B C F H I K N O P S U V W Y

Alphabet soup?
Nope!
A word with Slavic origins?
Wrong again!
The letters for all of the elements which have a single letter as their chemical symbol?
Bing, bing, bing!!! Correct-o-mundo!
And so I ended yesterday on a high note, playing trivia with the Liquor Posse at a local watering hole. What a nice way to finish a day which had begun so poorly! Even better, this particular answer was the final question, worth forty-two points if all fourteen parts were correct. And I nailed it, with some assistance from the team for U, V, and Y. Woohoo!
That final question was not the only one I nailed, either. The game had started with a question about SNL's Jeopardy skits: who played Trebek? Why, that was Will Ferrell!!! And I knew it! Oddly, I seemed to be the only one who did, too. Still, we wagered our maximum bid on it and we were off and running!
I know, I know. It's just a trivia game, right?
True, but I am usually not good at those games. I may know one question, or think I know it, but usually not so much.
Tonight, I was the team leader on that first question. Amazing!
Then, I knew the one about the sports figure on the most Wheaties boxes.
Michael Jordan, of course!
Then, the game-changing final question came along. You get 3 points per correct answer, but lose 3 points for every wrong answer. For a 14-parter, you stood to gain as many as 42 points... but you could also lose that many if you blew all of it.
We weren't in the lead, for a change. We weren't even close enough to the lead to be in second place.
We were third out from the win, behind by 19 points.
Ouch.
Then the final question came and the answer slip flew in front of me! They all know what I do for a living and this was definitely in my field of expertise! I wrote nine of the 14 immediately, seeing the Periodic Table with my mind's eye. Carbon, Hydrogen, Oxygen, Nitrogen, Sulfur, Phosphorus: the backbones of the molecules of biochemistry and organic chemistry, the mainstays of our lives. Fluorine, Iodine: halogens, in the same family of chemicals. Potassium: that's a K, y'all, not a P or a Po, and we can thank the Romans for that confusion. Then came, Tungsten, aka "Wolfram", a favorite W-word for me and another team player. Thanks to him, and his methodical perusal of the alphabet, together with my knowledge of the names of the elements, we finished up with Uranium, Vanadium, and Yttrium.
Woohoo!
That didn't give us enough gain to win (the winning team also had a science teacher in their ranks), but we did take 2nd! Yeah! $20 gift card for the team's next visit!
This visit, my dinner was free. That's right, free! Along with four other members of our team, we split the 1st-place and 2nd-place gift cards from previous weeks.
Ah, such sweet victory!

pull harder, mom

The bfe sent me two comic strips he'd spoken off in the past week or so. They were from the site xkcd.com (ask me some time what that means to me), a self-proclaimed webcomic of "romance, sarcasm, math, and language". Most of the time the sarcasm seems to be the most important focal point. That dominant aspect is what draws the bfe to it and pushes me away with both hands.
So, yesterday afternoon, while I was in class and my phone was flying, he sent the two comics to me, to lie in wait. One was really cool in a positive sense, encouraging folks to become organ donors. It likened body parts to reusable building blocks of construction-type toys. Like I said, pretty cool.
The second one, titled "Dark Flow", is aptly named.

That last panel is the killer, right?
Yes, most definitely.
So there I was, bereft and sobbing at 8 PM on a Monday night, missing Mama. As I told the bfe, "Sometimes, i am so very world-weary from missing my mother. Sometimes i handle the weight of the loss more easily."
All I knew for sure was this: going home to an empty house was not what I needed, was not a sane option.
No. That would pull my essence down, down, down, into a deep pit of sorrow. I was teetering on the edge, as it was, losing my balance along with my mind.
Sounds like time for a bfe to offer a comforting arm, a comforting shoulder, a comforting kitteh. But a thirteen-year-old boy is not hardly going to do so, is he?
No. By his own admission, he is more thirteen-year-old boy than he is man at the onset of his fourth decade. He reckons he might be out of his teen years by the time he hits 45.
We'll see. He just may be right.
But that thought brought me no solace.
I recalled that Brenda, the trivia-playing retired teacher, had said she and John (her gentle man) would habitually go to the CBP for dinner around 8 PM. That would be NOW. That would be good. I like her, and he gives nice, easy hugs, too.
Maybe they would be there. I would just park and get hold of myself a little, then go in and see if they were there. If not... well, if not, I don't know what I would do. Sit in the parking lot and bawl, maybe.
But they WERE there! Moreover, they greeted me enthusiastically, but not prying about my red-rimmed eyes or sensitive state. She mentioned that one of the regulars would not be there for trivia that night, as that regular was spending time with her mother at a theme park. When I started tearing up, the subject of mothers and daughters was dropped in favor of their upcoming trip to France and had I ever been there?
Nice. How very nice to know kind-hearted people with experience of the world. Truly.
So we dined together and talked of travels to Europe and the Elvis tribute artists and the parade last Saturday. Then others began arriving to the booth for the trivia game and we all talked and played and groaned about the wrong answers and celebrated our correct choices. We lost, but that was okay.
We were all together, all trying, each with our own strengths, none of us with much sports knowledge.
By the end of the game, I was almost right as rain. Hugs with those I'm close to, then off to home.
Just before I exit the parking lot, I get a message from my first niece: Are you home yet?
No, just leaving the Crystal Beer Parlor.
Drive safely.

And so I do, smiling that she had contacted me.
Smiling even more when I arrived home and the porch light was on.
And the mail was THROWN into the house!
"hahaha! mail thrown in my house!" I jubilantly texted to her.
"I fringed the porch light for you too" was her reply.
"You fringed it? you KNOW i like fringe!"
And now she and I have this new little inside joke.
And the world is brighter again.
And my tethers are holding.

touch me touch me touch me touch me!

The Rocky Horror Picture Show song is totally appropriate!
I was in SUCH a great frame of mind today! My mood ring would have glowed warm purple for mellow and loved. Truly!

And I have figured out why, too.
Touch.
I scored major touch from all kinds of sources today! It's been pure magic, the transformation of a physical sensation to a balm for my mental, emotional, and spiritual self!

How did it begin?
I met my stepmom for lunch and a movie, something we haven't done in far too long. Schedule conflicts, what with my Fridays being consumed either by meetings or special make-up tests for students. In other words, lots of special favors for others, none for me. Boo hiss!
So this was an especially nice way to celebrate my first day of Spring Break! Oh, yeah! Hugs, first, then a leisurely lunch at what has become our favorite twice-named restaurant. The manager even brought us a free sampler of their new treats: fried mushrooms for her and fried pickle chips for me. Yum!!! Nice and crispy and zingy pickles!
Then off to the movies! She even got an extra dollar off because it was Senior Monday. Nice! We got the popcorn & soda special, too (and a free refill on the large tub before we left, of course!) and had a good time laughing at the movie.
I may have enjoyed "Identity Thief" more than she did, as it had the expected harsh language in it, and a bit more than she liked. Still, we totally enjoyed being with each other and ended our day together with more hugs before going in our opposite directions.
I went home, put away the popcorn, and checked facebook. Oh, yeah! The indomitable JinHi had received a clean-of-cancer decree by her doctor! The evil marshmallow was gone and had left naught behind!!! Woohoo!!! A quick call then to my house-mate. Had he heard the news? Nope, not yet. Yeah! Definitely a night-brightener for both of us!
Then north I headed to downtown for some improv to add more laughter to my life. Great idea! Hugs for the loving husband of the indomitable JihHi! Hugs from friends there when I entered! Hugs from friends there when I exited almost wo hours later! Hugs, hugs, hugs!!!
Then to the Liquor Posse for a bit of camaraderie around a team trivia table. Nice! Some of the Philo Cafe crowd were there, too, adding to the merriment. I can't recall if our team won or lost, but we sure had fun trying! Then hugs before we all dispersed into the night.
Wow! What a fabulous day!