Mrs. H. and I have just made this informal arrangement wherein whichever one of us dies first, the other will have a cardboard cutout of our late spouse made.<\/p>\n
Sounds creepy, doesn\u2019t it! But \u201cit\u2019s not what you think.\u201d (How many times have you heard that defence being used?)<\/p>\n
It\u2019s all to do with remembering things and solving problems.<\/p>\n
Back in the early 80s, I worked as a computer programmer at a major record distribution company. In our office was a cardboard cutout mobster\u2014probably a promotional item for an album being marketed at the time. His\/its job was merely to stand behind one of us programmers and \u201clisten\u201d while we described a bug or design problem we were having. (It\u2019s not the same as talking to yourself; trust me!) The \u201caha\u201d moment would invariably occur, and we could apply the fix or whatever.<\/p>\n
That cutout was probably the biggest productivity improver I\u2019ve ever seen in IT.<\/p>\n
Fast forward to today and the bilateral pledge to commission a cardboard cutout of our late spouse when the time comes.<\/p>\n
I was trying to remember who had a hit with a song called \u201cWhat a Difference a Day Makes\u201d in the UK back in the \u201870s. I\u2019d tried all the usual memory tricks; going through the alphabet thinking of first or last names; sitting on the toilet and concentrating; trying not<\/em> to think of the name and then mentally creeping up and ambushing the information. Nothing worked. I told her what had just happened, and it was at that point she suggested the Mutual Post Mortem Cardboard Cutout Pact.<\/p>\n Problem is\u2014if Mrs. H. goes first, I\u2019m not sure I\u2019ll want a cutout of her watching me as I change my lifestyle to accommodate my new circumstances (I\u2019ll leave it to your imagination!) And if I go first, I\u2019m totally freaked out that my consciousness might transfer itself to the cutout and I\u2019ll spend the rest of Mrs. H\u2019s days frustrated because I can\u2019t help her work out how to use the new technology that she\u2019s purchased.<\/p>\n On second thoughts\u2014I\u2019m going to suggest we acquire a cardboard cutout mobster for the survivor to rely on. He\u2019d be non-partisan; neither of us would be aware of any sentience he may possess; and if the survivor decides to check out the \u201cplenty of fish\u201d theory, there would\u00a0 be no guilt or awkward explanations.<\/p>\n By the way\u2014it was Esther Phillips.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Mrs. H. and I have just made this informal arrangement wherein whichever one of us dies first, the other will have a cardboard cutout of our late spouse made. Sounds creepy, doesn\u2019t it! But \u201cit\u2019s not what you think.\u201d (How many times have you heard that defence being used?) It\u2019s all to do with remembering things and solving problems. Back… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[488],"tags":[664,206],"class_list":["post-436","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-bbs","tag-500words","tag-cardboard-cutouts-mobster-problem-solving-memory-aids"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/reggothard.com\/kelvin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/436","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/reggothard.com\/kelvin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/reggothard.com\/kelvin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/reggothard.com\/kelvin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/reggothard.com\/kelvin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=436"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/reggothard.com\/kelvin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/436\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1548,"href":"http:\/\/reggothard.com\/kelvin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/436\/revisions\/1548"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/reggothard.com\/kelvin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=436"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/reggothard.com\/kelvin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=436"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/reggothard.com\/kelvin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=436"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nThen at lunchtime, we were doing dishes together, and I envisaged myself asking Mrs. H. if she could remember the singer\u2019s name and\u2014flash!\u2014it came to me!<\/p>\n