Next time I won't forget the spanner.

There's something about not being able to answer a question when you feel you should. When the answer is on the tip of your tongue but you can't get it. I find that quite often, once I've been given the answer and kicked myself for a while, I can then remember that again when next I need it.

Like the time when someone in my maths class had built me up as some sort of invincible test fiend, and I managed to get invalid answers (not just wrong: completely off the scale) for practically all of it [Geek-Fu: In the quadratic formula I forgot to square the b in the discriminant, so almost all the roots came out imaginary when they were all supposed to be real.]
I remember that Fairground Attraction were responsible for Perfect, due to a pub quiz back home.

After failing to win (in the strictest sense) a game of Trivial Pursuit at the weekend, I'm not going to forget that one of the weapons in Cluedo is a spanner. I might forget the five I could remember on the night, but I'll probably remember the spanner.

No promises though.

I'm sure there's a valuable lesson in it somewhere, but it doesn't lend itself to a reliable learning technique, at least not as far as I can see. After all, it only works on the things you should know but don't: if it's something you happen to remember this time you've done little to cement that, nothing more than just reading the fact or similar.

Besides, maybe it's just me.