Wednesday, June 25, 2014

What Was I Thinking?

Researchers, led by Martin Lotze of the University of Greifswald in Germany, observed a broad network of regions in the brain working together as people produced their stories. But there were notable differences between the two groups of subjects. The inner workings of the professionally trained writers in the bunch, the scientists argue, showed some similarities to people who are skilled at other complex actions, like music or sports.  - Carl Zimmer, The New York Times

Any of us in the field could've told Lotze writers have way complex brain activity and saved him the trouble and expense of all that research.  It's at least as complex as your typical outfielder.  I mean, watch an outfielder sometime; what is he thinking about?  Is he thinking at all?  Whereas, me, my brain is a beehive of activity.  (See?  I was thinking right there.  I briefly considered a "whirlwind of activity," and even more briefly, "a tilt-a-whirl," or possibly, "washer-dryer combo" of activity, but I went with the beehive which is the result of pure brain-work.)

Almost every area of my brain is activated while I write.  Some areas, of course, don't pull their weight, and I think they mostly just provide cushions for the workers.  Like the neo-cortex-quisquilae, which is responsible for reminding me to take down the garbage or wrap the cheese up to keep it from getting hard - that part of my brain seems to go completely dormant, if indeed it functions at all.  The temporal-campus-mutinium, which senses if I haven't pulled my zipper up, is another slacker.  I can't even tell you how much trouble the temporal-campus-mutinium has gotten me into.  But the rest of my brain is a regular tilt-a-whirl.  (See, that time I went with the tilt-a-whirl, the ol' brain was working again.)

Right now, there's the amygdyla-dorsi-digustibus, the part of the brain that thinks how good coffee tastes, and then there's the hippo-bottomus-clavicle, the part of the brain that's noticing my briefs are starting to ride up.  The prefrontal-latex will later activate telling me I could really go for a sandwich, and throughout the day my lower-celery-lobe will light up, helping me daydream about being interviewed by Charlie Rose or Terri Gross.

Right now, I'm experiencing difficulty with the lower-occipital-circumflex, which would provide a snappy ending for this blog.

Dang it, my briefs are riding up again.