BRAINPAN LEAKAGE

Competition, in and of itself, is a good thing. A bit of healthy competition helps folks to strive toward excellence. It forces them to work harder for a reward, thereby helping them become better at what it is they are competing over, about, around, on, under, or otherwise with.

In the marketplace, it even tends to promote a little better pricing here and there. Sometimes it even spurs honesty – but then again, sometimes it spurs dishonesty, which is a bit less than healthy.

But, we aren’t talking about the marketplace here today. What we are talking about is “healthy competition” among friends. A contest, as it were, on an impromptu family & friend game night.

And it all starts with coffee…

You see, a dear friend of mine – we call her DeathStar because… well, if you ever meet her you’ll understand… Anyway, this dear friend of mine is a coffee roasting hobbyist. Actually, I think she has migrated from hobbyist to professional in recent months, but the real point is that DeathStar  hand roasts and custom blends some of the most INCREDIBLE coffee on the planet. And, since I am her friend I am fortunate enough to receive freshly roasted – as in less than 3 days old – coffee beans on a regular basis. If you are a coffee drinker at all you understand me when I say this is almost literally a case of “Java Nirvana. ” The aromas when you open the sealed package, the aromas when you grind the beans, and everything else that comes along with it… Because of DeathStar I even went out and purchased a French Press… Well, actually E K picked it up for me, and she doesn’t even like the smell of coffee, which just goes to show you that even someone who hates coffee with a passion knows how to respect the “Beans o’ DeathStar”.

And so… I have this coffee. And, I have this other friend who is a coffee fanatic. We’ll call her Anastasia. We won’t, however, call her ‘Stasia Mae. Only her husband gets away with that. But, if we’re going to be honest, we mostly just call her Luets. Long story there… But, anyway, Luets is a coffee fanatic, and whenever I come into possession of the sacred beans, she shows up at my door. As was the case recently.

Luets and her husband came by for freshly roasted, ground, and pressed coffee one Saturday. After juicing several of the beans and sitting around talking it had progressed into the late afternoon, so we invited them to stay for dinner. Afterwards, as we all sat around drinking Vodka-Tonics the Evil Redhead decided we should play a game (see… now I need a friend who distills their own Vodka…)

Now, normally when this happens it usually involves me wearing a collar and fetching sticks, tennis balls, and various chew toys for E K. However, on this particular evening the Redhead was looking for something we could all do, and she didn’t have enough leashes on hand to accommodate everyone.

But, seriously… E K came up with the idea that maybe we should play Uno or some other card game. Since the O-spring was involved, we let her pick and she decided upon Phase 10. If you’ve never played it, Phase 10 is sort of like what would happen if Rummy and Uno had a child. It’s a lot of fun, and we really enjoy it. And, it’s healthy competition…

Or, so we thought.

You see, Luets is competitive. When I say competitive I don’t mean healthy competitive. I mean insano, take no prisoners, needs a straitjacket competitive. With everyone…

Her husband, Mike, however, is not what you would call competitive at all. He’s more along the line of “Yay! Everybody wins!”… In fact, he is sooooo diametrically opposed in “competitiveness” to Luets, that he will literally go out of his way to help someone else win, even if it costs him points. In fact, he readily admits that he is happy to lose as long as he is able to drive Luets up a wall. It seems that when it comes to games, making Luets crazy is Mike’s real entertainment.

And so, we discovered this… with extreme prejudice, mind you…

At one point during the game Luets used a skip card, but didn’t skip Mike, even though he wanted her to. The reasoning, announced loudly and without apology, was that, “You don’t play the cards right.” You see, had she skipped him it would have set him up to help someone else win on the next round. She knew he was going to do this and was vying to prevent it, all the while seething and generally turning into a psychopath whenever anyone would inch ahead of her. To give you a verbal illustration of her behavior, Luets was even going head to head with our 10 year old, and was being brutal.

Fortunately, the O-spring can hold her own, as I shall now illustrate…

During a later hand, as Luets whined, seethed, grumbled, and shrieked, it came around to the kid’s turn. O-spring was in possession of a skip card herself, and she played it. On Luets…

Well, I probably don’t have to tell you that Competition Girl immediately became pissy. She demanded to know why the O-spring didn’t skip Mike instead because in her mind that would have been a better play. Without missing a beat our 10 year old looked across the table and completely owned her by saying, “Because just like you said, he won’t play the cards right!”

Yeah… The O-spring doesn’t fall far from the tree… Next time we play cards though, I’m thinking we might need to dial back on the amount of DeathStar Coffee we allow Luets to drink…

More to come…

Murv

As many of you already know, I recently had the opportunity to take a vacation with my wife and daughter. This was the first vacation The Evil Redhead and I had taken since before the O-spring was born, meaning it had been more than 10 years since our last excursion. However, since the economy hasn’t been the greatest, the land of mouse ears wasn’t in the cards. Instead, we elected to explore nature in southern Missouri and the Ozark Scenic Riverways.

Of course, since we have these high-maintenance, geriatric, special-needs felines roaming the house this meant we needed someone to keep an eye on them. Enter our good friends Anastasia and Mike. While gone, in order to keep these two brave souls up to date on the progress of our vacation I embarked upon an adventure in text messaging.

Since many have been asking “how was your vacation?” I thought I’d post a bit of a travelogue in that same sort of format.

What follows here are not the actual text messages I sent.

Why?

Because I couldn’t tell the real story in 160 characters or less.  Of course, if you ask my wife she’ll just call it revisionist history, but then Evil Redheads are like that…

* * * * * * * * * *

Day 1: Woke up. Packed van. Drove.  Actually, rode. E K won’t let me drive. Ate fried chicken. Drove (rode) more. Checked into motel. E K immediately declared war on flies (again).

Night 1: Toured downtown Eminence, Missouri for 3 minutes 27 seconds. Saw everything twice. Asked business hours @ local eatery. Question seemed to confuse hostess who proceeded to vapor lock. Decided it might be better to eat somewhere else. Went next door. Had steak. Returned to motel and went to bed at 8.

Day 2: Woke up. Drank really bad coffee obtained from nearby gas station after standing in line for 20 minutes to pay for it. Only one person ahead of me but she wasn’t the sharpest crayon in the box.  Went to Two Rivers.  Dude in van took us up river and kicked us out at the bridge. Paddled canoe. Ate lunch. Paddled canoe more. Arrived back at Two Rivers.

Night 2: Ate bratwurst. Played Uno with O-spring and E K. The Evil Redhead cheated. Not sure where she is hiding the cards. Looked at news. Saint Louis reported a full 24 hours without anything evil happening. Attributed the outbreak of goodness and niceness to E K being out of town.

Night 2 (continued): Went to Bed. An hour later woke up gasping. E K had shut off power to my CPAP and was watching from the doorway. Reconnected power to CPAP and Evil Redhead wandered off, grumbling to herself as she reworked her sinister plan.

Day 3: Woke up. Drank more bad coffee made with overly-chlorinated tap water. Intestines officially sanitized. Went hiking. E K pushed me down a hill. In order to make her stop grinding her foot on the back of my head I had to remind her that we canceled my life insurance.

Day 3 (continued): E K not happy that her plan to do me in was thwarted. Made me wash up at the outhouse nearby, then told anyone who asked about my scrapes and bruises that I am clumsy and fell down. Talked me into taking cave tour. Attempted to lose me in caverns, but was unsuccessful due to my clever use of breadcrumbs, glow in the dark twine, and a Coleman electric lantern.

Day 3 (continued): Once back out in the open I offered a lady park ranger ten bucks and a beer in exchange for Federal Protection from the redhead. Ranger declined, patted me on the head and then high-fived E K. It was then I realized that I was on my own and may not survive the vacation.

Night 3: Ate grilled chicken, Played Uno again. The Evil Redhead cheated again. Still can’t figure out where she is hiding the cards. Watched rain outside window. Went to bed. Laid awake listening to young couple next door “mucking like finks”.

Day 4: Woke up. Drove to Alley Springs. E K attempted to lose me on hiking trail. Reminded her that I had her car keys in my pocket. Evil Redhead grumbled quite a bit, then tripped on the trail and blamed me. Visited the Mill at the spring. E K attempted to push me into grain chute but I wouldn’t fit. Redhead grumbled some more. Vacation obviously not going as she had planned.

Night 4: BBQ’ed a pork tenderloin. Tish’s Hair helped. Fixed some truly amazing brown & wild rice faux risotto. Made note of recipe. Ate supper. Drank beer to stop the voices in my head. Went to bed.

Day 5: Woke up. Drove to Big Springs. E K still couldn’t lose me on trail so she used her evil powers to make gnats swarm my head. Then she made me buy her ice cream at The Jolly Cone in Van Buren. After finishing ice cream she threatened me with a spork. I promised to be good.

Night 5: Ate supper. Went to bed. Listened to different crew next door. This time no mucking, but much loud laughing and talking.

Day 6: Packed van for trip to Arcadia Valley and next to last day of vacation. E K frightened the 3 guys next door who had been loud all night. They apologized profusely and then cowered on the corner of the porch. Not sure if it was the red hair, the bullwhip, or a combination thereof. As soon as she turned her back they jumped into their cars and left.

Day 6 (continued): Visited Johnson’s Shut Ins. Watched from observation deck while E K and O-spring played on rocks. Didn’t join them as there appeared to be too many places where E K could hide my body.

Night 6: Checked into Fort Davidson Motel. Visited Fort Davidson across the street. E K attempted to do me in with a civil war cannon, but discovered it was non-functional. Redhead not happy. Ate BBQ at Baylee Jo’s which meant I didn’t have to cook. Yay! Finally vacation time for me! Went to bed early.

Day 7: Woke up. Ate breakfast at motel restaurant. Yay! More vacation time for me. Wondering if E K has finally resigned herself to keeping me around, or if she has hatched a foolproof plan and I am a dead man walking. Packed van for trip home. Visited Elephant Rocks State Park as a last hurrah. Remained wary of redhead.

Day 7 (continued): Evil Redhead looking exceptionally hot today in shorts and figure hugging top. Local Mennonite group arrives at park for picnic. I watch with great amusement as a trio of hormonal, adolescent boys from the congregation spy E K climbing around on a large boulder and are instantly transfixed.

Day 7 (continued): The trio of sexually repressed, pubescent males can’t stop staring and soon proceed to pop tents and snap suspenders. Although I can empathize, I laugh so hard that I almost fall off rock.  Eventually leave park and drive home, taking long, scenic route. Remain wary of redhead during frequent stops at landmarks along the way.

Night 7: Vacation complete. Saint Louis news reports that hiatus is over and evil has returned to the city.

And there you have it.

More to come…

Murv