ProBlogger recently suggested list building as a great way to “rediscover your blogging grove”. Copyblogger recently offered a list of ways to make offering lists “that work”. And come on… both of these guys have “blogger” in their names… so they must know what they’re talking about, right?

I ran across SEO Honolulu’s “5 signs that I need a break from SEO” list and got a laugh out of it. I also decided that, while most of his signs are specific to him, there may be other people out there that have been spending too much time with SEO. So I decided to spend a little Friday afternoon time coming up with my own light-hearted list:

7 Signs That You’ve Been Spending Too Much Time With SEO

1. It’s impossible to type the word “ask” or “live” without adding .com to the end
2. Your friend tells you the animal they ran over had “a tail” and you start running possible keyword combinations through your head
3. The first things you notice about a site are the URL structure, the PageRank, and the footer content (where folks like to try to sneak links, etc in)
4. You try to rank the stuff in your pantry based on how many other items can be “linked” to it to make dinner
5. You know exactly how to query Yahoo! to find out which pages link to SEOmoz and contain the words “monkey” and “turnip”… but you can’t get the 12:00 to stop blinking on your DVD player
6. Every word that begins with a capital “G” automatically ends with -oogle on the first draft… but you eventually realize that you meant to type something else
7. You spend more time using search engines after finding a site than you do actually looking for it

For the record… I only do a few of these. I don’t actually rank the stuff in pantry. Honestly! I do, however, have problems not adding .com to a lot of words (ask, live, etc). I also have a problem spelling the word “dig” right these days.

On a more serious note, it’s always a good idea to take a break from the job. When was the last time you went to a lot of the more popular websites these days and just used them like the rest of the world… as opposed to looking for ways to use them for marketing or link building?

Besides… you’re gonna sound pretty silly trying to explain that tail thing away when your friends all look at you with dumbfounded looks.