On the nights I'm the last one to leave the living room before bed, I like to play a game. The game involves strategy, a sharp mind, and uncanny senses. I call this game "Hit the Middle".

Here's the setup. Before bed, I usually get a glass of water, collect my things and head for my room. Being a person educated in the field of Industrial Engineering, I find it quite inefficient to cross the living room more than necessary to make sure the hall light is on before I turn off the living room lights. Of course, in order to save energy the living room lights must go off.

Herein lies the challenge. Before the lights go out I must take a mental snapshot of the room. If I do not have my things in my hand, and they are not on the way to the light switch, I must take note of where they are. Then, I head for the switch. When the lights go out, I bob and weave my way over to my things and pick them up, hopefully without running into anything. I can use my hands as a guide if I want, but it's best to just accustom myself to going "no-hands" because I'll probably end up carrying stuff anyway.

Once I've picked up my things, the next challenge is to make it to the hallway. This is where the "hit the middle" comes from. As you might imagine, gunning for the hallway in the dark is the most difficult part because of those tricky and dangerous "corners". Yes, corners are the most feared obstacles by the toes, just ahead of randomly placed coffee tables and snack trays. So the trick is to, in the dark, hit the middle of the hallway so that all toes remain safe and unharmed. The positives of a successful hit include great sense of accomplishment and healthy extremeties. I think we're all aware of the consequences of an unsuccessful hit.

So that's it. Hit the middle without killing your toes and you win. Stub a toe or two and you're out, and you owe T-Rav an apology for waking him.