Today I annoyed myself by shutting off my car while it was still in Drive. I wasn't moving at the time, having just pulled into a parking space, and was at a complete stop when the incident occurred. It was a simple mix up of the procedural order one normally goes through when parking a car with an automatic transmission, namely: Stop, Place Vehicle In Park, Turn Off Car, Check For Muggers, Exit Vehicle.

I know my action was the result of a habit that developed when I used to drive a 1977 Mercury Grand Marquis. Towards the end of its life, the car began to diesel when turned off, which basically means that it would choose to keep chugging even after the key was removed from the ignition. Eventually the problem got so bad that I could run into a 7-11, buy a pack of cigarettes, come outside, and still find my vehicle happily chugging away.

The simplest way to solve the problem was to turn off the vehicle while it was still in Drive, and then shift into Park. I wasn't 100% sure if this was good for the vehicle, but also figured that the poor thing was so old that the only thing I could have done to make its situation worse was to blow it up with explosives. So, for the last six or eighth months of the car's life, I got into the habit of shutting it off in what would be considered a premature fashion.

After I acquired my next vehicle, a 1987 Mercury Grand Marquis, I slowly got out of the habit of shutting the vehicle off while it was in Drive. This was a somewhat difficult task, complicated by the fact that the 1977 and 1987 had identical controls. Sometimes I would forget what vehicle I was in until I noticed that much fewer toxic fumes were leaking into the cabin than with my previous car, and the fuel gauge dropped like a rock as opposed to a boulder. After I donated the 1987 to medical science, I acquired a 1998 Mazda Protege, which pretty much took care of the Drive before Park habit, considering it was a dramatically different kind of car.

When the habit appeared again today, I was rather surprised. And what surprised me more was how it resulted in me remembering a part of my automotive history that I normally wouldn't have pondered. It was one of those incidents where I had to ask myself, "Why did I do that?". And in the process of answering this question I generated some fairly detailed, albeit somewhat boring, historical information about myself that doesn't ordinarily cross my mind..

Players seem to get the notion that once they've written up their background during character creation (if they bother to write it up at all), they can't continue to develop their past as their character works in the present. I've never had a problem with players doing such a thing, and try to encourage them, unless, of course, a player is pinned down by cops and suddenly decides that their father was actually the CEO of Lone Star.

A good way to create history on the run is to perform a specific action that at least falls within the general bounds of your character's personality, and then ask yourself. "Why did I do that?". For instance, a PC might always touch the ceiling of his car before exiting it, the reason being that he once had a sunroof which he left open one night, awaking to find that the interior of his vehicle had been unceremoniously removed by thieves. Because of this, he had gotten into the habit of feeling to make sure the sunroof was closed, even though his current vehicle isn't equipped with one. The player doesn't have to role play this action every time he gets out of his car; it is merely a tool designed to help generate back story.

Other actions, off the top of my head, are answering the phone after a minimum of three rings (one once blew up on the second), using a nite-lite (over active imagination causes horrific faces to appear in pitch blackness), only playing music at a low volume (drunk and armed landlord once shot through a wall when music was cranked up), or making sure cigarettes are packed with something other than 13 hits (while once a habit, on one occasion a toxic spirit appeared during the 13th whack purely by coincidence).

Branch out, do something weird (but not too weird), take a little risk, and then ask yourself: "Why did I do that?". Then do yourself a favor and write it down. No sense in having a history if you can't remember it.