A Bug's Life

Went to pub at which there was Beer Festival. The beer brought Roger, and Roger brought Naomi, and I was Provider of Non-Beer-Related Conversation to Naomi. On Friday I will be Provider of Haggis to Naomi, and she will be Cooker and Server of Haggis to us in turn.

Ahem. Appear to have caught a virulent case of Excessive Capitalisation. Will take two aspirin and see if it gets better in the morning.

Pub was v. full. Is difficult to tell real ale fans from geeks! Was able to mostly cheat and spot beer fans by their clutching lists of beer. And not illustrating their conversation by drawing matrix algebra on lists. Is it possible to do matrix algebra on beer?

I caught the bus home from the pub with 20 seconds to spare - the call to drink up is timed just right to alert me to dash out!

As the bus pulled up to one stop, I saw a glamorous person with long dark hair, wearing a black jacket with sparkly sequins all over the shoulders and lapels. But by the time they sat down in the seat in front of me, I realised it was someone wearing a black hoodie top underneath a studded leather jacket....

Alea jacket est.

I was pondering some of the common difficulties in hugging, and contemplating doing an illustrated book in the style of Kathleen Keating's The Little Book of Hugs (not using camels as they are difficult to draw hugging!).

When I fumble a hug in clumsy and graceless fashion, a typical failure mode is not achieving the complementary arm configuration. I approach - the huggee approaches. We raise our arms in preparation! I (say) have my left arm up (to go over the shoulder) and my right arm low (to go round the waist/torso): the huggee has mirrored this. Oh no! We're going to clash! Quickly, I move my left arm down and my right arm up so we will fit together - just as the huggee adjusts their position to fit mine! Aieee! By then it's too late and one person ends up smacking the other upside the nose with their elbow, or you do manage the hug but with one arm of the four crushed between you in a most uncomfortable angle.

( More: A Theory of Chirality - with diagrams and semaphore! )

One of the most useful hugging techniques I have learnt is that when something goes wrong, to smile and continue the hug as if there's no problem. The alternative, of leaping away and cringing, tends to leave the parties uncomfortable and self-conscious.

I like to save my cringing and falling through the floor moments for when I am safely on my own, and eventually become able to laugh at myself. Triggering events have included, as well as the crushing/elbowing mentioned above,
- the OMG he's much taller than I realised and I've accidentally grabbed his bum instead of his waist! hug
- and the aren't women's chests squashy? Isn't this weird? We should have gone in at a different angle! hug.

Thank you for reading - I hope this has been useful, or at least mildly entertaining. It is probably now time to punch someone on the shoulder and talk about sports.

Am off to work then for haggis, back in the early hours.