reading (Asimov's July 2009)

I finished the July issue of Asimov's over the weekend. "Sleepless in the House of Ye" and "Shoes-To-Run" stretched into very different societies. "Sinbad the Sand Sailor" was a romp well suited to R. Garcia Y Robinson's style. "Camp Nowhere" was creepy, though I must admit I thought the main character was female through most of the story, which is not the case. "Earth II" has a complex world with all kinds of things built into it, but it didn't wow me. I think it fell a bit short of its potential, but even so, there is a fair amount there.

28. Asimov's July 2009

brain practice

I heard a bit on the radio today that said people could actually improve their cognitive capabilities as they aged (hard to believe if you're over 30). The trick they said is to exercise your memory in three different ways. One way was to exercise longterm memory. The example they did was pick a year that you lived through and begin to think of all the things you can remember associated with that year. The second way was to try to work short term memory with keeping track of multiple things. His examples made me think of concentration games or doing math in your head. The third way was sense memory. It seems mainly it's an exercise in concentrating and focusing.

So maybe there is hope for me after all. Of course, I couldn't remember the third kind of memory exercise, I had to look it up. :)

If you're interested, the piece was on "All Things Considered" and is available online.