Memory slums

[come_to_think]

The other day, after singing a song by Cyril Tawney, I confidently attributed it to Ewan MacColl.  Yesterday, reading an article on Camus with increasing puzzlement, I found that I had him mixed up with Sartre.  Those are among the many pairs & triples of nouns that seem to occupy the same slot in my memory, so that unless I am careful I will retrieve the wrong one.  Over the last few years I have compiled a list, ~/p/Memory_Slums:

Alzheimer's disease, Parkinson's disease
Amazon, Ebay
André Gide, André Malraux
Barry Finn, Shay Walker
Bill Staines, Stan Rogers
Birth of a Nation, Gone with the Wind
Bob Blue, Fred Small
butane, propane
Camus, Sartre
Ceylon, Madagascar
Cole Porter, Noel Coward
Cyprus, Malta
Cyril Tawney, Ewan MacColl
eclair, napoleon
Edna St Vincent Millay, Elinor Wylie
Figaro, Tivoli
George Gershwin, Ira Gershwin, Irving Berlin
Iraq, Pakistan
Jack London, John Reed
Jane Fonda, Joan Didion
J. D. Salinger, John Updike
Jean Ritchie, Margaret MacArthur, Peggy Seeger
John Betjeman, Philip Larkin
Manitoba, Saskatchewan
Max Eastman, Max Lerner
Peter Drucker, Peter Viereck
Phil Ochs, Tom Paxton
Steve Allen, Woody Allen
The Naked and the Dead, From Here to Eternity
Tropic of Cancer, Tropic of Capricorn

It is no surprise that most of the entries are proper nouns.  I have always had trouble with them.  The human race, in particular, walks around in a private fog of mine.

It seems to be getting worse.  I anticipate the day Fred Allen gets stirred into the pot with Steve & Woody.