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The Enlightenment (Still) I’m Not Ingesting

June 26, 2026

Robyn Parnell are we having fun yet? (Women & Men & Feminism), books & magazines, current events, extended family, freethought/humanism, friends, general ruminations, health & wellness, Holy Shit!, Isms (religion), nature, politics, radio & podcasts, school, science, sports, The Write Stuff (literary life), Uncategorized, Wow, YEE HAW! , , , , , , , , Comments Off on The Enlightenment (Still) I’m Not Ingesting

Department Of My Favorite I KNEW IT Headline

That would be from this book review:

The guru who loved to lie:
The wild celebrity and dark secrets of author Carlos Castaneda

 ( review excerpt ):“The 1970s were thick with New Age spiritual fads and movements, from the benign (crystals) to the unspeakably toxic and cultic (Jonestown). Somewhere in the middle of that woo-woo spectrum lies the work of Carlos Castaneda. A UCLA anthropology grad student turned self-appointed guru, Castaneda became a counterculture icon with the publication of his first book, The Teachings of Don Juan: A Yaqui Way of Knowledge, in 1968, purporting to find enlightenment via psychedelic mushrooms, peyote and the cryptic musings of Don Juan, an Indigenous spirit guide.

That book (…and those that followed) seduced millions of readers….That Castaneda’s books were largely flimflam isn’t in dispute. But Ru Marshall’s hefty biography, American Trickster: The Hidden Lives of Carlos Casteneda, reveals the depth of his deception — and…how easily people can be taken in by it.

‘He didn’t lie out of convenience or opportunism,’ Marshall writes. ‘He lied because he loved to. Lying was, for him, an art, and he did it exceptionally well.’…

Born in Peru (not Brazil, as he often claimed) in 1925 (not a decade later, as he often claimed), Castaneda demonstrated no particular intellectual promise. But in the mid-1950s…he developed an affection for writing, philosophy and history. While pursuing a graduate degree in anthropology in the ’60s, he grew enchanted with Buddhism, Theosophy, existentialism and Native American spirituality — all key elements of the spiritualist goulash he would eventually cook up for his books.

His timing was impeccable: From Timothy Leary’s LSD experiments to transcendental meditation, non-Christian religion and drugs fueled the zeitgeist. And Castaneda’s manuscript of The Teachings spoke effervescently about both.

It hardly seemed to matter that the book also demonstrated his ignorance of both: He had little understanding of psychoactive drugs (you don’t smoke shrooms, dude), and there was nothing meaningfully Yaqui about Don Juan. Still, the book — and their follow-ups… were massive bestsellers.”

 

 

The writings of trained   [1] anthropologist Castaneda, in particular his Don Juan series, were all the rage during my early college years.  If often seemed that, when walking down the residence hall hallways, you couldn’t spit (and I did try) without encountering a fellow student, slumped outside their dorm room, taking a break from cramming for their chemistry midterm by searching for some stoner wisdom from the mythical   [2]  Yaqui “Man of Knowledge” Don Juan Matus.  Castaneda’s books portrayed Don Juan as a shaman (of the indigenous Yaqui people) who imparted his wisdom to Castenada via a purported apprenticeship Casteneda had with Don Juan in the early 1960s.

I tried to understand the appeal by reading  [3] the first and some of the second of what would eventually be a series of quasi-spiritual drivel nine books.    [4]   My reaction to what I read was further evidence to moiself  that I would never be as hip as my comrades…and I was relieved to be so.

I only said, You realize he made up all that shit?!?!  a few times to Castenada/Don Juan true believers.  The reactions my skepticism received made me realize that if the reason for my lack of mystical illumination after reading the books – the reason moiself  couldn’t understand the deep spiritual enlightenment wisdom of the books’ teachings –  was that I wasn’t stoned while reading them (as one devoted Castenda follower informed me), then that was a burden I was willing to shoulder.  I got more enlightenment, and a better use of my time, via playing a game of racquetball with friends.

 

 

*   *   *

Department Of Sometimes The Analogy Can’t Be Stretched

Dateline: Sunday 2:52 pm, listening to a TED Talk podcast, Sports Psychology For Everyone: The Psychology of Winning (and Losing).  Some interesting stuff there, including interviews with sports stars and behavioral scientists.  The hour-long podcast is divided into four segments:

* Soccer legend Abby Wambach reflects on the most iconic goal of her career

* Why we choke under pressure, according to a cognitive scientist

* Why we love watching sports

* Don’t be afraid of failure. Instead, embrace the near-win

The third segment had some key insights into why some sports develop and maintain a loyal audience while others – e.g., women’s sports – have a harder time doing so.  Obstacles include good old-fashioned sexism…

 

 

…coupled with cultural traditions, familiarity, and generational inheritance.

Journalist Kate Fagan:

“When I worked at ESPN…I was always pitching women’s sports stories.

It almost never worked. Every once in a while, it would work. But this thing would happen when we would do a women’s sports segment.  Many of the other men on the segment – they didn’t really do their homework.  So they were kind of blah, then the segment would be kind of blah. There’s actually a term for this.  It’s called  gender bland. And then the segment would end, and the producer would be like, ‘See, this is why we never do women’s sports, ’cause they’re boring.

When a men’s segment fell flat, the problem was us. We would redo it.  All right, come on, do your homework. Pick it up. We’re doing that again. When a segment on women’s sports fell flat, the problem was women’s sports.
The reality is that, just existing in our culture, you will know a dozen men’s storylines… these things are literally push-notified to your phone. Or you’re at a bar or a doctor’s office, and the talking heads are giving you the latest NBA drama. In America, osmosis will have you knowing men’s sports storylines…”

 

 

Fagan:

“There’s so many veins of generational inheritance in sports. There’s the one that does take time and literal family generations where you can actually say, Why am I a New York Met fan? Well, ’cause my grandpa was a Brooklyn Dodgers fan. And then they left for LA. And then the next team that we got was the New York Mets…. And there’s something bigger than yourself about that.
I think why we love sports at its core is for the culture and community of it. And whether it’s your literal community, it’s like your city team, or you live out of state, and it’s your grandmother’s favorite team…That’s all part of community as well.

And then pair that – and they often go hand in hand – with cultural value….We want to be in on what culture is talking about.”

 

 

Fagan and other podcast guest spoke of factors that get people interested in more obscure/not-so-popular-in-our-culture sports  – factors such as when we understand the stakes to the games and the storylines within them (e.g., the underdog USA ice hockey team battling the heavily favored USSR team; the Romanian gymnast struggling in poverty…).  Then Fagan shared a story of how her father, who taught her basketball, guided her with two pieces of advice about the game, which she applies to life today:

” ‘Always make your last dribble the hardest’….

The other one I loved was…‘You miss 100% of the shots you don’t take.’
And that’s a standard basketball one, but…my wife and I will say it to each other all the time when we want to do something we’re not sure we should. It’s like, ‘Well, you miss 100% of the shots you don’t take.’ “

Moiself’s  mind immediately began trying to analogize that shot-taking adage to other sports and activities.  For some reason, rock climbing was the first one I thought of:

“You survive 100 percent of the cliffs you don’t fall off of
from the mountains you don’t climb….”

Hmmmm?  Needs more work to reach pithy aphorism status.

 

 

*   *   *

Department Of Why AI Sucks

Moiself  looks forward to AI applications that can assist doctors to more quickly distinguish between benign and malignant tumors, and which can also help medical researchers fine-tune existing/invent new treatments and for illnesses from cancer to tuberculosis…and help scientists discover non-toxic ways to eliminate air- and waterborne pollutants and develop non-toxic, renewable energy sources…

As for the rest, this sums up my feelings and fears.  When it comes to writing (both fiction and nonfiction/journalism) and the creative arts, don’t be fooled by a seemingly bland term like, Artificial Intelligence.  It’s counterfeit coding ; it’s plagiarism software.

 

 

BTW, that ingestion of written output…without consent, compensation, and credit…?  It’s happened to moiself.

BTW 2.0: for any other published writers out there, whether or not you are involved in one of the many class action lawsuits re AI-enabled pirating,    [5]   AI-enabled pirating of your work has already happened or will happen to you, whether or not you are aware of it.

*   *   *

Freethinkers’ Thought Of The Week     [6]

 

 

*   *   *

May you be able to spot spiritual flim-flam;
May you not be the easiest person to fool;
May you not fall off of the cliffs you do not climb;
…and may the hijinks ensue.

Thanks for stopping by.  Au Vendredi!

*   *   *

[1] But never professionally employed as an anthropologist.

[2] As in, Casteneda pulled Don Juan (and their encounters) out of his ass.

[3] By the second book, it was more like skimming, as I found it so uninteresting I couldn’t concentrate on paying actual attention to the twaddle.

[4] The Teachings of Don Juan, A Separate Reality, Journey to Ixtlan, Tales of Power, The Second Ring of Power, The Eagle’s Gift, The Fire From Within, The Power of Silence, The Art of Dreaming.

[5] I am one of the many parties to the Anthropic CA lawsuit. 

[6] “free-think-er n. A person who forms opinions about religion on the basis of reason, independently of tradition, authority, or established belief. Freethinkers include atheists, agnostics and rationalists.   No one can be a freethinker who demands conformity to a bible, creed, or messiah. To the freethinker, revelation and faith are invalid, and orthodoxy is no guarantee of truth.”  Definition courtesy of the Freedom From Religion Foundation, ffrf.org

The Belly Button Deodorant I’m Not Using

June 19, 2026

Robyn Parnell annoyances, are we having fun yet? (Women & Men & Feminism), books & magazines, current events, exercise & fitness, extended family, family life, freethought/humanism, friends, health & wellness, Holy Shit!, Isms (religion), movies, Oregon, politics, radio & podcasts, science, TV, Wow, Yikes! , , , , , , , , Comments Off on The Belly Button Deodorant I’m Not Using

Department Of Yep, This Is It:
Succinctly Brilliant Life Advice (Before The Inevitable Snark)

“You’ll regret it if you get married.  You’ll regret it if you don’t.
You’ll regret it if you have kids, and you’ll regret it if you don’t.”

The following is attributed to Kierkegaard  [1]   (my emphases):

“Regret is inevitable because the human mind
will always romanticize the life it didn’t live.
It’s not about making the ‘perfect’ choice;
it’s choosing which regret you are willing to make peace with.”

So.  Choose your path.

 

*   *   *

Department Of, And Now, On To The Snark:
Could This Be The Sign; Is This The End Of The World?

Dateline: Monday morning; 7:54 AM; watching My Big Fat Greek Wedding III   [2] while doing an elliptical workout.  During the commercial break I behold an advertisement moiself  has never see before – it’s from    [3]   a series of ads for Cottonelle toilet paper known as the  Come Clean campaign.   [4]   The ad begins with a discreet shot of some guy sitting on a toilet, then we see him (after he has presumably done his business and hiked up his trousers)    [5]  walking into a family/TV room in a (his?) house, where friends and family wearing team jerseys and eating copious amounts of snacks are watching a football game on the room’s wide screen TV.  The man has a beatific smile on his face, as if he’s just received enlightenment from a guru or had another kind of spiritual experience.   Apparently, after having used Cottonelle toilet paper to wipe himself post-deuce-dropping he has the cleanest hindquarters he’s ever had.  [6]   He is so overcome with the bliss of butt cleanliness he decides to “come clean” with his friends, confessing, among other things, the fact that he doesn’t really “get” football….

 

 

*   *   *

The Saga Continues: Department Of Bodily Functions Sell Products,
The Neverending Story

Back to moiself  on the elliptical, continuing to watch  My Big Fat Greek Wedding III  (which primarily takes place in – surprise! –  Greece).   [7]   After fifteen minutes, there is another commercial break:  three ads in a row featuring products related to those pesky bodily functions:

* #1:   [8]  It’s one more Cottonelle  come clean ad, this one featuring a woman, who, after having the tush mop of her life, comes clean to her homework-doing child about the fact that she never “got” algebra;

* #2:  Yet another ad for that    [9] ( “doctor-developed!” ) whole body deodorant, Lumē.  And by whole body, the Lumē folk mean your entire body – including parts you maybe didn’t realize you had, much less had to worry about being…reekified.

“Anywhere you have odor but wish you didn’t….just a pea-sized amount rubbed in like a lotion…all over your body:  “pits, privates, underboob, belly buttons, tummy folds, thigh creases, feet….”

 Underboob?

 

 

You name it, if it’s a body part, Lumē wants to you to be concerned that it might stink.

feet; tummy folds; thigh crease….  I think they left out that space between your fingers – for which there should be a name.  Actually, there is: the interdigital folds. But, moiself  suspects there’s a better word for it in German, like FingerSchlitzen….

Ahem.  That omission aside, the not-so-subtle message these Lumē advertisements convey is that your entire body is an odiferous swamp in need of aroma-masking.  As for the bemused skeptics who ask, “Um, why not just take a shower?”

 

Silly geese!  If you feel felt cleaner after taking a shower, they can’t sell you anything.  Check here if you’d like An Expert® to explain why you’re so stupid as to think that bathing is better than using Lumē products.   [10]

Just in case you’re not sure how the product should be applied to someone’s, er, privates, here are the handy instructions (found here; my emphases):

“For privates – the short story:
A little goes a long way. Using fingertips, swipe onto thigh folds, undercarriage,
and sweep up between the butt cheeks to the tailbone.

For privates – the full story:
Working front to back (never work back to front due to increased risk for urinary tract infections), apply to the clitoral hood & labia majora (not inside the vagina or around the urethra), continue back further to the perineum (the space between the rectum and vaginal opening), and sweep up between the butt cheeks to the tailbone.
Apply around the base of the penis and between the folds of the legs, work back to the space between the scrotum and rectum, and finally sweep back between the butt cheeks and up to the tailbone.”

 

 Undercarriage.  In all my years in health care…

 

 

… moiself  never heard the word at word undercarriage – heretofore used for the structural and mechanical foundation supporting the body of an automobile or truck – to refer to human anatomy.

 

 

Listening to this insulting shill ad, moiself  be getting my undergarments in a knot ( this could be a job for Lumē! ) as I consider the commercial’s underlying premise: your entire body is a stinkpit.  Yeah, thanks for the empowering message, brought to us by a woman OB/GYN ( a fact much touted in the product’s various ads).

Ah; once again, moiself  digresses.  On to Advertisement #3, which was concerned with infant and baby number two – specifically, with the idea that not all baby BMs are manageable ( as in, containable ) – via the average disposable diaper.  And this certain brand of diaper – damned if I can’t remember the name, [11]  is for “…people who’ve seen some sh*t.”   [12]  Translation:  it can handle your biggest baby’s biggest poop!

Now then:  although moiself  wasn’t paying close attention to My Big Fat Greek Wedding III, I’m fairly certain it contained no overt nor clandestine themes of cleaning up after defecation and/or malodorous body parts.  Thus, I’m forced to conclude that the clustering of these particular ads during  MBFGWIII  commercial breaks was just a happy coincidence.

 

 

*   *   *

Speaking Of Products Related To Crap…

Freethinkers’ Thought Of The Week     [13]

Notes I wrote to myself a few years ago after someone, who’d discovered my “unbelief,” tried the What-you-need-is-a-personal-relationship-with-Jesus crap on me:

What I do not need is a “personal relationship” with Jesus,
or the Christian god, or any deity.

What religious believers need is a personal relationship with reality – the same reality to which they appeal when they critique the tenets and validity of Scientology, Islam, Hinduism, Mormonism – of any faith but their own.  The same reality they use when they evaluate evidence to make any important decision in their life: such as, which investments are sound, which physician to see for an illness, etc.

Oh and by the way:  How is it that, for all their much-touted (but in reality, scantily practiced   [14]  ) reading of their scriptures, Christian fundies never seem to recognize that their “personal relationship with their personal savior” rhetoric never occurs in the Bible.  Jesus is never quoted as speaking this way in the gospels, nor does the founder of Christianity, Paul, do so in his epistles.  This “personal savior” piety is no older than 18th century Lutheran Pietist movement in Germany.

 

 

*   *   *

May we all have a personal relationship with reality;
May you not romanticize the path you didn’t take;
May we give our respective undercarriages the honor they are due;
…and may the hijinks ensue.

Thanks for stopping by.  Au Vendredi!

*   *   *

[1] Søren Kierkegaard, (1813 – 1855), Danish philosopher.

[2][2] It was either that, or some May Day Airline disaster show…which I actually like – the parts about the investigations and the problem solving involved (not the crash reenactment).  

[3] Yep, I googled it afterward.

[4] Slogan: “We are coming clean: your booty deserves gentle care.”

[5] I could have written pants, but I think trousers is a work we should all use more frequently.

[6] doesn’t say much for the character’s potty hygiene and/or showering skills, does it?

[7] So I don’t really mind or pay attention to the plot; I just enjoy the scenery.

[8] Shouldn’t this have been add #2, since it’s about cleaning up about number…you know?

[9] I say that because you’ve likely seen at least one of those ads – you can’t spit (or sweat) without hitting one.

[10] BTW, the company is facing several class action lawsuits accusing Lumē’ of false advertising/deceptive marketing of their products.

[11] Which I attribute to my brain being overloaded, at that point, with this ad shit.

[12] The word is bleeped in the ad

[13] “free-think-er n. A person who forms opinions about religion on the basis of reason, independently of tradition, authority, or established belief. Freethinkers include atheists, agnostics and rationalists.   No one can be a freethinker who demands conformity to a bible, creed, or messiah. To the freethinker, revelation and faith are invalid, and orthodoxy is no guarantee of truth.”  Definition courtesy of the Freedom From Religion Foundation, ffrf.org

[14] The bible is a huge collection of writings; still, it’s mind-boggling how many Christians cherry pick their readings to “the happy” or familiar, G-rated stories stuff.  Most of them seemingly have no idea what is in their scriptures, from the three different version of The Ten Commandments ( Version 1: Deuteronomy 5:6-21; Version 2: Exodus 20:1-17, differs slightly from the Deuteronomy version; Version 3: Exodus 34: 14-28 – Hmmm, these commandments are wildly different than the first two versions, although the writing claims it is the LORD speaking.  Guess he’d forgotten what he’d said the first two times?  Also, although this list is never referred to when religious leaders and politicians talk of the Ten Commandments, this version – in verse 27- is the only version referred to in scripture as the “ten commandments” ) ,to the passages where Jesus contradicts himself, to the scriptural guidelines for killing and raping women….

The Deity Of Obstructed Plumbing I’m Not Beseeching

June 12, 2026

Robyn Parnell annoyances, are we having fun yet? (Women & Men & Feminism), books & magazines, current events, exercise & fitness, freethought/humanism, general ruminations, health & wellness, Holy Shit!, Isms (religion), Oregon, politics, radio & podcasts, science, The Write Stuff (literary life), Wow, Yikes! Comments Off on The Deity Of Obstructed Plumbing I’m Not Beseeching

Department Of Learning To Change Your Mind

I’ve always been careful with/skeptical of the label, SBNR ( “I’m spiritual but not religious.”)  Describing one’s self (or others) as SBNR in answer to questions about one’s religion and/or worldview can be seen – and often is, IMO – as an intellectual cop-out” by people on all sides of the question.

Those who are religious can be annoyed by the term, for several reasons, including:

* It is the pinnacle of cherry picking.  “The ‘I’m SBNR  folks take the warm and fuzzy ideas of their god/religion while not actually following anything…”

* Those who claim they are spiritual-but-not-religious are trying to sell the notion that they are somehow in a deeper, more profound relationship with their ‘higher power’ instead of working within the theologies and traditions of an established church.

* “This idea of being ‘spiritual’ without being ‘religious’ sounds like an attempt at superiority, being that religion (in American society) is often looked upon as a bastion for the ignorant. But being ‘spiritual,’, well, that’s just totally cool, dude.”  [1]

 

You SBNRs are numerous enough to have people marketing your very own religious – excuse me, spiritual – accessories to you!


Humanists/Freethinkers/Skeptics/Atheists/otherwise Religion-Free folk’s critiques of SBNR include:

*  The mealy-mouth SBNR acronym stems from not wishing to come out of the atheist closet.  There is a social stigma of irreligion, particularly for those who have devout family and friends (or even coworkers) who view any total “rejection” of religion ( “I am not religious” ) as a betrayal and/or criticism of *their* beliefs and values.  The claim of SBNR is conflict avoidance strategy, so as not to admit to a complete loss or rejection of faith. Openly declaring oneself as atheist risks alienating friends and family who view the transition as a moral loss rather than an intellectual one.

* The “Spiritual” Buffer: Using the SBNR label often serves as a safe stepping stone.  SBNRers believe the label distances them from rigid doctrine while retaining a connection to awe, mindfulness, or the unknown, without having to do the hard-but-necessary work of confronting and refuting the harsh stereotypes religious folk often associate with atheism.

*   The SBNR people are being smug and/or provocative and/or cowardly.  Responding to a question about one’s religious beliefs by claiming to be ‘spiritual’ isn’t an answer; rather, it’s a cop out – an attempt to avoid the question while sounding like one has put some thought into it, and to avoid the judgement that might come their way by declaring that they are, in fact, religion free ( “What!?  You don’t believe in anything?!?!?” ) .

 

 

And there are those who simply have questions about the SBNR phrase’s semantic employment (translation:  there is no coherent definition of SBNR ):

” Spiritual is such a useless non-word; I’ve never heard from a believer what spiritual encompasses – no two people can agree on how to define it.”

 

“Yeah, I’m not into organized religion, but I’m very spiritual.”

 

Moiself  recently (re) listened to a podcast related to the SBNR issue: A PIMA ( People I Mostly Admire ) podcast rerun, specifically, Steve Levitt’s interview with Sam Harris: Spirituality Unveiled.

From the PIMA episode website:  He’s a cognitive neuroscientist and philosopher who has written five best-selling books. Sam Harris also hosts the Making Sense podcast and helps people discover meditation through his Waking Up app. Sam explains to Steve how to become spiritual as a skeptic….

LEVITT:
I’d love to talk about your book, Waking Up, and I’m going to say something that I literally have never said before about any book, and that is that I think Waking Up is important. And it’s important in the sense that I think it can have a large and a positive impact on many people’s lives….
And while there are, I’m sure, thousands of books on meditation and mindfulness, your book, Waking Up, is the only one I’ve ever run into that I could read through my scientific mind and not feel embarrassed about thinking that I could pursue spirituality. Does that reading of your book resonate with you at all?

HARRIS:
Yeah, yeah. That is certainly its purpose.

 

 

HARRIS:
Spirituality is a loaded term. We don’t have a great term for what the most positive end of human psychology should be called, right? But we want to explore this range of human experience. We want to understand it scientifically. We want to access it personally. On the most basic level, as a matter of experience, all we have is our minds, right?
Happiness and suffering are mental events and that opens the door to various possibilities. One is that the changes you make in the way you pay attention to the world and to the content of your own experience and the contents of consciousness — that it’s possible to make real changes in your relationship to experience itself, and to suffer less, and even not at all in circumstances that would have otherwise caused you an immense amount of pain. And to find joy and beauty and connection in places that you were unable to even notice before. And there’s a training that allows for that. And meditation is sort of the generic term for that….
And so, my goal in writing the book and subsequently releasing the meditation app by the same name, is to convey that. We should have a 21st century conversation about the deepest possibilities of human well-being.

LEVITT:
And if I try to dumb down what you said, I think your main point is that there’s a lot of evidence for practicing various techniques like meditation, which will then lead you to experience the world in a way which is more fulfilling and gratifying and less troubling and disturbing than if you don’t do it. Is that a fair summary of your view of the world?

HARRIS:
Yeah, and I would just point out that 150 years ago, the only person lifting weights was the crazy guy in the circus with the handlebar mustache and leopard skin singlet…. And yet, we all now know that physical exercise is one of the best things you can do. And most of us have found a way to not just tolerate it, but actually love it. But the notion of mental training is fairly esoteric and has to be argued for…
…one difference is that you can’t see the results in quite the same way. The body admits an immense plasticity, and given commitment and native talent and good luck, you can make some serious changes in your physical body. But most people feel like their minds are more or less whatever they wound up with when they stumbled into adulthood, right? They understand that they can get educated and they can learn new facts. But the idea that through training, you could really change your mind, that’s not understood. And it’s not helpful, frankly, that the people who’ve done this work traditionally have always done it explicitly in a religious context. We do have to break it out of these traditional framings because we should be able to use all of the world’s literature and the millennia of conversations that have been had about the mind or anything else, about what works and what makes sense.”

( excerpts, PIMA,  Spirituality Unveiled.  )

 

Let’s work it out together!

 

*   *   *

Department Of A Blast From The Past
Dateline: January 2025.  A new year; a new project: taking an excerpt from a past blog, from the same time frame (the second Friday of whatever month).  My thought at the time: Perhaps moiself  will like this enough that it will turn out to be a regular blog feature.  So far it has, but time, and my capacity for reruns, will tell.

This journey down memory lane is related to the most convincing reason a YOU-of-all-people-should-write-a-blog-why-aren’t-you-writing-a-blog?!?!?!  [2]   friend gave me, all those years ago,   [3]   as to why I should be writing a blog: a blog would serve as a journal of sorts for my life.  Thus, journal/diary-resistant moiself  would have some sort of a record, or at least a random sampling, of what was on my mind – and possibly what was on the nation’s mind – during a certain period of time.

Now I can, for example, look back to the second Friday of a years-ago June to see what I was thinking. (or as MH put it,  WHAT was I thinking!?!? )

 

 

Here is an excerpt from my blog of 6-12-2015 ( The Self I’m Not Hating ).

 

It’s Later, and I Don’t Hate Myself

The spam message I dared to delete:

IF  YOU  DON’T  READ  THIS  NOW  YOU’LL  HATE  YOURSELF  LATER

*   *   *

I’d Like to Buy a Vowel, Pat

 

NO NO NO NO NO.

Not that vowel.

I’d like to buy an i.

i is my favorite vowel, in part because two of my favorite words begin with it.   [4]

There is the word I itself, the personal pronoun. Although I am not fond of the first-person narrative in fiction and rarely employ it in my stories, I am fond of I for more personal reasons, having to do with action and momentum. I is an indicator of agency and responsibility ( I will do ___; I think that ___).

My other favorite i-word is if.  I love that word.  For me, it is the key to answering the question non-writers of fiction often ask of writers of fiction; specifically, How do you get your story ideas?  The closest I can come to answering that question truthfully  [5]   is to say that the What if question is always involved.

Story ideas, from the mundane to the profound, center around possible answers to the question, What if… 

*  a couple used their argument over whose turn it was to bring in the garbage can as a distraction from their crumbling relationship, mental health issues, and employment insecurity…

* a husband betrayed his wife by posting bail for her sister who was in jail for abetting a cult leader…

* a bereaved mother enlisted the help of a sympathetic stranger she met in a university library to avenge her daughter’s death…

* a teen-aged/elderly/mentally challenged skate boarder/retired cracker salter quality assurance manager/grocery bagger  stumbled upon the body of a former teacher/complete stranger/notorious serial flasher in the hall closet/supermarket parking lot/Grand Canyon gift shop restroom…

Also, if can be used to denote the hope of things to come and the rationalization of things that fail in the here and now ( “If ___, then ___” ).  It is a word of both promise and regret ( “If only…” ).  A mere two letters, a thousand possibilities. I like that.

*   *   *

 

 

*   *   *

Freethinkers’ Thought Of The Week:  [6]

Who Says We Don’t Have a Sense of Humor?    

( Credited to Sun Tzu [7] )

*   *   *

May you have a favorite vowel, or consonant
and know why it’s your favorite;
May you learn how to change your mind;
May you never have to beseech the gods of clogged toilets;

…and may the hijinks ensue.

Thanks for stopping by.  Au Vendredi!

*   *   *

[1]  My Take: ‘I’m spiritual but not religious’ is a cop-out,  Sharper Iron (a self-described fundamental Christian forum)  10-1-12.

[2] I was adamant about not writing a blog…thus, the title of the blog I eventually decided to write.

[3] Was it really over twelve years ago?

[4] Uh, that is, they begin with the letter “i,” not “it.”

[5] Yep, I’ve lied or mislead on many occasions. “How do I get my ideas? Well, there’s this guy in a trench coat who hangs around NE Burnside, and if you slip him a twenty he’ll flash you a plot and character outline….”

[6] “free-think-er n. A person who forms opinions about religion on the basis of reason, independently of tradition, authority, or established belief. Freethinkers include atheists, agnostics and rationalists.   No one can be a freethinker who demands conformity to a bible, creed, or messiah. To the freethinker, revelation and faith are invalid, and orthodoxy is no guarantee of truth.”  Definition courtesy of the Freedom From Religion Foundation, ffrf.org

[7] Sun Tzu was a Chinese military general, strategist, philosopher, and writer (“The Art of War“) who lived during the Eastern Zhou period (771–256 BC)  (Wikipedia entry.)

The Catalog I’m Not Ordering From

June 5, 2026

Robyn Parnell annoyances, are we having fun yet? (Women & Men & Feminism), books & magazines, current events, extended family, freethought/humanism, friends, general ruminations, health & wellness, Holy Shit!, Isms (religion), music, politics, science, The Write Stuff (literary life), TV, Wow, Yikes! , , , , , , Comments Off on The Catalog I’m Not Ordering From

Department Of The OSITY File

As I live my life…

Moiself  changed that from, “As I age,” when I remembered that As We Age was the name of a mail order catalog with which the-gods-I-don’t-believe-in pranked me, by sending said catalog to me a on a quarterly basis.  The catalog’s pages were filled with pictures of women (in their late twenties-early thirties pretending to be in their fifties and sixties) alternatively modeling sensible beach coverups, loud floral-patterned loungewear and the like.

 

 

Moiself  was mildly intrigued by receiving this publication, and flipped through the first issue I received.  Doing so provided me with several minutes of petty satisfactions, as in, getting all snarky re the catalog’s, Oh crap you’re getting older,  “be your best“ products, all counting on proving their worthiness for purchase by magnifying the cultural current/subtext of Celebrate Yourself ® Because You’re Going Downhill And You’ll Slide Even Further Unless You Use This Rejuvenation Cream/Powder/Supplement/Slimming regimen/Thigh Tightener….

Then, in the very middle of the catalog, I stumbled upon two pages of…well, dildos. Some of them were described euphemistically as “massage wands”  while the other Bobs    [1]   and selfie sticks were more wink-wink-nudge-nudge about it.

Yet again, I digress  (which, BTW, happens as we age to everyone).

 

 

As I live my life, as I observe myself and my fellow members of my species – what (IMO) “works” and what doesn’t; what I admire and what I frown upon; what I think is helpful, both personally and society, and what I think is no fucking way are you serious? – I have developed an OSITY file.

 

 

 

Clarification: The OSITY file isn’t a material folder of any kind.  Rather, it is a mental accounting of the characteristics I find essential to Being A Good Person® – characteristics I hope to maintain and hone…most of which I think can be broadly classified into two categories: curiosity, and generosity.

Yep; I think that covers just about everything.

 

 

*    *    *

Department Of I Don’t Mind…

That when I’m looking for something on youtube, somehow – most likely because The Internet ®  knows that I have the heart and soul of a 11-year-old – my search window defaults to this:

 

 

*   *   *

Department of Employee Of The Month

 

 

It’s that time, to bestow that prestigious award upon moiself.  Again. The need for which I wrote about here.   [2] 

*   *   *

Freethinkers’ Thought Of The Week     [3]

“Judge a man by his questions rather than by his answers.”
( François-Marie Arouet, better known by his pen name, Voltaire  [4]   )

 

 

“If something does not look odd, it is less likely to be investigated.
That is precisely why ‘normalcy’ serves as such a protective covering for so many patriarchal institutions.”
 ( Cynthia Enloe, American author, political theorist, and professor, quote from her book,
Seriously!: Investigating Crashes and Crises as If Women Mattered )

 

*   *   *

 

May you cultivate your own osity file;
May you maintain (or at least appreciate) the heart and soul of an eleven year old;
May you judge people by their questions and not (necessarily) their answers;
…and may the hijinks ensue.

Thanks for stopping by.  Au Vendredi!

*   *   *

[1] Battery Operated Boyfriends.

[2] Several years ago, MH received a particularly glowing performance review from his workplace. As happy as I was for him when he shared the news, it left me with a certain melancholy I couldn’t quite peg.  Until I did.

One of the many “things” about being a writer (or any occupation working freelance at/from home) is that although you avoid the petty bureaucratic policies, bungling bosses, mean girls’ and boys’ cliques, office politics, and other irritations inherent in going to a workplace, you also lack the camaraderie and other social perks that come with being surrounded by your fellow homo sapiens.  No one praises me for fixing the paper jam in the copy machine, or thanks me for staying late and helping the new guy with a special project, or otherwise says, Good on you, sister. Once I realized the source of the left-out feelings, I came up with a small way to lighten them.

[3] “free-think-er n. A person who forms opinions about religion on the basis of reason, independently of tradition, authority, or established belief. Freethinkers include atheists, agnostics and rationalists.   No one can be a freethinker who demands conformity to a bible, creed, or messiah. To the freethinker, revelation and faith are invalid, and orthodoxy is no guarantee of truth.”  Definition courtesy of the Freedom From Religion Foundation, ffrf.org

[4]  Voltaire was “… a French Enlightenment writer, philosopher (philosophe), satirist, and historian. Famous for his wit and his criticism of Christianity (especially of the Catholic Church) and of slavery, Voltaire was an advocate of freedom of speech, freedom of religion, and separation of church and state.”  (Wikipedia entry)