"The anchor holds, though the ship is battered. The anchor holds, though the sails are torn. The anchor holds inspite of the storm."

I was thinking things haven't changed in so long, that is has been a long calm. I wonder if it hasn't been storming so long I don't even take notice of the dangers anymore.

The evil eye is the name for a sickness transmitted -- usually without intention -- by someone who is envious, jealous, or covetous. It is also called the invidious eye and the envious eye. In Hebrew it is ayin ha'ra (the evil eye), which in Yiddish is variously spelled ayin horoh, ayin hora, or ayen hara. In mainland Italian it is mal occhio (the bad eye) and in Spanish mal ojo or el ojo (the bad eye or just the eye). In Sicily it is jettatore (the projection [from the eye]) and in Farsi it is bla band (the eye of evil).

Dundes theorizes that the evil eye, which has a Middle-Eastern, Mediterranean, and Indo-European distribution pattern and was unknown in the Americas, Pacific Islands, Asia, Sub-Saharan Africa or Australia until the introduction of European culture, is based upon underlying beliefs about water equating to life and dryness equating to death. He posits that the true "evil" done by the evil eye is that it causes living beings to "dry up" -- notably babies, milking animals, young fruit trees, and nursing mothers. The harm caused by overlooking consists of sudden vomiting or diarrhoea in children, drying up of milk in nursing mothers or livestock, withering of fruit on orchard trees, and loss of potency in men. In short, the envious eye "dries up liquids," according to Professor Alan Dundes -- a fact that he contends demonstrates its Middle Eastern desert origins.
Only in Sicily and Southern Italy is it believed that some people can DELIBERATELY cast the evil eye on others. There the regionally idiosyncratic belief is that certain people (including at least one former Pope) are born with the evil eye and "project" it involuntarily. Such people are called jettatores ("projectors") and their specific form of evil eye is called jettatura ("projection") in contradistinction to the garden variety of envious or praising evil eye, which in Italian is called mal occhio ("bad eye"). Jettatores are not necessarily evil or envious people, according to this belief system, and they are often represented as being saddened and embarrassed by the harm they cause.
In the eastern Mediterranean and Aegean region, especially throughout Greece and up into Turkey, there is a strong tendency to view blue-eyed people as bearers of the evil eye -- probably because few locally-born people have blue eyes and those who do show up, such as tourists, are given to praising and cooing over babies, who are thought to be most at risk from the eye.
In Italy, the evil eye is said to affect men as well as children, nursing mothers, fruit trees, and dairy animals. It brings on impotence, through a drying up of the semen. Typical protective aversions of this problem include making the gestures called the mano fico ("fig hand") and the mano cornuto ("horned hand").
Mano fico is a hand gesture in which the thumb is inserted between the index and middle finger. It means literally means "fig hand" in Italian, but "fica" or fig is a common slang term for the female genitals, so the mano fico is a representation of the sex act (with the thumb as phallus).

All so very interesting. Watch out-- I'm dangerous one look and Bla-band! And I will not spit on you!

Welcome back to the Motherland, Keeper of MJ

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I don't know you, and you don't know me.

I should really be preparing to be very busy starting next week. I came across a complaint of someone lamenting the fact that he would have to take 17 hours in school and work 20 hours a week. I assure this youngling- it can be done.

Now I begin 40 hours of work and 9 hours of grad school. This, I am also sure can be done. It may exclude my novel reading and knitting for some time. I will survive.

I was happy to discover that if three of my classes transfer into this degree, I could be done in the Spring. I have no idea what I will do at that time, but I'm sure I will be able to think of something.

I've been on a knitting frenzy the past few weeks. I think I finally discovered how easy it is. Of course I'm still working on beginner's projects, but at least now I can put it down and I'm not totally lost when I go to start again. It's beautiful. Now, I have to convince myself to stop buying yarn.

I never changed my calendar from July. I think that is uncharacteristic of me, but I'm not sure.

The news moved from fat people to hairy people. There was a man in China who has 96% of his body covered in hair. He has to have an ear operation to remove some of the hair from his ear because he was going deaf. Now, that's a lot o ear hair.

I encountered two incredible news stories today. One was about a 1073 pound man who finally admitted that he needed professional help with his weight problem. One person who weighs over a ton, now that is amazing. I wondered how anyone (the one eating and/or the one buying and serving the food) could let it go that far.

The second story, however, shocked me even more. It was about a 38 year old 4'10" woman who weighed 480. That is a lot for such a petit height. (Well that's a lot for any height, but the point is this woman must have just been a ball of fat.) This woman had not left her house for 6 years. Her neighbors didn't even know a woman lived there. More astounding is that she never, (never-ever) left her couch for 1 year.

When the police went in to search the house (presumedly because of the stench) they found feces and rotten food everywhere. They found this woman, still alive, but fused to the couch. He skin had grown around the fibers. They took the woman, still on the couch, to the hospital on a flat bed trailer. The woman died of morbid obesity before they could surgically remove her from her furniture.

The man living with her may be charged with neglect. He said he tried to get her off the couch, but he could not.

So, with that in mind, I need to start a diet/exercise plan. For real this time.

That is after my donut frenzy I've arranged for tomorrow in celebration of Friday the 13th.

www.phobialist.com

pick your fear!

some of my favorites:

fear of bald people- peladophobia
fear of constipation- Coprastasophobia
fear of Englishness- Anglophobia
fear of Friday the 13th - Paraskavedekatriaphobia
fear of gravity- Barophobia
fear of kissing- philemaphobia
fear of meat- carnophobia
fear of otters- Lutraphobia
fear of peanut butter sticking to the roof of your mouth- Arachibutyrophobia
fear of the Pope- Papaphobia
fear of yourself- Autophobia
fear of sermons- Homilophobia
fear of vegetables- Lachanophobia
fear of long words- Hippopotomonstrosesquippedaliophobia (what I didn't make it up)

And last, but certainly not least, for after reading the entire phobia list I have discovered this is my one true fear: alektorophobia- fear of chickens.

I'm not kidding either-all birds are scary but chickens are particularly vicious and wicked creatures.