Thursday, December 27, 2012

Post Secret/ Mayans/ consumer culture

 

Dec. 16 Post Secret:

"Frank, I'm sending you my key to her house- it hurts too much to keep and throw away.  I'd rather it be here.  No secret- just the pain of a love we could never get right..."

Dec. 23:

"I've been praying that God would do an "It's a Wonderful Life" thing with me and show me what life would be like without me.  I'm not looking for catastrophic differences.  Just something to show me that I'm living for something."

"All I want for Christmas is a positive pregnancy test."

Email: Frank- Last year, a couple of weeks before Christmas, I posted this secret to the PostSecret App.

I received so many responses of heartfelt encouragement and offers of prayers. It was amazing how much love the PostSecret community shared. I was devastated when my pregnancy test came back negative two days before Christmas.

Amazingly enough, a month and a half later, a trip to the doctor revealed that I was pregnant! I can't thank the PS community enough for being an amazing group that I could lean on. Thank you for the encouragement, thank you for the prayers. My beautiful baby girl is now three months old. Merry Christmas to my PostSecret family<3 p="p">
"I know my purpose in life is to change the way people see the world.  And themselves." 

Postcard: There's a bubble that says: " 'I can't.  She asked if I could spend Christmas with her.'  I can't wait till I have a girlfriend so I'll have an excuse to spend the holidays with another family."

"My happiness is your happiness.  Your happiness is my happiness.  I know what we have is love."

"I have a few things on my Christmas list, but I would give all of them up if that could give my dad a job."
(The postcard has a Christmas tree that says: "All I want for Christmas is...sweater, sneakers, money (things crossed out) to see my dad smile again."

Dec. 26 Christmas: I worked all day Christmas.  I went home and had a roast beef dinner with my family.  After that I read a bunch of Christmas articles from the newspapers.

I don't know about you, but Christmas is a 2 month event.  It starts on Nov. 1, at least for retail.  As soon as Halloween is over, you pull out all the Christmas merchandise out.

Amnesia: Here's some good news.  This woman who had amnesia and was wandering around Toronto, has finally been identified as Linda Hegg.  She had schizophrenia.  She has a university degree in languages.

"Police say an amateur web sleuth helped them make the connection to Hegg, who was reported missing in the United States after she had already arrived in Canada."

http://ca.news.yahoo.com/mystery-woman-turned-toronto-shelter-amnesia-now-identified-165630945.html

Mayans: Here's an article from Yahoo.  It says: "...one of the most advanced civilizations in the ancient world. They had advanced concepts of astronomy and mathematics, and they had an intricate system of calendar."  I didn't know they were an advanced civilization.  I was thinking: "Why should I believe what some people from centuries ago thought that the end of the world was happening?"

http://ca.news.yahoo.com/blogs/geekquinox/mayans-actually-wrote-why-end-world-happens-tomorrow-202840768.html

Apocalypse: There is often lot of talk of the end of the world.  I remember in 1999, I read a book about the millennium.  I forgot what the book was called.  It was for kids/ teens.  It mentioned in the year 999, everybody thought the world was ending, and they gave away all their live stock by setting them free.  The world didn't end, so they returned to normal life.

There was panic of the year 2000, and nothing bad happened.  Last year, there was "The Rapture" and nothing happened.  I wrote about it, like I was watching a MTV Live promo and the hosts said: "This is the first show after the rapture!"

The audience cheers.  lol.

Dec. 27 Consumer culture: Yesterday was Boxing Day, so I find this subject fitting.

Clothing: On Nov. 19, 2012, I read an article by Courtney Shea who writes "The Weekly Challenge."  It's a self-improvement column.  She has to spend a week wearing the same outfit.

Article: "In her 2011 book To Die For: Is Fashion Wearing Out the World, British journalist Lucy Siegle reported that the average British woman currently buys almost half her body weight in garments per year, and owns a whopping 4 times more clothing than she did in 1980."  (Same for Canadians.)

The article mentioned the movie The Fly where Geena Davis asks Jeff Goldblum why he has 5 identical suits.  He says it's about not wasting time thinking about fashion, and makes him think about more important things in life.

Me: I find the challenge easy.  I have a black shirt from work that I have to wear, and wear black dress pants.  Prior to getting the uniform shirt this year, last year I had 5 black shirts I had to wear for work because you have to wear black.

When I worked at the Soup place, I wear a selection of shirts I owned.  I don't buy clothes, because I mainly get them from my sister.

Save your money: On Nov. 13, 2012, I read an article in 24 by Joanne Richard. 

It talked about people hoping to win the lottery and your kid's athletic skills will win them a college scholarship.

Money guru Nathan Dungan: "In both instances, you are suspending rational thinking for an outcome that will most likely lead to disappointment."

It talked about how we spend too much money going out to eat.

Rob Livingston (president of Capital One Canada): "We're using food as a way to reward or treat ourselves- we learned this is the No. 1 motivating factor behind why people overspend."

Facts:

"Women overspend on groceries, clothing, and personal care items.
Men overspend on bigger ticket times like education, shelter, and vehicles.

In planning for a secure future, men hope for a salary increase at their current job.
Women hope for a new job that pays significantly more."

Words: I've been reading and have come a lot of words I don't know, so I went to dictionary.com:

Oryx: "a large African antelope, Oryx gazella,  grayish with black markings and having long, nearly straight horns: an endangered species."

Coccyx: "a small triangular bone forming the lower extremity of the spinal column in humans, consisting of four ankylosed rudimentary vertebrae."

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