The hand of fate.

After walking past the ocean washing up on the boardwalk's edge and flooding the beach, the only thing more exciting would have to be connecting with the unseen and mysterious workings of the spirit realm. Or a trip to the local psychic's office would be good too.

I should probably avoid saying who this psychic is, but I will say that according to her information card leaflet thing, she's been using her "God given gift to help people through meditation and spiritual guidance" for over 45 years, and offers to "help you or a loved one in matters of love, business, divorce, depression, finding your life path or reuniting with a soulmate." Sweet. Oh wait, that's bad. It's a really bad idea to get personal advice from anyone other than a certified expert or a close friend.

But maybe I presume too much. After all she's been doing this for 45 years, which means she's either an expert in tapping into the fabric of the universe or she's pulling off the longest con I've ever taken note of. The decor of her boardwalk-side office no longer includes the smoke fountain I mentioned in the last post, but it does have religious icons from Christianity, Buddhism, Hinduism, and just tokens of astrology bullshit. I didn't find out anything about my horoscope, or my zodiac sign, which is a month off anyway.

I only got one palm reading, as this particular psychic's services are rather expensive. Palm readings are $10 each palm. Playing card readings are $25. Tarot card readings are $35 for a half deck and $45 for a full deck. Crystal readings are $75. And life charts are a whopping $125. Jesus fish! No wonder there are plaques adorning her walls commemorating her business achievements. She gets the big bucks single-handed for giving no real services whatsoever. I love how the "crystal reading" is such a big deal, even though you're essentially looking intently at a big piece of naturally occurring glass. Why are crystals hyped up to such a lofty position in the New Age movement? There's no significant properties in them. Now I could afford either a palm reading and a playing card reading, a half deck tarot card reading, or I could just get the palm reading and get something to eat. And since I don't support this establishment in any way whatsoever, it would be better to save as much money on this inanity as possible.

After waiting for a short while, I was at last able to see the psychic herself. This was the first time I'd actually laid eyes on her despite seeing her office for years, since she keeps herself hidden from passerby in a separate room. A clever marketing ploy, much like Cloverfield. She was a middle-aged Hispanic woman. Spoilers. She proceeded to do the palm reading. I have no idea how this is supposed to work. She's looking at the folds in my hand and somehow divines future meaning in them. Is there some genetic disposition that leads to certain aspects of my life that also leads to certain creases in my hands? Do events in the future bend the fabric of time to make these folds in my hands appear? What exactly is going on here? It can't just be a guessing game, can it? No, it's more like a guessing game and cold reading. John Edward would be proud.

And so, the reading. First, she pointed out my lifeline. Apparently I can ask the audience. Actually what she pointed out was that I will live to be 80 years old. I'd make a joke about testing that out by trying to do myself in right away, but it's more appropriate to point out that anyone taking this proclamation seriously would take it to mean they're invulnerable to life-threatening harm until they reach that age.

Interestingly she said I could read other people's palms. Really? Is this a secret ability? Do I have to go to a university or get some special training to understand it? Or am I only able to do it intuitively? How come I'm able to do it and not others? Did God decide I should be given this ability? Or do I have a high midichlorian count that lets me communicate with the Force? Hell, maybe I should do my own palm readings. Save myself ten bucks.

She said I have the ability to see spirits. Fuck, why don't I just become a paranormal investigator or some real life equivalent of Edward Carnby? Well, other than possibly my dead cat (which I'm pretty sure was actually just a step ladder I didn't get a good look at), I haven't seen any spirits. Maybe I just need to believe. I mean, the sign to the entrance did say that the psychic "has the right to not do readings for anyone she does not feel positive with." That's fine, it's her business, she can choose who she works with. But what exactly does it mean to be "positive"? Hell, I was a skeptic and an atheist going in and coming out of that place. Surely she could sense the negative energies.

She said I would be living in Pennsylvania, then asked where I come from. Why bother asking me? She should know, she's a goddamn psychic. I said New Jersey, and she confirmed her previous statement that I would be living in Pennsylvania, or Delaware. First of all, that's a really easy guess. I come from New Jersey, so sooner or later I'm going to spend some time in Pennsylvania. But why in the hell did her mind take a detour to Delaware for a second? That's another state away. Why would she second-guess where my future home would be?

She said I had marks of writing in my fingertips. Signs that I've been writing, with my hands? Noooo! Evidently I'm supposed to write inspirational stuff. Well that would be nice, but so far I just write random shit on my blog making fun of irrational belief systems and reviewing entertainment and just anything that comes into my head. At least I still occasionally get messages from people on YouTube saying they were inspired by comments I wrote on a George Carlin video. Comments I wrote a year or so back. Some people have way too much time on their hands.

She said I had "a positive loveline". ... What the hell is that supposed to mean? That I can fall in love? That it's within my human capacity? That's great, she informed me that I'm not a heartless sociopath. What are the odds? She continued that I "just need to open up a bit more". I can see why she has such a shining record as someone who gives relationship advice. I paid $10 for that little nugget. She couldn't have sensed that I'm, you know, ever so mildly autistic. I know you can't tell that right away from talking to me, but that's my point. If she had any special advice to offer, I wouldn't have to tell her that I'm an aspie. Otherwise she's little more than an unqualified counselor.

She even asked me if I was in a relationship, and when I said not as of yet, she said I could expect a love interest this August or September, if I "opened up" of course. I'm a single college student, and a virgin. Obviously I'm looking forward to going back, and hoping for the best when it comes to closer relationships. So naturally the response to such a visitor is wishing them luck in finding love soon, but this is supposed to be more than just well-wishing. It's supposed to be actual love advice. And it's so bland and predictable, and easily falsifiable. Watch, nothing's going to happen that quickly. It would have been something if she said I was actually going to have to wait until February or something to meet the right person. Or hell, maybe a year or two. But we wouldn't want to be realistic, would we? No, we need to feed people's desires as we drain their cash.

Continuing to draw out my path in life, she said I should look into engineering. I said I had never done anything related to it, and she predictably told me to open up to it. I'm sure my own ambitions or the advice of my academic counselors pale in comparison to the wisdom this woman has offered as a result of her 45-year experience of making shit up. That ended the palm reading. $10. Before leaving I asked if there was any way I could discern one's star sign from their palms. Nope. Damn. I could have made $125 a pop from the horoscopes I could write from the palms I apparently can read.

So, off I went to get good food with the rest of my money, and some ice cream from the Chinese peeps working at the candy shop. I could have spent that $10 on something more meaningful and worthwhile. Like candy.

2012 will be a grave, grave year...

It will be the year that I have to graduate and leave college. Maybe.

What? No. No, not me, I don't buy into that 2012 bullshit one bit. I've already lived through one apocalypse, and it made for a terrible New Year's.

Really, what is it about the year 2012 that is so damn significant? Because the Mayan Calendar ends on that year? A cycle of keeping track of time on an ancient calendar will end, so what? Did they accurately determine the age of the earth and the universe itself? What credibility did they have for determining the destiny of existence? The calendar goes by cycles of 5125 years; what happened 5122 years ago that was so earth-shattering? Why should I believe the ancient Mayans knew anything we couldn't find out for ourselves with our more advanced understanding of the cosmos? And no, there's nothing astronomically sigificant about this year. There's no "galactic alignment", and a rearranging of how we view arbitrary constellations will not have any effect on any aspect of your everyday life, much less the fate of civilization.

Oh, and astrologers, you'd be interested to know that our view of the original 12 zodiac signs changes monthly alignment* every 2000 years, so all of your horoscopes are already one sign off. Not that it has any impact on the validity of astrology, because there isn't any.

And this New Age idiocy about a paradigm shift in spirituality? Does anyone really believe that on the 21st of December, 2012, everyone's suddenly going to have a change of heart and live together in peace without explanation? Get real, please. It's hard enough trying to figure out feasible solutions to the world's problems without this nonsense muddying things up.

More importantly, there will be a really bad movie coming out in November of 2009 about this supposed doomsday scenario. Look cool? No? Good. Yes? Keep in mind this is the same idiot (I'm not even going to dignify him by mentioning his name) who made Stargate, Independence Day, Godzilla (the american remake), The Day After Tomorrow, and to top off this shit sundae, 10,000 BC, a movie taking place during the agricultural revolution about cavemen who must do battle with woolly mammoths and horsemen who are capable of building pyramids. Yeah... Why exactly should we think this guy has any say in the significance of specific dates if he can't even get it straight with regards to events in the past. How do you screw that up? "Before the coming of the End Times in 2021, just remember how close humanity came to an abrupt end when the dinosaurs came back in the 19th century, and... Wha- Oh shit."

All of these movies are made to be big and gaudy with trailers designed to pull you in by not letting on the actual plot of the film. 2012's trailer is fairly indicative of this pattern. Fortunately there's never much of a plot to any of these godawful things, so you've got it all figured out from the beginning whether you know it or not. What do you see in the trailer? It's the end of the world, and the incompetent governments of the world can do nothing to save us. No, more than that. They will not try to do anything to save us. That's what the captions say. They've blatantly played the anti-government card to try and hook in as many americans and rebels-without-a-clue as possible. As much as I criticize the United States government for being an overall incompetent political body, I'm not that stupid. I'm not going to be psyched for a movie just because you tell me the government can't be trusted. I know that already, tell me something I don't know. You know, something interesting.

Oh, but they do tell us something. They tell us to "find out the truth". Upyours. Tell me the truth! It's your movie, you do your research! What is it with truth-finding in american pop culture that usually means buying into hyped-up bullshit? The truth is not out there, it's not waiting to be uncovered, it's not hidden, it's not coded, it's not secret. The truth is right in front of you. You may point out that there's too much bullshit to figure out what's real. But that's my point. Watch anything on television, and you'll realize the truth: it's all bullshit. That's the truth. What? You were expecting a thriller to start up when you found it? If you're so damn curious about a specific claim, look up a credible academic or professional source.

But then if everyone thought critically, we wouldn't have hack film-makers informing us that 9/11 was an inside job.

But what's most alarming about this film is not the subject matter or premise or even the sheer idiocy that is bound to flow forth once it's released. It's that this film is most probably going to make a massive profit, despite all forewarning that it's going to be really, really bad. Think I'm too presumptuous? Look at all those movies listed above. Actually, look at the one. The Day After Tomorrow. Can you think of anything that could make 2012 any different? The premise is the same, the effects look (from the trailer) the same, the plot of these movies never deviates in complexity or coherence, and the standard of acting is far from impressive. (Matthew Broderick? Are you FUCKING joking?) And we keep telling ourselves the same thing every time the same guy makes another movie. So why do we keep going to see them?? These films have collectively raked in almost a billion dollars. That's no small amount for a series of terrible disaster movies. Why do we keep giving these guys the benefit of the doubt? I can judge a book by it's cover if the cover treats me like a 12-year-old. This is not impressive material for a high-budget film-maker.

DON'T SEE 2012. DON'T SEE ANY OF THIS GUY'S MOVIES EVER AGAIN. You're doing yourself a favor.

By the way, the music stolen blatantly from the Shining trailer was a nice touch of incompetency.


*I don't know why all the videos of Bill Nye pwning astrology have the ratings and comments disabled. Are people that persistent in their faith in astrology that they make rational discussion impossible? Christ, it's all made up, guys, kids' stuff.