C R B E L B S A

Tonight I had a lovely evening with my parents. I went over in the early afternoon, after a rebound case of Suckiness when I couldn't jiggle and card the Boy's front door open to retrieve my planner. I packed all my laundry in my car (except for a pair of unders I just found in my purse oops) and the beads for my mother's necklaces I promised to finish by her birthday (in February). As soon as I hugged my dad hello, the floodgates opened and he definitely took pity on me and made me a nice hot cup of peach tea. Today was a shitty day, even though I got to talk to three best friends on the phone. (THREE!!!!!) But everyone was kind of busy doing their own thing, with their families in Sacramento or Orange County or Toronto, and no one within driving distance could offer me a hug. And my dad gave me a hug AND tea. AND dinner. (Although he couldn't offer me the comfort of a carpeted room, which is what I crave right now.)

Laundry was yummy because it was free. Dinner was yummy because it was cooked by my dad. We discussed the dead rat under my living room floor (no, it will never get old) and then we discussed cockroaches, which are maybe the next grossest thing to find in your house. I have this memory that once our cleaning lady Mirna saw a cockroach scurrying around in a closet, and she dropped a wooden building block on it and stepped on the block, and then the cockroach let out a high-pitched squeal as it was cruched dead. Neither of my parents remembered such an occurance, but I couldn't make this shit up.

And then -- here comes the best part -- after dinner, we played Scrabble, which is kind of a family tradition, and I BEAT MY PARENTS FOR THE FIRST TIME IN MY LIFE!!!!!!!!!!! My parents are both super good at Scrabble. They both have their M.A.s and PhDs which means they were in college for eleven straight years, and they continue to read and write and publish, and they both have huge vocabularies, and they always always win in Scrabble and Boggle and Upwards and Balderdash and all those other awesome word games and I BEAT THEM!!! I didn't just beat them by a few points, oh no sir, I won by twenty freaking points. While we were cleaning up, my mother let out a sly, "I let you win" AS IF.

There is a new Scrabble champion on Hi Point Street, and she is getting her planner back tomorrow!