I emptied the sweetener packet into the trash, put the empty pack into my cup, then proceeded to pour coffeee into the trash before my brain kicked in!
About a year ago, I was in a meeting, describing some features of the user-interface of one of our products, when I realised that…
I couldn’t remember the English word for those things that drop down from the top of the window on the computer screen, you know, they’re labeled File, Edit, View, and so on, and to use them, you select items, and then the program goes and does them?
I had no problem remembering the Esperanto word for them, but other than that, I just had a very clear picture of the thing and what it did, but no words.
After a pause of confusion, I described my way around the missing word and went on. The Esperanto word for the thing was, of course, “menuo”. I had no idea at all about the English word…
Appropriate.
My story…I was participating in School Reach in high school (academic competition).
It was a medical category. ‘What is the name of the medical discipline having to do with aging and the diseases of the aged?’
I ring in, preparing to say ‘Geriatrics’ (They wanted Gerontology, FTR.)…and I blank.
All I can remember is it starts with G. Gah…‘g’ medical disciplines… Then it occurs to me…I shout ‘Gynecology’… Before the ‘logy’'s out of my mouth, I realise what I just said…but by then it was too late…
OK…reading the rest of the thread, this post reminds me… Add me to the list of people who can look at a very common word and think it just looks WRONG.
Take George, for instance. WTF is up with George?
This whole exchange is making me laugh so hard, I’m crying! 
::wipes tears from eyes, literally!::
The Esperanto word for them?.. snort
Granted I have similar problems. Back in the tenth grade I took an introductory course in German. Got to learn essentials like “book”, “binder”, “pencil”, “I am a tourist”, “that is not my luggage”…
The German word for “pencil eraser” is “radiergummi” which I always used to say like a battle cry:
“This looks like a job for Crayons… RrRrRrRrRrrrradiiiiiiiierguuuuuuummiiiiii!”
Jumps off roof with cape
Due to the glee with which I relish “radiergummi”, that word seems to have supplanted all other nouns in my head for “eraser”. So for some reason, a good 15 years later, I very often completely forget the English word for the “pink rubber thingy on the non-pointy end of a pencil that makes the marks go away”. You know, the rrrrrrradiergummiiiiiii…
My girlfriend thought it was hysterical the first time I blanked and had to do an internet German-English search on it.
I used to have literal, recurring, waking up in a sweat screaming nightmares about doing that. Actually, the nightmares were about taking out a contact, and then another one, and then another one, and then another one…
I’ve been having the dreams as long as I can remember, about once a month or so (certainly longer than I’ve had contacts) and I’ve had contacts for nearly 20 years. Six months ago, for the first time ever, I put both contacts in one eye.
And broke out into a cold sweat. :eek:
It was much easier to deal with than in my nightmares, however.
The dreams stopped after that. How weird is that?
Stopped at the red light. Began to make a right turn on red when I remembered, ‘oh yeah, I want to go to Burger King’. So I went straight instead…Straight through t h e – r-e d – l i g h t.
I didn’t realize what I did until the nice policeman who gave me a ticket told me.
Most expensive burger I never had.
I love these! Mostly because I’ve experienced most of them first hand… A couple more:
Does anyone else ever phone someone, and then forget who you’re phoning just as the other person picks up? “Hello?” “Uh… hi…” Man, that makes me feel like such an idiot, but it makes me laugh too.
A few years back, my dad and I were out clearing the snow off the sidewalk, and he needed the shovel I was using.
“Hey IGJoe, could you pass me the show snovel?” I look at him funny for a second.
“The what?”
“You know, the show snovel.” I give him another funny look, and burst out laughing. At that point, he clues in to what he’s saying. He laughs for a bit, and says “Look, just pass me the show snovel… I mean, show snovel! Show snovel! The. Snow. Shovel!”
It was a loooong time before I laughed that hard again. 
Finally, count me in with the people that forget how old they are, lose things they’re holding in their hand, and spontaneously forget their PINs.
Heh. I almost forgot one. I once forgot my best friend’s name. DogDad asked me, “who was that on the phone?” and I said, “it was…um…er…you know, that gal from Cinci?” He said, “Oh, KIM?”
This would not be nearly so embarassing if it weren’t for the fact that Kim is my name, too. :o
I can do better than that. Introducing my wife (g/f at the time) to my sisters I couldn’t remember any of their names!
When I write checks, I often have to stop and think how to spell five. :rolleyes:
And I’m convinced I’ll never be confident what my home phone number is. Though I never call myself, so maybe that has something to do with it.
I accompanied my friend back to her apartment so she could feed her cat. We got in the elevator and she just stood there looking at all the buttons on the panel.
After a very long moment she said: “I don’t know which floor is mine.”
Human nature. Don’t think about that stuff you do on automatic pilot or else you’ll crash. Like when someone asks “What side of your mouth do you chew on?” and suddenly you can’t chew normally and your mouth just goes up and down like ventriloquist dummy.
*Damn *you. I was really enjoying my sandwich.
Just now, racinchikki finished reading this thread and was leaving to go to back to work when she gave me a bit of paper with her work schedule for next week, so “you can write it on the counter. Map. Um…”
“Calendar?”
“Yes! Calendar! You should post about this.”
‘Refrigerator’ was going to be her next guess, and the calendar is on the fridge, so she probably would’ve gotten it within the hour. We’re always doing things like that.
Two years ago, I woke up at 11:30 PM, took a shower, went back in my room to get dressed, and realized I didn’t have to be up for another six hours. Later that day I had to go home from district orchestra with a fever. So I’m blaming my midnight shower on hallucinations I didn’t know I was having.
My entire LIFE is a brain fart, for crying out loud.
For a seasonal example in addition to what Gunny pointed out above, I am apparently incapable of comprehending that the holiday when you get dressed up is named HALLOWEEN.
The weird thing is, this only applies if I’m talking about costumes. Everything else, I say Halloween.
“I’m going to carve a pumpkin for…”
“What sort of candy should we give out this year for…”
“The stores are full of black and orange … decorations.”
No problem. I’ll say Halloween in all of those situations. However, if we’re talking about getting dressed up, I can’t think properly.
“So what are you going to be for…”
“I want to dress up as a ghost for…”
“That would be the best … costume ever.”
I say “Christmas.” I usually don’t even realize that I’ve said “Christmas,” and I don’t understand why everyone’s either laughing at me or staring blankly in my direction.
me: “That would be the best Christmas costume ever.”
them: “Guh?”
me: “I said that would be the best Christmas costume ever.”
them: “What?”
me: “Are you deaf?”
them: “No, what holiday is coming up this weekend?”
me: “Halloween, you idiot.”
them: “You said Christmas.”
me: “Shit.”
Ahh, racinchikki, I did the same thing last year!
The story was that I was late to a Halloween party last year due to having to work. By the time I got there, almost everyone had gotten tired of wearing headcovers and wigs and masks, leaving most people wearing costumes on their bodies only. I was relaying the story of the party to someone else, and I was saying that I was amused that when I got there, this guy I knew was wearing only a white robe that looked like a bedsheet. So I jokingly said, “I was like, ‘What are you supposed to be for Christmas, an unmade bed?’” And then I continued talking normally.
Five minutes later, I said to my conversation partner, “Huh, did I just say Christmas?”
And indeed I had. She didn’t want to tell me. :o
Similar: when, and only when, I write checks my instinct is to write the digit instead of the first letter of the number. So unless I’m careful I’ll write:
4our hundred and 6ixty 5ive dollars and 2wenty 7even cents.
What’s sad is, that looks perfectly alright to me.
Without a doubt, every single time I call information, I’m positively stumped when the robot operator asks me the city and state. Baffled, I tell you. I usually manage to get half the city out before she says ‘thank you’ and connects me to the real person that helps out us idiots.