“See, I can't do that. I'm a total neat freak.”

English Lesson: See, I can't do that. I'm a total neat freak.

You're chitchatting with some friends. One friend says that she only cleans her house once every two weeks. You're very clean. You say this.

See, I can't do that. I'm a total neat freak.

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a total (something)

"Total" means "complete" or "100%". Use it to talk about a characteristic that a person has a lot of. Some examples of using "total" to talk about people include:

We were total strangers at that point.

You'd be a total fool to turn this down.

See, (sentence)

You can use the word "see" at the beginning of a sentence for several different reasons. One is to contrast what you're going to say with what the last speaker said:

A: I'm not worried about saving for retirement. I figure it will work out somehow.

B: See, that's the difference between you and me. I can't just leave my future up to chance like that.

A: We should definitely go with the first option because it's cheaper.

B: See, I'm not so sure. It might be cheaper right now, but in the long run it's going to cost more to maintain.

(someone) is a neat freak

A "neat freak" is someone who keeps their home really clean and organized.

"Neat freak" sounds a bit negative, so you should avoid calling someone else a neat freak if you're not close to them. A more positive way to talk about someone like this is to call them "neat":

You're so neat.

Some other phrases using "freak" are:

a control freak

a fitness freak

a baseball freak

All of these mean that the person does something much more than other people.