Celebrities and your credit card

I wonder, have you noticed that if a face of a celebrity appears on a package the price doubles? I always wondered about that. There are catalogs that sell jam with Paula’s face and bam, the jam costs 10 bucks instead of 3 or 4. Rachel’s face makes the kitchenware double in price.
Today I want to write about the cosmetics advertized as Cindy Crawford’s skin care. Meaningful Beauty defrauded me out of a lot of money with amazing help from Capital One credit card.
I understand that Cindy Crawford does not know about what is being done to people’s money under her name. She did not renewed the commercial in years. Some money, probably, drips into her account monthly, but I am sure she is not the one to blame. The only fault I can accuse her of is letting criminals use her name to lure unsuspecting fools like myself to buy into this skin care product.
My mistake was that I did fall under the spell and ordered the cream in August 2013. I am actually allergic to all these skin products and can’t use them on my own skin. However I do have a friend who is not allergic. I decided to give her a birthday present and I did.
When I examined my Capital One monthly bill, I noticed that I was charged for the product twice: at the beginning and the end of September. I immediately called, reported fraud, and canceled the card as lost or stolen. Imagine my surprise when I saw another charge of $39.95 in October!!!! The Capital one explained to me that just calling will not work, I had to fax a letter reporting the fraud so they could investigate. At the beginning of November I closed the card, faxed my request to investigate the fraudulent charges, and believed that was the end.
In December I was charged another $39.95 and in January the number increased to $48.95. I did not receive any product during all those months. After another telephone conversation 3 payments were returned to me, but by March I got 2 more charges on the closed account.
On March 6 I called again and this time we had a 3-way conversation. I was talking to both - Meaningful Beauty and Capital One at the same time. I was promised that the conversation was recorded and we agreed that Meaningful Beauty would close my account and return all the money to the Capital One and the Capital One will not charge my account because it is closed and has $0.00 available. You would think the problem was solved!!!!
On March 7 my card was charged $39.95 again.
Meanwhile everyday on TV I am forced to watch how beautiful Cindy Crawford looks when using the Meaningful Beauty product. I can’t change the channel, this commercial is on all of them. I have to share my story with all of you. Please, be careful. The face of a celebrity on the package does not mean the company is not a fraud.

Why do I love Astrology?

In 1995 by accident I bought a book. It was Lynda Goodman's "Love Signs". I instantly fell in love with the book, the subject, and the author. This book was written with such love for people, understanding the beauty and individuality of each sign. I read all 914 pages, not at once, of course, but slowly, sign by sign, and my life was changed for ever.
At first I thought I just got lucky and ran into the best book and the most kind author on the subject. However, very soon I realized that the more books I read and the more astrologers I learn about the more kind and understanding of the human nature I get. I noticed I do not judge people as harsh as I used to do. I became more understanding and forgiving. I had more fun learning how different we all are.
Learning about the differences and individuality of each person was the most important lesson. I am a teacher who by definition has to teach the same material to all these different kids. Since I learned astrology, my work became more interesting too. I started to teach each individual student not classes full of kids.
This does not sound as a new thing now. Many teachers and researchers started to switch to this strategy lately. We created individualized or differentiated instructions, studied multiple intelligences. In other areas you can see the same trends not just with teachers: our mattresses are made with individualized numbers, we have our individualized insurance plans, medications schedules, diets, and even sinks that are designed just for you. Everybody is trying to find his or hers individuality now. It seems there is even less pair pressure among kids.
Do you know that all of that was predicted by astrologers and explained long ago as influence by our astronomical movement in the universe. We are entering new astrological Era - Era of Aquarius. Let's move on with minimal suffering.

Stay at home vs. Go to work

I recently realized why it is so much harder to stay at home with children, especially little ones, then to go and work.
Just think about it, imagine you have to ran after a toddler whole day long, or sit in a cubicle and type and click on the computer. This one is no brainer. Majority will choose the computer, it can be a stirring wheel of a bus or a train. We still will choose the job over the toddler. Give me other situations and I’ll adjust my examples.
I know why!
When you are working you plan and execute. You are the decisionmaker. You are doing your thing in your own order, with your own pace, and you can stop and leave some of the load to the next day. Sometimes you have to follow a very specific steps to complete your shift, you still decide when to start and when to finish it.
When you are left alone with a toddler you are not the decisionmaker any longer, the little one is. He wants to run you will have to ran, he wants to dramm you will watch and listen to the dramming until he decides to stop. The moment you give in and decide to play alone he already changed the plan to another unexpected adventure.
I, personally, get exhausted in 10 minutes. I admire people who can stay with their children and not go crazy.
Funny thing, if it is your job, it’s completely different. I was watching caregivers at LYFE centers a lot. They are magicians. They decide when the kids will eat and when they go to sleep. They decide when the music goes on and when the lights go off. The little ones learn very fast to follow the routine. I think it’s because they know and recognize the professional hand. The people in the nurseries know that too. After work, they take off the uniform and turn into one of us, a parent who now has to deal with their own decisionmakers.