The Missing Yosemite Moose

I saw a Ted Talk recently that challenged viewers to keep a record of everything they are grateful for in a journal - 21 days in a row. I am unsure where the magic number of 21 comes from, but the speaker cited "research" and I seem to recall that it takes that long to break a bad habit.

I have some quirky blessings but I must share that I love quirky. I strive to be quirky and avoid being demented or viewed as narcissistic. I also want to avoid weird. Too many bad connotations with that one, especially with spelling. It just never looks right.

I am grateful for a good cup of coffee. It jangles, enervates, and soothes - all at the same time. Add some milk, and voila! Happiness in a cup. But not just any cup. It has to be my aqua green Yosemite Moose coffee cup, with a repaired handle that nobody in my house will confess to damaging. Somebody, somehow, broke the handle of this beloved cup and then repaired it. Like I wouldn't notice. Then they committed conspiracy and hushed it up.

My work cup is a Starbucks travel mug. This mug doesn't leak, which is good when you set down the coffee within the vicinity of children and their feet. This mug replaces the original Starbucks mug - it was a real coffee cup with a flat bottom and sealed tight lid. But I dropped it. It didn't feel right throwing it away. It deserved some kind of roasted coffee bean burial or something.

But back to the Yosemite mug. I have used this mug for years and years. Sometimes I even wash it. One day, I carried it somewhere in the house and set it down. For the next few days, I thought it would turn up. But nothing, zip, zilch, nada. NO Yosemite mug. Dan asked where it was and for a minute I thought he might be messing with me - either he KNEW where it was and was teasing me, or he found it, broke it, and wanted to play innocent. Since the handle was obviously repaired with epoxy (something he actually uses regularly) he is my chief suspect.

Nonetheless, I am grateful for that good cuppa coffee, even if it has to be in a Starbucks "New York" souvenir cup... with an intact handle and beautiful Lady Liberty. I have patriotic devotion to our national statue, but she ain't no Yosemite Moose.