(edited 4-11-0

This is a Book Tag from Loni’s Argyle Socks:

1. Pick up the nearest book (at least 123 pages).
2. Turn to page 123.
3. Find the 5th sentence
4. Post the 5th sentence on your blog.
5. Tag 5 people. (Like Loni, consider yourself tagged, if you feel like it.)

Nearest Book: The Varieties of Religious Experience (Which I am currently reading, and loving, BTW)

5th sentence of the 123rd page:
“The adequacy of their message to the mental needs of a large fraction of mankind is what gave force to those earlier gospels.”

Alone and out of context, that sentence isn’t anything of particular interest. In fact, I haven’t even gotten to the 123rd page of that book yet. However, after I went to find the particular sentence this meme required, I started to read some text from the previous page just to see what the context of that sentence was. On the top of page 122, I read this passage:

“This system is wholly and exclusively compacted of optimism: “Pessimism leads to weakness. Optimism leads to power.” “Thoughts are things,” as one of the most vigorous mind-cure writers prints in bold type at the bottom of each of his pages; and if your thoughts are of health, youth, vigor, and success, before you know it these things will also be your outward portion. No one can fail of the regenerative influence of optimistic thinking, pertinaciously pursued. Every man owns indefeasibly this inlet to the divine. Fear, on the contrary, and all the contracted and egoistic modes of thought, are inlets to destruction. Most mind-curers here bring in a doctrine that thoughts are “forces,” and that, by virtue of a law that like attracts like, one man’s thoughts draw to themselves as allies all the thoughts of the same character that exist the world over. Thus one gets, by one’s thinking, reinforcements from elsewhere for the realization of one’s desires…”

I was shocked when I read this almost perfect description of people who follow the ideals from the dangerous and ridiculous self-help book, “The Secret”. Now while I think that positive thinking is a generally a great idea, and that pessimism can lead to misery, “The Secret” takes the power of our thoughts to extreme levels. It teaches that if we think about something, it will happen. Literally. For instance, let’s say you wanted a million dollars. Supposedly, if you believe it enough, you’ll magically be given a million dollars by “the universe.” Conversely, if you think negative thoughts, you are asking for negative things to happen to you. So, according to “The Secret”, child abuse victims attracted their abuse.

But the passage from the book I’m reading wasn’t about “Secret followers”. It was about a spiritual movement called the Mind-Cure or New Thought Movement. What was even more interesting was that the lectures that the book was compiled from, were given in 1901-1902, over 100 years before The so-called “Secret” was published.

I’m sure this isn’t nearly as interesting to most of you as it is to me. But I’ve been a little obsessed with the pervasiveness of this, and other dangerous and extreme philosophies, lately. Well, at least ever since last summer, when I briefly and unknowingly attended a cult that thrived on and taught those philosophies. Yes, a cult. The kind with brainwashing, lovebombing and where everyone follows an “all-knowing” leader. But that’s a story for another time.

The other morning, I had a severe case of cabin fever, and decided I had to get Curious George and I out of the house. Not just anywhere out of the house, but I had a particular itch to go swimming. You see, last summer all of Utah’s public swimming pools banned all “diaper-dependant folk” because of a “Crypto” outbreak. If you don’t know what “Crypto” is, you probably don’t want to know (but I’m telling you anyway because it’s hilarious for me to imagine the grossed out look on your face you’ll inevitably have after reading about it.) Cryptosporidium parvum is a parasite found in water and food sources contaminated with the feces of infected humans. If someone ingests contaminated pool water they may experience painful abdominal cramping, bounteous diarrhea, fatigue, fever, nausea, vomiting, and loss of appetite.

*ahem* Well, the ban was recently lifted, Utah’s pool water is “crypto” free, and when I have an opportunity to take advantage of a cheap, toddler-friendly activity, that does not involve being at home, I am all over it.

Curious George loves playing in water, so I was surprised when he said he didn’t want to go swimming. He’d rather watch TV, he said. So, I spent the next ten minutes trying to convince him to come swimming, during which he repeatedly claimed that he’d rather watch TV. This was frustrating because I KNOW that he’d have much more fun at the pool than watching the current show on TV (which happened to be the most boring preschool show ever, “Max and Ruby”.) Eventually, I give up on trying to convince him, simply scooped him and our swimming gear up, buckled him into the car, and start driving to the pool.

The closest indoor, toddler-friendly pool I know of is 20 miles away, so for the half hour drive there, I hear Curious George wailing:
“No swimming! No swimming! No swimming!”Over and over and over again.

When we arrived at the pool, Curious George finally stopped crying. He recognized the building from last year, and like a mini Mr. Hyde to Dr. Jekyll, he suddenly became very happy and excited.

“Swimming! Swimming! Swimming!” He squealed.

I got him out of the car, and went to grab our swimming gear (swim suits, towels & and George’s swim diaper.)

I couldn’t find any of it.

That was very odd, because I distinctly remembered taking the swimming gear out to the car. I checked every nook and cranny of my car several times and it was still nowhere to be found. Then I remembered the last place I saw it: in order to free up my hands so I could buckle Curious George in before we left, I had placed the pile of swimming stuff on top of the car.

Oh crap.

I hurriedly put Curious George back in the car and started driving back towards my house. This of course greatly upset Curious George, as he had just barely decided that he did indeed want to go swimming.

“Swimming! Swimming! Swimming!” He cried the entire way back.

As I drove, I surveyed the road, looking for our stuff. Of course, I had no idea where it would actually be, or if I would be able to find it, but I figured it would have fallen off the car very close to where I had began the drive.

I am happy to announce that I did find all of our belongings, but not in the nice little pile in our apartment’s parking lot that I imagined. No, it was scattered about the middle of a busy five lane highway. When I spotted it, I pulled over and had to dodge fifty mile an hour traffic while I gathered up two towels, two swimming suits and a swim diaper. I ran back to our car, quickly brushed everything off, and started the 30 minute drive back to the swimming pool. I was going swimming today, dangit.

When we arrived at the swimming pool for the second time, I realized we only had one hour left to swim before I needed to be back to pick up Salvador (oh, the joys of sharing a car). I rushed in, we changed into our swimming suits and we climbed into the pool. As Curious George giggled and splashed around in the water, I sat back and enjoyed the warm, relaxing water. That’s about when I looked down at my swimsuit and noticed the large, black tire track going across my left boob.

Oh well. What mattered was that we were finally swimming, and neither of us could be happier about it.

 I have a recurring temporary job. The company that I am employed with has occasional work available that I can do out of my home, and this week I’ve been asked to be a part of another three week project. While I attended training and a meeting, I wished I had a translator. Someone who could translate from business-ese to Meisha-ese. It’s not that I didn’t understand the words coming out of these brilliant entrepreneur’s mouths, it’s just that I don’t have one business-y bone in my body. If my very life depended on it, I don’t know that I’d be able to sell someone a $1o bill for a quarter.

But, that’s OK. The perfectionistic part of me wants to be good at everything, but lately I’ve been trying to fight that part of me. Perfectionism is a belief that anything less than perfect is unacceptable, and ironically, perfectionism is a major personality flaw. Perfectionism has never helped me achieve perfection, just neuroticism.

So, one of my tactics against perfectionism is to celebrate “unperfectness”. Weaknesses and quirks are some of the things that make life interesting. For example, since I was talking about business, I thought I’d share pictures I took of two businesses in my community that crack me up whenever I see them:

I have yet to have the courage to actually go into “Bell Electronics and Krazy Daves Knives”. I imagine a guy like Herman from “The Simpsons” would be standing behind the counter (if there is a counter in there.)

If I ever do work up the courage to go in there, though, I’ll be sure to bring my camera (and maybe some mace) and you guys will be the first to hear about what’s inside.

The other one is located in downtown Provo. There used to be a furniture store there called “Provo Furniture”. It was in business there for many years, and not too long ago, there was a big sign on it announcing a sale in lieu of the owner’s retirement. The sale passed, the owner retired, and “Provo Furniture” was passed on to a new owner.

The next time I saw “Provo Furniture”, it was having it’s grand re-opening under it’s new clever name:

Yes, frugality can go too far. Yet, whenever I pass “Pro Furniture”, it warms my soul.

As you probably already noticed, I’ve neglected the bloggety blog as of late. You could say that I have been on a blog writing strike, you know, to be in solidarity with the WGA. (All I wanted was 2 cents to every dollar that WordPress makes off my “lucrative” blog, is that so unreasonable?)

However, though I support the WGA’s cause, if you were to say that that was the purpose behind my recent sabbatical, it wouldn’t be true. As much as I’d like to say that I haven’t been posting because I’ve been busy with some worthwhile cause, the truth is that I just haven’t been in the mood to write.

Depression has been known to creep up on me from time to time, and when the darkness follows the bright lights of Christmas, the contrast magnifies the melancholy.

I bet you didn’t know, though, that depression can be a funny thing.

On one January morning the world feels like this-

And then the very next day, you could wake up and the world feels like this-

See! Hilarious! Depression pulled the ole switcheroo! Ha!

In an effort to take back some control from this madness that follows me, I have been trying to figure out what factors trigger depression for me. You could call it a morbid past time of mine. Come try it with me!

I dealt with low self-esteem, distorted body image, feelings of worthlessness, the suicide of someone I cared for, and other teenage melodrama-ness in high school. These negative thought patterns were directly connected to my teenage episodes of depression. I was making myself sick by believing the damaging propaganda fed to me by my own guilt, magazines, peers, my parents expectations, movies, and my own hormone-drunken mind. When I finally discovered the correlation, it was as if I saw a light at the end of a dreary tunnel. I knew how to beat my depression. I worked hard to accept the parts of me that I couldn’t change. I worked on the parts of me I could change, instead of wallowing in despair. I stopped having pity parties. I acted confident, in hopes that it would stick. I stopped placing my worth in my boyfriends’ hands. I took back control of my self worth.

And it worked. I buoyed myself up from the ocean of despondency, and the new view was breathtaking. During that time in my life I ended an unhealthy relationship, re-enrolled in college and mantained a 3.7 gpa, and eventually married Salvador. We had our share of bumps along the road of marriage, but our first two years as husband and wife were so happy. It was wonderful. I had it all figured out.

Then, I got pregnant.

(to be continued)

I gave in to social pressure a week ago, and signed up for a facebook account. Friends and family members were quickly added to my list of “facebook friends”, and I had fun comparing movie tastes, political preferences, etc.

Then, a few days ago, I decided to check my email while I was working on a little project. I had gotten a notification from facebook that I had been nominated by a friend for a superlative. It said I had been nominated as “Most Likely to be the Next Martha Stewart.”

I thought to myself: “Martha Stewart?! I’m not crafty!” But then I looked down at the unfinished project I had in my lap at the moment. It was a wreath. I was making a homemade wreath, people! I really don’t know how much more “Martha-esque” you can get than wreath-making.

Wreath making aside, I’m really not a lot like Martha Stewart. For example, I have no idea what framboise ganache is. In fact, I am a nuisance and a danger to human, pet, & plant life in the kitchen. I set off the smoke alarm when I’m cooking on a regular basis. Once, I even burned ramen. (In my defense, I was in high school, and I was talking to a cute boy on the phone and kinda forgot I had put anything on the stove in the first place. That is, until I saw the plume of smoke.)

For another example, this is what I imagine Martha’s herb garden to look like:

This is what my herb garden looks like:

You get the idea.

Anyway, a day later, I talked to the friend who had nominated me for the superlative in the first place. He said that he had accidentally selected the wrong superlative. *phew* What he meant to nominate me for was: “Most likely to Get Tasered and End Up on CNN”. Ohhhh. Now that makes more sense.

This is my entry into Summer’s Nook’s Christmas Confection Collection. I call it a “Cheater’s Gingerbread House.” I made this little “gingerbread” house before I knew Summer’s Nook was hosting the Christmas Confection Collection, so I apologize for the lack of step-by-step instructions. I’ll just have to improvise. But first, here is the finished product:

I have always thought making gingerbread houses was a fun holiday tradition, and I was especially excited to make one this year with Curious George. However, I didn’t really feel like baking gingerbread. It sounded like too much work and I don’t like the taste of it, anyway. (I know gingerbread houses aren’t made to be some kind of gourmet dessert, but still, why go through the steps of baking something I don’t even like?)  My next option was to go buy a gingerbread house kit, but the only kit I could find at the store looked like this:

Sure, it’s kinda cute, (and they use a MUCH better camera), but there’s no soul to it! Besides, what is with the example? Gum drops and mystery hard candy placed on the roof randomly?  You can’t just put the candy wherever!

So I finally decided to make my “gingerbread” house out of graham crackers.

Pros of using graham crakers: No baking. They’re cheaper. You can buy two boxes so you have extra in case you mess up or they break because you were too anxious and didn’t let the frosting harden before you added candy to the roof, heh heh. They’re yummier, IMO than gingerbread (especially if you get the cinnamon sugar ones like I did.). Also, again, no baking involved.

Cons: Graham crackers aren’t as nice looking as gingerbread, but you can cover the graham crakers up with candy. Also, unless you are some kind of engineer, the houses tend to turn out smaller than with gingerbread. 

The Bad news is the Writers Guild of America and the AMPTP haven’t come to an agreement yet, so my favorite TV shows continue to air reruns. 

The good news is that if I really want to relax and be entertained, I can always turn to Japanese television:

If you want to watch more clips from the Japanese show, “Brain Wall”, click here, here, here, & here.

WordPress informs me of the Google search terms people used to find my blog. So far, people have found my blog by googling things like: fat camp counselor job opportunity (sorry, no applications avaiable here right now), curious George Christmas ornaments (awww, that would be cute! Sorry I don’t have any, though), brushscript overused font (you’re preaching to the choir) , ricki lake boots, Papyrus font Firefox (I hope they knew better than to look for papyrus after reading my post on it), candy that looks like eyeballs , the cotton candy nightmare comic (perhaps a good idea for a post? )  

The bad news is that ever since I briefly related my mother’s childhood experience at a nudist camp, I’ve been getting traffic from a bunch of pervs. Yesterday, someone found my blog by googling: tween nudist camp photos.

Eeeeek.

Note to person googling “tween nudist camp photos”: Go get professional help. Now.

Well, here’s some more good news to help you shake the icky feeling you all got from thinking about pedofiles:

I won an award! Yay! The very lovely Summer, from Summer’s Nook, gave me the Egel nest Blog Award!

This is an award meant for either new blogs or blogs that don’t get the traffic they deserve. I am honored to pass this award along to Elizabeth at Successfully Underachieving . While she isn’t new to blogging, I’ve only just recently found her, so her blog is new to me (that counts, right?). As I read through her posts I became an instant fan (Like this post, this one, this one and this one.) So, do yourselves a favor and go visit Successfully Underachieving , don’t forget to leave comments!

Growing up, decorating for Christmas is something my parents take very seriously. In the front yard, they cover the whole roof, all of the windows and every last tree, bush or shrub, with lights. There is at least one tree, that has blinking lights synchronized to a selection of loud electronic Christmas carols (to our neighbor’s chagrin). The lawn has a herd of lit mechanical reindeer (that the aforementioned neighbors will rearrange in various naughty positions when no one’s looking.) Inside the house, there are wreaths, lights, mistletoe, snowmen, santas, nativities, and stockings. They even have 3 Christmas trees, yes THREE. My Mom couldn’t decide between two styles of ornaments AND she couldn’t bear to get rid of her grandmother’s vintage tree. So she has three different trees, now. The “main” Christmas tree is over 9 feet tall and underneath it is where my mom sets up her ceramic Christmas village that is encircled by a festive train. Every year my Mom collects new buildings, trees, figurines and other things to add to her village. It has gotten so big, that that this year it has officially been declared a Christmas metropolitan area.

With so many decorations, putting them up each year became an increasingly tedious process, and I became increasingly grinch-like with each successive holiday season. But now that I have my own family, I’m starting to warm up to the idea of Christmas decorations again. I mean, how can you resist the excited squeals of a two year old when you do something as simple as plugging in a string of lights?

I was especially excited for this year, because, at 2 1/2, Curious George is even more aware and excited about the world around him. As I set up our fake treea few days ago, he giggled with delight. His eyes were filled with wonder as I opened up our box filled with glistening round glass ornaments. When I was done unwrapping most of them, I got up to quickly use the bathroom. Curious George had been in a very calm mood, and had listened to me when I asked him not to touch the ornaments. But when I came out of the bathroom, I saw Curious George standing in the box of ornaments, furiously stomping on them like a grape-stomper in a barrel of grapes.

After I threw away the broken remains of the ornaments, I went to the store in search of cheap, non-glass ornaments. I came home with a stack of pretty paper. I had decided to make little paper, origami ornaments, instead. Though it would be a little tedious, there wouldn’t be glass shards everywhere, should Curious George have a surge of destructiveness come upon him again.

About an hour of cutting and folding, I had a small collection of paper ornaments done. I placed them on the tree, and stood back to see to see how they looked so far.

I think Christmas ornaments may be for Curious George, what a red cape is for an angry bull, because as soon as he saw the origami on the tree, he ran up and grabbed the ornaments he could reach, and began crumpling them and ripping them to pieces. *sigh*
While Curious George served his longer than usual time-out sentence, I wondered whether our tree may only have lights on it this year unless I could think of a cheap, unbreakable alternative for ornaments. I rummaged through our closet for ideas and came across a big bag of colorful plastic balls. You know, the ones you might find in a ball pit at Chuck E. Cheese? They went with an inflatable ball pit that Curious George got for his birthday one year, but it had been punctured by a rowdy cousin, so I had all of these unbreakable plastic balls without a home…

I am experiencing technical difficulties, so I apologize for my recent lack of comments and blog postings. My laptop power cord was tripped over, yanked, and otherwise mangled by Curious George one too many times, and it finally snapped. While, I will have access to other computers, it will be much more sporadic access than I had with my little laptop.

In other news, I had sushi for Thanksgiving. My mother-in-law talked about making turkey tamales, so we were all a bit surprised when she brought out salmon and a variety of sushi to the table. Hahaha, I love sushi, so it was a good surprise. What did you have?

What is the worst, best or weirdest job you’ve ever had?

In my last post, I talked a little bit about my weirdest job: I was a counselor/tie dye instructor at a youth fat camp for a summer. Hahaha, it was an interesting summer that year, that’s for sure.