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What's the word for when you're looking for something and it's in your hand or in front of you?

Examples:

  • Looking for your phone and it's in your hand.
  • I had put on my spectacles and I was looking for them.

Does this phenomenon have a name?

Part of speech: it's a name of the phenomenon so it should be a noun. It can be a compound noun or a single word.

I searched many different things but did not find anything helpful.

Laurel
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Decapitated Soul
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    This is a ... I had it right in hand but forgot what I was going to say ... Oh, yes!! "Senior moment"! – Hot Licks May 24 '20 at 17:27
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    It doesn't exactly roll off the tongue, but schotoma might work. Or how about hiding in plain sight? – Tinfoil Hat May 25 '20 at 03:42
  • Answers will probably just duplicate those to one word describing making an uncharacteristically stupid mistake. – Edwin Ashworth Jul 09 '20 at 15:42
  • @EdwinAshworth, Just because there's a duplicate — which isn't really a duplicate of my question but contains the words that are posted in the answers to my question — doesn't mean the answers to my question deserve downvotes. – Decapitated Soul Jul 09 '20 at 15:49
  • No, but if they fail to address the 'when you're looking for something and it's in your hand or in front of you?' directly and merely are repeats of synonyms for 'senior moment' / 'absentmindedness', I can't see how they add value to the site. Bloat should be discouraged; ELU aims to be a reasonably easily searchable resource – imagine if CGEL say covered everything ten times. Note that I haven't downvoted the question, which does ask for a more specific term than the one I linked to. – Edwin Ashworth Jul 09 '20 at 20:17

2 Answers2

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How about absentmindedness? From Lexico:

absentminded: (of a person or a person's behavior or manner) having or showing a habitually forgetful or inattentive disposition.

Forgetfulness could also work.

forgetfulness: lapse of memory

Examples of absentmindedness and forgetfulness:

Looking for your phone and it's in your hand.

I had put on my spectacles and I was looking for them.

Community
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Richard Kayser
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The term you are looking for is called a brain fart.

Brain fart: (figuratively, slang, mildly vulgar) An instance of absent-mindedness or forgetfulness.

Example sentence: Sorry for the brain fart, but what exactly did you say again?

Senior moment or Mental lapse also work here.

Flutterby
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