POPCORN BRAINS

"...I will personally EAT,FUCK and KILL each one of you." vampire Pam on TRUE BLOOD....

(groan moan) aloha2u today,
words fail me,yes me. i cannot describe how much i am in today.
it started out as a joyride,a simple excursion up Zayante Road
into the deep redwood forest of backwoods S'Cruz County
and it ended with a electrical short/failure
a tow truck,a hike,a bus and a taxi home.

i cannot tell you how reassuring it is to be told,
while you're barreling down a narrow road
chock full of blind curves,that your driver is
missing part of his brain and half his skull to
a dog pulling skateboard accident.
yes i really cannot tell you....

at least the day and scenery were both
pretty and we neglected to bring either camera.
(long agonizing sigh)
if you like Nature and mountains and
have steady nerves i hardily
recommend the expedition
plus we met some VERY Nice peeps.
not bad for an oreo couple with
a wheezy old fart wearing
a tie dye shirt and black kilt.

now back to our irregularly schedule screed...
as usual i was doing something else
with CNN in the background
when i heard the term"popcorn brain"
say what?
some backstory first
when the Greeks adopted an alphabet
there was some heated controversy that
it would destroy the human capacity
for memory esp.for epic poetry like Homer
and age old myths.
now we have "popcorn brain"
and even the radio show GEEKSPEAK
has bemoaned the advent of Search Engines
(sorry Google) and our omnipresent
smart phones,laptops, tablets, Blackberrys
and WiFi (S"Cruz now even has it on our buses!)
et al and its impact on our memories.

"popcorn brain" is what The Mirage calls
"Magpie brain"...its a scattered unfocus of
"Ooooooh it's shiny!" scattershot
attraction and not the long drudgery
of sustained focus of thots.
(see Denzel in THE BOOK OF ELI
for an example of the capacity the
Greeks feared we would lose).
me i blame MTV and video games,
the usual suspects...

two of my wives have accused me of
being MR.MEMORY
and yes,at one time, i had
what is commonly called
a "photographic memory"
altho holographic is possible more accurate.
i would read entire textbooks at the start of each term then
dredge up the needed material for each test,
as i was also working full time and had
lil time for sustained study.

was i born with this freakish ability or
did i enhance it with self awareness and
discipline. i have no idea BUT
i did not have this before
i went back to school late in life.

as a young student i was sorta smart and
maybe even a low grade genius (sic)
but the whole Total Recall thing was absent.
maybe being visually oriented helped???
the US Miltary had a test wherein you had to
take a flat patterned image,fold it in your mind then
match it with one of seven possible results.
65% was passing, i got 70%
which qualified me fore Nuclear Weapons
(YIKES!) luckily my pneumonia scarred lungs
made me 4F.(whew)

anyway where was i?
oh well, if i had a point to make
i either made it or lost it.
either way my spine is killing me...
GTG
Peace Now?
namaste
mega