It was a psychological experiment gone horribly awry. The objective? To test the power of the spoken word and its subsequent effect on the human psyche. The victim? My friend Ben, a pacifist so mellow that it would require the use of powerful pharmaceutical stimulants to bring him up to the level of a catatonic…
THE CITY SLICKER AND THE COUNTRY BUMPKIN
Never ask someone whose childhood nickname was Miss Prissy to go on a hiking trip with you. It never ends well. My sister had never been the outdoorsy type, not even when we were kids. My favorite place to be was up a tree or wading in a creek. Hers was indoors in a make-believe…
ITS BACK TO THE PIONEER DAYS FOR ME NEXT THANKSGIVING
If I had been a settler of the early American frontier, I would have been forced to approach the preparation of the Thanksgiving feast entirely differently. At my house this year, the turkey came from the store frozen, the yams were in a can, and the dressing came out of a box. The rolls came…
THE HIDDEN MESSAGES IN NURSERY RHYMES
Giving up my addiction was much harder than I had anticipated. I attended weeks of meetings before I had the strength to stand before the other addicts and state, "My name is Denise, and I am a television addict." The psychiatrist I went to was no help. "Do you realize," she said, "that television is…
THE WORLD’S OLDEST PROFESSION?
When I graduated from high school, I was naive and aimless. While leafing through a magazine, I found the name and phone number of a career counselor named Herb. Maybe he could provide some direction. "What are your interests," asked Herb. Are you interested in retail work? No? Maybe food service? No? Agriculture? Do you…
AN OPTIMIST, A PESSIMIST, AND A FLAKE
While an optimist can occasionally be pessimistic, and a pessimist can occasionally be optimistic, but a flake remains eternally as flakey as grandma's homemade biscuits. I have a theory that every social group has at least one in each of those categories. Not sure which one you are? If a homeowner receives a piece of…
YOUR COMPUTER: THE CYCLOPS THAT KNOWS TOO MUCH
Our computers know way too much. I haven't totally trusted them since way back when I watched the movie "2001, A Space Odyssey," in which Hal, the computer, proved to have a murderous, power-hungry mind of his own. I am convinced that in the decades since the first computer was developed, computers are in constant…
