RAM is Random Access Memory
ROM is Read Only Memory
These are, generally, computer terms. ROM is where you can store data, but once it's stored, it's there forever. Read Only means it cannot be erased. RAM is temporary memory and once the program is finished, or the machine rebooted, the data loaded into memory is gone forever.
An old friend and I were discussing memory the other day, and I got to thinking about it. I can remember tidbits of information from work when I first started in this business in the early nineties. Stuff that I'd get called in the middle of the night for a problem, and I'd tell them what to do to fix it, go back to sleep and never even knew I had gotten a call by the next day.
Like, I know what this means: 1GV057083900
I won't even try to explain it. Let's just say it means something to me - going back to 1990-1993 timeframe. Somehow those numbers and codes got burned into my ROM - my Read Only Memory. I can't get rid of them.
Ask me what show I watched last night on television and IF I can somehow remember what show it was, I probably can't tell you the storyline. Forget commercials. I did. I am TERRIBLE with names and trivia - unless it's something that interests me deeply and even then I have to make a concentrated effort to remember it.
But once it's there, it's there.
I have three vehicles at this time, truck, car, van. Don't ask me what the license plate number is on any of them. Haha ha. I've owned quite a few cars over the years, and between owning them and moving into different states with them, I've probably had 30 or 40 license plates at one time or another. Do I know any of them?
As a matter of fact, I do. My white car, now sporting 120,000 miles, but which we originally purchased new in Alabama in 1998, a Ford Aspire of all things (great gas mileage)... It's had 3 or 4 license plates since time began for it. And during our time in Oklahoma (December 98 to around July 00), it had a license plate. An Oklahoma license plate. QUE180.
Why do I remember this, you ask? Well... It's like this. When you go camping, or doing certain other activities, you must fill out paperwork to include your license plate number. I generally carry the clipboard back to the car and fill it in and 30 seconds later I have forgotten. But at Fort Davis, in Oklahoma (come to think of it was the name of the place Fort Davis, or something else? heck, I cannot even remember...), but at that campground in southern Oklahoma, the "book" where I had to register was permanently affixed.
I walked to the car, looked at the plate and started back. Within a few seconds, I had forgotten. So, I went back and looked again. This time, I concentrated on the numbers for a moment, went back to the book, and filled it in. QUE180.
Ya know. I've only got this very limited amount of grey matter up in the old noggin. QUE180 uses several brain cells, I am sure. I wish I could forget...
*sigh* Some things are impossible to forget, though.
Has anyone seen my keys?
3 comments:
Keys. Check the freezer. You may have dropped them in the ice tray while you were making a daquari. Happens all the time.
Also, memory is an amazing thing, isn't it? I've got some of the damndest phone numbers flitting about inside my noggin, and pi stored out to 15 decimal places. But can I remember the time after I've just looked at my watch? Heck no, it doesn't register until about the fourth glance, at which point I *still* don't know what the time was when I wanted to know, only what it is when it finally "clicked."
John
I can't even remember the phone numbers of the places I've lived and worked before now - except Mom's.... but I can remember that of a lady I knew growing up - close friend of the family... even after all these years.
Must run in the family. I sure can't remeber much. I remember faces but not names. embarrassing to say the least.
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