MavEtJu's Distorted View of the World

How my brain works

Posted on 2009-10-05 09:00:00
Tags: Memories, TV

With the move to Australia I have learned a particular thing about my brain: I can't remember names without seeing them written down. This presents itself mostly when watching television or movies: The names of persons (an overal problem), but also about medical issues (Skully in the X files, House), city names and star systems (Star Trek :-).

Last week I was reminded about this when discussing the latest episode of The United States of Tara: I didn't kow the names of any of the characters except for Tara. I know there is a husband, a son and a daughter (and on the side line a sister, a fast-food shop-manager, a boyfriend of the son and a psychiator), but I don't know any of their names. Neither the name of any of the personages Tara transforms in (except for Buck, which is a name I saw in the subtitles of Kill Bill).

I have seen numerous episode of The Bill (UK Police series), but I won't be able to name any of the characters in there. I have seen numerous episodes of House but can't name his colleagues or female boss.

This issue has never been a problem when I lived in the Netherlands, because all the foreign television series and movies are subtitled. So I know all the names of the people in Star Trek and Babylon 5, and I know part of them in Battlestar Galactica (Starbuck, Apollo (is he in the new one?), Boomer and Adama because they were in the old series which I saw with subtitles) but the name of the president or the second in command on the Galactica or the name of the scientist are all unknown to me.

That didn't mean that having the BBC was useless for me, thanks to the subtitles on the Teletext system "behind" the broadcast I was able to follow everything.

So, what does this leave for me in Australia? Not much, there is no Teletext system on the normal channels and there is only one channel, SBS, which has subtitled movies and series (because they are non-english). Before the re-run of every episode of Dr Who and Torchwood I read up on the TARDIS Wikimedia website to make sure I know who is who this time.

At least I know the limitations and the workarounds, but it's very tricky sometimes!

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Comments:
From: infofarmer@FreeBSD.org
URL:
Posted on: 2009-10-05 15:44:35
CommentJust try to imagine words written, in the air or on a wall. When I was a child, the only way to make sure I remember something important in the morning, was just to “write” it with my finger on the wall (finger clean, no traces left :D). I don’t know why that worked.
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