I LOVE my new Kindle2. Love it. I've done more reading in the last three days than I probably have in a month. It's a fascinating toy. I'm sure the fascination will wear off, but when it does I'm equally sure that it'll be just as awesome in a different way. I mean, once I'm used to using it, I can tell I won't be aware of it. Reviewers say that it "disappears when you're reading", which is as it should be. But I confess that it isn't really disappearing to me right now because I'm having too much fun with buttons and gizmos.

My favorite things:

1. The ability to highlight and annotate. Really well done Kindle books, I find, have all sorts of navigational links built right in. But if they don't, I can make up for that with the highlighter. And if I have thoughts I can digitally jot them right in using the keyboard, which is astonishingly easy to use compared to texting on a cell phone.
2. Wireless shopping! And sample chapters! I can download the first chapter to see if I like the style of writing, and I can keep that sample for as long as I like. I can also put something on my "save for later" list. I can shop right at the Amazon Kindle store, although I find that a little cumbersome and prefer to shop at Amazon. I wish I could have an on-line wish list that would transfer to my "save for later" list, maybe that's coming.
3. Portability. To the people who insist that nobody needs to drag a reference library around with them I say this: What sort of boring life are you leading, anyway?? My first downloads were all of my favorite references that are available in Kindle format. The psychic fair on Saturday was extremely slow, and my helper and I entertained ourselves by looking up animals and reading dream meanings. We were about to break out Heal Your Body and start diagnosing symptoms, but someone stopped to talk to us, so we didn't make it. Can I do that without a Kindle? Only if I'm dragging a ton of books around with me everywhere I go. The Kindle weighs nothing (relatively speaking), and fits in my purse!
4. How easy it is to use. The interface is very intuitive, and the instructions are very clear for anything less than intuitive. There are features that I haven't tried yet, but the dictionary and search functions are fantastic. Particularly when combined with the ability to highlight, bookmark, and annotate.
5. Battery life - even with being on line, I just now got the low battery warning. And I already know that I can read while it charges. Awesome!

Have I mentioned, yet, that I really really LOVE this gadget? :-)


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Life is what happens when you're busy making other plans. I planned to refinish the tub, drive to Albuquerque for a week, and drive back.

Instead, I applied the first coat of finish, and then drove to Deming to retrieve my mother from a hospital after her car rolled around on I-10. She's fine. Nothing broke. Some bruises, some minor scratches, that's it. I am thankful.

Deming, I learned, is a five hour drive from Tempe. We stopped for a nap outside of Tucson on the way back. I tried to apply the second coat of bathtub finish within the specified timeframe, but it turned out that I was tired and befuddled, so really what I did was screw it all up. I'll have to get another kit and start the whole process over. But at least the first coat was decent and it corrects the problem I set out to correct.

We drove back to Lordsburg on Friday to get all of my mother's belongings out of her car. The wedding cake smells like cake but looks like paste inside its cooler. In stark contrast to that, we took four bottles of champagne from the car intact. There was only one wine bottle that broke so that the car and my mother reeked of alcohol. All of the wine soaked contents of my mother's car are now sitting aromatically in the trunk of my car. The car was a Subaru Forrester.

We also drove back to the crash site to make sure there wasn't anything left there and generally look at it. The cop was there taking measurements for his report, and so he walked us through the scene. That was probably a good thing, but I did find it stressful. I took plenty of pictures, but didn't think the skid marks and trenches and broken fence posts would photograph well with my cell phone and so don't have any to post here yet.

Since I'm not in Albuquerque like I thought I'd be, I was able instead to do some work this weekend. Provided party services on Saturday night, worked with a great hypno client on Sunday afternoon.

I am so tired... and I can't use my bathtub until Tuesday!
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So about that surprise block party... I suppose if either of us were sports fans my friend and I would not have been surprised, considering that the All-Star game was here today. We did figure out the overall theme and put it all together. But how fun is it to think you're doing one thing and find yourself at a block party instead? If you don't know, I'll tell you - it was fun. :-)

Today I was a useless blob all day and then I realized that I should be getting my bathtub ready for refinishing and became a frenzy of activity at 9:30 pm. Really it's absurd. Better than it was for a while there, but still a very unstable schedule.

Therefore, even though I've been planning a post in my head about disembodied spirits in general and the finer points of exorcism using hypnotherapy methods, today is not the day. Maybe tomorrow.

There. That should make you tune in!
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Once in the stillness of a lazy day she turned from him and walked away. His hand reached not to keep her there; her back to him, she did not care.

There in the shadow as she found her way she moved along on feet of clay. His voice called not for her return; a sound for which she did not yearn.

Once in the tempest of a storm-tossed night she ran from him headlong full flight. His eyes looked not to see her go; her back to him, she did not know.

Clear through the woods her heart did sing, she rushed along on feet with wings. And when at last she did take flight... all the wrongs at once came right.
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Oddly, I find that things I wrote ten years ago or so are all true today. Prophetic without realizing it... or could it be manifesting?
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So about that BBQ free Laveen Pit BBQ... it has been dubbed the Lavegan Pit BBQ. I can't imagine how disappointing it would be for the organizers, vendors and performers to have the pig come out of the pit the wrong temperature. They couldn't serve it, and so we had the option of eating rolls, slaw, beans and cookies, or taking ourselves somewhere else. And that's how we ended up at a Red Brick eating pizza four hours after we thought we were going to be eating BBQ.

Four hours later because of course we still caroused the stalls, such as they were, and checked out the old cars and took the kiddies in the group on rides. I found a hot pink bracelet that matches the hot pink earrings I happened to be wearing. And also a couple of neat things to give to my mother.

So I worked most of yesterday, and got to spend some quality time doing fun things with friends today. Life is good! :-)
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Sunday, February 8, 2009 - 2 am (or so)

I love psychic musicians. True, that might sound like a sweeping generality, and maybe it is. However, I can't help noticing that almost all of the best relationships I have are with musically inclined people who are very far over on the intuitive side of things. Let's count.

My musician. (I call him that even though really he doesn't belong to me at all.) The greatest gift I ever received while working in the soul-destroying life-sucking career field. At any rate, he's a musician. Plus! We have dreams that we both remember. I call them spirit dreams.

My piano teacher. No, she isn't teaching me to play piano, that would be a losing proposition. She's a friend and she teaches piano to people who actually have some aptitude for the instrument. And yet! I met her in hypnotherapy class. She's extremely intuitive although she does not consider herself psychic, but she definitely belongs on this list.

My friend the closet dancer. Forget it, she isn't dancing in your closet! She's from a very musical background, and although she doesn't play an instrument she has dance in her blood the way musicians have music in theirs. Most dancing works out better with music so I say she counts, and guess where we met. That's right! HypnoBirthing® class. She's at least as much of a whackadoo as I am. At Least.

My legal eagle friend. We met in a way that had nothing to do with hypnotherapy. At a spiritual gathering, in fact. And she plays an instrument. And she's very intuitive indeed. Not to mention her very strong focus on healing work.

So I think the odds are very good that what I need in a relationship is a psychic musician! Glad I finally got that sorted out!

Perhaps I should consider calling it a night. What a day, though - I participated in a wellness fair by providing Reiki treatments on a donation basis, and I went straight from there to birthday party where I was the tarot reader. I thought the band was great, but unfortunately what I was doing forced me to tune a lot of it out. It takes a little while to wind down after a full day - but I have a little four-footed friend stomping all over me and insisting that it's time for bed. He's usually right, so off we go!
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What I'm really appreciating about this new lifestyle is the way that every time I start to feel like a complete slacker, I find something to do so that I don't feel that way.

I slept too much yesterday. I was feeling sluggish and disgusted by that, when I had the thought that maybe it was time to write more of the castle story. I tend to forget that the sleep disorder was related to that. So I sat down and wrote. The story could use more polishing, but the whole thing is now down in black and white. I'm aware that I could fill in more detail but find myself deeply reluctant to do so. Which is fine with me. What I have done has been difficult enough.

I spent some time looking into publication methods. I thought I wanted to go the traditional get an agent route, but maybe not. Maybe one of the hybrid methods would be good. Fortunately I don't feel the need to actually decide until the book has been written. I got started with the modern day chapters and realize that it's going to take some work to get my story organized into a clear presentation of my ideas.

On another note, what a great super bowl game! I'm not really a sports fan. I don't follow anything, don't watch it on television... but this year I really wanted to watch the super bowl. Maybe because of the miracle of the Cardinals having made it that far. And you know, it was a good game. I couldn't help noticing that the Steelers are roughly 10% larger in physical size than the Cardinals. And even though they couldn't hold the lead, I thought it was very impressive that the Cardinals even took the lead. It was a good showing and they have nothing to be ashamed of. Okay, maybe the personal fouls were a little OTT, but whatever. Go Cards!
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It's amazing the way gratitude and loving one's life vanish when a cold arrives on the scene. I've been fighting it off for over a week, I thought successfully, but it appears that I'm succumbing after all dagnabbit. Well it won't be bad and it won't last. So there.

Today's horoscope says to let someone know how I feel before it's too late, because I've been sending mixed messages and the other person doesn't know how important they really are. Huh. I can't really imagine that... and if I could imagine it, I have no idea who it would be that I've been confusing so. So much for today's horoscope! I think I'll take the opportunity to learn how to read tea leaves instead.

I sent out feelers for a super bowl party. Everybody knows I don't care for football and don't have a television, but for some odd reason this year I want to watch. Maybe because of the miracle that makes the Cardinals one of the teams. Maybe because I'm finally over having football rammed down my throat in stereo all those years ago. Whatever the reason, I'd like to watch this year, surely there is a party I can crash.
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I think I must have forgotten what it feels like to be alive. There's nothing like a blood sucking soul destroying job for killing any inkling of joy, gratitude, freedom... So when it returns it's like a miracle. Nowadays I wake up grateful and looking forward to my day. There are moments when I actually love my life. Good grief, I had lost my belief that it was even possible to love my life!

We have recorded our second CD, Healing Rain. I'm not sure how I feel about this one, but I know that I cried after recording it, so I'm pretty sure the script works. :) As if it wasn't enough to cry after recording, I cried again when we played it through to get the voice/music balance worked out. Good thing Randall knows how to be kindly entertained by a sniffling girl. We also learned with this session that we need to start every session with some sort of invocation or Randall's computer will crash repeatedly and none of his files will appear on the file list. As soon as we asked for assistance everything was fine for the duration, thank you Azrael. I think we're on to something.

But enough about the second CD, what is important to note is that we are finally starting to earn money on the first CD! Back in November, someone listened to one track on Napster, and as a result, in January we have $0.011 in the bank! Yes you read that right! $0.011

If the road to riches is paved with pennies, we are definitely on that road! :-D

My house has suddenly become much more organized and orderly, and any day now I'll have to start pursuing methods of garnering actual income. I know that clients are coming any day now!
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At last I have more things to say than I have time and space to type them. I'm always surprised by the length of my entries - it's the short version! It is! I swear!

I am excited to have a recording session scheduled for tomorrow. We've been trying for three months to put the second album together and it's thrilling to finally be there. Not that we've sold any copies of the first one yet, but that's a minor detail. We have a body of work that is waiting for us to present it, we can see it stretching out in front of us, and we know that it is ours. We should get on with it already. Poor Randall, I am always so impatient. He's not exactly what I would call a saint, but he is tolerant of me.

I am also excited to have a past life regression session scheduled for tomorrow. I learned some things with my surprise past life and I think it's time to address something else in the same way. One of my friends told me that in his experience there are physical symptoms that occur before a past life spontaneously surfaces. I had physical symptoms for a week before my surprise experience - I couldn't wake up, I was freezing, I had morning sickness. Morning sickness. There was no way, it was so confusing. But in retrospect it does seem reasonable that the recall of being poisoned and buried alive while in the first trimester of a pregnancy in another lifetime would lead to queasiness, sleepiness, and coldness in this lifetime.

So lately one of my eyes has been bothering me. Not just the eye, though, that whole side of my face, on down into my neck, shoulder, and upper arm. I keep having an image of something that seems extremely violent and that is probably related. Not that I want to visit another nasty rotten experience... but I would like to have my eye back.

I think the way it all works is amazing, simply amazing. The ability to heal is such a blessing, even when the process sucks. My agreement with God has always been that I will do whatever it takes to heal, and yet I was skeptical, I didn't believe, I sat on the fence... and now I am led to share Truth as I know it. My past life regression book will be a great book, it really will.

I bet this post is long already, and I'm not really finished....
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I have been feeling tremendously guilty for not posting to my blog - after all, what's the use of a blog that nobody posts to? So I'm glad to finally be sitting here typing, even if what I have to say is a list of excuses and justifications. :-)

The first thing that happened was that I facilitated a past life regression for a friend. I've been pretty much on the fence about past lives, but have never doubted past life regression as a valid and useful therapy tool. I therefore have not hesitated to facilitate them. However, this time when my friend reached resolution, I was affected.

Someone told me that it's probably an occupational hazard. Maybe so, but it certainly wasn't one I had anticipated. I was forced to spend some time working through my part of the past life I'd shared with my friend, which was no small effort. Fortunately help was available. In the process I found the tools I needed to effect healing on the cellular level and seem to be mostly done healing a sleep disorder.

None of that is exactly what I would call a picnic. Totally worth it, and I am extremely grateful to be able to address things in such a way. But still not a picnic. Healing is like that, I find - it's great to be healed, but doing the healing often sucks.

Next I went to Albuquerque for a while to help out while my mother was on a vacation. It was great to spend that time, I love that I can pick up and do that. As a family we're not used to me being available, but it sure is great that I am. I watched old movies with my grandfather. Let me tell you, that's the way to do it - every thing you wonder about while watching is something you can find out on the spot.

During the drive home yesterday I saw something in the sky and felt that God was looking down at me. At that moment I knew, all through me knew, that it's time. The old is done, the new begins, it is time. I asked for help with the parts that are still a struggle for me - I wondered if there is ever enough faith, and was informed that I have always had exactly the right amount. Hadn't thought of it that way, but I suppose it's true. After all - here I am.

As I was dragging suitcases from the car to the back door, a voice said to me, "you have the most beautiful aura I have ever seen". um... I said really? He said yes. I thanked him. He said that it almost looked pure, but that couldn't be right, because I looked too old for that to be true. I said, quite dryly, that I've done a substantial amount of work. He said yes, he guessed I must have.

Curiosity got the better of me and I asked him what it looked like. He said that the colors were shifting such that he couldn't really tell me what they were, but that all of it was clear and bright and full. I said that was nice to know. He said that he couldn't even detect scars and wondered how that could be. I told him that there is a way to cleanse even the scars, and that he must be catching me in an extra good moment, because I still have some things I'm working on and have not yet attained perfection.

Then he said, "God told me that I would know you by your purity. I wasn't sure, but here you are and now I understand." I said that really, we would need to meet - in person, in the physical world. I have a rule about that. He said he understood.

I thought it was a fun fantasy, and then I had a dream.

He was in the dream, of course. I know what he looks like, it was a very clear dream. We were doing something that had to do with boxes. Someone is packing or moving or something. He seemed very serious and I noticed that although I could see him clearly, I couldn't really see his energy. It had to be bright, though, we were not in a dark place.

It felt very much like meeting someone new for the first time, not like the times I've dreamt about someone new in this lifetime. This was a new person. I felt my usual hesitancy, caution. I thought that he was also being cautious and hesitant. In the dream I remembered my vision, and when I did, he commented about what God told him.

I woke up feeling just slightly freaked out. It's time, and he's almost here. Oh my goodness. I hope there's enough time for me to get the house clean!
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