I love mnemonic devices. Love. When Shaun and I were first dating, I bought my first vintage Samsonite suitcase (which is a whole nother series of posts. Lord), and it had the initials EP on it. We spent a good 45 minutes imagining what they may have stood for, and it's one of my fondest memories of our early courtship (The two I remember most are Elvis Presley and Edible Panties).
The other day, V was asking what direction we were driving, so I explained north, south, east, and west to her. And then I shared how I remember them: Never Eat Shredded Wheat. Now, V and I both enjoy the occassional shredded wheat, so she was not comfortable with this sentence. Today, she put the letters N E S W up on our fridge and worked on new sentences.
No Easter? Soon winter.
Never eat soft wombats.
No, Edith. Say what?
Never eat singing worms.
She read each dramatically, especially the one about Edith, and we laughed and laughed and laughed.
I can hardly wait until we get to Every Good Boy Does Fine. What are your favorite mnemonic devices? And have you seen this helpful online tool?
Edited for spelling. Thanks, Cousin!
11 comments:
No, Edith. Say What?
Priceless.
PS Edith is either the name of my future child or cat. I'm not fussy which.
I memorized some books of the Bible that way once.
General Electric Power Company
Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians
Never Eat Salty Worms
My Very Eager Mother Just Served Us Nine Pickles
Every Good Boy Deserves Fudge (which connotes other things these days, but was rated G at the time)
ROY G BIV -
Makes absolutely NO sense on its own, but it's still fun to say!
And although I'm assuming this isn't necessary:
Rainbow Colors-
Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Indigo, Violet
Man am I jonesin' for some shredded wheat now. And I'm out. CRAP!
My current pneunomic device is for the essential plant nutrients:
"See Hopkins Cafe managed by mine cousin Clyde Como."
"C HOPKiNS CaFe Mg B Mn CuZn Cl CoMo."
(Carbon, Hydrogen, Oxygen, Phosphorus, Potassium, Nitrogen, Sulfer, Calcium, Iron, Magnesium, Boron, Manganese, Copper, Zinc, Colbalt, Molybdenum.)
Ok, I just totally outed myself as both a plant and science nerd. Still. It's kind of fun, isn't it - Meagan
Not original, but I just came across this:
TEABAGGER = Totally Enraged About Blacks And Gays Getting Equal Rights!
Your auntie
skj
Do you mean mnemonic device? A pneumonic device is something to help you breathe. Personally, I find the iron lung at Ax Man extremely creepy...
Pneumatic devices, on the other hand, are indeed awesome. Nail guns are handy, and I've always wanted one of those canister/tube systems they use at bank drive-throughs in my house.
Jonathan
Dammit, cousin. When I'm a famous blogger, will you be my editor?
I saw a Trading Spaces knock-off show years ago that installed an elaborated canister tube system. You could send a beer through it, but you had to wait awhile to open it afterwards.
That was Monster House where they'd come in and renovate your house based on a theme. I think that was the sci-fi house, with a crashed UFO as the foyer ceiling. I think that was also the house where the owners tried to sell the house and learned that the Monster House treatment isn't good for resale value.
There's a McDonalds in a strip-mall in Edina where the drive-thru is a little building out in the middle of the parking lot. The beverages are served up in the out-building, but the food is all cooked up in the main building and delivered through pneumatic tubes. They claim to be the only one like it in the world/country. They also have a full-scale "Mac Tonight" moon-head guy with a grand player-piano playing showtunes about serial killers. It's about as cool as McDonalds gets.
My dad was one of 9 kids, and I could never, ever remember their order. Somehow the Johnson side was much easier. Here's what I came up with in Jr. high.
Order of kids:
Leon
Lorraine
Darrel
Delano
Raymond
Wendell
Gene
Eddie
Jerry
Here's my little memory rhyme:
Little
Lions
Dread
Dancing
Right
When
Ghosts
Eat
Jam
Never had a problem after that.
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