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Things you do out o...
 

Things you do out of habit which are utterly pointless

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[#13214438]

I've had this thread idea in my head for a while now (and may even have already done it once and forgotten) but, inspired by a comment on https://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/whats-going-on-with-milk

I still shake full fat milk before pouring, out of habit despite it being homogenized these days.

I do the same.  Even if it's skimmed milk.

The other habit I do, uh, habitually: it was drummed into me by my grandparents to walk behind cars rather than in front after getting out of them in case the driver sets off without seeing me.  I still do this unthinkingly to this day, despite me being the driver.

What've you got?


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 10:53 am
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Check STW each morning?


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 10:54 am
hightensionline, susepic, temudgin and 67 people reacted
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Ask my wife to buy fewer clothes.


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 10:55 am
dander, footflaps, dander and 1 people reacted
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Check STW each morning?

I knew that was coming, though I wasn't expecting it quite so quickly!


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 10:56 am
 nuke
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Superstitions...got lots that I've inherited from parents/grandparents


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 11:00 am
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Reading pointless news articles about horrible things that have happened over night.


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 11:06 am
mashr, silvine, SaxonRider and 5 people reacted
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"Superstitions…got lots that I’ve inherited from parents/grandparents"

Unlucky.


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 11:07 am
frankconway, breadcrumb, kayak23 and 15 people reacted
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Before I get in the shower I'll test the water to see if it's up to temp - then dry my hand - then get in the shower! 🤷‍♂️


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 11:10 am
jimmy and jimmy reacted
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The National Lottery

Supporting Reading


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 11:16 am
supernova and supernova reacted
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Clean the car / windows 🙄🙄🙄


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 11:26 am
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Leave a cm of tea in the cup <b> </b>as my nan always used to do when she drank loose tea, my mum does it and I do having almost never drank loose leaf tea.


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 11:30 am
hightensionline, kelvin, hightensionline and 1 people reacted
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Always make sure the volume control on my radio is set to an even number - utterly bonkers but I have a (weird) thing about odd numbers.


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 11:32 am
hightensionline, dove1, lankystreakofpee and 7 people reacted
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I walk my dog in the same woodland every morning and always have to walk an anti clockwise loop. Any other time of the day I can walk in any direction, but in the morning I can only go anti clockwise.


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 11:33 am
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GlennQuagmire

Contains 13 letters. 😱


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 11:35 am
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Always make sure the volume control on my radio is set to an even number – utterly bonkers but I have a (weird) thing about odd numbers.

My partner will happily set things like car aircon to 19.5'C.  The patio is on order.


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 11:35 am
welshfarmer, fatmax, fatmax and 1 people reacted
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I do the tea thing as well. Try so hard to break the habit, and always fail.

I don't know how smokers get out of their spiral of habits that are paired with actual chemical addiction, if I can't even break this little one.


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 11:35 am
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I've picked up a few superstition ones from my mum. Salt over my shoulder if spill it. Spit and salute if I see a magpie - a right PITA on the motorbike with my visor down!

Now I'm a pretty rational person I think, I don't believe in any woo woo or supernatural bollocks. I know at an intellectual level that superstitions are nonsense, but I still do it! it's partly a connection with my mum I suppose, tipping my hat to her influence on my life and I feel a connection with her when I do it.


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 11:41 am
geeh, fasthaggis, geeh and 1 people reacted
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Avoid walking over triple manhole covers. If I do find myself on one I'll skip off to the side, even into the road!

Not sure where this came from, because I am in no way superstitious about anything else 🤔

...and another weird thing - if I'm driving and the hour beeps come on the radio, I count the first 3 and then whistle a harmony with the last three. Nothing bad happens if I don't, though I am a bit sad if I miss it 😁


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 11:44 am
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STW...

2 taps of the knife on the chopping board before the chopping actually starts

Shake bottles of squash


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 11:46 am
fazzini and fazzini reacted
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My partner will happily set things like car aircon to 19.5’C. The patio is on order.

My daughter has that weird affliction. I turn the music volume or temp in her car to odd numbers to mess with her head. She's hilarious at filling stations, she has to ensure the fuel quantity AND price are on nice even round numbers or it really freaks her out!


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 11:46 am
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I put a little line in the middle of the number '7' whenever I write it. I can't not.

I've tried not doing it and walking away, but even some considerable time later I have to go back and complete it, it's like I've left the digit unfinished and have abandoned it. Bonkers and completely irrational, I accept!

Always start shaving on the right side, I've tried starting on the left and it's really weird.

Rev the engine slightly before turning off the ignition, a habit from my dad; I think it was something to do with carburettor cars bitd.


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 11:46 am
fazzini and fazzini reacted
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My first thought was errr not sure that would involve me thinking and remembering so decided to plunge on down into existential angst and say live, exist.


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 11:47 am
davros, 10, 10 and 1 people reacted
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If I use a match to light a candle or something, then like any other normal person I shake the match to extinguish it. I will then, almost without thinking, either dunk it in water or run it under a tap just in case - Of what; I'm not exactly sure, I'm pretty certain zombie matches aren't a thing.


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 11:48 am
hightensionline, nt80085, frankconway and 3 people reacted
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Left arm first in to any jacket/shirt/backpack straps. If I try right hand first my left arm can't figure out which way to bend to find the other hole.


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 2:03 pm
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Always make sure the volume control on my radio is set to an even number – utterly bonkers but I have a (weird) thing about odd numbers.

You total ****ing weirdo

Is it not obvious that even numbers are only partly right. For sure, 12 is way better than 11 or 13 but who'd set a radio to 14 or 16, when 15 is clearly the right number?

Sort yourself out man!


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 2:03 pm
ngnm, hightensionline, funkmasterp and 9 people reacted
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Our car has separate heater controls for passenger and driver, I move them (on purpose) so that they are different, to annoy my wife. luckily our volume control doesn't have a numerical scale, otherwise, she'd have murdered me ages ago.


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 2:08 pm
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Turn the lights off after my daughters have been in a room … got caught out the other day turned light off when D3 was still in her room 🤣


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 2:10 pm
verses and verses reacted
 ton
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Say 'good morning Mr Magpie' to the first Magpie is see each day.

Pointless?? Or is it.....


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 2:10 pm
blokeuptheroad, fasthaggis, nickc and 3 people reacted
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"Superstitions…got lots that I’ve inherited from parents/grandparents"

As Larkin said "...they leave you with the faults they had, and add some extra, just for you."


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 2:10 pm
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I have a mate who mentally assigns a number to everyday objects around him.  If he walks into a pub for example, his beer glass, the table, the rug on the floor or whatever will all be given a number in his mind.  Apparently it's to do with the number of corners or surfaces or angles or somesuch! Weird AF!  He says he does it instinctively and almost instantly whenever he's in new surroundings.  If you ask him 'what about this ketchup bottle' he'll instantly fire back '7' or whatever.  He's pretty normal otherwise!


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 2:14 pm
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When I am walking down the stairs in our house I always "bounce" my heels off the edge of the stair before placing it down on the next step. I used to do this when I lived in a flat that had a really dark staircase and it helped me to make sure I was putting my feet on the right step without having to turn the light on - say if I was getting up to fill a glass of water in the night. I still do it now even though I can see fine in this place.

Maybe less weird and just a general interest thing - I check MWIS - the mountain weather forecast - every single morning for the northwest highlands. Even though I don't live there anymore and haven't for years - and only go to the mountains maybe once every couple months.


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 2:20 pm
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@blokeuptheroad - kinda sounds like a weird version of synaesthesia. I have a thing where numbers and days of the week are all different colours and it'd really clear in my mind. Like if someone says Friday I always get the colour brown in my head, or Wednesday is pink.

4 is orange..!


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 2:21 pm
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I put a little line in the middle of the number ‘7’ whenever I write it. I can’t not.

I do this too 🙂 Zeroes as well. It's an engineering thing, isn't it?


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 2:24 pm
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Rev the engine slightly before turning off the ignition, a habit from my dad; I think it was something to do with carburettor cars bitd.

Don't do this, it puts a load (a bit) of unburnt fuel into the bores which can wash the oil away leading to premature bore wear. *

* Probably (I did hear/read it somewhere way back and now kill the engine on idle only)


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 2:27 pm
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I count stairs, but only going up.


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 2:28 pm
fazzini and fazzini reacted
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Whenever I finish a can of pop, I have to make sure that the opening is not pointing at me/nearest to me when I set it down.

Can't be doing with that spooky hole staring at me.


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 2:29 pm
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Can’t be doing with that spooky hole staring at me.

<FinbarrSaundersMode>We've all been there.....</FinbarrSaundersMode>


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 2:38 pm
jimmy and jimmy reacted
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Say ‘good morning Mr Magpie’ to the first Magpie is see each day.

My mum used to do this - but only single magpies; one for sorrow, etc. Two or more together, and the bad luck is negated after all, two for joy). You had to say Morning Mr Magpie but that didn't get the luck taken away, that was just something you had to do.

So far so not abnormally weird, plenty have heard of or have similar superstition to that.

However, in my Mum's world - if the single magpie was seen by more than one person simultaneously, then the bad luck IS negated. So, she'd need to get someone else to see it - but you couldn't ask them to see it. It had to be sort of unsolicited. So many's the time as a kid I'd be working in my room or watching TV or whatever and I'd get an urgent call to come into the kitchen. But she couldn't say 'come into the kitchen and see this magpie'. Pretty soon I was aware what the Code M, Jonny to kitchen type call meant and would immediately scan the trees in the garden, but you had to be careful to not scare it away before having a firm visual..... she wouldn't stand for a pretend sighting. Even if I could describe it fairly accurately.

I'm still not clear on additive effects - if you see one, and then at a later juncture see another (assumed to be different; two single magpie sightings in the same garden a few minutes apart are assumed to be the same one obviously, despite evidence of seeing seven or more together from time to time) - I don't know if that counts as 2x1 so now two bad luck events incoming (unless obvs seen unsolicited by AN Other subject to aforementioned clause 3.b.1 above, etc) - or is that 1x2 and hence some good fortune is coming your way?

I miss my mum, even if she was a bit mad.


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 2:43 pm
jimmy and jimmy reacted
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However, in my Mum’s world – if the single magpie was seen by more than one person simultaneously, then the bad luck IS negated. So, she’d need to get someone else to see it – but you couldn’t ask them to see it. It had to be sort of unsolicited. So many’s the time as a kid I’d be working in my room or watching TV or whatever and I’d get an urgent call to come into the kitchen. But she couldn’t say ‘come into the kitchen and see this magpie’. Pretty soon I was aware what the Code M, Jonny to kitchen type call meant and would immediately scan the trees in the garden, but you had to be careful to not scare it away before having a firm visual….. she wouldn’t stand for a pretend sighting. Even if I could describe it fairly accurately.

My mum did this!  On car journeys - that's a nice tree/field isn't it?  We all soon learned to look and acknowledge the black and white fella.


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 2:51 pm
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"any more and she would have started*" after any suitable fart.

Pointless.

But still makes me laugh.

(*Other phrases too. I just have to comment)


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 2:54 pm
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Always start shaving on the right side, I’ve tried starting on the left and it’s really weird.

Elsewhere on the Internet recently, there was a poll.  Apparently there is a percentage of people who, when getting dressed of a morning, will put on one sock and one shoe then repeat for the other side.

I put a little line in the middle of the number ‘7’ whenever I write it. I can’t not.

I do this too 🙂 Zeroes as well. It’s an engineering thing, isn’t it?

It's a European thing (France, probably others). Sevens have strikethroughs because ones have a much more pronounced upstroke than we'd write, almost like an inverted V.


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 3:01 pm
Jamze and Jamze reacted
 5lab
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Running the cold tap for a bit before filling a cup of water/kettle/whatever

I think it came from water sitting in lead pipes overnight? Of which there are none in our 9 year old house


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 3:14 pm
fazzini, kayak23, Murray and 5 people reacted
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It’s a European thing (France, probably others). Sevens have strikethroughs because ones have a much more pronounced upstroke than we’d write, almost like an inverted V.

Yep they need to clearly differentiate the 7s from the 1s, especially in France


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 3:21 pm
fazzini and fazzini reacted
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Bite my nails.... I start and then think "why not get the nail clippers out and do it properly".

put a little line in the middle of the number ‘7’ whenever I write it

I do this, but it's down to living in Germany for years. How've, I refuse to write a 1 like an upturned, slanted "V".


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 3:33 pm
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I do 7s like that, I'm not German but my Grandma was, my writing just evolved that way.

Also I'll join the even numbers brigade. The boy put the tv on thirteen the other day, I nearly throttled him. New car doesn't have a numerical scale for volume which I find massively annoying as I can't find a sweet spot without trying to remember the number of button presses.


 
Posted : 08/04/2024 3:48 pm
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