Shopping Tips and Guidance by Mandy Claire

Welcome to "The Gods Are Bored!" Laughing through Cyber Monday -- got Spare's gift at a deep discount by being up at 5:00 a.m. for a cyber deal. Sure beats standing in line in the cold and dark for an hour, only to find that the bait-and-switch item you wanted is all "sold out."

Time to pass along a little free advice!

I thought of this while I was watching "Harry Potter and the Incessantly Endless and Pointless Plotline." If you're candid with yourself, you'll have to agree. Holes in the logic here, people.

One of the biggest holes in Harry Potter is the whole wand thing. Proof beyond shadow of a doubt that the author is not now, nor ever was, a Pagan.

How does one procure a wand in Harry Potter's world? Oh, gosh! One goes to a store. Buys it. Sure, the wand "speaks" to you. But you still have to buy it. I presume that the more doubloons you have, the better the wand that speaks to you. And in this saga, the most powerful wand is buried with a wizard whose grave is so easy to plunder it just boggles the mind. Wands. Bought and sold. Stolen. Borrowed. Grabbed and used by others.

Baaaaammmmmp! Foul! Pish tosh!

The whole point of a wand is this: You invest your time, energy, and love into it. Not your cash. Don't ever let anyone sell you a wand, no matter how beautiful it is.

Let me amend that. You can buy a beautiful wand for its appeal, but don't expect it to work for you. A working wand starts with a stick you pick up in the forest. Feathers you find here and there. A charm someone gives you. String. That little bead on the floor just at the edge of the fridge.

What does a real wand look like? It looks like you. It's a reflection of your personality, because you made it. If you're showy, it will be snazzy. If you're quiet, it may just be humble. The point is, to have an effective wand, you must make it yourself, from things that really speak to you.

On we go to the whole point of a magick wand. Have you ever tried pointing one at someone and saying, "Drop over dead, you wastrel?" Not that I've done it, but my guess is that this would not work.

My wand is an object to hold when I am meditating or reflecting. Good energy was stored in it when I made it, and I take it with me to places where I know it will absorb more good energy. I don't use it for protection, or for show, or for spell-making. I just hold it in my lap.

This morning I thought about my wand. It was the Monday after Thanksgiving, 40 minutes before lunch, and my English Honors class bounded into the room like a pack of Tiggers. Hot on their heels came my Language Arts supervisor, newly hired by our district. He had come in for an informal "walk through." So, clipboard in hand, he watched as I spent about 15 minutes trying to calm a dozen 14-year-olds who must have had Sprite for breakfast.

The charming evaluation forms have a place for a numerical ranking. One (1) is "needs improvement." Two (2) is "barely ok." Three (3) is "decent." I got one-half. Not a 1-slash-2, a .5. Fifty percent. Half. Which isn't even on the sheet.

It's at times like this that one wishes for a Harry Potter wand. Just wave a fancy stick, shower everyone with "quiet dust," and zap the supervisor with the sinking feeling that he's forgotten his wedding anniversary and ought to biff off to the card shop.

Real wands aren't like that. A real wand welcomes you home at the end of a tough Monday and has you laughing into the wind and looking for faeries in the ivy. A real wand sits at your elbow as you make dinner, chat with your daughter, trash-talk the River Tribe on Facebook. Soon enough you might as well have had that quiet dust, because it doesn't really matter anymore. Tomorrow's another day, and maybe the Tiggers will be turtles, and maybe Gatsby will turn away from that green light on the dock and say to himself, "Can't repeat the past. Off to Tibet."

It's Cyber Monday. Get your magick wand today! It's not in a store or even online. Be like Dorothy. Look in your own back yard.

Welcome to "The Gods Are Bored!" Please be patient while I record a few notes for my future reference.

When visiting the homes of my children and their families, I should:

*Figure out which chair is the favorite of the lady of the house and not inhabit it.

*Only volunteer in the kitchen when asked to.

*Go with the flow, not try to direct it. Others may be tired from working all week.

*Be very mindful of my aging body's bad habits and adjust to my surroundings.

*Spend time with grandchildren, not with children. Children work, and they're tired.

*No more than three nights.

*No organ recitals.

*No complaining about the schedule.

*Be very mindful who the alpha female is in a home.

*When tempers fray, seek a quiet corner.

Heinikka was founded in 2007. We specialize in scrapbooking and card making materials & tools. We begun first as internet based shop only (www.heinikka.fi) and then opened our shop in Kälviä. During the year we travel on many of the Finnish Craft shows and on our stand you can see demonstrations on for example on the latest scrapbooking / card making & stamping techniques.

Welcome to "The Gods Are Bored," sadly drawing toward the end of a long weekend! Don't pay attention to what the governor of New Jersey tells you. School teachers work hard. At least I haven't found a way to pace myself yet.

But today I come to you with a very serious message. Please be seated and pay attention.

I just heard from Kevin Spahr, the producer/director of "Glen Rock Fae," a documentary about the Spoutwood Fairie Festival. Kevin didn't write to me about the festival or the film, however. He wrote to me because he saw that I like buzzards, and he had an up-close-and-personal conversation with one this summer in New Hope, PA.

As Kevin tells it, a young buzzard was strolling the streets of New Hope, cadging goodies from tourists. It was not intimidated by the crowds (which intimidate me) nor by the dogs. In fact, it tried to jump up on his lap.

Of course, having a vulture jump onto my lap is the stuff dreams are made of. Well ... let me re-phrase that. Having a tame vulture jump on my lap while I'm hale and hearty is the stuff dreams are made of. If I'm slowly expiring and a buzzard is overly eager to nibble, I might not be so pleased.

Pay attention, now. If a vulture ever acts this way around you (cadging treats, tugging at your shoelaces for attention, fearless of people and domestic animals), call 911 and track that bird. Don't let it out of your sight until Animal Control shows up to take possession.

Vultures are a protected species and should not be domesticated. However, every now and then some well-meaning human finds a baby buzzard and brings it indoors and tames it. Vultures are very intelligent. They learn fast who is feeding them. Unlike parrots, they are virtually noiseless. They can't vocalize at all hardly. Eventually, though, their toilet habits make them undesirable as pets. It's at that point -- when they're mostly grown and completely clueless about how to live as a buzzard -- that their foster parents drop them on the side of the road and tell them to find a possum.

The people at wildlife rescue do not kill these domesticated birds. They use them as teaching tools. I saw one domesticated turkey vulture on Hawk Mountain last September who was thoroughly enjoying being the object of attention while still living a quality life in a wildlife rehab center.

What happens to a tame buzzard who isn't taken in by wildlife rescue? It can get attacked by dogs or hit by a car. In rural areas it will starve. All this is needless suffering, because healthy turkey vultures, tame or not, are not euthanized at wildlife rehab centers. They are either nursed back to health and returned to the wild (if they know they're buzzards), used as teaching tools (if they think they're human), or allowed use of a flight cage (food and roost for life) if they can no longer fly and aren't tame.

If you can get close enough to a buzzard that you could pet its head, and it's not hissing at you and vomiting on your feet, call Animal Control. That's not the way buzzards behave. They are very shy and want nothing to do with humans who are alive.

The word of Vulture for the people of Vulture. Thanks be to Vulture.

Welcome to "The Gods Are Bored!" Why would you go sit in a traffic jam at the mall when you can shop right here, save a bundle, and get everything you want for your holiday extragvaganza? Yes, we at "The Gods Are Bored" are offering a one-day, half-off special on hard-to-find items. Whip out that credit card and fill your shopping cart!

1. Peace of mind: This HTF commodity is in very limited supply here at "The Gods Are Bored," but if you act right now, we will send you total and complete peace of mind at a 20% discount. Be wary of those who would offer you peace of mind by reading religious books or attending services! True peace of mind can only be achieved by .... no, wait! Buy first, find out the secret to peace of mind later! Heck, that's how most religions handle it. Why should we be different?

2. True Love: Very, very HTF! This is not a spell or an herbal enhancement here. It's pure true love, the complete works with significant other, heart strings, and "you complete me" kit. Lifetime guarantee. Yours on Black Friday at 10% discount and free shipping. (Sorry, no returns on this item.)

3. High Adventure: Tired of your dreary life? Chuck it all and climb into our fully functional Tardis! Travel this world and others, saving everything, all the time, in the nick of time. Limited offer: Buy today, get The Doctor free! You'll want to have him too, because it takes awhile to learn how to drive the Tardis.

4. Spiritual Enlightenment: Go for the real thing!  You know how many phonies there are out there trying to convince you they have all the answers? We've got the answers! Fresh from ancient and forgotten texts, these few, sure-fire steps will have you enlightened before you can say "ShamWow!"  Today only, buy one spiritual enlightenment, get the second at half price. You don't get offers like this every day. Just sayin.

5. Patience Extender: Back by popular demand, our patience extender helps you to deal with all annoying situations and people far longer than you ever could have imagined! If you're surrounded by aggravation, this is the perfect item for you. It is highly effective if used properly. Two-year limited warranty. Half price with mail-in rebate.

6. Breathtaking Beauty: Now mind you, people pay tons of money for this with no guarantee of success. There's a secret to it, and in our Perfect Beauty Sampler, we give you step-by-step directions to the kind of gorgeous visage usually reserved for starlets or baseball players. Change your life! You know it's all about looks. Walk the walk. Two-for-the-price-of-one special, great when combined with True Love, above.

7. Kittens and Puppies That Never Grow Up: Scientists have been trying to do this for years with no success. We know the secret to how this is done, and we will share it with you on a half price basis, today and today only. Some restrictions apply.

So there you have it, readers. Your Black Friday shopping early and in one spot, and useful gifts too! But don't stop here. Remember that "The Gods Are Bored" regularly offers free advice, and you can't do better than free!

Any other gifts you could possibly need can be found at the stores listed in my sidebar. Enjoy your Black Friday ... my mother-in-law is here at Chateau Johnson until Monday, so the Patience Extender is running on high.

Welcome to "The Gods Are Bored!" You may be an only child. You may not have siblings. But I'll bet you have at least one cousin somewhere. Aren't cousins fun? I don't know where I would be without mine.

This past week my far-flung cousins sort of came together in an odd synchronicity.

First I heard from my dad's nephew, Cousin Brad. He had found a buyer (we hope) for our farm in Appalachia. He has been living there with his dad (and sometimes in the wintertime by himself) for a long time. Dad Brad is well-mannered and thoughtful, spiritual and an outdoorsman. He is engaging company and has always comported himself in a way that harms none.

Dad Brad wanted me to get in touch with some other cousins of another Dad uncle. Which I did, and they all want to sell the property, and they all are quiet and well-mannered people. It was a pleasure catching up with them. In a jiffy we had a consensus, and I assume that Dad Brad is proceeding with the details of the transaction.

I also have a Mom Brad ... another Cousin Brad who is a BAMF. Trouble is this dude's middle name, and it's been that way since he was a kid memorizing Hitler's political speeches and giving them in German to the general dismay of his WWII veteran father. Mom Brad was a frequent resident at my home when I was growing up, especially after he got expelled from his high school in Springfield, Virginia. Four decades of checkered career later, I also heard from him this week.

Now here's a piece of free "Gods Are Bored" advice: If you send out chain emails, be careful what you send when you hit "reply all."

A mutual cousin of Mom Brad and me sends this stuff all the time. I delete her mass mailings unopened. But Mom Brad opened it, saw that it was pictures of Muslims in London carrying signs threatening the safety and security of Europe, and read the message that we Americans should pretty much annihilate anyone wearing anything other than a baseball cap on his or her head.

Mom Brad, who has lived the past decade in Germany (surprise!) fired off a vitriolic response to the mass mail, sending it not only to our mutual cousin, but to everyone on her "reply" list. She blistered him back -- also to everyone on her "reply" list, and her son-in-law blistered him too. ("Take your medication." Apt as hell, but not funny.) Mom Brad sent an even more feverish response back -- again to everyone -- predicting that the Tea Party would bring our country down as Nero did Rome, or some such.

Coming the same week as the polite emails from my dad's family, I was struck yet again how different my parents were, and how different their families were. Mom's family had dough and patrician backgrounds, and they resolutely behaved like white trash regardless of the big houses and cars. Dad's family lived deeper in Appalachia, on less money, but they had better manners and gentle sensibilities.

Isn't it funny how childhood personalities stay with us as we grow old and gray? I could talk to Dad Brad all afternoon. If Mom Brad calls, I don't pick up. In fact, I go to the mall until bedtime.

Still I sent Mom Brad a private email saying he got mistreated, and that if I was him I just wouldn't open those forwarded emails, they are uniformly aggravating. He wrote back promptly, promising to call me soon.

Time to go to the mall. Oh, crap. It's Black Friday!

Welcome to "The Gods Are Bored!" We passed exhaustion about 50 miles back. Literally can hardly hold my arms up to type.

But here's a story from my sister's neck of the woods, and Sis stories are always worth a read!

About a month ago, Sis and her spouse took in a Korean exchange student who was having issues with his host family. The young man in question does not speak English very well.

At first I thought the student was just a public school invitee, but it turns out that he's being hosted by a horrifically conservative Christian private school inconveniently located in a backwater redneck enclave near the Mason-Dixon Line. Sis has to drive him to and from this school every day, an hour round-trip.

I don't know the details, but the young man pulled a Saturday detention. Sis dropped him off at noon. When she picked him up, they had shaved his head. He was limping from all the running they made him do. He had additionally been made to do sit-ups and push-ups and yard work.

The big thing, of course, is the hair. Someone at that school shaved the kid's head.

The Facebook pictures tell it all. In the "before" pictures the little dude looks something like an Asian Justin Bieber, with one of those shaggy, combed-to-the-front, Beatles-style mops. Now? Now he looks like a thug. All he needs is a do-rag, and he could pledge a gang faster than you can say, "Some Christians are a menace to civilized society."

I guess the morons at the B******** Christian Academy don't keep up with trends. If they did, they would never shave a kid's head to the dome. I'm not sure of the legality of this in the first place, but the kid's family is in Korea. Sis is his only advocate, and she is maximum pissed. But what can she do? If the school dumps the kid, he'll have to go home.

Mind you, this young Christian Korean chappie is no blood kin to me, but if he's under my sister's roof, that makes him family. As a proud Pagan auntie, I intend to take steps.

First, I will research and call upon the bored deities sacred to the Korean people prior to the arrival of Christian missionaries. To these deities I will carry the grievances of a boy who -- whatever he did to deserve detention -- did not deserve to be shaved. I will ask the deities to speak to this young man and pull him back to their ways.

Then Ima gon' inna Philly and buy that dude a ghetto hoodie with badass graphix in a non-affiliated color. Got the hair, get the threads.


A cheerful thought to end this post: The person who shaved that poor boy's head goes into a voting booth and casts a ballot. Sweet dreams, reader!

A very brief dispatch from "The Gods Are Bored." We have a potential buyer for our farm in Appalachia -- the owner of the adjoining property, who would be buying it as an investment and would be looking for vacation renters. I have asked the bored Goddess Cloacina, who is in that neighborhood just now, to shed Her brilliance on this transaction.

If the purchase is made, a property that was split up in the 1930s by my great-grandfather would all be in one person's ownership again. Not a family member, but a neighbor in good standing since 1987.

Please toss a coin in a charity fountain with a prayer to Cloacina on my behalf. The person who may buy my land would let me tread upon it in a most liberal way.

FROM ANNE
THE MERLIN OF BEDFORD COUNTY

PS - Thirty, count 'em, 30 copies of The Great Gatsby! I love you all!