25 Random things about me

1. I just celebrated 40 years on my chose spiritual path in January. The resonance of this anniversary is still being felt.
2. Mary Carroll Moore and Lloyd King doing this exercise was the direct inspiration for me jumping in. It just hit me we are all three Aries. I have been working on a memoir for years. It amazes me that Mary has published so many good books. I want to know how to finish and publish one!
3. I have officially been married five times although I only had kids in one marriage.
4. The only ex-wife I maintain steady contact with is Sheila, the mother of my kids. Most folks know she is also known as Omnec Onec from Venus.
5. The most memorable year of my childhood was 1954. I was 11. I spent the summer at Circle Pines Center in Michigan. Big Bill Broonzy was the second cook, my mom was his boss. He interpreted his job to mean Resident Blues Singer; I often got called on to substitute in the kitchen for him. I love revisiting my memories from that year. My mom gave birth to my wonderful little sister that October.
6. I lived in Berkeley and Big Sur, California in the early 60s. I still dream about Big Sur all the time and I love to look at the web-cam Nepenthe has online:`http://www.nepenthethebigsur.com/ The house I lived in was right over the hill from Nepenthe.
7. I spent most of my working life driving a cab on the streets of Chicago. I usually loved this work, it rarely felt like a job. I had a zillion cool experiences, met and chatted with countless interesting people, and got many important life lessons.
8. I also met many famous people. I picked up Studs Terkel and his wife Ida and established a relationship with them. It helped that they knew my mom from their work together in progressive politics. Ida was a sweetheart and Studs was always his awesome self. Lloyd, one of the folks who inspired this list, also was quoted in Stud's book on Race. http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/chi-studs-terkel-dead,0,2321576.story?page=1
9. Probably my favorite random cab experience was picking up Ray Brown and Milt Jackson, two of my jazz heroes. I had been thinking about going to their show but had to work. They insisted I come to the gig and how could I refuse? They signed my sketchbook and I did a cool sketch of them playing at the Showcase.
10. I also picked up Sid Caesar a couple of times when he was in town doing a show at the Briar Street Theatre with Imogene Coca. He was very gracious. My mom was still alive then and he autographed my day-timer with a personal note to her. I told him about watching “Your Show of Shows” when I was a kid, one of the first things I remember watching on TV. Sid had a certain nobility to his presence.
11. John Belushi fell into my lap when I was sketching one night at the Earl of Old Town. He was drunk. People had been elbowing each other when he was up on stage singing the blues but I didn’t know who he was. I hadn’t had a TV for years and so I didn’t see his early work on SNL until much later and I missed him at Second City too, even though it was right across the street. I just thought he was a mediocre blues singer:)
12. The most important person I ever met in my life was Paul Twitchell. Meeting him was a life changing event that is still resonating. I met him inwardly after reading his biography and finally in the physical in 1969. He claimed to be the Mahanta, the Living ECK Master and when I found out it was true and who that really was, my life was never the same.
13. Back in the 60’s I hitchhiked around the country twice. I have visited all 48 contiguous states although not all hitchhiking. I have never crossed an ocean in the physical, hitching or otherwise:) I have been as far South as Oaxaca in Mexico and just a few miles into Canada North. I would love to do more physical traveling although I satisfy my travel jones in the dream state which allows the ultimate freedom and the price is right:)
14. Back in the 60’s I had a minor motorcycle accident coming back to Berkeley from San Francisco State college on my Puch cycle. A guy in a car made a left turn, caught my rear wheel and knocked me down. I got a small puncture wound in my knee. Some friends came and picked me up. When I realized how vulnerable I was, this permanently cured me of my desire to ride motorcycles.
15. The one other memorable incident that happened on this same bike was crossing the Golden Gate bridge into Marin county. There was a strong cross wind, I hit an expansion joint, flew up and literally came down a lane over. Fortunately there was no one in the other lane. This should have cured me of my motorcycle mania but it took the incident described in #14 to do it.
16. I’m a pretty decent cook. Although I never was formally taught, I made a great soup from scratch without a recipe the first time I tried. I’m sure this came from watching my mother in the kitchen. She was an amazing cook and I guess I just learned without realizing it. I never asked her to show me how.
17. I went from being homeless to living in a million dollar house in Lake Forest, IL within the course of about three years. I should add that the house wasn’t mine, I was just house sitting for a friend who owned it and wintered in Florida. This is the subject for a much longer piece. It mostly has to do with the power of attention.
18. I recently moved into a low cost housing facility in Round Lake Beach, IL. It’s the first time in my life I have ever lived in a building with an elevator. I am grateful for this apartment now although I resisted the idea of living in a county housing facility. Its actually quite nice for the most part. The rent is based on 30% of your income so its dirt cheap, clean and quite livable. Not like the housing projects in the city. This is Northern Lake county, a whole ‘nuther world.
19. One of the old men I met yesterday is named Ernie Forester. He is 84, was a gunnery officer in the Pacific theater during WWII. I want to introduce my video game-loving grandsons to him. This guy shot down real planes with real shells, kids.
20. I have already started a blog about my new digs. I call it Lamb’s Lambs. The resident manager’s name is Pam Lamb. I couldn’t resist:)
21. I love all color. It is one of the gifts of life that makes it worth living.
22. I have had a blessed life. I still am working on giving back as much as I have been given. It seems hardly possible although I love the effort. Yea Yoda, I know, there is no try, only do:)
23. Contemplating the gift of the present moment always inspires me.
24. My last wife passed in ’02 and I often wonder if I will find another suitable partner. I miss that a lot although I really love and relish my solitude and won’t give it up unless its really, really right.
25. It is so cool to contemplate the community of friends that inspired this and is going to read it. I love you all.

hot dog

Beth Tyler posted this picture on Facebook which is the very definition of viral. It required sharing! Mustard, no Ketchup!

Stop Fluoridation!

I would like to stop buying bottled water, but from the research I have done, filtration and other processing can remove everything but Fluoride from tap.

Fluoridation is a big scam perpetrated on the public. Christopher Bryson in his book The Fluoride Deception says:
“Fluoride science
is corporate science,
fluoride science is DDT science,
it’s asbestos science,
it's tobacco science,
it’s a racket.”

The organization that is fighting the good fight is the Fluoride Action Network. Go to their website, take some action! Let's get our tap water drinkable again:
http://www.fluoridealert.org/

Miso: Soup part two

When one writes his personal experience, what ends up on paper/the screen is always just the tip of the iceberg. There was so much more that passed through my consciousness in that hour of soup preparation that what you have read is truly the tip of the iceberg. I trust you got that from my last sentence in part 1.

I wanted to mention Miso. This is another key ingredient in my soup. I learned about Miso from Dodie Bellamy many years ago when we had a brief life together. She is a very good cook and she taught me about adding Miso to soup. Thanks Dodie!

Our little live-together ended suddenly when I asked her to leave. We're talking 35 or so years ago. I often felt like I had been cruel and brusque.

Who should request friendship on Facebook recently but Dodie. She is married and living in San Francisco and doing poetry still and looks happy. It was so cool to be reconnected; basically I always loved her and was glad we could again be friends. Of course virtual friends are not real friends, at least in my experience, but they can be, and in this case we have such old karma together its nice that it feels all healed.

To say these are extraordinary times is to repeat the obvious. But I am amazed and excited by what is happening now that the winds of change are blowing so hard and cold. I am so grateful for all the years I have studied the spiritual life.

I know how to live on nothing and be blissfully content. I don't need anything that I am not provided with and I feel such gratitude for the way my life is going.

Sure I need to lose weight, etc. etc. but on balance I am a happy camper. Here, have some soup!

Soup

I had a great day. I signed a lease on a new, better, cheaper apartment. I got my heater fixed on my old Honda, although that didn't hold. I spent most of the day with my ex, and we always enjoy each others company. It was a remarkable coincidence that she had an appointment at a medical clinic at almost the same time and in the same area as my new building. Yes the universe conspired:) So I drove her and we spent the day together.

I got home fairly late and pretty much feeling exhausted. I realized that I had bought soup ingredients and I had scheduled myself to make soup also. I could have done it tomorrow, but I decided to go ahead, it only takes an hour.

I normally love making soup. It is a familiar ritual and allows me to contemplate as I work, since I have done everything many, many times before. Tonight was no exception.

My mother was a great cook and although she never formally taught me, I guess I spent enough time in the kitchen watching her that when I decide to start making soup from scratch many years ago I just went ahead. I don't think I ever consulted a cook book, I just followed my nose.

The first soup I made turned out pretty decent. I remember when she was still alive I asked her to sample my freshly made soup. She tasted it thoughtfully and said, "Its good but it needs tomatoes". I had forgotten to put in a can of cubed tomatoes which is what I have done ever since.

Except tonight, I realized I had forgotten the tomatoes again! I could blame it on Mercury retrograde, but never mind. I forgive myself and I was somewhat amused at making this same old error.

I was very conscious of the fact that I was cooking vegetables. I know the chicken and barley need the processing of heat, but I kept thinking of all the enzymes I was killing by cooking these beautiful organic mushrooms, onions, peppers, broccoli, garlic and yellow squash.

The raw food folks are definitely on to something. My making of soup was so much governed by habit and tradition. I though of that story about the woman who cut off the top half of a pot roast and threw it away. When asked why, she said, that's the way my mother did it. As you probably know, her mother did it that way because she didn't have a pan big enough to fit the whole roast.

Consciousness has been brought to the task. I love that there are always variations on the ingredients.

Food can be a great metaphor. What ever we put our attention on is food for us. Does it truly nourish or is it poison? I have been watching TV too much. I think of giving it up like some artists I admire, but all I really want to do is just be much more discriminating in what I watch.

After I made my soup I sat down in front of the TV and caught the rebroadcast of Chicago Tonight. Phil Ponce was doing a wonderful interview with a literary academic about Blagojevich's use of poetry in his recent press conferences. The man was very, very insightful. I loved it. I don't want to give up this kind of TV!

Mostly today with the warm Leo moon I was just feelin' the Love. I am blessed and grateful for every moment of this life. I would like to do a better job of being of service, and now I know how.

Spiritual Lessons and Growing from Hardship

Normally I sleep in on Sunday morning. I woke up around 6am this last Sunday and realized that this was the day I should finally get back to the Rogers Park Eckankar center and attend a Worship Service. I hadn't been to one in a long time and not only that, I was supposed to be the manager of the center so I was way overdue for a visit.

I especially wanted to see the remodeling job that had been done, supervised by my old buddy Ellen O'Keefe. Ellen is a great artist and I really wanted to see what she had done with that modest little space.

An amusing thing happened when I looked up and found what the topic was going to be for this particular worship service: Spiritual Lessons and Growing from Hardship. I had to chuckle; I may know a bit about that, I thought, no wonder I need to go.

I had experienced homelessness for the first time a few years ago. I had moved more times in the last few years than I care to count. Been broke? Sure. It is pretty hard to go hungry in America so I never had that problem, but I certainly had my share of what many would consider hardships in the last few years especially.

Experiencing close up the death of my mother and a few years later my wife was no picnic either; all that had happened recently enough that I could relate spiritual lessons learned.

This is how it happens with the ECK (Spirit). You get a nudge and if you're smart you pay attention to it. Trust me, there are times when I would have rolled over and gone back to sleep but fortunately, this wasn't one of them.

The Rogers Park Center is a tiny two room storefront right on the lakefront. Ellen had done a magnificent job transforming the place. As the room filled up, I saw a lot of familiar faces. In fact I knew everyone in the room except for one person. I should add that the average age of the 15 or so people there was in my rough estimation close to 50.

Vicky, the clergy was walking with a cane, Rosy sitting next to me had just had a hip replacement, and just by the age of the group there was no doubt that everyone had stories to tell that could relate to the subject.

So after Vicky made some opening remarks and read some quotes from some ECK books, the topic got opened up for discussion. She had hurt her knee when she was dancing with her students; thus the cane. The first question that was asked was something to the effect; Have you experienced any hardships? What have you learned?

After Vicky asked the question there was this silence. I had to laugh, and so did everyone else. Yes, how much time do you have?

So we talked about how we had dealt with the issues that had been dealt us. Afterwards, I thought about that pregnant silence. Eckists are taught to find the spiritual lessons in their life experiences and the folks in this group were used to doing that. Perhaps it was modesty that kept people from speaking.

Most of the session was spent listening to one very sincere man who was trying to overcome a tobacco addiction. He got lots of good advice from the group which essentially can be summed up thus; It may not be easy but you gotta tough it out and do what you have to do to get through it. Persevere.

He was advised to call upon the Mahanta, which is the Inner Master that works with each individual chela (student) in ECKANKAR and listen to and follow whatever inner instruction he is given. You gotta walk that lonesome valley by yourself, as John Jacob Niles used to plaintively sing. With a little help from your Friend, WahZ..That's the spiritual name of the Master.

People talked about using the "as if" principle and imagining oneself as a non- tobacco user. This guy chewed, he didn't smoke. He gratefully took it all in.

I think the other reason that not much was said by the experienced folks there about their hardships was that they realized that essentially we were all very fortunate. Rosemary who had the hip replacement talked about experiencing discomfort before hand and she got advised that the only way she was going to be able to function normally again was to get this major surgery. She said she had to train like an Olympic athlete just to prepare for the surgery. But she wanted it so she did what she had to do and so she got through it and now she could look forward to gardening again in the spring, playing with her grand kids, etc.

Rosy didn't say it but she knew that she was fortunate to be living in circumstances that allowed her to have the option of having that hip replacement. Everyone living in America has more good karma than they realize.

Seeing the challenges in our life as opportunities for spiritual growth is a powerful perspective to have. It transforms everything.

I mentioned experiencing homelessness. I should also mention that a year later I was living in a million dollar house in Lake Forest. How did that happen? In the first case I was worried about being homeless and after putting so much attention on it, it was inevitable that I experience it.

In the second case, I had a long time fascination with Lake Forest. When I was in the limo biz I spent a lot of time driving its beautiful streets, dropping off and picking up folks there. I put a lot of energy and emotion into wondering what it would be like to live there. Again, the common denominator was attention.

Where attention goes, there energy flows. Or as Dr. Bernard Jensen put it, your attitude is your altitude. Where are you flying?

Zen Habits

I just subscribed to this very cool and practical blog. Lots of clean design, good suggestions, well communicated.

Great attitude too! Here is a post title: Open Source Blogging: Feel Free to Steal My Content.

Here's the link: http://zenhabits.net/

Time, money and other illusions

I have an account at a website called Simpleology; I just went to log in there and I read the following notice:
Welcome Stan Schultz
Last Logged in: Sep. 25, 2008 11:46pm

The amusing thing was that I logged in at a little after 7pm, Sept. 25. This reminded me of a recent discussion I was having with some friends in an email group about sending emails to yourself from the future, etc. I would ascribe this event to Mercury going retrograde which happened earlier this week. Anyway, its all illusion...smoke and mirrors, baby!

Good thing to remember when you think about Bush and the Secretary of the Treasury asking for $700 Billion dollars from us Quick! with no accountability required:)

Row, row, row your boat
Gently down the stream
Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily
Life is but a dream.

ps. The image is actually a cool moving animation, a GIF. It doesn't want to move; anyone know why?

Pandora radio

Have I told you about Pandora radio? It is such a wonderful program that it has become one of those that I use almost everyday. It is a smart internet radio that is free. You input your preferences and it plays songs and tracks that match your preferences which you can constantly tweak.

I love it! Here's the link:

http://www.pandora.com

PS. The image is a pastel I did at Andy's Lounge on Hubbard St., Chicago of the Chuck Hedges Swingtet.

Binaural Beats

I just discovered a fascinating and possibly very useful website that allows free access to a series of healing soundtracks. You can play them on the Mp3 player of your choice. Among the choices are: Coffee, energy drink, relaxation, meditation, etc.
After some brief experimentation with them, it sounds like they do work and can be helpful and effective. Please check 'em out and let me know what you think.

http://www.i-dose.us/

Dylen the photographer

My grandson Dylen took this photo of me on a recent outing to the park in Vernon Hills. Not bad for a 7 year old, eh?

Shimer

www.shimer.edu.

My alma mater. I had a blissful college experience here 1960-1962.

water4gas

Perhaps you have heard the buzz about hydrogen as being the fuel of the future. Well folks, the future is now. This is an amazing, practical solution to the high cost of gas that you can implement immediately. You can recoup your investment in weeks with the cost of gas being what it is. Check it out:

http://tinyurl.com/3bymvb

Mark Joyner does blogging

I'm evaluating a multi-media course on blogging from the folks at Simpleology. For a while, they're letting you snag it for free if you post about it on your blog.

It covers:

• The best blogging techniques.
• How to get traffic to your blog.
• How to turn your blog into money.

I'll let you know what I think once I've had a chance to check it out. Meanwhile, go grab yours while it's still free.

Waking dream?

I was watching TV late last night. Charlie Rose had a great interview with Alice Waters. I started getting chilly which is unusual since the TV room is usually pretty warm. I checked the thermostat and sure enough it was about 62 degrees in the house. The thermostat was set at 67. Something was amiss.

The furnace had stopped working.The manual said not to try to relight the pilot manually. All the electrical stuff was working ok. No need to belabor all the gory details. It is now the next day, the repairman has been called, and I am waiting for him to arrive. The house is chilly but I have a little electric heater nearby so I am not freezing.

But I am wondering about the furnace going off. Is this is a waking dream? If so, what is the significance?

A waking dream is a sign from Spirit. Sometimes they are easy to interpret and other times more mysterious. I am still working on interpreting this event. I am not even sure it is a waking dream, not every event is. But I do wonder.

The primary event that preceded this was the post that preceded this one, Big snow. It made me wonder if I was being irresponsible by airing my negative imaginings. As an artist and as someone on the spiritual path I am very conscious of the effect of my words. Could this be it?

I was speculating on the fragility of things, and sure enough I am sitting here in a cold house with no heat. Did I help to create this situation by publishing those thoughts? I am inclined to think that is the likely scenario. In fact the only reason I have not removed the previous post is because I want to share in this learning experience with you. I had submitted this same article to Associated Content but deleted it this morning, pending my conclusion of this investigation.

Of course there is a more sweeping interpretation, ie, my light is out. Have I fallen asleep spiritually? I don't feel like I have. I am more inclined to the previous interpretation.

A couple of interesting things happened this morning. I got an email from a woman I don't know asking me to vote for a short film she had done to be aired on PBS. I was particularly annoyed that she published my email address along with a hundred or so others, inviting further spam.

I was curious about her film though so I followed the link she provided. The film was about a murder. I wrote her to suggest she not spam people and also suggested she use her talents for more uplifting purposes. Do I need to take my own advice, especially the latter?

I also got a email from tarot.com inviting me to get a free I-Ching reading in honor of the the Chinese new year. That sounded like fun and I love the I-Ching so I got the reading. I asked if the furnace going off was a waking dream. I got the hexagram of Patience changing to the hexagram for Determination.

As I sit here chilly wanting to go out and do some shopping but needing to wait for the repairman, counseling patience was certainly appropriate. But not necessarily an answer to my immediate question.

The thing I love about the I-Ching is that even if the reading does not seem to apply directly to your question, the answers always have some useful wisdom in them. Being reminded to be patient is rarely inappropriate.

Maybe this is just another manifestation of Mercury retrograde? Since this situation falls in the category of inconvenience and annoyance, it certainly has the right earmarks. Am I perpetuating the Merc.ret. issue by publishing these thoughts?

Chill out Stanley! That too:) I would love to read your thoughts.

ps. I just became an affiliate of tarot.com. I will write more about that later, but since there is a graphic inviting you to participate, in the interest of full disclosure I thought I should mention it. I have never spent any money there, but have gotten a lot of free readings. They have good writers.

Big Snow

We got a big snow today. We have actually had quite a bit of snow this winter in the Chicago area where I live, but it always seems to be followed by rain and/or enough of a thaw that it quickly becomes a non-issue.

For me it is an issue because I am currently living in a big house with a hundred-foot driveway and no snow blower, plow or other mechanical means of clearing the snow other than an old-fashioned shovel.

I got stuck in the driveway earlier in the week for the first time this winter so I know I was going to have to do some digging if I wanted to get my car into the street without getting stuck.

I have an old Honda Accord with front wheel drive and newer tires that is pretty good in snow. But there are limits, and with about a foot of the white stuff on the ground, I knew I was going to have to move some of it out of the way.

My larder is getting a bit low and I thought I would go out to do a little shopping today. I was putting off going out and finally got myself going about 4:30 with just an hour or so of daylight left. It wasn’t enough time.

I got about half the driveway done and was feeling pretty bushed. Mind you, I am almost 65 and overweight so I took it pretty easy. I don’t want to become another victim of the old cliché. I decided I would make do with what I had in the house and finish the dig out tomorrow.

A couple of interesting things happened while I was shoveling. My two closest neighbors were clearing their paved driveways with their snow blowers; two men and one wife.

I thought how nice it would be if one of my neighbors offered to help me with his snow blower. Didn’t happen. Of course I have a gravel driveway so it doesn’t exactly lend itself to being cleared by a snow blower. Was that the reason? Probably not.

I haven’t really met my neighbors, except for saying hello once to the guy next door when we were both in our driveways when the weather was warmer. I am just house sitting and have only lived where I am for a few months.

It just made me nostalgic for when I was a kid growing up. I lived in a housing co-op where the neighbors knew each other and helped each other.

The other thing that occurred to me as I was digging was how vulnerable we really are and how fragile our lives are. We take our comforts so much for granted. What would we do if suddenly we didn’t have electricity, or running water, or what if I wasn’t healthy enough to clear the driveway myself?

I know that Soul is Eternal and so I am not really talking about life and death. I am just talking about planning for the uncertain future.

I named my blog What Now Grasshopper? because this has been an old tendency of mine, to not take life seriously enough. By this I am definitely not suggesting that we lose our sense of humor and became nothing but grim and practical. A sense of humor is a vital survival tool. But there is a balance somewhere.

Perhaps it is in part the 9/11 Consciousness, in part because I want to make my life more useful and be of more service. It is significant to me too that I haven’t felt much like writing until I went out and did an hour of honest work. What’s that about?

My Ex-wife was born on Venus

I’m guessing that most of you who read the title of this article might be thinking that it is a set up for a joke. In fact it’s no joke. Her Venusian name is Omnec Onec. If you have not heard her story, you might want to continue reading this little introduction.

We met on Wells Street, Chicago during the hippie era in the middle 60’s. She and her girlfriend were playing at shooting hippies with toy rifles. I watched this little melodrama unfold.

Some of the hippies would play along and fall to the ground. The cops stopped her and checked out her weapons and discovered they were toys and told her to cease and desist.
After they drove down the street, the girls started up again. The cute blonde one shot me but I didn’t play her game.

I was however very attracted to her, so I walked up and introduced myself and invited her to tea. She accepted. There used to be a restaurant called the Stagecoach on the corner of North and Wells; we went in there.

She kissed me and the rest, as the cliché goes, is history.
We ended up staying together for more than 10 years, marrying and having two kids together. She spent 2+ years writing an autobiography with the help of a writer friend and we had lots of wonderful adventures together.

She had a hard time getting taken seriously. Jerry Springer had her on back in the early days of his show, along with our kids and me. The theme was, What was it like to grow up with a mom who said she was from Venus.

They intended to make a mockery of her, with a panel of scientists, etc. But Sheila/Omnec impressed everyone with her dignity and the seriousness and credibility of her presentation. To this day she is the guest that has gotten the most mail in response to a show.

We split in ’76 and soon after she moved to Germany. She was taken more seriously there and spent many years giving talks, seminars and workshops all over Europe.

She managed to get featured by all the major media in Europe and basically had a career telling her story and inspiring people with her mind-blowing experience.

Visa problems and other issues now have her back in the states. I would normally be babysitting my grandsons tonight, but she is in town so I am getting a break. So here I am returning the favor by writing this little piece.

She had a two-volume, 400-page autobiography that tells her story published years ago. Currently it is out of print. If you look on Amazon, copies are selling from $400 to $2000. It is still available in German translation and there will be a Japanese translation published in ’08.

I have recently decided to again help her bring her story to a larger audience. We have had our share of differences over the years but the love bond is still strong and mutual. And I think her story is so amazing that I can’t imagine anything more important to do.

Is she authentic? I decided so many years ago, and I got important confirmations from authorities I trusted. Of course this is the sort of thing that you have to decide for yourself.

Science tells us that it is 7 or 800 degrees on the surface of Venus and the planet cannot support human habitation. NASA has probed and mapped the surface and found nothing that looks like life as we know it.

So what is the truth? Just remember that cutting edge science used to be sure that the earth was flat and that the Sun revolved around the earth. So much for science:)

I think she has an important mission and message for us all in these crazy, fast changing times. I think it is worth listening to what she has to say. You have to judge for yourself. Be sure to check out the little video excerpt of one of her talks on You Tube: http://youtube.com/watch?v=40jo5uElYNI

Cuddle Parties

I was just looking around at meetup.com. and I ran across these. I am very curious about them but it does not look like they are happening much in the Chicago area. If anyone reading this has been to one of these, I would love to hear what your experience was.

Here is their website: http://www.cuddleparty.com/ One of the great quotes on this website from the Dalai Lama, "The main cause of depression is a lack of affection."

I have always been a touchy-feely kinda guy, also subject to depression. I'm guessing more affectionate touch would go a long way toward solving that.

I looked long and hard for an appropriate image for this post. I love the image I found but it is probably a little too intense and romantic for this particular context. What do you think? Thanks to Clarita and morguefile.com for the free image.