Being someone who is frequently called “weird” (or some variant), I was really excited to see a celebration of idiosyncrasies, oddities, and general weirdness going on over at SoulPancake. I’d previously said that I had another blog post stewing in my brain, but I think I’ll let it keep stewing. I’m in the mood to share some of my weirdness with you (as long as you don’t judge. If you’re judgmental, skip this one). So here it is: ten of my weirdest traits. If you use these things against me, God help you.

1. The most infamous: I am “afraid” of buttons. Specifically the kind with two or four holes, sewn on with thread. Buttons on my jeans don’t bother me. Clear or nearly-clear are the worst. I have no idea why I have this fear (someone once told me it’s related to OCD), but I’ve had it my whole life. When I was little, I can remember throwing up all over myself when my mom put button shirts on me. I’ve gotten better about being around people wearing them (by “better,” I mean that I can consume food around them, but certain people won’t really even bother me at all if they have them on). Working around this drives my family insane. If I have to wear a button shirt for whatever reason (like in marching band in high school), I have trouble breathing, I feel a little sick, and I can’t eat anything while wearing it. I’m also compelled to wash my hands a lot. I may or may not have had my sister button my shirt. I may or may not have had my friends cut the buttons off of my school polo shirts (I only ever wore them for the staff picture). I may or may not have cut the buttons off of my work polos in high school. In that same vein, I hate shirts with high collars (like polo shirts), but I think that’s mostly because I have a short neck. As you can imagine, this all makes purchasing dress clothes very difficult. I won’t even wear dress pants that have a button on the inside.

2. Certain places make me feel compelled to wash my hands. If I’m around something gross (like buttons, ha), I’ll have to wash my hands even if I haven’t touched whatever grossness is there. Sometimes there’s no real reason. It’s not always gross places either. In my house, for example, I’m fine on the first floor. But if I go upstairs or down to the basement, I have to wash my hands immediately upon returning to the first floor. I don’t think my house is gross. We clean it. Again with the OCD, I suppose.

3. I get ridiculously offended if a girl who is a size 12 or under (not that I think people over a size 12 are fat) refers to herself as fat and makes a big deal about losing weight. I don’t remember a time in my life where I wasn’t heavier than everyone else, regardless of how many diets I went on or how much exercise I got or what thyroid medicine I was taking. I’m insanely sensitive about it (I have to remind myself that when people make food comments around me, it’s not necessarily an underhanded jab, especially if they’re my friends), and when girls who seem skinny to me say things like that, I feel like saying “Well, gosh, if you think you’re fat, you must find me absolutely repulsive.” This is something else that first occurred to me before the age of 10. You might struggle with self-esteem, too, if you believed that everyone else found you repulsive. But more than that, it’s just offensive to me. It’s sad that people are so terribly shallow and superficial.

4. I am super paranoid about having food stuck in my teeth. I never had braces, so I’m already a little bit like “ohmygosh, my teeth!” (even though I know they’re not THAT bad). However, when I was in 6th grade, we came back to our classroom after lunch, and the boy I liked was actually talking to me. I was so excited! About two hours later, we took a class bathroom break. I looked in the mirror and there was a huge piece of lettuce stuck in my teeth. Since that day, I have done whatever I can to make sure that my teeth are food-free. Sometimes I carry a compact mirror. My family and a former roommate know that if I look at them and bare my teeth after a meal, they’re to tell me if I’m in the clear. Otherwise, I go to the bathroom and check out my teeth (and maybe wash my hands). Bonus oddity: one time at work, I had a piece of pepper that I couldn’t get out. I used a piece of my hair as dental floss (so gross, I know. You know what they say about desperate times…). Now I keep dental floss in my purse and in my work bag. Speaking of teeth, I also chew sugar-free gum like it’s my job.

5. When I watch a movie or a TV show where at least one of the actors has passed away, I imagine the scenes and dialogue taking place without them. Examples of this: when watching The Golden Girls, I first saw all the scenes as happening without Sophia, even if they were talking to her. Then scenes between Sophia and Dorothy had no one in them to call Blanche a slut. And now finally I just see Rose talking to herself. My favorite example of this is probably Dirty Dancing. Baby’s riding in a car driven by no one (poor Patrick Swayze… she really is like the wind). “You’re WILD!”

6. Until I was 11 or 12, I had a really difficult time saying the word “heart” because it made me really uncomfortable. I was afraid that if I used it to talk about the actual organ, I would be perceived as a pervert of some kind (why? I don’t know). My alternate concern was that if I used it, someone would think I liked them or something. I guess it can be likened a little bit to how some people have trouble saying “love.”

7. As a result of marching band, I find myself sometimes slowing down or speeding up in order to get myself on the right foot so that I can walk in time to music that’s playing. Speaking of marching band, I’ve also been known to play air trombone in the car.

8. I name things that aren’t alive and then I get too attached to them. My car’s name is Beverly. In high school, my trombone’s name was Butch. Bring it.

9. I can’t look at dead animals along the side of the road, regardless of what they are. It makes me so sad. For some reason, I start thinking of the little animal families they left behind (silly, I’m aware). If it’s obviously a pet (like the time I saw a dead dog with a collar still on it) or an animal that could have been a pet, I start crying like the girl that I am. I’ve called 911 from the road twice in the last year to get the state police to rescue dogs that were walking around on the side of the highway.

10. I think naming fish after former pop sensations (I use the term “sensations” lightly) is cool, and you will never be able to convince me otherwise. This is my fish, Richard Marx:

So now I’m interested to see if you’re brave enough to talk about how weird you are! Leave a comment or take the prompt to your own blog. :)