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[Humour] Middle aged absent-mindedness



AZ Gull

@SeagullsAcademy @seagullsacademy.bsky.social
Oct 14, 2003
13,101
Chandler, AZ
Arthur Conan Doyle - A Study in Scarlet:

I consider that a man's brain originally is like a little empty attic, and you have to stock it with such furniture as you choose. A fool takes in all the lumber of every sort that he comes across, so that the knowledge which might be useful to him gets crowded out, or at best is jumbled up with a lot of other things, so that he has a difficulty in laying his hands upon it. Now the skillful workman is very careful indeed as to what he takes into his brain-attic. He will have nothing but the tools which may help him in doing his work, but of these he has a large assortment, and all in the most perfect order. It is a mistake to think that that little room has elastic walls and can distend to any extent. Depend upon it there comes a time when for every addition of knowledge you forget something that you knew before. It is of the highest importance, therefore, not to have useless facts elbowing out the useful ones.

I subscribe to this theory. Since I was a young teenager I have been careful, whenever possible, to only populate my brain-attic with important knowledge, ie facts related to Brighton and Hove Albion.
 






Harry Wilson's tackle

Harry Wilson's Tackle
NSC Patron
Oct 8, 2003
56,179
Faversham
I left home early for a flight from Heathrow to Frankfurt and checked in at the airport, only for the Nice Young Man to say

"Es tut mir leid, Sir, aber Ihr Flug geht von Gatwick aus"

What? Gatwick? What the f***?

"But I can check you into a flight from Heathrow, alles ist klar?"

f***. I arrived in das Vaterland an hour late, but blagged my way out of any embarrassment.

On another occasion, I cockily left my office in Chelsea, hopped onto an eleven bus to Victoria to connect to Gatwick for a flight to Paris.

Wandering through Vic station concourse I realized my passport was gone. I legged it into the first cab and said "follow the 11 route down Victoria street!". In parliament square, traffic at standstill, I saw an elven bus. 'Hang on a mo' I said. Nipped out of cab, ran to bus and the conductor swung round his silvery pole and handed me my passport in one elegant maneuver. Like he was expecting me. Zipped back to Vic, gave cabbie a massive tip, got the train, bosh.

Both of these episodes happened when I was in my late 30s.

Once a cock-up artist of staggering proportions (but lucky).... and you can guess the rest. Age has only improved me.
 


ozzygull

Well-known member
Oct 6, 2003
4,173
Reading
I left home early for a flight from Heathrow to Frankfurt and checked in at the airport, only for the Nice Young Man to say

"Es tut mir leid, Sir, aber Ihr Flug geht von Gatwick aus"

What? Gatwick? What the f***?

"But I can check you into a flight from Heathrow, alles ist klar?"

f***. I arrived in das Vaterland an hour late, but blagged my way out of any embarrassment.

On another occasion, I cockily left my office in Chelsea, hopped onto an eleven bus to Victoria to connect to Gatwick for a flight to Paris.

Wandering through Vic station concourse I realized my passport was gone. I legged it into the first cab and said "follow the 11 route down Victoria street!". In parliament square, traffic at standstill, I saw an elven bus. 'Hang on a mo' I said. Nipped out of cab, ran to bus and the conductor swung round his silvery pole and handed me my passport in one elegant maneuver. Like he was expecting me. Zipped back to Vic, gave cabbie a massive tip, got the train, bosh.

Both of these episodes happened when I was in my late 30s.

Once a cock-up artist of staggering proportions (but lucky).... and you can guess the rest. Age has only improved me.
in my 30s as well I left my passport in a taxi in Zargreb that I had got from the airport. I only noticed when checking into the hotel when they asked for it. They were able to get hold of the taxi driver from my recipe and he dropped it back, after two hours of worry and waiting for it. That was also the work trip the hard drive died on my laptop, luckily I had the important stuff save on a usb drive, but the only laptop they had to lend me was some really old laptop windows 95 or 3-11 that ran like a dog.
 


Green Cross Code Man

Wunt be druv
Mar 30, 2006
20,756
Eastbourne
that’s nothing to worry about, wait until like me you walk into a room and then cant remember how to get back out
The toilets at the De La Warre Bexhill are like that. I took a few moments trying to get out as they have a really weird layout. I thought I was going batty but then another middle-aged chap came along and asked me if I knew the way out as he couldn't find it lol.
 




GT49er

Well-known member
NSC Patron
Feb 1, 2009
49,188
Gloucester
The toilets at the De La Warre Bexhill are like that. I took a few moments trying to get out as they have a really weird layout. I thought I was going batty but then another middle-aged chap came along and asked me if I knew the way out as he couldn't find it lol.
So, both of you two old ******* stuck in the lavatory then? Have you found your way out yet? Or have you found a real new 'friend'?
 








Weststander

Well-known member
Aug 25, 2011
69,325
Withdean area
Slightly OT but this happened to one of our group on a golf trip. We ended up in a certain bar (probably well known to those who have been to Vilamoura) and he ended up taking a girl back to the hotel. When a group of us walked back we found his roommate in the hotel gardens sat on a bench, fully dressed but with his pyjamas on under his clothes (the other the guy wanted the room - obviously - and asked him to make himself scarce even though he’d already gone to bed). He was offered a sofa in someone else’s room for the night. The following morning the guy came down to the breakfast room and looked deeply disturbed……told us the girl had stolen his passport and money and disappeared in the night. He said he’d turned the room upside down into a right mess but couldn‘t find his stuff, so would have to miss golf that day and go and get a passport sorted etc. It was at that point man in PJs reached into his pocket, took out a passport and wad of cash and said ’here you go, you gave it to me to look after last night when you chucked me out of the room when you brought that tart back’.

On a related topic but not about forgetfulness, a mate (recently passed away, young :() turned his phone’s fingerprint sensor off when he spent a night with an escort. Wealthy and he kept all his passwords on his phone, he was paranoid she might drug him to rob him overnight. Who said romance is dead?
 




dsr-burnley

Well-known member
Aug 15, 2014
2,632
I teach at a primary school. 👍🏻
Working at a school, surely you have your "emergency excuse mode" well tuned. Tell them that you split your coffee all over your trousers when the lights changed, but fortunately you had these (hopefully smart) jeans in the boot of the car and thought they would be better than trousers with a large wet patch. ;)
 




Green Cross Code Man

Wunt be druv
Mar 30, 2006
20,756
Eastbourne
I once got up, a bit hungover, and set off for work in Worthing. Traffic was quite light and it dawned on me somewhere along Old Shoreham Road that it was Sunday.
A friend and former colleague of mine used to be a postman in Seaford. One day he finished work, went home, had some lunch and then fell asleep on the sofa. He awoke with a start, everything was quiet and to his horror, he saw the time was 4:30. He rapidly had a bit of a wash, put his uniform back on and gobbled down his breakfast. Still in a bit of a stupor, he drove to the office, all the while wondering why there seemed to be so many people about just before 5 in the morning. It was only when he reached work, bang in the middle of town, that it dawned on him that it had been 4:30 PM and he'd only fallen asleep for a couple of hours!
 


Auckland seagull

Well-known member
Aug 26, 2016
241
I have the same with words. And no matter how hard I try to think of them in the moment they won't make themselves known to me.

A colleague said to me a while ago that when your brain is full, if you cram something in one ear, a correspondingly sized bit of data falls out of the other. That's how I see it.
59 in September. Where has that time gone.
That is 100% true. I teach at a secondary school and at the start of every year I am absolutely skilled at memorizing the names of 150+ new students. This takes me about three days. Unfortunately while I am successfully cramming the new names into my ageing brain, all of the names of students from the previous year simply melt away. This leads to countless embarrassing 'don't you know my name?' moments. The joy of it.
 






Green Cross Code Man

Wunt be druv
Mar 30, 2006
20,756
Eastbourne
'don't you know my name?' moments. The joy of it.
Absolutely spot on. I don't teach a specific class but instead teach at points, all the children in the school. There are even children who I have known 7 years whose name I forget. It simply isn't possible to remember a whole school, at least not for me. I hate those moments when a child asks the question you pose. You are right, it's embarrassing and they don't understand.
 


Weststander

Well-known member
Aug 25, 2011
69,325
Withdean area
Absolutely spot on. I don't teach a specific class but instead teach at points, all the children in the school. There are even children who I have known 7 years whose name I forget. It simply isn't possible to remember a whole school, at least not for me. I hate those moments when a child asks the question you pose. You are right, it's embarrassing and they don't understand.

Do head teachers ever have that knack?
 


Green Cross Code Man

Wunt be druv
Mar 30, 2006
20,756
Eastbourne
@Weststander, I was wondering that. I think it varies. I think our deputy head does whilst the head doesn't. Awkward one to ask though. My memory is usually pretty good, but refuses to work well for anything I'm not interested in. Although names are important, for some reason I have always been useless with them.
 


The Clamp

Well-known member
NSC Patron
Jan 11, 2016
26,205
West is BEST
Our brains are hired wired so that when we are in a rush or are stressed, we absorb and process only the information that is vital. It’s a survival thing.

So when you’re busting for a pee for example and someone gives you info or asks something of you when you’re on your way to the lav, you’ll forget it almost instantly.
 




Super Steve Earle

Well-known member
Feb 23, 2009
8,931
North of Brighton
I work at a primary school, we are fairly casual with our dress code but blue denim is not allowed. Luckily I only live about ten minutes away. I managed to get back and still be on time.
Oh dear. If you are middle aged and still wearing blue denim, you do indeed have a problem.
 




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