A trio of observations

I've gone through all of the debris in my pocket notebooks tonight, and garnered some short subjects. That's a habit that I got from my Dad, always carrying a small notebook and pen. There are things that you need to remember and "If it's not written down, it never happened."

Headline this evening: Bertinelli Blows Diet; She's Spotted Stuffing Her Face -

Well, that certainly is helpful, isn’t it. The public cannot stand to see someone successful in anything, rather they want to see the mighty fall and in so doing they can piously chant how they are themselves morally superior even to the rich or famous. A more helpful response might be, hey, Valerie, you’re looking good. Is there any way we can help you or encourage you? I know that weight-loss and maintenance is a lifetime struggle, and I really admire you for hitting it so hard. I really like you, and I want to help you. Nah, that would be asking too much.

Carefully screened psychics?

A radio commercial played this morning. The voice was that of a perky young woman with sparkle in her voice asking how you would know that the psychic you were consulting was good. The answer: Obvious - just call California Psychics. After all, their psychics are "carefully screened." I wonder - how does one go about carefully screening a psychic? At the interview, look at their aura? Peer into their soul? Or maybe require that they predict the Dow Jones Industrial Average withing 1 point for, say, next Thursday? Why do I doubt if the boss at California Psychics does any of these things? Why do I picture that s/he looks for a cheerful voice and a smooth patter?

More secrets that "they" don’t want you to know:

I saw a book in B&N this week. (Okay - I’m addicted to B&N; and Amazon; and Borders.) The title is The Secret Message of Jesus, and it’s another one of those "Bible code" kinds of books. Why do we always seem to need to know things that others don’t know, thereby proving that we are more sophisticated and smarter than the unwashed masses? I don’t think that there is a "Secret Message of Jesus." It seems to me that His message was pretty clear - Love one another; Do unto others . . . ; that sort of thing.

OK - The Bible Code - Very wise scholars plot out Bible passages in Hebrew on tables or charts and play a word search game to find prophetic references. They find, for example, foretelling of the 9/11 terrorist attacks. The problem here is that they only find this stuff after the events occur. I’ll consider taking these bozos seriously if they ever accurately predict something important in advance.

Pippa passes.

R