...And You Are....??

Most people blame their 'sieve brain' tendencies on being pregnant or getting older. I have none of these convenient excuses, but I suffer from the condition in a very real way. It's most notable when it comes to faces and names. I'm really, terrible at remembering either faces or names, and often it can become quite embarrassing.

Just to give you a few real life examples of what I mean...I can easily meet someone half a dozen times or more, and not only will I have no idea what their name is, I'm almost always certain I've never clapped eyes on them in my life. If someone calls me and introduces themselves on the phone, I forget their name about one millisecond later. Very often when friends are talking mutual friends or acquaintances of ours, I have to ask for a LOT of detail about who they are talking about..."Do you mean the one with the red hair?" "The one with the fat baby?" "The one who wore that hideous headband?"...and even with their answers I will shake my head and say, "Nup. Sorry. NO idea who you mean."

The same is sadly true of my clients - whose names and faces I never remember but whose cake I *always* remember. Not at all unusual for me to get a call from a client who says, "Hi, emzee, it's Sally Jones here, you've done my last forty-two cakes for me and we've met ten times!" and for me to say, "Hi, um..Sally.... Remind me again what the last cake I did for you was?" Then the lovely Sally will tell me and my brain will go PING! and I'll be all, "OHHH! Sally of the shark cake! How *are* you, dear Sally?" Of course when Sally comes to pick up her 43rd cake, I will have no idea who she is (truly.)

Embarrassing. Ridiculously so because it happens to me ALL THE TIME.

This week I was at the gym, and a woman overheard me talking about the new premises. Important to note here is that I've seen her at the gym a lot (we are there at a similar time most mornings). I don't know her name (of course). I pretty much just had her in my brain as "other morning gym lady" but that's about all I really thought. Anyway so she hears me talking, comes over, and says, "Oh, so you're no longer working for Big Catering Company?"

I stared at her. Last time I worked at Big Catering Company was about 4 years ago. WHY THE HELL DOES SHE KNOW that I worked at Big Catering Company? OMG. Do I somehow KNOW this woman but I didn't know that I know her? So I casually say, "No, I don't work for them anymore...but how did you know that?" and she said, "Oh, last time we chatted we talked all about it!"

Last time we chatted? There was a last time we chatted? Really? Clearly we don't chat all that often because a heck of a lot has happened between my working for Big Catering Company and me owning the Awesome Cake Company.

But..shit. Really? I knew you well enough to tell you where I worked? Because I was pretty sure I only knew you as other morning gym lady.

This required some help, so I called a friend who is also an avid gym goer..and of course when I told her this story she laughed her ass off, because not knowing this woman is an extremely emzee-like thing to do. To try and help me out, she asked me, "Well, what did she look like? Tell me and I'll try and figure it out for you."

Umm. Yeah. Well. She had brown hair...I think. And she was kinda...medium-ish size, maybe? And...ummm...yeah. She looked like that.

Sieve brain. It's what happens when you're not paying attention.