In many memorization techniques it is often taught that you should make use of overly vivid, even absurd imagery to make sure that bits of information stick in whatever organizational technique you might use, be it a ladder of pegs or something as elaborate as the method of loci. Sometimes you have to work to make something stick, and sometimes the absurd makes itself known spontaneously.

Have you ever pondered why there are so many things that you simply can’t unsee on the Internet?

Stop and think about all the things that you wish you’d never seen over the years. All the stingers and nasty surprises that gave you a nasty jolt. No, I won’t list any, I’ve no shortage of my own memories that routinely invade my nightmares… the point I’m making is that those things are so far off the beam, so far removed from our daily experience (regardless of what it may be), so… there’s probably a word in German for the concept. The best I’ve got it ho’polis d’l’Byr (Horror of the Other) that it wraps around into Lovecraftian or possibly Gigeresque surrealism or disgust (sometimes with a bouncy, catchy techno remix playing in the background) that it burns itself indelibly into one’s long-term memory in exactly the same way that Musashi Miyamoto rolling out pizza dough with a shinai on a wicker papsan chair in the back yard does.