h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I do recognise SOME of my own shortcomings. And my need for routine is one of them.

So having managed to get my knickers in a twist this morning by upsetting my breakfast / shower / brush teeth / get dressed routine just a little, and then I started to think about the order in which I wash myself in the shower. Basically from the top down. It seems to me to be logical. But I wondered what it would be like if I washed various bits in a different order.

Well I won't be doing that again in a hurry!

Showering this morning was chaos! Soap shower curtain, shampoo arms and legs everywhere. And I probably have unrinsed soap in my hair and shampoo under my arms. What an uncoordinated mess!

(I also seem to brush my teeth in the same order too)

Am I alone I this?

PP.

I don't care what order I do things, but if I don't use the normal order, I can't remember if I've done them.

I was going to say the same thing - if I don't do things in the (to me) proper order, then the liklihood of doing one thing twice and forgetting another is very high.

Routine can be good.

No you are not alone.
I think most of us have a habitual process, especially first thing in the morning, as it saves waking up fully.

because I'm still half asleep, If I don't do things in the right order everything goes to rat shit.

e.g. if I brush my teeth before shaving, I only realise that I haven't had a shave after I walk out the door.



[BB]

I change around things or I get bored.

I also noticed recently that I always start brushing my teeth at the front top left, I am very thorough but am so bored by the end that the bottom left (I go front anti-clockwise then back anti-clockwise) doesn't get brushed as well.
I wonder if this is why my lower left molar is the only adult tooth I've lost through decay.

So I've started switching it around to even out the 'neglect'


I have yet to start eating breakfast at night and dinner in the morning though
(except as a childhood experiment with a bowl of cereal in the evening once or twice of course )

I certainly don't get in a flap about any of this sort of stuff. I guess we are all different.

I've sat down to breakfast and found I've out out 3 spoons. Didn't worry me though.

I useually shower in the exact same way.... sort of top to bottom with soap, then shower gel/sponge, then I wash my hair (and condition if I'm doing that), then rinse my hair (if not conditioinng), or if I am conditioning, I then leave that on my hair, whilst I shave, before rinsing everythign off Mind, I spend far too long in the shower

I have a morning routine, and if I deviate at all from the usual routine, I will forget steps entirely. I don't think I always perform all aspects of showering in the exact same order, other than if I am conditioning, I will shampoo and apply conditioner first so that can sit while I do everything else. But everything else must be done in order, or I'll miss something. I always have toothpaste and toothbrush in my purse anyway, but it sucks to get halfway to work and realize I've left my house keys or my lunch on the kitchen counter.

The opening credits of Dexter have convinced me that anyone who has a highly regimented morning routine is probably a serial killer.

Considering what I eat as part of my morning routine, I am definitely a cereal killer.

I have no idea what 'order' I brush my teeth in. I do shower from top down because no point washing the bottom and having the top's dirt/sweat/blood/tears/lostyouth mess it up all over again.

I don't think I have routines as such, for anything, which is probably why I have to come back into the house at least once for something I've forgotten when I'm trying to go out. But once I'm set on a course of action (ie starting to get ready to go out) if this is disrupted by anything I find it very hard to cope.

"I have yet to start eating breakfast at night and dinner in the morning though "

What? You have never had "Brinner"? Something obsenely nice about a full English in the evening!

FB

I really don't think so - although I have been known to have sausage egg beans and chips for tea which is more or less the same thing with less bacon

I only noticed the toothbrushing thing recently - probably something to do with the psychological trauma of the (dentist's bill) major agony of a toothache combined with subsequent extraction of the dead tooth.

Sometimes I go the wrong way round the supermarket. Yes.

Uh Ooh

going widershins in the supermarket, whatever next.

Don't you find yourself talking to security if you go in via the tills (with an empty bag)and out via the entrance (with a not so empty one)?



I hate it when they break my routine by moving stock around on the shelves, meaning it takes me twice as long as otherwise.

[BB]

I'm not well-organized if you judge by the number of times I forget something and need to get out of the car and go back into the house for it before I can drive off.

I often think of the similarities between supermarket shopping and American football. In order to score a shopping cart touchdown, I have to dodge other shoppers and utilize empty lanes before the others realize I've escaped down them.

I am sort of relieved to read some of this. I went through an increasingly worse period when I would arrive at work without one of four vital things (diary, ID, pen and phone).

I now have My Box of Four Things, I don't have to remember WHAT the four things are any more and I have reduced the number of uncomfortable days that I have at work.

PP.

this morning I fed the cat before I showered etc. And that isn't what I normally do so then I forgot to clean my teeth, which meant I did some other things in my morning routine in the wrong order.

So I spent the journey to work going over it all, comparing it with my usual routine and trying to work out if I'd forgotten something.

Seems not but it's horrible.

Routines are great when you're in control of them, and things get done on autopilot. Problems can arise when you get stuck in that routine, to the detriment of other opportunities, which is why I tend to break routines regularly to see if I'm missing out on anything; before going back to the old routine, or modifying it in the light of the new information thus obtained.

Once I'm awake I like to break with routine as much as possible. It's good to do things differently.

We try to go on holidays every year to a different place; we sing new things in choir. Although the choir sang Messiah every year for charity, I didn't enjoy it as much as I would have done singing something new.

I like to drive different routes to places, and see other aspects. I have three routes which I can walk to the tram in the morning when I'm going to work, and I don't always take the fastest one.

And the entries that I write, I try to pick new things each time, rather than a whole series about one thing. That way I get to learn about new stuff all the time.