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I have a very good memory. It is a bit selective (I do not remember everything), but it works very very well on the subset of things I am interested in. In particular I have an excellent visual memory...

When I watch a movie, I usually remember every single frame, and all of the dialogues. This makes having dinner with Aubrey after having seeing a movie with her slightly challenging for her because I suppose that she did observe and remember every thing.

One day, at home, Aubrey came along to my desk and suddenly said "Pascal didn't you say you were about to watch a video ?", I replied that yes, and that in fact I was already watching in... She looked puzzled and pointed out that I wasn't actually watching it, I was listening to it. Turns out that when I watch a movie (and this obviously only goes for movies I have already seen), I launch the DVD, start watching the first 30 seconds and then bring up windows of other applications to carry on doing whatever I was doing before. Very soon none of the movie can be seen because it is under the hundred or so of other windows I am working with. The important point here is that once the movie windows gets hidden, my memory gets the relay and shows me the pictures as clearly as if I was actually watching the video. The soundtrack of the movie is enough to bring all the other details to my mind.

I had already noticed this effect when I was a young student, and I used to record on my music player (a mini disk at that time), the soundtrack of movies I liked and listened to them during university lectures, while doing shopping, in the public transports etc... Incidentally I think that the movies I listened the most are The secret of my success and Ghost in the shell, which are some of my favourite movies ... and to complete the top three, I did also listen Surf's Up a lot (three of them are kind of autobiographic, that's why I like them so much...).