Wednesday, May 30, 2012

Humans still rule


In their e-mail suggestions, here’s what the Amazon bots think would make me salivate and rush to purchase.

Select luggage set of three
A camping tent
Tora, tora, tora, Blu-ray movies under $10 
Infant Sleep Sheep Four Soothing Sounds From Nature
Nikon 1 camera
Athletic outdoor apparel
14 carat gold earrings for pierced ears
Red sandals
A Black and Decker weed wacker
Popular Science magazine
Hugo dvd
Earth’s Best baby food
4 channel digital video recorder with Smartphone viewing and a 4 pro 550 camera

I know that the actuary tables used by insurance companies probably know exactly what day I will die and my credit card bills give an accurate autobiographical outline of my life choices, but Amazon has me confused with a traveling salesman with a penchant for outdoor living , a new baby who’s not sleeping through the night and a wife who just had a birthday.

That’s why even though bots are getting smarter and humans are getting dumber, humans still rule.

Tuesday, May 29, 2012

You make pizza? she asked, astounded.


You’ll be in the baking aisle, staring at ten different kinds of flour when suddenly another customer, a woman, will ask, Is there any difference between bread flour and regular flour?
I happen to know the difference.  When I was a homemaker and made my own pizza I knew to buy bread flour because it had more gluten and produced a chewier crust with more air holes.   That was before Lucifer was reincarnated as gluten.
Bread flour has more gluten in it, I said. I buy it for making pizza dough.
You make pizza? she asked astounded. (Even though Elmore Leonard implores writers never to qualify dialogue, this lady was too astonished to let it go unnoticed
Once a year, I said.
Oh, good.
Cooking is nothing to be proud of, I said. Watching all those cooking shows has leached all desire to actually do it myself.  My particular favorite is Wolfgang Puck selling his line of cookware. 

She looked as if she had been searching for me for several years.  I was her long-lost emotional twin sent to validate her secret beliefs.
Then it all came tumbling out as if we had the same script.
Why cook a chicken when you can get one already rotisseried? 
Exactly.
Tastes better than anything you can make.
Exactly.
Take out?
Love it.
You save money in the long run.
I know.
You don’t buy food that never gets eaten.
I know.
Nothing to throw away.
I know.

We continued down the aisles making fun of all the stuff being pedaled to the Stepfford wives. What the heck is a skirt steak? I asked.
It looks nothing like my skirt, she said, and it’s expensive.
Look at this milk, I said, the sale by date is a month away. They must think we’re stupid.
We are stupid, she said, for falling for all this stuff.
Well, nice to meet you, I said, and made a u-turn at the pasta aisle.  Feeling a bit guilty I threw a Mama Mia jar of tomato and basil spaghetti sauce into my basket and some Barilla fettucini.  I hope she didn’t see me.

Thursday, May 17, 2012

You can't handle the truth

I’ve lied a few times in my life.  I probably lie to myself everyday so I can live with the bad habits that have a stranglehold. Perhaps that’s existential lying. Remember that line from A Few Good Men? “The truth! You can’t handle the truth.” Well, I probably can’t. I know I can’t. And what the heck is the truth and is it going to make my life better?

Disclaimer: I didn’t mean for this post to take this dark anti-values turn but it seems to have it’s own agenda.

Pamela Meyer who gives a slap-in-the-face wake up call in her TED lecture on lying, feels we are a post truth society and that even babies fake cry, stop to see who is coming and then continue crying. Bottom line, we are all born liars; it is part of evolution and the smarter we are, the more we lie.  Ms. Meyer also points out that lying is a cooperative act.  A lie has no power until someone agrees to accept it (even if that someone is you).

Once a cop stopped me for speeding and I told him the truth: “I was rushing to the doctor for a perceived emergency.”  The policeman believed me and I was confused. I was so ready to lie to a speeding charge that I lost sight of the truth. According to Ms. Meyer, we are deeply ambivalent about the truth. We are against lying but we are covertly for it.  Even Koko the gorilla who learned to communicate so charmingly with sign language blamed her pet kitten for ripping the sink out of the wall.

Here’s the good news: although we are all liars not all lies are harmful. Lying is often used for social dignity. Ms. Meyer says we are lied to from 10 to 200 hundred times a day. She says strangers lie to each other 3 times within the first ten minutes of meeting.

 “Is that your Porsche?”
“Yes.”
“Why is that man driving it away?”
“That’s my brother. I told him he could drive it.”
“You two don’t look anything alike.”
“Different fathers.”

Of course lying has an evil corrupting face when it undermines the economy or a government. Corporate fraud has ruined the lives of many and undermined the financial health of the country. Think Enron or Bernie Madoff.  In her book, Liespotting, Ms. Meyer shows you techniques for detecting a lie, especially helpful If someone is trying to dupe you out of your life savings (if you still have life savings.)

Some telltale phrases: “In all candor.” or “To tell the truth,” She says, the more we lie the more formal we get in conversation. My favorite Liespotting phrase describes the inappropriate smile after a very sober statement. We all remember President Nixon’s inappropriate smile when he was delivering a mea culpa message.  Ms. Meyer calls this “duping delight”.  The speaker is pleased with himself for lying so brilliantly. A suspect might describe the bloody death of four people, deny his involvement and finish with a big grin.

Henry Oberlander, the most accomplished con man of all time who could have undermined the entire banking system of the world, had a rule explaining why he was so successful. Henry said that everybody is willing to give you something for whatever it is they are hungry for. Ms. Meyer agrees. If you don’t want to be deceived you have to know what it is you are hungry for, she warns.  We are hungry for better looks, height, wealth, intelligence, social standing. "Lying bridges the gap between what we wish we were and what we are." That sounds about right.

Wednesday, May 9, 2012

Selective news and Jell-O


Going, going, gone for One Hundred and Nineteen Million Dollars

Most of us know The Scream as a painting of excruciating desolation. You have to be a learned art connoisseur to appreciate the artistic quality of this painting.  My grandmother, Farida, who suffered transplantation during WWI, would probably not have included it when she packed up the few things to put in her knapsack. 
The version of The Scream (there are four) that was in the news recently was a crayon pastel with a blood red sky. They say the figure is a man but it looks more like a woman in a shirtwaist dress reacting to a washing machine that has overflowed and is sending a cascade of suds into the wood floor of the living room.  The painting sold for 119 million dollars last week. If I sound like an ignoramus making fun of this iconic symbol of human anxiety, it is because I am an ignoramus. The artist left this explanation for the painting in his diary:
I was walking along a path with two friends the sun was setting I felt a breath of melancholy. Suddenly the sky turned blood-red I stopped and leant against the railing, deathly tired looking out across flaming clouds that hung like - blood and a sword over the deep blue fjord and town My friends walked on - I stood there trembling with anxiety And I felt a great, infinite scream pass through nature. (1892)
Norway, the artist’s home, has an extensive social welfare system. Norway has a lot of money acquired from their extraction of petroleum in the North Sea. They keep their money for their citizens and don’t dribble it away on wars and foreign aid to countries that hate them.  A compulsory National Pension plan provides citizens with benefits such as universal child support, one-year paid maternity leave, and pensions for old age, disability and rehabilitation. Norway's extensive attention to the medical and financial needs of its people translates into a long average lifespan.  Seems like a happy place to me.

Mensa, Mensa, Mensa
A two year old has been admitted to Mensa.  The toddler with an IQ of 154 can recite the alphabet backward and forward, count to 1,000 and name the planets in the solar system. Memorization seems to be the measure of genius here.  What about original thinking? Has that toddler ever had a unique thought? Can you imagine anything more dreary than going to Mensa meetings where everyone is trying to play extreme smartness. You only hear of Mensa when unlikely candidates are admitted.  If Jessica Simpson was admitted, we would be like “huh?” 

Jell-O Redux
I haven’t thought about Jell-O in decades. I was never a big fan of Jell-O (the dessert) and aspics (the savory version of gelatins).  It would take a lot of money to get me to willingly make an aspic. Last week, I was browsing the baking aisle in the supermarket and discovered a shelf full of puddings and gelatins. 
The cursing angel of good, said to me “Why the f**k are you so against Jell-O?” To my surprise, the sugar-free version of Jell-O has O calories. What?  I took a box home.  It was so good, I ate the entire portion while it was still only half jelled.







    Monday, May 7, 2012

    Sounds crazy but I think it works, part two


    The post about the tapping therapy has received hundreds of views and the numbers grow every day.  I’m guessing many people want to get rid of personal boo boos and they don’t want to do it the lengthy way on a shrink’s couch.

    One of the discoveries I made a couple of days after I used tapping for another problem is that I have a history of setting a limit on how much success is due me.  This new insight came out of solving the old problem and that’s what prompted me to revisit this subject and share it in this post.  Changing in one arena means you can’t continue to act in the old way in another arena.  The rule must be (I’m guessing here) that consistency rules in nature.  There’s a book titled “Change One Thing” that implies the same rule.

    I don’t have certification for dispensing advice of any kind.  I have no formal training for anything except what I have learned through observation and obsessive devotion to cracking the mystery of why I act the way I do and get the results I get.  I’m a big fan of the quick fix and highly suspicious of conventional wisdom.  Conventional wisdom is often lazy wisdom except when it warns you not to jump from high places.

    I’m going to use tapping on this new insight.  It will take some quiet thinking to formulate a precise “problem phrase” but that’s part of the process.

    If you would like more posts on this subject, let me know.  If you have some success with tapping, leave a comment. 

    Sunday, May 6, 2012

    SampleSunday: Ch.2 Softgoods: all the pretty things women are dying to wear


    (Chapter two of the serialization of new book, Softgoods)

    TWO

    Democracy Mews in the early morning was a prettified bedroom community of townhouses filled with young ambitious couples.   This was what developers dubbed ‘the starter home’ purchased when the first kid was on the way and traded when the second kid was still a bump.  The central street was reached through a gate that required a coded card. The development was postcard perfect. It looked as if the developer had hired a stager.  Lampposts, saplings, tubbed begonias made the residents feel a little richer than they were. Although the backyards were contiguous and owners were in plain sight of each other, there was not a lot of socializing.  The residents were at a point in life when they had too much responsibility and not enough money.  Those with jobs were not sure how long they would keep them.  The times were difficult and most families kept to themselves.
    At a corner townhouse about a half-mile in and one street north a dinged and dented 2003 Silver Toyota Camry sedan was parked in the short driveway.  A child’s rubber ball was on the path to the front door.  Inside a telephone was ringing and it sounded shrill because it was early morning.  A machine answered. “You’ve reached 753-0247.  We can’t come to the phone.  Leave your name and number and we’ll return the call.”
    A woman’s voice said, “Come on. You’re there.  Pick up.”  After a short pause, she continued. “You’re using a refrigerator you haven’t paid for.  You’re stealing. You’re a thief.”
    In the master bedroom of the house, Carol Lasting, attractive, barely thirty, alone in the lush brass bed raised her head and listened to the message as it continued. “...deadbeat, lazy yuppie deadbeat.”
    Carol bolted and picked up the bedroom extension. “There are laws against this kind of harassment.  I’ve tried to make arrangements with your company.”
    “Put John Lasting on the phone,” said the woman on the other end.
    “John Lasting is out of town.”
    “I don’t think so.  You people are all alike.  Same snotty tone.  Same snotty sense of entitlement.  But not for long.”
    The phone line went dead but Carol held on to the receiver. Was the woman right? Did she have a sense of entitlement? She heard breathing on the extension.
    “Mom?  What’s snotty mean?” It was Carol’s five-year old daughter Rebecca.
    “It means stuck up.”
    “Stuck up where?”
    “Becks, you shouldn’t listen in.  Get dressed.  You’ll miss the school bus.”
    * * * * *
    Carol in jeans and tee stuffed a white load into the washer. In early February just three short months ago her life had seemed okay.  Not happy and carefree okay but something to work on.  Every week, her handsome high school sweetheart and husband, John Lasting, wasted some of their money on gambling.  She knew it was happening because he often confessed to her late at night and then promised to get it under control.  On the plus side, she still loved him, they had a very nice kid and she had started a parenting/self-nurturing blog that she called Me, Only Happier.   The blog was becoming popular enough to attract advertisers. She wrote about parenting in a loving but irreverent way.  She spoke openly of the dirty little secrets that every mother kept in the darkest part of her brain.  The admissions sent waves of relief to her followers.  Oh, good, I’m not the only one.  I’m not an evil witch.  Pretty soon, if her blog hits continued growing, she could expect an income to start trickling in. 
    All the hope and elation had dimmed when the truth of John’s gambling caused him to be suspended from his job at the law firm.  They had begun to receive ugly phone calls.  The partners said John had to take an indefinite leave and go to rehab.   Rehab was for wayward celebrities hooked on drugs and liquor.  That wasn’t John.  She didn’t know at the time that gambling can be as deadly as any drug and it had John firmly in its grip.  He hadn’t lied to her about the problem but she was floored by the horrendous damage it had caused.  The 401K, their savings, their credit cards were all either empty or maxed out.  She couldn’t even find the words to express her shock and John had nothing to add.  There’s nothing I can say, he told Carol and she was too frightened to challenge him.
    In the middle of his treatment, John had called one day at dusk.  She was making a meatloaf with a pickle inside to amuse Rebecca. The phone rang and without any preamble John said, “Carol, I’m not coming home when I’m done here.  I’m sorry.  I can’t come back to the house or to the routine.  Everything I knew is a trigger. I can’t.  I’ll be in touch later on and when I get some work, I’ll send money for you and Rebecca.”
    For a week she felt nothing and did nothing.  If she just waited perhaps everything would set itself right.  After a month of nothing, an overlay of panic had set it. She wasn’t all right.  Her thinking was all messed up.  Her consciousness was frozen over a situation that she couldn’t control. She was too ashamed to discuss her predicament with anyone close to her.  She realized for the first time that she didn’t have many people she could trust with her dark secret.  Why did she feel it was her fault?  Her life was at a standstill.  No one was calling and there were no pertinent e-mails and there was an unhealthy stillness surrounding her.   She wasn’t scared all of the time.  If you walked into her house, she would have been cheerful but when she was alone, there were moments when she could not contain her panic or what she described as a stoic frozen fear that would creep into her nostrils and her throat and throughout her head.  There was no space.  She was breathing yet each moment she felt she would not be able to take the next breath.  During those long spring days when she sat on her sectional couch for hours, she figured out that human beings are able to move on in a world that is basically flawed by hanging on to anticipation.  Anticipation of what is going to happen gives people the railing they need to go down the stairs. But right now, she had nothing to anticipate but the horrid sense of failure.  And worse than the failure, she had to remind herself that she had not chosen well.  She had not had the clarity to choose a good man. 
    “You stupid, stupid woman,” she said to her mirror image. You chose your life’s partner without knowing anything about him. If anyone had asked back then:  do you and John share the same values, she would have snorted like the streetwise kid she considered herself to be. Values?  No, no, no.  There were no values about it.  He looked great on paper and I was grateful.  She had even written about it in her blog. Why am I grateful that somebody married me?
    This morning she couldn’t get the voice of the repo woman out of her head. She even had some admiration for the woman. Maybe the woman didn’t like acting tough and waking people with that awful message but she had to feed her family and that was her job.  She was a grown up doing her job.  It made Carol feel worse. She wanted to give in to the despair she felt but her daughter’s small socks and crazy stripped leggings that she was putting in the washer reminded her to just keep it going.  She spotted a single red sock on the floor and rushed to dig out the mate before it bled on the white clothes.  She pulled the sock dripping pink water and dropped it into a basket.  There was a doll lying on the dryer and impulsively, Carol pulled the chatty string.  The doll began to talk. “I’m Assertive Sally.  I can change a flat tire.” Carol grunted and threw the doll back on the dryer.  “Yeah, but can you find a job?” No, you can’t.  There are no jobs.  What are we going to do Assertive Sally? Tell me.”
    Carol McMillan Lasting, the younger of two sisters born to crazy bossy Margaret was supposed to be the normal nice looking child in a borderline household.  In high school, she sat at the second best lunch table and her schoolmates voted her ‘Most Competent.’ She had been surprised with the title because she always felt awkward as if she wasn’t sure of her place in the world. Part of it was the ‘fabulous older sister’ syndrome.  Her older sister had scorched the earth of Edgemont High, snagged a modeling contract at seventeen and married a Hollywood lawyer who was considered the 18th most important person in the celebrity world, just under Jerry Bruckheimer and above Michael Jordan. 
    She suspected Melissa Thomas had made up the dowdy title of  ‘Most Competent’ to humiliate her for stealing John Lasting away from her.   Carol was as surprised as everyone when she had interested the football star.  John Lasting was an unexpected bonus that life had thrown at her.  Imagine this handsome athlete begins hanging around you and you look around to see his real girlfriend but it is you.
    “This is some aberrant shit,” she would whisper to her girlfriend Olive when they would see John coming down the hall with a big stupid grin on his gorgeous face. Olive always replied, “No offense Carol, but I have to agree.” 
    “An aberration just to annoy me,” Carol would say just before John reached her side. John’s devotion continued through college and they married just before law school. It was only when her love for him grew and she felt secure that he began to drift away not to another woman but to a fierce gambling fever that ultimately ruined everything. There was a day when winter turned into spring and she realized he had been serious.  He wasn’t coming home.  What was worse is that she could almost see it from his point of view. He couldn’t come back to the scene of his addiction.  Maybe marriage and the life they led had caused his addiction.
    * * * * *
    She shook her long loose hair and ran her hands through it to settle the mishaps of sleep and went to the kitchen to pack a Smurf decorated lunch box.  The routine was reassuring and moved her along through all the early morning tasks.  Maybe if she just kept doing what she had always done, life would be all right again.
    The school bus stop in Democracy Mews was momentarily reassuring, too.  Something would come up.  After all, she had a college degree and she could type 65 words a minute. It was all about good timing and keeping a positive attitude
    Rebecca, almost six was thin with curly unruly hair and huge brown eyes. Carol was glad Rebecca had the thick curls, a replica of her father’s hair.
    “You have power hair,” she always told her daughter.  “Your good mind is going to take you places but that hair is going to make it easier.” As they waited, another little girl arrived wearing new sneakers and a fancy backpack with a day glow strip across the back. Rebecca stared and Carol could tell she would love a new backpack just like it.  She wanted to fit in for her daughter’s sake, but she didn’t and even in this silly situation, she couldn’t help but feel that a big L for loser was tattooed on her forehead.  Children leach all of the rebellion out of you.  You want to be freaking Betty Crocker: a good-looking soccer mom with plenty of money so the kids can fit in.
    “You forgot to give me lunch money,” said the girl to her mother who pulled two dollar bills out of her wallet and stuffed them in one of the pockets of the backpack.
    “Can I buy lunch today?” Rebecca asked.
    “ I made your lunch. It’s in your book bag.”
    “Please.  They have pizza on Thursday.”
    “Beck, I said no.”
    Before Rebecca could plead some more, the bus came.
    “I’ll pick up the girls later.  Rebecca can come over if it’s okay with you,” said the other mother.
    “She’d like that.  Thanks.”
    As Carol retraced her steps to the house she noticed a white Volvo station wagon inching alongside.  The woman behind the wheel gave a short beep meant to get Carol’s attention.
    “Hey, wait up,” said the driver and Carol stopped. She recognized the woman as a neighbor.
    “A collection agency called me about you,” said the woman as she pulled up. “They wanted to know if I’d seen your husband.  If he went to work regularly.  If you had a job.  If you had visible assets.  If you prayed to God or Allah.” The woman’s sarcastic tone let Carol know that at least for now, she was on her side.
    “Oh, god.  They probably canvassed half the neighborhood.”
    “What do you care?  I told them I was blind and diabetic and had to give myself insulin shots in Braille.”  She pointed to a house up ahead. “They’re big on surprise attacks.  The repo guys are after George Chan’s Passat.  They hide at the turn on Democracy waiting for George to leave the car on the street.  The minute he does . . whoosh!”
    Carol shook her head. “Yeah, I guess things are dicey all around.”
    “If money’s tight, I could use someone to help me,” said the woman.
    “You’re offering me a job?”
    “Uh huh.  Selling clothes.”
    “In a store?  A saleswoman?”
    “Not in a store.  On our own.”
    Carol hesitated, about to turn it down. She knew nothing about selling clothes.  She had never even been particularly interested in clothes.  The offer sounded too casual to be real.  And suppose she had to work on commission and she didn’t sell anything? “When do you have to know?”
    “Whenever.  Tomorrow.  Come by. I’m the house with the red door on BlueJay, the block behind this one. By the way, I’m Sheila and you’re Carol, right? I got it from the repos.”
    On the way home, Carol felt lighter than when she had left. The job offer wasn’t much. It wasn’t anything she could use from the sound of it but it lightened her spirits and she felt it in her chest.  Someone had reached out to her.  She had a connection and she was surprised that it meant so much.
    For the first time in two weeks, she posted on her blog.  Without thinking much about it, she described the process of having her life dismantled by dark forces.  She described the panic, the inability to have faith that she could take the next breath and the frozen state of her thinking.  Today, she commented at the end, a woman approached me in the street and offered me a job.  When I think back, I wouldn’t have predicted that would happen.  It’s not much of a job but at least someone wants to hire me. It’s a freaking start.
    The tags she put on the post were: panic, despair, joblessness, debt, hope.  She received sixty seven comments.  Sadly, there were a lot of people who related.

    Friday, May 4, 2012

    I don't laugh at things


    Why don’t I laugh at things?  There’s a ton of humor offered to me on Facebook every day and there are humorous things sent to me by e-mail with the subject line: this is really funny.  This humor is often about women and men, about menopause, about getting old, about sex, about the ungratefulness of children, about the workplace, about fat people.  A lot of times the humor is in the form of a long list that supports the premise of the joke.  Sometimes the list is the straight man and it remains for the reader to create the joke through recognition.  Much of the humor is offered in a frame as if it were a piece of art.

    Sometimes the humor is image driven and sometimes it is just words.  Either way my brain doesn’t send the laugh signal.  I don’t chuckle.  I don’t have the bittersweet moment of recognition smile.  What is wrong with me?

    I know that someone spent good time thinking up these clever things.  I often wonder what is the difference between something that is clever and something that is inventive and brilliant.  Clever seems to bear the stigma of the charlatan.  “That clever fellow will steal all your savings.”

    My children make me laugh.  They are all funny.  Their humor almost always comes out of life situations and their take on it. My children are funny in ordinary conversation. They make me laugh out loud because they are able to hone in on the naked absurdity of a situation and blurt it out as a throw away line. 

    Eddy Izzard makes me laugh. He infects you with the chaos going on in his head.   Joan Rivers makes me laugh.  She goes where no one else will go. Recently on Yahoo they offered the funniest joke ever created.  Yahoo is “est” crazy, and this joke is just okay but I thought about the joke later when I tried to improve on Yahoo’s joke of the century.  Here’s the joke:  A man calls 911 and says:  “My friend is lying on the floor.  I think he’s dead.”  The 911 operator says, “Here’s what I want you to do.  First, go and make sure he’s dead.”  The operator hears several gun shots. “Ok, he’s dead.” As I’m writing this I laughed. 

    There was a similar joke in the New Yorker.  Lassie is on the bank of the river and Timmy is in the water struggling. “Lassie, get help,” gasps Timmy.  The next frame shows Lassie lying on the couch in the shrink’s office.”  As I’ve admitted here before I also laugh when that dog on television barks “I love you.”

    Here is some recent comedy “art” sent by kindly people to help me laugh.

    Thursday, May 3, 2012

    Jesus is ganging up on me


    I am not against Jesus.  I like most of the things he said. Some of the things he said are fantastic.  According to Jesus, even if I don’t do a darn thing, especially if I don’t do a darn thing, I’m going to have a bucketful of fine clothes or the metaphoric equivalent of free wordly goods. (ref. Consider the lillies of the field.  They toil not neither do they spin but even Solomon in all his glory is not arrayed as one of these.)

    Is it  blasphemous to write about Jesus in this attitudinal way? I don't think so.  I think Jesus likes a current vernacular interpretation.  I think Jesus would even like a Hollywood Roast where people would make tasteless jokes about him.   Like the song says, Jesus was way cool.  I think Jesus would laugh louder than anyone and when he took the podium, he’d give as good as he got. 

    What I think Jesus doesn’t like are the samplers that have invaded my Facebook page to the point where I am reminded every half inch what a slug I am about religion or being good even though I am a slug about religion and being good.

    My Facebook page has been hijacked by too many inspirational messages.  They've lost their punch.    The constant nudging is wearing me down.  Where are my peeps?  Where are my Christopher Hitchens ironic groupies?  Where is my rightful place on this earth?
    Here is a sample of what greets me when I visit my Facebook page hoping to get a glimpse of my children or grandchildren and their activities or maybe some old friends that I only get to like-hug on the page.

    My friend Sandra and I play this game called “Why didn’t they ask us?” When some product, or game show, or movie or social pastime or Katie Couric’s impending talk show goes down in flames, we call each other up and say, “Why didn’t they ask us?” Right now, I’m predicting that despite all the hype about Facebook’s IPO being the event of the decade, Facebook is going down. Who even understands all that Timeline crapola.  Who chose my profile gallery of pictures? Who cares about that anyway?  Btw why did Bravo give Kathy Griffin a talk show?  She was doing just fine with stand up. Going down. Why did Oprah give up being the most powerful person on earth to spearhead a network? Going down.


    This last pix compels me to say:  "Oh, now you tell me."

    This has nothing to do with anything.  I just liked these super alert family of Meerkats.

    In case I'm all wrong about everything in this post, pray for me.

    Wednesday, May 2, 2012

    Sounds crazy but I think it works.


     EFT otherwise known as Emotional Freedom Techniques, otherwise known as the tapping therapy.

    Is the quick fix always the wrong fix?  If it sounds too good to be true, is it not true?

    A couple of weeks ago I was re-introduced to a system of eradicating psychological problems by tapping different parts of the body. I am a person who will try every crazy thing that does not require leaving my house.  I befriend new therapies because I love and firmly believe in magical transformations.  Magic should be in our bag of tools when we arrive in this “vale of tears.”  If our poorly used brains and extra sensory apparatus were put to utmost use, magic would probably appear ordinary.  Twenty years ago Google would have been thought of as magic? Get the answer to anything in five seconds? Really?  Sounds too good to be true.

    Ideas appear as we need them and currently I was in need of an escape route from some long-standing circular behavior that was making me unhappy.    The handy appearance of the tapping therapy gave me an aha moment.

    I had heard of tapping ten years ago when I availed myself of another therapy that sounded bizarre but worked very well called EMDR: a system of bi-lateral manipulation first used to help veterans with PTSD.  I wanted to be re-introduced to tapping and went to my friend, Google, and viewed all of the matches for Tapping Therapy.  I selected one of the videos that was easy to understand and guided me through the process.  The exercise takes about three minutes and I went through it twice.  The problem is solved.  Yes, I said, I solved my problem.  Would I have solved it anyway?  I have no idea but investing six minutes on something that didn’t cost anything was worth a try.  I’m going to try it again on something else and I’ll let you know how it works out.

    Meanwhile, if this idea interests you, here’s a link to one of the sites.  There are several matches on Google and they are all pretty good.  Some of the sites explain the way the therapy works. Some of them offer classes or things to buy.  I didn’t buy anything; I did the exercise on Dr. Mercola’s page with Julie.