C is for Cranial Contortions

I am interrupting my regularly scheduled program to make two announcements.

First let me say Happy Birthday to my sweetie, Stan the Man.

Second I'm up to like 83 followers! This is a REMINDER. When I get to 100 there will be a wonderful unique contest with wonderful unique prizes! I only need 17 more....

And now back to the A to Z Challenge. Today it's

Cranial: Middle Latin from the Greek kranion; akin to the Greek kara for head.
Contortion: Latin contortus, past participle of contorquere, from com+torquere meaning to twist.

One can see the word torque is related to contortion. Ominously the dictionary says, "more at torture."

For me there are two forms of Cranial Contortions.

Mental gymnastics: as in doing crossword puzzles, or cyphers, or sudoku. There are a ton out there. A quick search on the web brought up lots of sites where one can play free word games. It's official, playing games such as these work the brain and actually create new synopses. Playing games keeps the brain flexible, otherwise it atrophies. And we all know that leads to senility and/or Alzheimer's.

Throughout my life my father did two things that inspired me. 1.) He read the dictionary. He'd pick up our great huge book open it at random and...read. He wasn't looking up a particular word, he was reading. He'd read a page or two at a time. 2.) He did crossword puzzles in ink. The harder the better. He particularly liked the ones from the Sunday London Times because it would have British colloquialisms and plays on words that stretched his brain. Puzzles of various kinds were a part of our lives, a way of passing the time since for so many years we didn't have electricity or TV. If we weren't reading, or playing a board game, or putting a jigsaw puzzle together, my sister Erva and I had our noses in puzzle books. I get a feeling of withdrawl, of nervousness, if I don't get my daily puzzle fix.

The second Cranial Contortion is/are:
Mind games. I'm sure we've all met or know a person who plays mind games; as in saying one thing and doing another. These people are manipulative. Alot of the so-called "reality" shows seen on TV thrive on mind games. They drive me nuts. I question, if children are watching these shows, that they aren't learning how to be devious and manipulative. For me people like that are an energy drain. My basic optimism (though I must admit I get misanthropic from time to time) causes me to want to take people at face value. I want to believe they are who they say they are. However if I am ill-used, if they hand me rotten fruit while insisting it's perfectly good, I will turn my back on them and never look back.

Another kind of mind game is the one we play on ourselves. It's that nagging, creative destroying voice that whispers sour nothings in our ears.

Like: I can't. I'm an idiot. I'm stupid/this is stupid. It's all been written before. Why bother? Who am I fooling?

The list is long and I'm sure each of us could write our own. Which is not a bad exercise if you write down after each negative the opposite positive affirmation.
I'm an idiot/I'm brilliant
I'm stupid/I'm smart
It's all been written before/It's never been written quite like I write it
Why bother?/Why not try?
Who am I fooling?/Who am I teaching?

So play word games to keep the mind subtle. In keeping the mind subtle you'll be able to spot mind gamers more rapidly.

Do you work crossword puzzles or cyphers or other such games?