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“I don’t have Brain Farts … my brain just completely poops its pants sometimes.” Unknown
We all have them, even though many dishonest people would deny it. Of course, some of us have more than most. Notice I said us, which throws me under the cloak of those whose brain oozes toots like a bean-eating buffalo.
It’s really not fair. I don’t consider myself an idiot, but if an invisible spy followed me around he would run out of notebook space to document my various gassy-headed maneuvers.
I think brains might just get bored, they can’t stay productively active all the time. Sometimes they need to take a break. Unfortunately those breaks don’t always end up well and they often end up getting stuck in a soupy mire of idiocy.
Neuroscientists, a refined bunch if ever a bunch was refined, call these episodes “maladaptive brain activity changes.” Even they can’t explain why a sensible, intelligent person can turn a straightforward task into an epic blunder.
The latest Brain Fart research indicates that they are unlike errors caused by a lack of information or experience, or even by distractions. They are supposedly “inborn and instinctive, and have a predictable neural pattern that emerges up to 30 seconds before they happen.”
They supposedly happen a lot when you are daydreaming, one of my hobbies, by the way.
Half-assed scientific theories aside, many if not most Brain Toots don’t even have a witness to them.
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The brain represents about two percent of the body’s total weight but consumes up to 20 percent of its energy. All of that firepower is bound to have a mysterious flat tire occasionally.
External stimuli acts like a bushwhacker, spawning the imagination and creativity that stimulates Brain Farts with distracting visions that can turn off the brain long enough for it to pass gas.
OK, I’m sick and tired of sounding like a dweeb scientist.
Can you imagine being paid to chart and categorize Brain Farts? I bet they have a blast describing their job to a roomful of brainiacs, all of whom are no stranger to Brain Farts but would never admit it.
It is possible that everything to do with our subject can be laid right at the door of a simple definition: the brain is lazy. It might get more downtime than the rest of the body, and in trying to make up for it, it freezes, making us prone to dumb goofs.
“A temporary mental lapse or failure to reason correctly.” Definition of Brain Fart in Oxford dictionary.
The origin of the phrase Brain Fart was said to have started around 1870.
Medicine and home remedies were starting up like gangbusters and opportunist quacks made a killing with their potions, many of which were dangerous. Self–destruction was sold as self-help.
An odd fellow named Roger Plimpkin had the term Brain Fart created in his honor, a dishonor if ever there was one. The township where he lived used it to describe his odd behavior.
On his trips for groceries, he avoided all other humans and stuffed cotton in his ears as a concoction to battle the rude remarks aimed his way. Prominent among them was the name Brain Fart.
It seems that when he was young, his father told him a big windy about an extremely tiny midget living in his brain that would confuse him occasionally by passing gas.
Little Plimpkin never forgot it and never quit believing in it, thus his warped personality and lack of affection for others.
He became so totally reclusive that the only human he ever talked to was the mail boy. The curious town folk always asked the boy what Plimpkin was up to locked up in his house. The boy always gave the same answer.
“He’s working on a cure for Brain Farts.”
This answer always prompted long, loud laughter. What an idiot, they all said.
In this case the idiot had the last laugh, for he brewed up a Brain Fart remedy out of caffeine, alcohol and poppyseed. It sold by the hundreds, especially to husbands who thought their wives suffered from bouts of erratic hysteria and mental madness.
His magical sauce proved the same as all the other blends sold by medicinal con-men, it was extremely addictive and dangerous when used for too long.
Anyway, when I came up with the idea for a Brain Fart story I certainly didn’t expect it to be filled with science and history foolishness. I thought I’d just pass along some of the personal brain gas episodes I’ve been guilty of.
Unfortunately my brain has just taken a huge poop, brought on by too much idiotic seriousness. I can barely remember my own name. Rest assured though, my brain’s ability to fool itself has few competitors. It seems to be my specialty.
Sigh. And I have never wanted to be the king of anything.