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From the Good News Network

Liveblog Emmys + percocet = I make no guarantees that I’m going to make sense.

Ellen Pompeo is weird looking already but she is currently sporting 3/4ths of a hairstyle. WHY WHY WHY?

I do not as a rule like dresses that are tight all over but fare at the bottom. It’s only nice for your ankles but you look like the opposite of having your pants around your ankles and trying to walk.

This theatre in the round style is just bizarre. If you are wearing a short skirt at the Emmys? You are PRAYING the camera isn’t up your hoohah when you decide to cross your legs.

Katherine Heigl (aka Keigl) just won an Emmy and TOTALLY said “Shit.” HA! And I’m always touched when winners acknowledge the other nominees.

The writers for the various variety shows should be nominated for just the part where they say their names. The Bill Maher feet under the men’s room door thing made me wheeze.

Whoever this guy is who won for the Tony Bennet miniseries, I couldn’t turn the volume down fast enough.

Ali Larter looks like she’d be a lot of fun to have a beer with, but she also looks like after that beer, she gets reallllly doofy.

There is no limit to the depths of my loathing of Ryan Seacrest. The only person I want to smack around more than him is that guy Billy who is like a super-annoying Ryan Seacrest.

RBelle has a fast forward button. I do not. My channel changer is on the same dohickey as the nurse call button, so I can lower the volume and summon drugs but I can’t fast foward.

There’s more!

1. I forgot how nice it is to have lunch and shoot the breeze with someone who knows you really well, and even if you don’t see each other all the time, you can still hang out in person like you do it all the time.

2. Really good pizza? IS REALLY REALLY GOOD.

3. A beautiful day in NYC? Awesome. If I hadn’t left early on Friday for le Ultrasound du 20 weeks, I’d leave early and shop my brains out. And really? I’m not one for shopping, especially when standing up for 45 minutes means I better find the ladies room STAT.

(That’s one thing about NYC by which I cannot abide: the scarcity of easy-to-find bathrooms that are (a) open to the public and (b) bathrooms you’d actually deign to use. I go out on the street and in the back of my mind there’s a lone gps signal receiving no feedback asking, “Where’s the nearest bathroom? Where’s the nearest bathroom?” It’s like trying to find the exit nearest to your seat on the airplane and knowing there isn’t one, only instead of an exit it’s an “exit.")

4. I had the 20 Week Ultrasound, which I LOVE, on Friday afternoon, and it was a hoot and a half. Thumb sucking! Posing for pictures! Attempts at 3-d scans with no success. And a very very happy, healthy baby shimmying around in there, showing off legs and arms and hands and feet (gotta make sure that there are 5 fingers and 5 toes per hand/foot, since polydactyly runs in my family), and an adorable little baby profile. Of course no revelations of gender, sorry to say.  But oh, how I love the 20 week extended visit.

5. Slightly bad news with a slightly happy twist at the end: my placenta has parked itself a liiiittle too close to my cervix. While it won’t move toward it and cover the cervix up, if it doesn’t move back it’s something to monitor, since it could make a delivery through the Valley of my Lotus Blossom a bit of a challenge (not that I have problem with having a c-section. I don’t care if the baby has to come out my sinus cavity, so long as there’s a healthy baby and a healthy mom at the end). Happy twist at the end? I’ll have another ultrasound at 28 weeks to double check how the internal baby blanket is and where it is, so I will have another visit to say hi to Baba O’Riley.

6. I’m now able to move fully into my maternity wardrobe since it’s finally consistently in the 60s, and I have pieces to layer with. I do need some maternity pants, though, which would be a nice thing to have. Thankfully, I have a gift card for Motherhood, home of the Most Inflexible Return Policy Ever, so I can shop for pants.

7. On a non-mommy, non-pregnancy, non-maternity front, Hubby and I had another one of our “check in with our financial long-range plan” chats, mostly because I was nursing weird notions to pack up and move to Montana, and it’s very comforting to be on the same page with someone as far as immediate money and long term money are concerned.

8. I do need to get cracking on my five-year goals, though. Wonder if i should make a list: what’s the five year goal list? I’ll have to ponder that - and ponder if I want to share it! Telling the internet about stuff like that makes me feel like I left the house without pants on. *checks ass* I do have pants on right now. Phew. 

I saw the Oprah on “The Secret,” which is a bestseller to the best of my knowledge judging solely by the number of people I see reading it on the subway.

Ever since I started taking yoga (which I have off and on for years), I’ve been both fascinated by the devotion and enthusiasm some of the teachers have had for concepts that revolve around terms like “energy” and “universe” and “karma” and “dharma” and “yer momma.” Ok, not that last one.

I figured most of the time I’d get a good stretch out of classes, my back wouldn’t hurt and I’d feel like I used to back in high school when I took ballet two or three times a week. I didn’t anticipate feeling as really you-have-no-idea freaking good as I did, especially when I took yoga twice a week after work in NYC. Not that that is an option any longer, but I do try to find yoga classes near me that fit my schedule ("my schedule” being tempered with a Very Healthy Dose of Laziness).

So everyone who is reading The Secret, in a nutshell, is taking a crash course - as far as I can tell - in dharma, karma, and the Law of Attraction. This isn’t a surprise, really, since The Secret was inspired by a book that takes its inspiration from Hindu teachings.

The basic instruction on “the Secret” that I’ve found reminds me very heavily of the ideas that were taught by two of my past yoga teachers: that everything you do, think, and say creates a palpable effect on the world around you, and the wish that all beings, everywhere, be happy and free.

The problem I have with the connect of “attraction,” as in “The Law of,” is that there’s an inherent element of narcissism, that you use this law for self-gain and personal acquisition, and I think that misses a good portion of the point of the whole idea. If you visualize what it is that you want for yourself, you’ll get it. Makes sense, but why should the focus be on what the individual wants and needs?

That said, one thing I do like about the whole Secret thing is that blame and responsibility are not the same thing. You aren’t to blame for your problems, but you can be responsible for changing your circumstances. In fact, you’re the only one who can effectively make the change you want. So if you are, say, unhappy, and you want to find happiness for yourself, you’re the only one who can do that.

Of course, the balance of the self-awareness taught in yoga is tempered with an awareness of ones place in a large and complex universe filled with a LOT of other beings as well. You are important, but You are also one of many, many, many. It’s not all about you, but you are important.

It can get very cheezy to go on and on about it, and if I were reading some of the things I think about, I’d totally roll my eyes and snort. But I can’t reject outright the people who openly embrace the ideas of “the Secret” and who embrace yogic practices and pursuit of meditation and tranquility, because I know that they’re on to something.

Do you know what you are?
You are a manuscript of a divine letter.
You are a mirror reflecting a noble face.
This universe is not outside of you.
Look inside yourself;
everything that you want,
you are already that.

-Rumi

Nicole apparently passed out in shock that I participated in a meme. Behold the rare event!

She’s interviewing me. You wanna be interviewed? Leave a comment indicating that fact, and I’ll email you 5 questions to answer on your site at your convenience.

1) You have an interesting name.  Can you tell us a little bit about its origin?

Mórag is a Scottish name, and when it came time to pick a name under which to write online, it fit.

2) What is your idea of a fun weekend?

Sleeping in until I wake up on my own unassisted by any external factors. Eat breakfast out at diner with a mellow, happy toddler, happy Hubby, and much coffee. And pancakes.

Take walks outside, eat donuts or ice cream, go to the playground or a park to allow the wee dude to run run run, and generally have as few stressful plans as possible, while having as good and tranquil a day as we can together. And if there’s time for me to read as much of a great novel as possible, that’d be awesome as well.

Come to think of it, this past weekend encompassed all of those things. No wonder I’m feeling happy and mellow.

3) You speak Spanish almost fluently.  How did you learn (and when are you taking me to Mexico)?

Aprendí Español en España (y por eso tengo un acento muy duro) cuando tenía 15 años. Estaba viviendo con una familia en que nadie habló Ingés y en seis meses, aprendí MUCHO.

Pero, yo recuerdo mucho más cuando hablo que cuando escribo.

I don’t know that I am fluent but I can mangle my way through a conversation easily enough. I do speak much MUCH better after a glass of wine (go figure). I learned Spanish when I was 15; I was an exchange student to Spain and the family I stayed with didn’t speak any English. There was supposed to be one person in the household who spoke English, but there wasn’t.

So I learned fast, and by the time I left I was dreaming in Spanish. I went back to Spain at age 20, and learned more, though that time I made friends with people from Quebec, and learned to cuss in Quebecois as well.

As a result of learning through total immersion in Spain, when I speak I have a rather thick accent that Spanish-speakers identify immediately as Castillian. Folks in Spain lisp the “c” or “s” in the middle of a word, and always the “z” in any part of the word. Ergo “Zaragoza” is “tharagotha,” and “Barcelona” is “Barthelona.” The upshot is that I sound like a know a LOT more Spanish than I do in reality. And I speak much better than I write.

As for Mexico, I have to confess, due to variations in the way different countries pronounce Spanish (and entire variations in vocabulary) I have the easiest time understanding people from Spain and Cuba, and the hardest time understanding Spanish speakers from Mexico and Central America. It’s like the difference between someone from New Hampshire speaking English, and someone from rural Alabama speaking English - the difference is distinct and I have a much harder time catching every word. I think in some conversations this has branded me something of a language snob, which I totally did not intend.

4) Name five ‘luxury’ items that you could not live without.

Define “luxury.” Like, an unlimited spending account at a bookstore with next-day delivery? I don’t have that luxury now but I could certainly learn quickly that living without would be impossible!

I assume you mean items that aren’t necessary for my survival.

1. Pajamas.
2. Romance novels.
3. Stories with unresolved sexual and emotional attention.
4. Happy endings.
5. The Internet.

5) If you were going to be stranded on a desert isle with only basic supplies and an iPod, what five songs would you hope it had on it?

I’d skip songs and make it five full length unabridged books-on-tape (or books-on-mp3 in this case). That way I’d get more time and entertainment out of my allotted five items, AND I’d be happier in the long run.