Triumph.

I've always been embarrassingly bad at remembering people. Old classmates, students, or colleagues regularly rush up to me on campus or in the mall, and I'll smile and fake my way through a short conversation, but in reality, unless I talk to you often, have lived with you, or have some reason to use your name, there's at least a 90% chance I have no idea who you are. As a way of compartmentalizing things, my mind places people in context rather than remember them as individual entities. For example, if you are in my molecular biology lab group, when I walk into molecular biology lab I will know you and interact with you just like I would a friend. But if you later run into me as we pass through the Bookstore, I won't have the faintest idea who you are. My memory of you is one with your context; to me, you do not exist outside of molecular biology lab.

Which is why I found the results I earned on this BBC facial memory quiz (take it; it's fun!) so surprising. I'm obviously better at this in theory than I am in practice. Cool.