probably on a recurring basis too.