Sometime ago we asked our regular contributors through e-mail, What strange habits have you picked up from your line of work? We got many interesting response. Here are some of them. We have just copied and pasted their responses, not editing them in any way and most of the respondents have requested to stay anonymous, so no names will be published.
1-5 Strange Habits Picked from Your Line of Work
1. I work with mentally disabled adults and sometimes I forget I can’t talk to normal people like they’re 5. I also hide my food in weird places and compulsively lock doors. It only takes one time of someone bursting into the bathroom screaming like a raptor while you’re peeing for you to remember to lock the door.
2. Locking my computer every time I get up from my desk at home even though there’s nobody else around. We have a webapp at work where you get a point if you visit from someone else’s computer and type in your name. Once we started doing that everyone got real good at locking their computers, but not before a few of us shot to the top of the leader boards.
3. Back when I used to work in retail, some dude asked me the time while I was on vacation. I looked at my watch, told him, and then when he thanked me, I thanked him for coming in and told him to have a nice day. I also find myself tidying other people’s stores quite often.
4. I am a career lifeguard. I yell “walk” at small children in public places for no reason.
5. After working in the restaurant business throughout high school and college, there was a period of time I caught myself saying “corner!” anytime I went around a corner in a crowded place. I also used to touch my coworkers’ backs and say “behind you!” I started doing this out of habit every time I was walking behind someone in a crowed area. Got a lot of awkward looks.
6-10 Strange Habits Picked from Your Line of Work
6. I used to work as a prison guard almost 20 years ago. To this day my hearing focus is about 3 feet behind me when walking around. Meaning you become hyper-aware of anything going on behind your back.
7. Engineering. I must find the most efficient method of doing something. I will sometimes spend 50 minutes of free time trying to make a 3 second task take 1 second.
8. I worked in a preschool. I found myself asking others if they washed their hands after they left the bathroom.
9. I’m a paralegal, so around attorneys all day long. I’ve learned to never admit to anything! I use the phrase “It appears as though that car ran a red light,” instead of “That car ran a red light.” It leaves a little doubt in your statements and you’re not outright accusing anyone of anything or admitting to anything either.
10. Restaurant manager. I have to stop myself from greeting/thanking people walking into/leaving businesses that aren’t my restaurant. It is quite embarrassing on the rare occasions I don’t catch myself. But I guess I just look super friendly or insane.
11-15 Strange Habits Picked from Your Line of Work
11. I am a martial arts instructor. We bow coming into the building to symbolize leaving all negativity at the door. On the way out, we turn in the doorway, facing back into the dojang and bow to symbolize our appreciation. Occasionally, when I’m not thinking, I bow when I walk in and out of buildings and sometimes to people when I meet or thank them. I’m sure I look freaky.
12. I used to work as a guide in a zoo aviary, and I got attuned to all the birdsongs. Now I can’t turn it off. Watching a movie, I start picking out the bird noises in the background. In a rainforest scene, for instance, I’ll notice a Screaming Piha, a macaw… and a robin!? What the hell is an American Robin doing in the Amazon? It’s really jarring. Either movie sound mixers need to step up their game, or I need to calm down.
13. I’m a maintenance electrician. Anytime I go anywhere I always catch myself looking at the lighting to see how many globes have blown. I recently traveled to Costa Rica and I was appalled by their electrical boxes/lighting. I kept pointing stuff out to my wife. She didn’t care.
14. I don’t do this anymore because it was many years ago, but I used to work in the casino area of a hotel. There were cameras everywhere and every time we were handling money, we had to visibly show our empty hands so the camera would pick it up, just in case they had to check someday. For a while after I left, I would find myself occasionally doing the hand gesture after touching money.
15. I work in childcare. Obviously it’s important to know how many kids you have at any given time so at work I’m constantly head counting. It’s kind of a weird skill to have, but having done it literally thousands of times now I can do it very efficiently, even with large groups of non-stationary people. Because I do this almost unconsciously at work I constantly find myself doing it in the real world, such as when sitting having a coffee in a cafe or at a party. It’s actually come in handy more than a few times, because if you’ve ever been with a large group of friends, it’s easy not to notice if someone goes missing. Not when I’m around.
16-20 Strange Habits Picked from Your Line of Work
16. I am a nurse. I assess people’s veins and occasionally compliment them. There’s this barista who works at the Starbucks near my apartment with hoses I could hit from across the room.
17. Fisheries biologist. I can’t eat seafood without dissecting what I’m eating. I remove ear bones from fish and check the sex of crustaceans.
18. My manufacturing job is really safety conscious. Gotta wear gloves for everything. Nitrile gloves while I’m cleaning. Cut-resistant gloves for basically anything else. Now when I’m working around the house, I don’t feel right without a pair of gloves.
19. I work at a high end wine and liquor store. I smell every beverage now before I drink it, including water. Also, when I grab an item at a store I sometimes pull the next one forward to make it look nice on the shelf.
20. TV reporter: I sometimes ask complete strangers (who I’m not interviewing – i.e., people at the grocery store or park) pointed, overly personal questions about their feelings or events that have happened in their lives. While inappropriate, I can’t think of a time when someone hasn’t given me a genuine answer.
21-25 Strange Habits Picked from Your Line of Work
21. I am a dishwasher. Contrary to my roommate, I can’t stand seeing dirty dishes left in the sink. I find it strange when people complain about doing dishes for like 30 minutes. Because that sounds like a crazy easy shift to me.
22. On my first morning as an apprentice plumber I was sent into a loft to turn off a valve. The loft was full of cobwebs and they got all in my long hair. I went and bought a cap in my lunch break. I wore a cap every day at work since. Nine years of wearing a cap later, I simply do not feel like I’m a plumber without my hat. I’ll have to put it on just to change a tap washer at home.
23. I’m a substitute teacher (have my license for middle/secondary bio) and also work nights at a liquor store. If I ask someone to help me with something or explain something, I always end it with, “Does that makes sense?” And then I apologize because outside of a learning environment, it can sound condescending. I also call everyone ‘bud’ or ‘friend.’
24. When I’m driving and someone does something stupid, I accelerate to catch up to them and reach to turn my lights and sirens on-then I realize I’m not in my cop car. My friends make fun of me at bars and public places because I’m always scanning and looking around at people. On more than one occasion I’ve opened the car door for my girlfriend, guided her into the car with my hand, and said “watch your head”. (It’s hard to get in a car with handcuffs on. I always guide the person in and make sure they don’t slam their head).
25. I was a casino dealer. I would never give or take cash directly from people’s hands. I have also said “no more bets” to several people in shops, on buses etc. I have even said it in my sleep.
Working in post production I had to QC TV and film… I can only now, two years after, avoid verbalizing it but my right hand still ‘ghost’ marks a non-existant form with whatever flaw I see. There are a lot of flaws on TV that I would never have let pass.
Working as a welder i tend to nod my head when i see a bright light in order to drop my hood. It looks weird when you jerk your head for no reason everytime you walk ouside to drop the hood that doesnt exist.
I haven’t delivered mail in 28 years, but in every TV street scene I first check for building numbers. Only recently realized I was doing that. For a while had to resist urge to pick up outgoing mail in offices & small stores.
As a teacher, referring to people by their initials when discussing them in public (it’s usually a strict rule to never mention a child by name outside the school building for safeguarding reasons, and when discussing work in public places the general rule is to call kids by their initials). Many times I’ve accidentally referred to my parents as M and D.
Working in a retail pharmacy, we always mark X’s on the stock bottles that are open. I’ve found myself doing this to items at home: mayo, cereal, milk…. I’ve had to move my sharpies out of the kitchen.
Me too! Glad I’m not alone. Just opened a bottle of Advil the other day and X’d it.
Traffic signal technician for over a decade…I find myself explaining to my wife while driving the particulars of phase timing , video and radar detection, and other things which are completely meaningless to people who are not in the business.As in , “why the Hell is this red light taking so long?” ” Well, phase 2 has a call, then a 45 second blah blah blah….” So boring….
I’m a lab technician in a clinic, i used to work at KFC before,
the KFC thing that i do now in the lab is greet patients with super friendly greetings (like those fast food chains people did) “Hi! / Welcome / May I help you? / Thank you & come again.
My colleague in the clinic had a strange look at me which isn’t a thing that clinic people do, and it’ll be more involuntary & subtle when there is a long list of patients..
those words will flow out like clockwork.
As an airline pilot, when I approach my car I look at it from afar to see if chocks are in place at the wheels. When I’m really tired (after a long flight, for example), a couple of times even to see if external power cart or a/c is connected… I laugh at myself for that. Also if tyre pressure is ok. But I do have mental checklists for almost every routine, specially when driving, so I rarely forget anything at home or where I left my keys. Constantly monitor dashboard as if it were airplane instruments. Good thing too; you’ll never catch me driving at night with my headlights off or me not noticing any warning lights, noises, vibrations, etc., or not knowing where I am and not having a plan as to how to get to where I’m going. I’m always anticipating -or at least trying to- not only what the car immediately ahead of me is doing, but sometimes two or three cars ahead are up to. Oh, and I’m a stickler with my car’s maintainance. I’m very safety-conscious whenever behind the wheel, but sometimes I do speed a bit, especially after landing; everything seems to move at such a damn slow pace! Good thing I look at the dashboard a lot and notice my speeding and bring it down.
Another good thing is that I never completely loose awareness even when napping (yes, we pilots do take turns and nap a bit in cruise in all-night red-eye flights, better be alert on landing and not drowsy… makes sense, right?), happens at home too. After dozing off with the TV on I’ll wake-up just moments before any part of a movie or show has a plot twist, start of an action sequence, thrill scene, etc., and not be lost as to what has happened up to then. Freaks my wife to bits, she’s been awake watching and can’t anticipate those things in real time! I can sometimes even call it, like “look at what’s gonna happen now”. Not bad habits at all, come to think of it.