I compulsively left and right click random shit all day. It helps me encounter bugs like steam locking up for a few seconds on Linux if you right click the steam windows or overlay too quickly.
I'm a compulsive highlighter too, but it's generally in the vein as xkcd (https://xkcd.com/1271/) and not a select all. Frequently, highlighting ends up starting in the middle of a word!
On some modern websites I end up having to select all because the selection mechanism is broken (I'll highlight, remove my finger from the mouse button, highlight another piece of text, and yet the original highlighted text is still totally, or even worse partly, highlighted.). Crtl-A Selecting all and then clicking anywhere is the only way to clear all of the highlighting in these instances.
Thanks for the XKCD. I didn't realize how common this is. Now I'm even more annoyed that so many websites and reader apps force context menus or 'gestures' when you highlight, without a way to disable those context menus or gestures.
Oh, I do too. But then his monotone typing out of the answer, eyes darting back and forth between two screens, it’s kind of obvious. The select all just starts me looking.
I just selected your reply here while reading. Some people use mouse selection as a visual aid to keep track of where they're reading. It's there, and it's handy!
(I also just select randomly sometimes. Not even quite sure why.)