Ed Byrne, the comedian - on the Graham Norton show on Friday - gave an example of how his pregnant wife's brain had taken on the consistency of blancmange, resulting in her normally razor-sharp intellect reducing to a state where she can barely remember her own name!
He recounted one incident where his wife's brain had met that of his father-in-law's, who is in the early stages of dementia.
The situation was when his in-laws had come around and had brought a clock with them that had belonged to his wife's grandmother.
Unfortunately the clock only had one hand, the minute hand, which as far as time telling is concerned is not the best hand. (You might know that it is 20 past something, but not what and is nowhere near as useful as the hour hand would have been!)
On seeing the clock, his wife said, "I don't want that, it's only got one arm", to which Ed and his mother-in-law replied, "Are you sure it's only got one 'ARM'?"
"Of course I am," she replied, "I can COUNT!"
Ed and his mother-in-law replied, "But are you sure it's called an 'ARM'?", to which his father-in-law interjected...
"It's not called an 'ARM', it's called a 'FINGER'!"
So it is, that "blancmange-brain" can happen at any age, and can help to explain both the strange utterances and weird decisions that at some point we have all, at one time or another, made.
As I lie in bed on this Sunday morning listening to the wind and rain outside and knowing that I should be getting ready to do a 20km walk with my nearest and dearest, I can recall my most recent "blancmange" response.
It was made in reply to the question "Do you fancy doing the Trailwalker UK event in 2011?".
It appears that I said "Yes!", when surely I must have meant "No!"
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