Every so often, people like me who use computers must delete files or burn them onto a CD to free up space on their hard drive because the hard drive has gotten full.
If only I could do the same thing with my brain.
I’m convinced my brain is full. There’s no more room for any more information up there.
Lately when I try to retain new facts, I hear a whirring sound in my head. It’s the same sound a computer makes right before the hard drive crashes, the same sound it makes right before the screen switches to what my IT friends call “the blue screen of death.”
I need a way to get rid of the useless stuff that I somehow managed to pack away in some remote part of my brain so I can make room for stuff I need to remember.
I can remember a song my kindergarten teacher, Mrs. Brewer, taught us so we could remember the names of the presidents of the United States.
But I can’t remember the story idea a friend passed along to me at lunch last week. In fact, I can’t even remember which friend it was. I just have a vague recollection that someone told me something about something that would make an interesting story for the newspaper.
I can remember the lyrics to “The Patty Duke Show” theme song. I can recite whole episodes of “The Andy Griffith Show.”
But I can’t remember the name of the author of a book I've been recommending to people for weeks.
I didn’t have room in my brain to remember his name because I’ve inexplicably kept in my head the fact that Billie Jo was the blond, Bobbie Jo was the brunette and Betty Jo was the redhead on “Petticoat Junction.”
I can see you smiling as you read this morning’s effort. I can hear you snickering.
“Mitch,” you’re saying, “your brain is not full. You’re just getting old.”
Perhaps. But I don’t think that’s the reason. My memory isn’t completely going. I can remember lots of things, just not the things that I need to remember.
I remember that the Beatles first appeared on “The Ed Sullivan Show” on Feb. 9, 1964. That’s a great thing to know if you’re playing trivia. It’s a pretty useless fact otherwise.
To be honest, having all this useless knowledge in my head does make me a good trivia player. We must play trivia at a local restaurant every week. I was good at geography, entertainment and literature, pretty good at science and sports.
But it’s difficult to make a living at trivia. I don’t know of any professional trivia leagues out there. No one is offering me a multiyear contract worth seven figures to show off my knowledge of the scenes in which Alfred Hitchcock appears in his own films.
There’s no way to purge these facts from my head. No way to free up space for new knowledge. I’m stuck with the whirring noise in my head. I’m worried my brain eventually will crash.
Well, I’ve reached the end of today’s column. I had a pithy line to end it with, one that was certain to bring a smile to your face.
If only I could remember it.
