Are you an emotional pawn?

Hello lovelies!  I've just started reading a book entitled Trust Me, I'm Lying: Confessions of a Media Manipulator.  The author, Ryan Holiday, tells his stories of "marketing" for his clients, many of whom have millions of dollars for budgets.  He starts off by telling about a time where he designed, paid for, and put up a billboard, then drove to it in the middle of the night, dressed in black, defaced it, drove around the block, took pictures of it, and then sent it to various media outlets in the morning.

The response was astounding.  But he wasn't finished or satisfied - he submitted anti-women articles about it to feminist groups, anti-Christian articles to Christian websites, and made repeat calls for anonymous complaints about it.  

It blew up astronomically.  People were angry from every corner of the world and he got exactly what he wanted - overwhelming attention with very little effort.  He played on people's emotions in order to suck them in.

Even though it was completely fake, it became an event - a "true" living, breathing, emotionally charged reality - for hundreds of thousands of people who became entangled in his deliberately artificially manufactured emotional net.  He got them.  He owned part of their minds.  He won.

He refers to a political cartoon from 1913 that is more true today than it has ever been before. In it, we see a businessman throwing coins from a gigantic bag of money labeled "money for business announcements" into the mouth of a tentacled monster, whose head is the press and whose arms include "cultivating hate", "slush to inflame", and "distorting facts".

 

I believe that we are at a critical time where if we do not pay very close attention and fight back, the monster will destroy all of us.

Right now, if I asked you who your enemies were, would you easily be able to rattle off a list?  Consider it -

The right hates the left.

The left hates the right.

The vaxers hate the antivaxers.

BLM hates the police.

Half of the country hates the post office.

Antifa hates everything and everyone.

These, we are told, are our enemies.

What if we're being played?  What if our real enemy is the media?  

Our national presidential election was last week.  On election day, after being told daily for months by every single person across all social media platforms, through billboards, on television and on radio, to vote, to let our voice be heard - we went to the polls.  We did our civic duty.  We felt proud of our little patriotic stickers. We were so proud that we took pictures of ourselves wearing them like a gold star on our foreheads in a kindergarten classroom, some of us posting our picks to social media, watching the likes stack up and watching the haters react.  We regurgitated and reaffirmed that we had a voice and that our voice mattered.

The counting began and the main event started.  Even though we knew that we would not likely see results until at least the next day, millions tuned in to watch as if it were the big game, cheering for our side, feeling more tribal than ever.

We cheered when our team got a point and likewise boiled, muttering and scoffing in wonder at those who voted against what was clearly a sane, educated, forward thinking choice.  We thought of those with the yard signs - the ones on "our side" and those who were on the enemy's side - and our love and hate grew yet more.

I have the app for Ted Talks on my phone.  A week before the election, I got a notification from Ted, telling me that I might be interested in what would surely be a valuable talk.  It was entitled, "What if a US presidential candidate refuses to concede after an election?"  It was given by Van Jones, a CNN political commentator.  

Huh.  That's interesting.  Are we predicting the future?  Or are we just setting it up?  Do we have a history of this that I need to be alerted to something that I should expect to happen every four years?

What we saw next in the days following was surveillance videos, personal tiktok videos, and eyewitness reports showing that our votes - our voices - may have been compromised.  I watched a ballot counter in a yellow vest and a white mask lift up a ballot, point to the presidential section where it was marked, and then rip it up and throw it over his shoulder.  I watched a personal video and heard eyewitness reports of ballots being brought in to downtown Detroit in coolers.  I heard that the Dominion software (funded by the Clinton Foundation) used in critical states was flip-flopping candidates names (like in Antrim county in Michigan).  Attorneys were called in, and what was thought to be a guarantee was now being contested.

While questions were still ongoing, we watched CNN declare a winner.  There was a speech.  People reposted a video of Ms. Harris making a phone call to tell Joe that they did it.  We watched women repost all over social media to "watch out" because there was "glass all over" since the glass ceiling had been broken. 

Without taking a side on the previous two paragraphs, I want you to think about what was really going on.  Fly yourself up above this and go big picture.

What was happening was the creation of a slush to inflame.  Whatever "side" you find yourself on, you are wired and pulled and tempted and played with to become emotionally entangled.  Why?  

Because we know that fear and anger will turn your attention and potentially drive you to action, and that, more than anything, is what they are there for.

They are not there to create peace.  They are not there to unite.  It does not pay to make peace.  The clicks on the media slow down when things are at a state of equilibrium.  When the world is in an uproar, it is good for the media.  It pays their bills.  The advertisers crank out even more, in hopes to get your attention. 

My concern is for what will happen once they've hooked most people onto one very passionate, die on this hill side.  

What if the legal battle turns the decision the other way from what the media declared?

The fire will engulf us.  Those who thought that the glass ceiling was broken will crumble in despair at it being so unfairly snatched out of their hands.  Those who thought their voice was silenced will rejoice that they were not eradicated.  The media will have created another group to be us versus them, another team to be on, and another source of heated, passionate division.

What is the end of this?  A civil war?  The thought of that gives us so much pause, but it brings gleeful delight to the media.  How juicy!  How absolutely fantastic!  They will have unleashed the monster for near complete annihilation of the American people and what we know as our culture, our way of life, and the future of our children's lives.  

I submit to you that those that you think are your enemy are not.  We know that we can believe differently and still be civil, unless we are perpetually fanned to do so and swallow it.  Contrary to what you've been told, Don and Joe aren't your enemy.  BLM and Antifa aren't your enemy.  The keepers of the glass ceiling aren't your enemy.  The police aren't your enemy.  The post office isn't your enemy.  Hunter's laptop isn't your enemy.  Joe's blond leg hairs aren't your enemy.  Don's border wall isn't your enemy.  Those are all logs to make the fire bigger.

Our enemy is the media.  You feed them every time you bow to worship their almighty proclamations, swallowing all of it whole: hook, line, and sinker.  Every time you feel the burning in your chest to smite that "other group", they found another hook to own you, to leverage your own emotions for their purposes.  They mock your pain, your desire to be justified and vindicated, and do it all while hiding in the background, throwing out fiery arrows to the middle of your street wrestling match.  

From what Ryan Holiday tells us, why shouldn't we believe that much of what is out there is literally created out of thin air for the purpose of getting that attention?  

How willing are you to place your emotional stability into the hands of an entity that lies to you and uses you?  You get a choice to answer that question every single day, multiple times a day.

We can get above it and see the big picture or we can continue to be pawns, fighting amongst ourselves, never looking up and seeing that we're really in the middle of a boxing ring on the Truman Show.  

 

I'll leave you with this picture quote that I found today that I hope makes you consider the true state of what is going on.

Who and what will you willingly give your power and your life energy to?  It is no small thing and you should not bestow it haphazardly or unthinkingly.  Will you stand up and fight for humanity?  Will you help reconnect us?  Will you reframe your thoughts to recognize that others who believe differently than we do are not so different from us?  Will you be hooked and swayed by every wind that the media blows at you?  Will you believe all of it, whatever "side" it comes from?  Will you ignore the fact that the only thing they want is your pocket, your will, and your passion so that you can be shaped to carry out their desires, schemes, and plans?

Will you live the rest of your life content to be a pawn?

Peace, love, and reach out - one person at a time, one day at a time - we can do this,
Ms. Daisy

The Year the World Lost Its Entire Mind

Hello lovelies!

I'm writing to you from the middle of June in the year of our Lord 2020, a time in which all persons inhabiting our once beloved planet are absolutely and wholeheartedly certain of one thing: we hit the tipping point and tipped waaaay over.

Is it because of the rona?  No - unless you have hooked yourself up to an IV of CNN, you are easily able to see that the predicted terror ended up being quite a bit of an overblown issue (not to say that it didn't exist or affect people - it did, but not at the levels we were being terrorized with initially).  The rona was so like, spring 2020 and we are totes like, mega over it.  Figuratively and literally (if you hear of the waving of a "second wave" flag, I'm pretty sure it's because the media misses all of those clicks and the powers that be miss all of the diabolical levels of control they get out of bludgeoning the masses with the scaries.  That level of power is highly addictive.), quite frankly.

Is it the media-stimulated race riots?  No, but it is linked to that.

Is it ANTIFA burning down buildings and smashing windows with bricks and making a lovely tent village with speeches and dance parties for themselves where naked people run down the street saying that they are prophets looking for their children, proudly declaring that they aren't part of the United States (but rather, "Chazikstan"), while still using our wifi, EMS and hospitals for the drug overdoses, building (the very literal and social) walls (that they ironically hate and riot and terrorize about), and silencing any differing opinion?  Well, no, but that touches the fringes of it.  (And if you're mad about Chazikstan, I hear you, but just let them be for a couple weeks and you can have a front row to watching the inevitible rise and fall of a very sad social experiment.)

No, it is none of those things, and neither is it even the chaos of the liberties that people have allowed to be stripped away from them out of fear.

What is it, then?

It is the silencing of rational discourse with the rise of cancel culture.

Could it be any more in your face (literally?) to silence people symbolically by forcing them to wear a mask, stripping them of their identity, individuality, oxygen levels, and muzzling them while taping directions on the floor of their local grocery store, telling them how they ought to walk?  This is the physical that has translated to the emotional, out into the atmosphere, that is now flying around the internet-sphere.  And flying it is.

Over the last couple weeks, we have seen countless examples of the vocal mob crying out to crucify anyone and anything that they deem as inappropriate, whether or not the person's opinion was justifiably and/or intentionally offensive or not.  This crucifixion is not only social, by people declaring they are now unfollowing them on social media (OH, THE SEARING PAIN!), but it is an outcry to demolish their livelihood, business, passions, and future.  This is once again a physical parallel in domestic terrorism of the destruction and arson of physical buildings as a result of the emotional world.

What once was "only" name-calling (you misogynistic, transphobic, fascist, homophobic, sexist, racist!) and slander on social media as a result of differing opinions is now full-blown catastrophic destruction if someone is caught in the crossfire and dares to think for themselves outside of the popular groupthink that is making an attempt to burn through the nation. 

Why did that name-calling start?

Name-calling in this realm exists most often from people shying away from the difficult work of digging through something together in order to try to understand another viewpoint. 

You don't like what someone is saying and you don't want to consider their points?  Call them a name.  Block that conversation from going anywhere.  Feel much better about yourself.  Nod in victory at your obvious moral high ground.  Threaten to unfollow, share with friends.  Spread the virus of the inability to have an intelligent conversation over a subject with which you strongly disagree.  Never even entertain that any aspect of their point of view could be valid because you are busy not listening to anything they are saying, convinced of your superiority.  Such intelligence.  So noble.  So big brain.

What harm could it do?

That is the catalyst that has led to a college football coach grovelling and begging for forgiveness because he wore a certain t-shirt while fishing. His running back, offended at the sight of his coach wearing an OAN News Network t-shirt while fishing tweeted that it was unacceptable and that he will not be doing anything with Oklahoma State until things change. 

I just want you to back up one second really quick with me here.  A man went fishing at his leisure.  He wore a t-shirt with the emblem of a news network on it.  Another person saw it and threatened to quit working with him because of it.  The university said that they would not "tolerate insensitive behavior" such as this rude TV network t-shirt wearing fisherman. 

Please.  Go with me for just a second.  This is the United States of America.  You can dye your hair purple.  You can identify as a tree.  You can fill your backyard with rocks.  You can drive a car that has figurines glued to the roof.  You can dance the cha-cha slide.  You can play basketball at midnight in your driveway.  You can refuse to shower for a week.  You can wear a skirt with combat boots.  You can tattoo your neck.  You can name your kid after viruses.  Why?  Because whether you like all of the results or not, we have the freedom of expression.  We are entitled to our own opinions.  We have the liberty to come to our own conclusions and to express them within our free society.  (Yes, I'll admit - that's getting harder for many to practice as we are bombarded with propaganda for what and how to think, but it still exists.)

This bizarre example is not one that is few and far between.  The founder of CrossFit, Greg Glassman, was stripped of his position for tweeting the opinion that there were some that were taking advantage of the death of George Floyd and manipulating it (just as had been done with Covid-19) by his tweet that stated, "FLOYD-19".  Furious tweeters demanded his resignation, saying that he was racist, and then pulled his business partners in, demanding that they withdraw from their partnership (like Reebok).  Reebok jumped ship, terrified to be associated with anything that the masses declared scandalous. His history of funding and supporting people of color did not matter to anyone, nor did anyone want to open up that door to conversation.  They wanted to call him a racist and end him, and that is what they did.

Whether or not you agree that he ought to have tweeted that, and whether or not you agree with his opinion, it is still only his opinion.  It is within the realm of his freedom of speech to declare such things.  You don't have to like it.  You don't have to agree.  You don't have to be friends with him.  But just because you disagree with another person does not mean that they should be silenced and destroyed. It is the mark of intelligence and maturity to be able to have a conversation with someone that you disagree with, and it is the embodiment of a free society to be able to express your personal views, whether they be popular or not.

Another aspect of the danger of groupthink was displayed recently with masses of people displaying black squares all over social media in an attempt to gain traction to end racism.  Perhaps I have been fortunate to surround myself with people for my whole life who think the very idea of racism is absolutely absurd to hold and expressly intolerable - in fact, I've only been aware of a very small handful of people who have ever vocalized anything overtly negative about people of color, and those people were very old and are now dead.  I don't know any person in my generation who has ever leaned positively toward becoming a racist.  It is the very fact of why so many scurry from even the hint of any behavior that would be linked to it.  Am I a minority for that?  I don't know for sure, but I have a hunch that even if a person was closeting feelings of racial superiority, they would never dare express it because they know it is wrong and that it is offensive, as they should.

With that being said, though, what happened on black square Tuesday on social media did not necessarily lend a hand in the right direction to fight racism.  Instead, what it did was influence people to behave a certain way and to display a signal to others that they were not racist and that they were going to prove it.  Instead of being comfortable with who they are (knowing in their heart that they were not racist) and displaying it in real life, in action, in loving others as they ought, they felt discomfort that someone might accuse them of being racist for their sin of omission of not following the masses and what was trending that day by not displaying a black square.

Certainly there were many who were passionate about connecting to other races of people - and we know that they are because they live it in their everyday life.  It was already part of who they are and at the front of their minds, but I fear that the majority of people who posted that did so more out of the fear that others would think less of them if they didn't.  That is not fighting racism.  That is unthinkingly following the vocal mob.  If you need to prove that you are not a racist with a black square, maybe you need to do a little bit more soul searching and think deeply about where you are at and what you believe.  The whole world is better when you're thinking critically.

Where do we go from here?  I beg that you connect with people who don't think like you and who are not like you, not so that you can call them names or crucify them on social media, but to explore the other side in an effort to truly understand - to expand yourself.  I encourage you to shun cancel culture wherever you see it as it is the very epitome of silencing voices.  But most of all, I encourage you to think for yourself and to use the liberty you have to express your own thoughts. 

You never know, your thoughts and opinions might not be a scary minority, even if the media tries to tell you that they are.  But even if you do not hear many other voices like your own, if you're not you, what are you even doing with your life?  Who are you?  Speak up.  The free society deserves it.

Peace, love, and think for yourself,
Ms. Daisy

The Fear Factory

'Ello lovelies!  (Go back and try again in a British accent if you didn't do that the first time around.)

What a year so far, amirite?

It's been enough of a wild ride on the free-flowing, wavy scrolls of hoarded toilet paper, diving deep into the deepest depths of oceans of hand sanitizer for any of us to likely want to climb aboard the crazy train again any time soon.

I am sure that many of us have had significant time to ponder and reflect on many new things (including - but not limited to - what you might trade toilet paper for and if you were going to be adventurous enough to make your own hand sanitizer from your liquor cabinet).  There are a few things that I have been rolling over in my head and I thought to share one with you today.  Are you ready for a ride into my brain?  It's wilder than the life of a Costco toilet paper roll.

I think that if there was one emotion that could be collected and weighed across all of humanity starting somewhere in late winter, fear would come in first place.  In many of our lifetimes, we have never had to deal with something that had such a wide span, affecting so many all at once.  One day we woke up and schools were closed.  And then the next day, they were closed for the year (three months out).  The next day, people were afraid of airports.  The next day, people were working from home.  The next day, we watched Italy singing from balconies, locked in their homes.  The next day, we were locked in our homes and high fives and hugs were essentially declared illegal.  The next, they took away baseball.  The next, people started wearing hazmat suits and disinfecting their groceries.

There is absolutely no reason that you could have ever gotten to a hazmat suit and a pile of $37 N95 masks that you burn inside out in your driveway on the way in and tossing your Rice Krispies into a bathtub of bleach without being completely terrified of something.  Three and half months ago, if you would have done that, they would have called 911 and put you into a mental institution.  Today, you're asked for your bleach concentration recipe and stared at for your tremendously stylish hazmat outfit.

How did it get that way?  It was that a lot of people truly believed the worst of what they were seeing in the media, and not only that - they believed it was probably going to happen to them and to their loved ones.  Imagining dangerous things happening to you and your loved ones is probably one of the strongest catalysts for change and wild unnatural behavior that you could ever find on the spectrum of humanity.

As people dove in headfirst, the media felt the exhilarating rush of clicks.  They upped the coverage.  The clicks went exponential.  The media stood in their quarantined offices with their fingers spread out to the sky, eyeballs flickering, purple-blue electricity pouring out of their wrinkled fingertips,  voices suddenly strengthening, and erupting with, "No, no!  YOU WILL DIE! Unlimited power!" while launching Samuel L. Jackson into the sky.  In a few short moments of our life, all news turned into coronanews.  In fact, in the first few weeks, I saw an infographic that showed the amount of times a word had been mentioned in the news.  Ebola was in the millions over the course of the entire epidemic.  According to Sprinklr, a company that tracks language and trends and helps manage social media images and brands, just on one single day - February 28 - 6.7 million people mentioned the rona on Twitter and on social media platforms.

 Personally, I am not one who likes to submerge myself into the news machine.  I don't want to support the media getting ad revenue for their hysterical hype, leveraging the novelty of a pandemic to benefit themselves financially. As they play on people's vulnerability and panic, they push others into a downhill spiral, scouring the world to shock them daily with more terrors and horrors, digging up the most random one-off experience you wouldn't find unless you were on page 19 of a google search, and then making it front page news.

I don't know if you noticed this, but it seemed that all of the media everywhere only had about six stories to pick from to broadcast on any given day. No matter what news outlet it was, they were all saying the same thing.  It was like it was either completely lazy journalism (and I use that term very loosely) or otherwise a very united front to decide what stories were going to make it to your homepage.  Those headlines would sit on top, ready to be gobbled up by the eager clicking masses who had barely just opened their eyes for the day, and then re-spread in various degrees across social media, infiltrating every crack and corner of life, giving people the Next New Thing To Freak Out About.

(And then their cortisol levels from stress tanked their immune systems, and they worried more into a perpetual spiral, making themselves more vulnerable to the thing that they were most worried about. SLOW CLAP.  Awesome job.)

You can get people to do anything if you work up enough panic.  Rational, thinking, level-headed people will turn to bleaching their cereal boxes, turning their masked faces 180 degrees away from other's in terror, afraid to pick up a box of pasta without a gloved hand.  These small things are the proof that you can get them to do big things.

This is the place that we stand and wonder at society.  Where are you?  Is it possible that the media may have their own interest in mind?  Do you believe everything that you're told?  How much do you question?  What if you weren't afraid?  Wouldn't you like to feel that way again?  (I ask that knowing that there are some people who totally get off on panic, so even though it could be rhetorical, it isn't.)

You know what?  You don't have to watch the news.  You don't have to read the headlines.  You don't have to know every gory detail of what someone is putting out for you.  You don't have to wake up and throw yourself into panic and depression.  You can just do your thing.  You can avoid any scrolling through facebook.  You don't have to open it up at all.  You don't have to argue with those who disagree with you.  You don't have to read the news before you go to the grocery store.  You can just go.  You can go outside.  You can call your friends.  You can smile at people at the grocery store and interact like they are a human being instead of the Black Plague personified.  You can refuse to drown in it.

Do you know what happens when you do?  You feel a lot better.  You're not fueling people who don't have your best interest in mind.  You're not giving them power over your day and your emotions, creeping into your subconscious, prying one thing after another away from your once much happier life.  When something wild happens, you will be clearheaded enough to react appropriately to it, and not with a knee-jerk survival mode.

I just thought that you should know that you're not obligated.  Maybe you could try it for a day and see how you feel.  Or don't.  Whatever.  It's a free country.  Kinda.

Peace, love, and take back your brain,

Ms. Daisy

Facebook Breakup (again)

Social media is quite the thing, isn't it?  If you're not in the mix of it, you're what the rest of everyone would deem as either lucky, crazy, or just busy with other things.  Personally, I have a love-hate relationship with social media (mostly hate, but whatever...well, except for Instagram.  Instagram is bomb.), with hating facebook at the top of the list.

Why do I jump in and out of it?  Why do I do this to myself?

Quite frankly, I always hate it, but sometimes I participate in the madness because I need it for business.  It's hard to be able to reach ~500 (or however many) people every day otherwise.  You can toss something out and get a good response almost all of the time because the people in your tribe want to support you and help you.  When I ask for help, they are there to back me up.  When I am feeling hilarious and like I need to get on stage, I pop on and say the funny thing I heard that day and then yay, oh yay, I get the laugh face.  I love the laugh face.

But what is the cost?  I'd say about one gajillion billion pounds of wasted time, energy, life, and motivation.  I scroll through that sucker like nobody's business sometimes because for crying out loud, if you miss that your friend had a death in the family, you are going to be an insensitive jerk.  And what about the people who are having health problems?  You want to be there to support them for that.

To be honest, if you think about it, most of it is not that - most of it is people writing the ten concerts they went to, the meowquiz (or whatever it is), the passionate politicos, and pictures of people's children (playing soccer/football/baseball/etc.), dogs, coffee cups, inspirational quotes, and dinners.  (Don't get me wrong, I love pictures of dinners.  I will stop and look at that, no joke.  I'll be analyzing it...hmm, you think that was cooked in avocado oil?  Is that a Teflon pan?  For heaven's sakes, these people are using a Teflon pan.  Do I say something?  Do I compliment the food and then tell them it would have tasted better in a cast iron pan?  Am I seriously looking at a picture of someone's dinner for like three minutes right now?  Good thing this isn't a waste of time...)

Then there is the fine line between what you can say and what you can't say.  Do you want to be all political?  Do you want to be obnoxious?  Do you want to be hilarious but potentially offend people?  So then what can you say?  Am I going to have a boring page of saying nothing?  I can't bear the thought of that, but I don't really want to offend my friends, either.  Can I say what I want but in a way that won't offend them?

Okay, okay, okay, this is getting a little out of hand.  What if I just have it to comment on other people's pages?  What if I just kind of hide in the background and randomly comment?  You know what, I'm not a hide in the background and randomly comment kind of girl. I'm more of a let's-see-if-this-crazy-thing-can-be-worded-so-they-know-I-still-love-them-while-I-say-something-totally-bananas.  Yeah, that's still a time waster.



So, I'm out.  I am on the facebook fast.  I've purged it from my life.  It's nice, I have to tell you.  I don't have to check it, I don't have to wonder.  I don't have to think, "Did anyone think that little girl who can't stand slow walkers was awesome?  Did I get like 99 likes or what?  Are people congratulating me at finding such a winning video?  Are they reposting it because it is literally the best video they have ever seen in their life?"  (Which, BY THE WAY, that video was seriously the best ever.  Watch it.  Are you type A?  This was you as a child.  In fact, this is you now, you just know how to conceal it better.  No joke.  This kid is my hero.) 

I apologize to all of my dear friends who have to roll their eyes and my ups and downs with social media.  I know, I'm sorry.  It's tedious and horrible to watch someone go in and out of a relationship like that, but I really can't help it.  Sometimes it just must be done, no matter the longing and call it puts out to you.

Yes, at first it's hard.  It's like, wait, what do I even do when I go to the bathroom now?  Slowly but surely, you can find coping mechanisms to deal with the new changes.  They are hard and you don't like them, but since you've committed to the change, you have to just bite your lip and get through it.  Thank you, sisu.  (There are harder things in life.  There are things that make you wonder if you really want to wake up in the morning.  Dumping facebook should not be one of them.)



Do I miss it?  I miss the connection, yes.  I really do.  I miss how easy it is to get in there and find someone to reach out to.  People are posting funny things and some need the kind of help that you provide.  That's the hard part.  Not being able to swoop in and be that hand for someone.  (Although, if you're reading this, please, just call me.  You know I'll help you.)

But on the other hand, just imagine your level of productivity.  In fact, I have to tell you something.  I got down to ZERO emails in my inbox as a result of this change.  I'm ahead in all of my work, and I even attended a PTA meeting, where I gave my opinion on not letting teachers have traditional desks (thumbs down - are you trying to kill them?). 

Have you ever thought of it?  Have you ever wished you could just give it all up and ditch social media entirely?  It really is possible.  It's the fastest way to lose 1000 pounds, or at least that's what it feels like.

I dare you to try.

Peace, love, and Luddites,
Ms. Daisy

p.s. Just because I'm gone doesn't mean I don't love you.  I do.  You know I do.  xx