Hubby and I are watching Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader?

This is breathtakingly stupid. 

This post on London Underground reminded me of my ew ew ew moment this morning. I got on a mostly-full bus, which means no hope of having my own seat row, and had to weave my way around too many elbows down the center aisle to the back half of the bus. I thought about sitting in my normal row next to a woman but decided to move further back and sit on the other side of the aisle.

Good thing, too, because the woman I almost sat next to spent the ENTIRE RIDE putting her MAKEUP on. Foundation! Eyeliner! Mascara! Eyeshadow! Lipliner! Lipstick! Blush! And (cough cough) powder.

It was so gross, and really, it usually takes a LOT to gross me out. But there is no reason I had to see all that. Why would you put on your entire face of makeup on the 40 minute bus ride into the city? Just… EW!

Especially the eyeliner and mascara. Jeez. I do NOT want to see the insides of your eyelids. I pity the person who sat next to that lady. 

Random Thoughts:

1. I had to roll over last night, and it seems I am “popping out” in front because I had to Wake UP to roll over successfully. It was like swinging the Queen Mary around in harbor. Ooofdah!

2. All I want to eat is cereal. Cold cereal. And milk. And cold water. Not that that last one is an edible item, more of a potent potable that ports my petard to the pot like pronto.

3. I asked R’TruvyBelle or whatever the hell her name is now a question for her interview: I’m giving you a not-bound-by-time-or-space universal do-over. What are you going to do over? Even Hubby was impressed with the question - I thought it was pretty rad myself. But now that question is following me around giving me a nudge - what would I do over? More importantly, what do I want to accomplish that I haven’t yet?

4. In my quest for new reading material online (did the entire internet have a child and start blogging about it? wtF?) I came across someone who said that life was like a coin, and you can only spend it once. This got me thinking about the most foolish of my habits: I save gift cards. I feel like if I use them, it has to be for something unGodly special and awesome and beyond fabulous, and whatever it is I’m buying at the time doesn’t cut it. So I save them. Piles of them. I have gift cards for stores that NO LONGER EXIST going back to the mid-90’s. Seriously. It’s ridiculous. So what does my unwillingness to spend a gift card say about the idea that I can’t spend that coin in my life? What am I waiting for? Everything I’m doing now is fine and fabulous and worthy of my giftcard and my effort and time. So what do I want to accomplish? What do I want to spend my coin on?

5. I just want you to know that I totally could have written something nauseatingly hokey about life being a gift card to myself and what was my gift card to the world and I stopped because there’s only so much room for hokey crap and many many other people have cornered that market.

My email on my Blackberry, whenever it has an error, tells me: “Error parsing message! Could not display the body part!”

I know what it means, but I still expect to fix the problem and see, like, a leg, or an elbow. 

I was reading this post (well done by the way) and it made me think about the number of “psychics” I drive by in a day. There’s one on Route 3 in Jersey that’s right off the highway, in a nondescript house with a big window and a neon sign that says, “PSYCHIC” followed by a phone number.

Hot pink neon, too. The neighbors must looove that.

But then there’s one lady who has her psychic store IN the building where the Plaza Hotel used to be located. Well, the Plaza is still there but it’s being converted into condos so it’s all under construction. On 58th Street next door to a deli is an awning in the Plaza’s back wall that says, “Psychic.” There’s even a brass marker on the wall that reads, “Psychic’s office, ring bell and enter door on left.” That marker has been in that wall a long while.

I used to work near there, and when I walked by I always wondered if perhaps that psychic HAD to be the real deal simply because, well, how else could she afford that rent otherwise? Larceny and robbery? She had to have a good stream of high-paying repeat customers, or a very very large trust fund and an interest in pretending to be a psychic.

I’ve never actually BEEN to a psychic or a palm reader. I do know how to read tarot cards, though my current deck goes untouched because they give me a little bit of the creeps, and I should probably burn them or throw them away. But I’ve never asked a person or paid them to tell me my future or to read my palm.

I do believe that it’s possible - I just don’t think there are as many people as are advertised who have the ability. And if someone did have that talent, would they set up a 900 number? Probably not.

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

I have come up with an idea that will make me richer than rich if I can figure out HOW to do it.

I’m going to cross a pacifier with a boomerang, so that when Angry 3am Toddler tosses his pacifier across the room with the speed and accuracy of a starting pitcher, the boomerang feature will cause said pacifier to swing right around and land BACK IN THE CRIB.

Seriously. This has to be possible. HAS to be.