A tale of an OCD man

We are all obsessed in some way or other. Hands washing, perfectly ordered desk, mandatory wiping on each table before seating, checking the door locks, returning from half-way to double check, triple check even.

But there is always another one who will take it to the next level. Meet Adam.

Adam is a boba tea lover. However, he demands a fixed amount of boba in his tea. No more, no less. On a Small sized Milk Tea? Exactly 25 pearls. Big Brown Sugar Milk Tea? 25. He is very adamant on this, sometimes even going to the extent of leaving “even monkeys are able to follow such simple requests” when the count is off.

The baristas are already weary of him and nicked-named him, The Numberman.

Adam has a way of enjoying his milk tea. First, he takes a look at the cup to ensure it has a “visually comforting amount”. Then he takes a sip. Nice tea. Then, the straw is used to dig for the pearls, sipped one at a time, munched slowly to feel the texture of the pearls. Repeat 10 times for this. For the next 10 pearls, he will drink so fast that the pearls directly hit his throat, that you will definitely hear “thud thud thud…” for exactly 10 times, if you bothered to count. How he manages the feat of counting just 10 pearls is beyond anyone’s comprehension.

The last 5? He prefers to save it and bring it back home with him. It’s very common to see him clinging on his almost finished tea for the whole outing.

Aaaanyway, his friends aren’t really bothered by it. And heck, it is a free popcorn show, dude! Entertaining as crap to see the surprised barista face, and them fumbling for long spoons or tongs to count the pearls.

There was one time that after he went home, he noticed the count of pearls was not 5. Panic mode he goes, squirting his face to try to recall how he had eaten the pearls, pacing in home up and down. Then the anxiety gets the better of him. He rushed to the stall and confronted the barista, and even demanded CCTV viewings. And sure enough, CCTV shows that the barista miscounted. The story settled with him taking a sample cup, with some sample tea and exactly 5 pearls, for him to take home and enjoy.

One day, he went to a new boba tea shop to order a drink. This time he is extra careful, staring at the barista to ensure he put in exactly 25 pearls. Satisfied, he proceeded with his usual ceremony and went back home. However, as he reached home, there were only 4 pearls.

“How can it be?” he thought. “I already make sure that the exact 25 pearls are being put in, my ceremony can’t be wrong.”

The next time, he is extra careful, and monitored with greater intensity. All his ceremonies are performed with greater, um, “mindfulness”.

Yet it still happened when he reached home. 4 pearls.

That really does it to him. He went into a hysteric episode on his instagram story and twitter. How all the milk tea shops and baristas are trying to “get him”, it’s all the workings of Illuminati, the sky is falling down ahhhhh.

And fainted he goes.

Little did he know, The Lost Boba, is actually a result from his intense obsession on boba counting. The brainwave his intense thoughts was so strong, that it microwaved the mainframe, causing a glitch to uncontrollably zap away the things he has been obsessing on.

Well then, this should serve as a lesson for us to be wary on our obsession. Now then, how does my boss look like again…?