CPD
and the Heartbreak
of Overprinting

Overprinting, also known as CPD (Compulsive Palimpsest** Disorder), is a common though under-studied illness in this society. Alarmingly, few people realize they suffer from CPD.

               **palimpsest: writing material that has been used one or more times.

For proof that the entire society is in denial about this condition, we offer the startling fact that there is not a single web site devoted to it, and in fact a search using all the major engines turns up exactly ZERO hits.

Are you ready to be honest with yourself? The following test will reveal not only if you have CPD and but also how serious your condition may be.

1. How often have you run paper through your print that had already been printed on one side? (Note: this activity is a sign of latent but incipient CPD.)
    a. never.   b. once.   c. several times.    d. often.

2. How often have you recorded over music on an old cassette and then erased and re-written the title on the old label?
    a. never.   b. once.   c. several times.    d. often.

3. How often have you bought a used, antique postcard and then re-sent it with a new message and new stamp?
    a. never.   b. once.   c. several times.    d. often.

4. After completing your income tax, how often have you had second thoughts and gone back and erased or Whited-out certain entries and inserted new figures?
    a. never.   b. once.   c. several times.    d. often.

5. How often have you reproduced?
    a. never.   b. once.   c. several times.    d. often.

6. How often in past lives did you find yourself, as a scribe, re-using the same papyrus or parchment?
    a. never.   b. once.   c. several times.    d. often.

7. How often do you have the same dream, which you would like to change but are unable to?
    a. never.   b. once.   c. several times.    d. often.

8. How often have you attempted to alter your first scratch-off on a lottery card?
    a. never.   b. once.   c. several times.    d. often.

9. How often have you committed murder and attempted to make it look like suicide by wrapping the victim's hand around the gun?
    a. never.   b. once.   c. several times.    d. often.

10. How often have you contemplated suicide and making it look like murder by carefully using a gun on which a lover one's fingerprints would be found?
    a. never.   b. once.   c. several times.    d. often.

RATE YOUR OWN CPD:
Give yourself zero for each (a) answer, 3 for each (b), 5 for each (c), and 10 for each (d). Add up your points.

0 - 10: Your CPD is minimal; you may expect a life relatively free of erasures
             and the social embarrassment of overprinting.

11-35: If you are young, trouble may lie ahead. It is possible you are facing a
             life of buying White-out by the gross and frequent purchases of new
             keyboards as you wear out the Delete key prematurely.

36-65: Interviews with older relatives would no doubt reveal a family history of
            massive erasures of many kinds. Re-training yourself to write at all
            times with ink may help, but your continuing abuse of the surface of
            your hard drive and subsequent frequent replacement is something
            you're just going to have to live with.

66 and above: You are the bane of future scholars and forensic historians.
            While science has found no cure for this high level of CDP, a
            workaround is available. Though clumsy and time-consuming, your
            only hope is to learn to make a Xerox of every document upon first
            completion before you have at it again, and similarly, to make
            immediate, archival back-ups of all computer documents after
            completion of the first (and subsequent) drafts.

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