homestretch

If this post were being made on Steph's blog, it would be labeled with the "This Post Refuses to be Labeled" label.
Also, it would be funnier.

You know what's really ...weird? Memory. How the hell does the brain record things - record everything - and filter it all and have it stored for recollection? Does the brain have storage limits? I would suspect that it must, and I'm tempted to quote Homer here, but at the same time, your brain would have to continue to remember stuff if it went on existing, right?

I mean, if we could somehow keep a brain alive forever - say hooked up to a machine ala many sci-fi stories - and keep it constantly stimulated with experiences, wouldn't it just continue to remember the events it witnessed in case such memories needed to be played back?

And I know that a lot of stuff (everything??) is stored in the subconcious, but doesn't that have limits too?
If we took our hypothetical brain and taught it 1 new word everyday, how long would it take before it could not recall the first word that it was taught?
Or maybe I'm thinking of memory (and memory storage) incorrectly and the computer analogy is not right. Or helpful.
Maybe memory is like a body of water - an ocean or a really big lake (or a pond, ha ha ha) - and we're constantly swimming in it as we remember past experiences, but at the same time, it's raining, which is adding drops of water to the overall amount of water to swim in. Since memories in this case would be liquid, they would all flow together - how does one keep track of a single drop of water in a lake - and that would explain why some memories are difficult to bring back to your mind - they're deeper in the water. Also, it would go a ways toward explaining why sometimes something you've not thought about for ages suddenly comes rushing back to you - the water has been stirred up enough to bring those drops of memory back to the surface.

I don't know.

In other news, the internet can be an incredibly frightening, depressing, and infuriating place. I'd link to what I'm talking about, but it's not worth it. Plus, I'm sure you can find your own examples.

In other other news, 99 Red Balloons is hilarious, and sad. I mean, the army overreacts to a bunch of balloons, and destroys the world, and then the singer starts the whole thing over again because she's in mourning over her friend having been killed in the attack. Um. Unless I'm interpretting that wrongly. Which might be the case. But my point still stands.