I am getting more and more forgetful as the years go by. While up in the bedroom the other night doing final ablutions before settling in my wife chirped up “we need more toothpaste”. Now, what she was really saying was that I needed to make sure that toothpaste was added to the shopping list which is on a notepad on the fridge downstairs. This is where I employed my now tried and tested memory jogging protocol. When I take my slippers off at night they are left right at the side of the bed so I can climb right into them when I get up. When there’s something I need to remember in the morning what I do is chuck one of my slippers so it’s way over by the bedroom door. When I wake up in the morning the missing slipper is duly noted and (in this instance) the toothpaste got on the shopping list.
I’m happy to say this system has yet to fail. It has however now taken on a rather more sinister element. There will come a time when I will wake up sans slipper and not remember why. My wife is monitoring this situation very closely.
Are there any other peculiar memory jogging protocols out there? I know I could just keep a notebook by the bed or something but where’s the fun in that?
Moose the Mooche says
You’ll have to do something else to remind you of the slipper.
For the want of a nail etc.
The only way Mrs Moose can get me to remember to take things to the postbox is by leaving whatever has to be posted leaning against the front door so I can’t leave the house without moving it. This is after many years of her watching me actually step over things that have been left on the stairs to be taken out to the post and then go merrily out of the door without a care in the word other than getting the cord of my earbuds untangled.
I also keep a notebook by the bed – details, marks out of ten etc.
SteveT says
Are the marks out of ten for your own performance or for the missus?
Moose the Mooche says
There are four sets – mine and hers according to me, mine and hers according to her. The differences are fascinating!
They get totalled up at the end of the
weekmonthyeardecade, and what do points mean? Prizes!dkhbrit says
Ahhh earbud untangleage. I’m pretty sure that’s been a source of strife for many of us on here. I reckon it’s what got the Bluetooth folks running off to the patent office.
H.P. Saucecraft says
The best memory-jogging method I’ve found is to … wait a minute … what?
davebigpicture says
Pre Covid, I still printed off jobs sheets and marked items on them with highlighter pens when they were off the shelf and checked. If an item was incomplete such as speakers but no floor stands, then it wasn’t marked off until the stands were off the shelf too. Royal Mail are similarly low tech too. Red dockets are placed at the relevant point in the bundles of mail to indicate that there is a parcel to be delivered which is too large to be part of the bundle but is in the cart.
Arthur Cowslip says
I love the slipper system, that’s a great idea.
Do you think these kind of memory faults are more widespread in men than women? It certainly seems to be a cliche that has some truth in it, the forgetful man. My dad was like that and so am I.
The worst thing for me is having a vague awareness of 101 things I need to do, but just not quite being able to put my finger on what they are. I have constant anxiety over what I am meant to do but haven’t done.
Moose the Mooche says
Make a list they say. The trouble with a stuff-to-do list is that I nearly always lose it.
“Item 1. Find list….er, that’s it”
mikethep says
Mrs thep is very big on making lists. But you have to remember to take it to the shops, otherwise eyebrows are raised to heaven.
fentonsteve says
Is this related to my ‘I must not oversleep’ problem?
I normally wake at 6am, 6:30 is a lie-in or a weekend. If I know I have to be up by 7am for something, I will have a terrible night’s sleep. I’ll be awake at 1am, 2am, 3am & 4am to check the alam clock is still working, then give up at 5am and get up, and remain knackered for the rest of the day.
davebigpicture says
I don’t really sleep that well but my phone allows me to set multiple alarms so I don’t worry about falling asleep around 5am or so and not waking at the appointed hour.
fentonsteve says
Yes, but what if there’s a power cut and my phone battery goes flat?
I know it won’t ever happen, but try telling my 3am brain that!
davebigpicture says
You could get a power bank.
Actually, one of the things that annoys me is that my iPhone must be on for the alarm to work whereas when I had Nokias in the late 90s, not only could you turn them off at night and the alarm would still work but they always retained enough battery for the alarm to function. Progress…..
Mike_H says
Before I retired to live my current life of sybaritic idleness, I used an old redundant phone as an alarm clock.
Set to chime annoyingly at 5am Monday to Friday and remain silent on Saturdays and Sundays. I purposely kept it well out of reach of the bed so that I had to get out of my pit to silence it.
During the last few years of my working life I found I was nearly always already awake by 5am, lying there waiting for the alarm to go off.
davebigpicture says
Do you still wake early now you’ve been retired a while?
Mike_H says
I never used to sleep very long at night when I was working. About 4 or 5 hours, usually. A bit more these days.
These days I tend to sleep in short bouts of about a couple of hours and I rarely get to bed before 1am. Up again at about 3am for a pee (Prostatism) and then again around 5 or 6am. Another couple of hours after that.
mikethep says
There are these cunning things called alarm clocks for people with your problem.
fentonsteve says
Insomnia is not logical, though. Neither is my fear of heights.
Moose the Mooche says
My experience of insomnia: “The thought that I’m going to be really tired tomorrow is keeping me awake”
fentonsteve says
Vertigo can similarly be summarised as “I’m perfectly safe up here, but what if I threw myself over that safety barrier?”
retropath2 says
Nailed it: not so much the fear you might but the seemingly irresistible force that pulls you to the precipice. It’s horrible!
mikethep says
I have a rather specialised form of vertigo. Top of the Empire State Building? No probs, as long as I’ve got something to hang on to. Footbridge across the North Circular? Nightmare. Have to cross dead centre with my eyes mostly closed. It’s the traffic whizzing by underneath at right angles that does me in. It’s not as if it’s very far off the ground.
fentonsteve says
One of my first dates with the future Mrs F was to a Boo Hewerdine gig on the South Bank, which involved crossing the old Hungerford bridge. I could see the river below through the gaps between the railway sleepers, so I shut my eyes and she had to lead me across. The new Hungerford bridge is a solid metal base and I’m fine with it.
On honeymoon in New York, we took the lift up the the World Trade Centre. I had to crawl on my hands and knees out of the lift. The lift went up the middle of the building, so it wasn’t like I could see out. After an hour of sitting at the bar, and a couple of large brandies, I allowed her to back my into a chair by the plate glass window and take a photo. I look terrified and very pale, with a hint of green.
chiz says
Sun tan lotion has an unusual name in our house because one day years go when we were packing to go on holiday I said “Have we got any-” and realised I’d lost the name for it. So I said “Fire butter” instead and she knew exactly what I meant.
Moose the Mooche says
You can probably get a butter gun in John Lewis, so in some households that would be taken as an imperative.
No doubt they’ll have to be discontinued once militant anti-vegans start firing them at innocent herbivores. They just don’t think these things through, do they?
retropath2 says
Next to the electric massagers, I think you’ll find.
Moose the Mooche says
Oh I say.
mikethep says
As Herman Goering said, “Butter guns before butter”. All very well having butter, but if you want to shoot it at people you have to have a butter gun, obviously.
Moose the Mooche says
Butter guns make us both strong and fat. Hurrah!
Twang says
Excellent idea. I used to have trauma about business trips where I might forget my passport on a day trip to some other country. The solution was I’d put it in the pocket of the jacket I was planning to wear then hang said jacket on the door. One time I was about to go out of the door at 4.30am when I spotted a black mark on the sleeve. Swiftly I ran upstairs, put on a different jacket and headed for Heathrow.
Yup, at Departures I realised the passport was in the pocket of a jacket with a stained sleeve in St. Albans.
fentonsteve says
I once went to the Reading Festival as the guest of my pal who was taking photos for the NME. It was the only time we camped (in the backstage compound) and he had the press passes. Setting off from Cambridge I made sure he had his tent, sleeping bag, bog roll, etc.
As we drove past Reading train station, I told him to get the backstage passes ready as we were less than a mile away from the Rivermead site. “They’re in my sock drawer. At home.”
Cue a 4-hour round trip…
retropath2 says
You nail the biggest flaw in modern life, at least for those who put stuff in pockets. Surely someone by now, if we are so clever, could have found a way of automatically transferring all contents, as you slip one garment off and put on another. They can do it for computers, why not for us? Or is that what the Covid vax upgrade is for?
salwarpe says
Get yourself a manbag.
retropath2 says
I’ve got one already, but it’s already full. I can feel it in my pocket now.
Moose the Mooche says
I thought you were just pleased to see me.
BigRogSound says
Off to a very important job abroad, I was driving down the A217 south of Reigate towards Gatwick Airport when I had to stop the car to help an old man struggling with his bicycle at the side of the road rather than run him over. Once helped, I turned to get back in the car but it wasn’t where I’d left it. The old man pointed up into a nearby tree where it was lodged in the upper branches, and as I looked it melted like a Dali painting. At that moment I realised I should have been en route to Heathrow and woke up in a cold sweat!. Anxiety dreams seem all the more real the more important the event, toothpaste, slippers, backstage passes, whatever……… Luckily I’m retired now and locked down busy doing nothing – not free, just doing nothing!