My OCD rears its ugly head

Because I've seen almost every episode of Law and Order, I consider myself a pretty good solver of mysteries. This, in conjunction with my anal retentiveness, is what led to the last week.

After some careful consideration, I recently decided to create a Facebook account. What you didn't know is right after creating one I went to MySpace and for some reason typed in my name. Like every good defense attorney says, memory is faulty, so I can't recall what urged me to do this since I didn't have a MySpace page. But within seconds of clicking the mouse, there I was. I was on MySpace. There was an old picture taken at a Make-A-Wish golf tournament, my "Location" listed as Evanston and a "Profile updated last" in November of 2003!

A wave of embarassment washed over me. I thought of the hundreds of people I've met over the years and the percentage of them that COULD have looked me up.

Sigh...ignorance (was) bliss.

I immediately tried to cancel the account, but, after typing in a few standard e-mail addresses I use, I discovered that my tendancy to create random e-mail addresses to sign-up on random websites (damn you, Netflix free trial!) had backfired. I couldn't remember my log in, therefore, I couldn't cancel the account.

I racked my brain for hours and at the same time desperately tried to give up, assuring myself it had been this long and no one had mentioned this page to me (telling me people had either seen the page and said nothing or they just weren't searching to be my friend.) However, my OCD wouldn't let me give up, so the mystery continued for a week. I went through every e-mail address in my mind, every place I could have written it down (an old resume perhaps?). I even hooked-up a no-longer-used iOmega zip drive on my mom's old ten-pound laptop (that I had always made fun of her for), but no e-mails were found on my zip disks.

After a week of this, I made a promise to myself before I went to sleep last night that, like many Law and Order cast members had promised their victims' families, I'd figure this out or so help me God.

I woke up this morning determined to rid myself of this stress. I immediately went to the attic and looked through boxes and boxes of dusty college papers and other trinkets until (eureeka) I came across a few old calendars. I ran to my computer and typed some newly discovered e-mail addresses on MySpace, but none worked. I stared at these old worn-out calendars; I stared at the computer screen trying to will my brain into remembering. After a few minutes of nothing, I slowly typed in an e-mail address I vaguely remembered (one I had tried to log-in to Yahoo! Mail with no success) and low and behold, it worked!!! The screen didn't tell me "Login not found," it didn't ask me to "Try again!" It refreshed slowly and within seconds I had access to my MySpace page!

Which I immediately cancelled.

Case closed....DUN dun.