A
friend of mine posted in a thread concerning Medical Lab workers and OCD -
“We lab techs, I think, have certain OCD traits. It helps us do our
jobs. I label canned goods with the dates that I get them, to make sure I
rotate stock. I also date other things, mostly to see how long it takes me to
use them - at least that's my excuse and I'm sticking with it”
My
reply was-
Perhaps
the ultimate OCD example remains the Dead Head tapers and traders who have
systematically collected every possible scrap of live performance related to
The Grateful Dead and its offshoots. Despite the Band's breakup following
Garcia's 1995 death, these collectors have continued to pursue recordings.
They've moved from analog tape to digital tape to CD's and now through various
forms of music storage as these have become a higher standard of storage and
playback. There are 30 years of live material available, all reviewed and
cataloged with venue information, guest musicians, hardware notes, track
lengths, etc. . Data bases, annotated lyric websites, tape compendiums and
other minutiae abound. This is the home planet for OCD I visit there frequently
but since I possess only ca 1100 hours of this library/catalog, I'm not truly
hard core OCD.
There are many destinations in the OCD
world, I’ve visited a few of them from time to time. We tie flies to catch fish or for
display. We build scale model aircraft
and ships. We play chess, we write and
play music , But these remain, for the
most part, pass times rather than true disorders.
The 24 hour news cycle can become a
source for obsession. The ready
availability of news about wars, natural disasters, and political idiocy can
snare someone quite easily.
The last several days have doubtless
trapped millions of viewers who are following the ISIS terrorists through
Iraq. Not surprisingly, the Iraqi army
is crumbling and fleeing in a manner highly reminiscent of the last month of
the VietNam war. Officers flee rather
than fight and the enlisted troops toss their weapons, uniforms, and run.
Not surprisingly, the Iraqi government
is asking the U.S. government for military aid.
After we spent billions of dollars training their army, there is no
cohesive military unit worthy of the name in Iraq. In the presence of organized military
opposition, Iraq demonstrates that its soldiers are of little use unless
fighting against civilians who have no training and no weapons.
We need to make it clear to Iraq that they will have to
face this war on their own, without our help.
That should very well lead to the current government emulating that off
the Republic of Vietnam in 1975
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