To remember things without paper handy, I used my fingers. I started with my index, and turned whatever it was into the Radio Phonetic Alphabet. "Milk", for example, becomes "Mike", and I imagine Michael Jordan dancing on my finger. Alpha is an Alpha symbol. Bravo was Johnny Bravo. Charlie was Charlie "Winning" Sheen. Delta is Jason Bourne (Read the book!) Echo is Echo from Dollhouse. And so on. It was less than effective.
"Sherlock" mentioned
the memory palace mnemonic technique in S02E01. Now, I had actually heard of it before, thanks to Derren Brown. I, being I, decided to take the mustachioed magician's method and put a little backspin on it. I decided to mix it with another technique from the novel "The Pigman", involving imagining the objects touching each other. So I imagine alphabetical things that are on, near, or contain other things. Armoire, Beneath the armoire, a Chair, Diamonds, Elephant (toy), Fireplace, golf Clubs, Hatrack, Icebox, Jumper, Kite. This worked so well I was up to K before I realized I had forgotten the first two.
I decided I needed to specialize. Study/Den/Library for things related to personal art and writing. Garage for schoolwork. Kitchen for shopping lists. Living room for everything else. I spent something like half an hour trying to find items that were at least vaguely appropriate to each room. The Living Room, for example, seems to belong to a family with lots of kids with lots of afterschool hobbies, who are always leaving stuffed Arachnids and Kites and Jumpers and Trumpets and Umbrellas about. I came up with a Blotter for the study while I was trying to get some sleep last night, and since all three of my main categories lacked As at the time, I stuffed it into an imaginary Armoire, under the classic system. Then I realized that I didn't need to strictly adhere to the themes, and bizarre, illogical items might actually be easier to remember.
And that's why the Queen is in my Garage between a Poker Table and a Roomba.
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