Neuropsych Haiku

I love to dream. Not daydreams. The all out, longer, stranger ones that occur late in the sleep cycle. Traveling in time, changing the past, reliving parts of it, when even being changed by the dreamstuff itself seems possible. I don't really mind if I wake in a panic from a dream if it was interesting. One type that I like the most combines concepts, people, words, images, or events in ways that would be highly unlikely in a waking state. I had one of that sort recently that somehow intertwined my confusion about my future with the mnemonic device for remembering the names of the 12 cranial nerves. Further, in the dream, I realized that the words of the "standard" version of this memory aid had seventeen syllables. Ooh, haiku! Of course upon waking I could not leave the version I had learned alone. I had to modify and add meanings to it. "Meanings" is deliberately plural to allow for good or bad outcomes.

The most frequently used mnemonic is, "On Old Olympus' Towering Top, A Finn And German Viewed Some Hops." There are other versions, one quite lewd, but all help the student to remember the names of the cranial nerves by using the first letter of the nerve as the first letter of the associated word in the mnemonic; Olfactory, Optic, Oculomotor, Trochlear, Trigeminal, Abducens, Facial, Acoustic, Glossopharyngeal, Vagal, Spinal-accessory, & Hypoglossal.

One Omen Only
To Tear Apart Fantasies
And Give Vent Sour Hate

-or-

One Omen Only
To Tease Apart Fantasies
And Grant View Soul's Hope

Quite likely a bit of each is present or I wouldn't have felt conflicted enough to have written two versions. I'm working on the latter, though.

Peace, Doc

Copyright © 2007, Thomas A. Blood, Ph.D.

"BP = f(E & RV)" - Julian Rotter, Ph.D.