
Ms. McLaughlin coined the term “Sri Lanka Syndrome” to explain the phenomenon of learning a new (often obscure) fact, word, phrase or anything for the first time and then encountering the item again, or several times again, shortly after it was learned. (It happened to her with Sri Lanka.) Wikipedia credits Terry Mullen, but I will always credit Sally McLaughlin. This happens to me often (but usually with items that are not necessarily ‘new’ to me), especially after I became aware of it (meta-Sri Lanka syndrome?) and it’s happening right now with tubas, Jeeps and life-size stone statues of horses.