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Battle of the Neurons
As many of you may know, synapses in the brain strengthen or weaken depending on how much activity goes across them. Things like your home phone number come easily to mind, while the combination to your locker in high school is probably lost and gone forever.
From the NYT yesterday--
"Scientists have long wondered whether the brain contains "grandmother" cells - one or a few neurons that fire in response to the familiar face of your grandmother. A new study suggests that the answer may be yes.
And it is not just Grandma.
If you are a Halle Berry fan, you have a Halle Berry cell or two in your brain. Not a region, but a single cell or a small handful that fire in response to her face in various angles and poses, her body in a cat suit, the string of letters in her name and other distinct features of the actress who plays Cat Woman."
This explains, for once and all, how beer can fight the memories of ugly people in your life.
We all know that beer, smoking, and other things that are bad for you kill brain cells. But I've long wondered, if so many cells are dying (like that painful Saturday night massacre in college) where are these neurons that are dying? How come people that kill so many neurons (with the exception of Ozzie Osborne) are still mostly functional. And science has now given us the answer.
The brain cells you are killing must be the ones that represent ugly people's faces you met in your life. Think about it, aside from the "fell out the ugly tree and hit all the branches on the way down" ugly people you met, how many average ugly people do you remember? Not many, I'll guess.
But Halle Berry? Heck, most of us guys could recognize her in total darkness from 200 feet. The pretty-people brain cells must be tougher.
This also makes it fortunate that so many people hook up in bars while they are inbibing. You can meet the ugly person, have a great time, and kill the brain cell that remembers them, all at the same time. Talk about time management.
Anyway, that's my theory, and I'm sticking to it.
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