For some this may be a little unfamiliar and for others the obsession has already begun.  You know who you are and there is no escaping it.  We all would like to think we either look or feel younger than we are.  As far as our brain age is concerned Nintendo has defined the ultimate to be age 20.  Ummm… well for some of us that is a little more difficult.  I would like to think that since my age is more than double that of the perfect brain age that I learned a few things but I just may not be able to spew them back as quickly as a 20 year old.  Not only is accuracy important but speed also play a part in the calculation of your brain age. 

For Christmas this year the husband got me a Nintendo DS.  It was at that moment the madness begun.  The more often you take the tests the more tests are unlocked.  You can test your brain age at anytime but only once a day.  The game will graph your progress for each test as well as your brain age.  This can be great as long as you have good days but very humiliating when you don’t.  So as long as you don’t update your brain age it will stay at whatever it was the last time you took the test.

It is very easy to get distracted while you are taking the test so I try and make sure that I will have the 10 minutes of uninterupted time.  This is not easy an easy task with two little ones in the house.

So I have been taking my brain age and gradually getting better until I came across a new test that had me stumpted to the tune of age 71… very very sad.  So I worked and practiced and I was ready to redeem myself by taking the test again.  Who hoo!  I got a brain age of 24.  At this point in the game you don’t want to take your brain age again because you know what a rarity it is to see those low numbers.

I started to take these tests while on Christmas vacation.  Needless to say when I returned to work my brain age increased by 2 years.  Do you think there is any correlation?  Yup… pretty much.  And if you aren’t humiliated enough when you don’t do as well the game says… your brain must be tired. (Like I need a digital game to tell me that). 

The best story was from my friend (who also reads this blog) what her brain age was after taking Ambien.  Yes it is just as funny as it sounds.  Needless to say she spaced for about 4 minutes and her brain age was in the 70’s.  So even I haven’t done that bad but the worst I have done was take the test after having a martini.  Sadly… I didn’t do so bad. 

So the brain age obsession continues and as of today I am the brain age of 39.  Considering I am currently 42 I will take it.