conversation hearts

Small, dense, sugary heart-shaped candies that usually come in pastel colors like violet, orange, green, and white. They have little phrases, almost always 2 words less than 5 letters in length, "typed" on them in a different color, always in CAPS.

These phrases include things like "LOVE YOU", "HOT ONE", "MARRY ME", "CUTIE PIE", and so on.
I imagine that conversation hearts were invented by NECCO, the New England Confectionary Company, because almost all of them taste like they were made from the same stuff NECCO Wafers are made of.

Last night I found a white conversation heart that said "MOON BEAM" in pink letters. I couldn't help it, I had to do something with a phrase so amusing, so I took out my black fabric CD case, and turned on my halogen desk lamp, and put the heart on the center of the case. Then, I took a digital photo of it, and edited it so that the black fabric looked like a long, black brick wall, and that the white conversation heart looked like a beam of light shining onto that wall. I think I'll make it my homenode pic when I make level 6.

Conversation hearts entered my life through a citation in one of P.L. Travers Mary Poppins stories (of which there are many, many more than just the Disney version). One factoid about Necco's version is that the sayings are updated every other year by a fellow in their corporate headquarters in Our Fair City, who says that he gets his best inspiration from teenagers. Lately, therefore, he's done a series of cyber-friendly messages, including FAX ME, WWW.LOVE, and E-MAIL.

Somehow, it just seems to figure that's what kids in Cambridge talk about...

The messages on conversation hearts seem to evolve right along with society. For example, along with the technology boom came messages like "Email me." Well, here are a few messages representing chemistry. As far as I know, they don't exist... yet. However, if you really like them, I am sure you can buy one of those conversation heart kits and make your own.

• I Xenon, but you. (Xenon: pronounced Z-non.)
• You're a bright line in my spectra.
• You are a Tin on my scale.
• I'm head over Helium in love with you.
• and my favorite... The days Boron when you Argon.

These messages are courtesy of my chemistry prof. He had a few more, but I couldn't write them fast enough. I'm sure he didn't think anyone would write them down, but I knew that they would come in useful somewhere.

If you think this writeup is the best thing since sliced bread, have I got a nodeshell for you.