I was watching TV the other day - a common occurrence - when Tempestt Bledsoe came on screen. She’s on Celebrity Fit Club and was doing some runway shoot or another. What astounded me was how rapidly I recognized her after years of her being off the radar. Is it just my mind that has a huge vault of celebrity names and faces in it? I don’t think so. And just how big is that vault? Well, I came up with a way to find out.
I devised an exercise to pull all those names out. Play along. Get a blank pad of paper and something to write with. Get a clock and note the time. Start writing down all the celebrity names you can. Keep going until you just can’t think of any. Or at least until you have to pause for 30 seconds or so. How long did you last? The answer is probably scary.
Our brains, for whatever reason are wired to suck up celebrity. If we could harness all that energy, we would likely do other mundane tasks instead, like curing cancer, feeding the world or making cold fusion a reality. But no, we get to make those kind of brain cells remember that Dustin Diamond is the guy who played Screech on Saved by the Bell.
To take your mind off of the decline of western civilization, the exercise an be turned into a game. Get a friend - not the kind of geek who can name every movie Stephen Tobolowski’s been in - and time yourselves. The one who names the most celebrities in 5 minutes buys.
I’m not going to reveal my results. It’s just to embarrassing.