Alpha lost her voice last night due to a sore throat.
Aww.
{{{{Alpha}}}}
Not one to whisper, she communicated last night via a complex system of squeaks until I finally told her it was bad for our relationship.
This morning I got up and did the usual things and she came down for some coffee with me and conversation, which went much better than last night because she was using sign language this time. (When I first typed that, I wrote “sigh language,” which would also be cool).
Sign language conversations are useful because they eliminate the linguistic level almost entirely, and allow you to directly access the subtextual level of what people are saying, that hidden meaning that usually gets obscured by surface meaning.

It works like this:

Some man: Good morning, Honey-Bunny.
Some woman: [waves]
Some man: Voice still on the blink?
Some woman: [Nods. Gestures.]
Some man: It is called a grapefruit in my country.
Some woman: [Shakes head, gestures.]
Some man: You want me to change lightbulbs at the mall? Is Beta awake yet?
Some woman: [Nods, gestures.]
Some man: She’s dancing the macarena on the ceiling. Okay.
Some woman: [Emits coffee through nose, shakes head, gestures.]
Some man: [Explains new method pharmacist allegedly recommended for application of throat lozenge]
Some woman: [Brandishes big serrated bread knife]

Highly recommended.