77. One Two Three........

I have a mental disorder.  You may have suspected it for some time but last Saturday Caroline confirmed it for me and even went as far as to tell me what it is.  Apparently I suffer from arithmomania.

Unwilling to take her word for it, I looked it up.  It seems that she thinks that I have a “morbid compulsion to count”.  “Morbid” seems a bit strong though.  It means an abnormal and unhealthy interest in something.  
Counting isn’t unhealthy.  It can be fun.  But Caroline may be right.  Suddenly much of my life makes more sense than it did. 

When I was thirteen I found a game to play that made car journeys and even just walking down the street, much more interesting.

In Corton Road, around the corner from where we lived in Lowestoft, was a parked car.  Its registration number was ERH 1. One day, just after I had cycled past it on my way to the beach, I was overtaken by DEX 2.  From that moment I was on the lookout for a ‘3’ and then, once I had seen that, a ‘4’.  
These numbers had to be seen in the right order and it was extremely frustrating for example to see a 145 when I needed 144.

Five years later when I left school to go to Durham University, I was on 768.  University life was too distracting and I eventually stopped somewhere in the 790s.  Anyway, I had lost heart a year earlier when my father had got rid of his car with the plate WMJ 905.  Despite my pleading with him to hang on to it for a bit longer, he sold it.

I played cricket for more than 40 years and during many of those games I fielded at slip.  Between overs, I had to walk the 22 yards between the two sets of stumps and I eventually learnt to automatically lengthen my stride so that I covered those 22 yards in 22 paces.  Obviously, as I made those 22 paces I counted them in my head every time and that could have been as many as 65 times a game.

Did you know that in Tesco stores the wine, beers and spirits are kept as far from the door as is possible in order to make it difficult for shoplifters?  I was told this while having a conversation with a manager in the nearest Tesco to us which is so huge that I think that it possibly covers at least two different postcodes.  When I told him that it took me 243 steps to get to the non-alcoholic lager section, he looked at me with some surprise. 

“You count them?”

“Of course.”

I had to go to Guys Hospital a number of times last year.  I discovered that if I went from Winchmore Hill to London Bridge station via Highbury, I had to climb 128 steps on the stairways, whereas if I changed at Moorgate I only had to climb 97 and so that was the route I took even though it was longer.

Last December, Caroline and I were with friends in their house.  During the evening, their daughter Skyped them from America where she is studying at university.  I couldn’t avoid listening to the entire conversation.

“How are you?” her Dad asked.

“I’m like so stressed at the moment. Like everything’s happening like all at once.”

I listened in awe as she used the word “like” 62 times in an 8 minute 25 second conversation during which her father had spoken for almost half the time.  That number includes the one time that she used the word correctly when she said, “It’s yellow but not like a taxi.”

If you have read Amazingl“ posted on October last year you will know that for several weeks I was hooked on counting the number of times that the four judges on The X Factor used the word “amazing” in their descriptions of the acts.  I would record the show and then fast forward through the music and only listen to the comments.  It seemed very important at the time.

Caroline made her accusatory statement when I told her on Saturday evening that I had seen Jessica Ennis’s navel for the 500^th time since August 2009.  I first became aware of it on August 15^th 2009 at the World Athletics Championships held in Berlin.

I became interested when the cameraman made it the focus of attention for a few seconds by filling the entire television screen with her abdomen.  Earlier that day, I had seen a photograph of Jessica Ennis and her navel in The Times in a preview of the Games.  So that made it two in one day and counting!

The rules I set myself were strict.  I never sought sightings.  Looking for them on Google would not be not allowed.  The next day, even though she featured in many TV shots over several hours, I only allowed myself to count them all as one sighting but I made several more from photographs in the newspaper and on the BBC website.  Last Saturday morning the total stood at 499.

I was looking at the ‘Weekend’ section of The Times on Saturday - not the most obvious place for a navel seeker - when I turned to page 8 and there it was: a huge photograph of Ms Ennis and her navel accompanying an article on diet.

I had initially set myself a target of 1000 but that seems unlikely to be achieved now and so I am stopping at 500.

What shall I count next?