My credit union sent the following helpful information and tips regarding scams to me (and their other customers) the other day. I found it useful, so I thought I would share it:
Don’t get caught in a Money Mule scam – from my credit union. For obvious reasons I don’t want to disclose the name.Red flags to watch for and how to protect yourself
I had never heard of a Money Mule scam before. I mean, I guess in concept but not in name.
Now, it’s up to us to do our due diligence to ensure we don’t fall victim to scammers.
By being better informed we can stop scammers from stealing our hard earned money!
Perplexity
I’m using Perplexity AI now to copy and paste potential job scam offers. I’m also using it to ask some scholarly questions pertaining to the research I have done for my 5th book!
So far, I am finding the answers and feedback it provides very helpful!
Subscribe to my YouTube channel
JIGGLE BUTT has been continuing to work out and get some views and Likes. These keeps me accountable to get my daily exercise in AND promote my husband’s original songs too! Thus, I love it! I really hope to encourage others over 60 to create their own Jiggle Butt videos too!
Yours in consciousness-expansion as we evolve and revolve during our mystical awakening. All while doing-my-egoless-best, to take you on a limitless, spiraling thought ride to better health, through doing more with ease, to help us sustain the JOY in our lives! (With lots of Gratitude throughout.)
Sheila “Spiral Sister” Murrey
The information provided is for educational purposes only and is not intended to treat, diagnose or prescribe.
About us
My husband is an award-winning illustrator, plus he’s a seasoned guitarist, bass player, and songwriter (with over 400 original songs). You can view some of his artwork and listen to many of his songs at: https://www.youtube.com/user/richardmurrey
In continuing my chats with fellow blogger, artist, and friend, Linda of Creative Artworks Blog, I discovered another rabbit hole of inquiry and self reflection this morning. And it is the rabbit hole of ‘Longing.’
When I leave someone or something, (or they leave me), I continue to feel a sense of sadness. Ugh! Yet, I know that is somehow tied to selfishness on my part.
Hmmm.
I think of the song, Everytime you go away.
Selfishness is tied to ownership.
Meditating on this, I find that when I say, ‘my’ anything, I am attaching some level of ownership to the person, place, or thing. Some degree of ownership comes from loving. Interesting!
Perhaps this is one reason the Buddhists teach us to detach. The less attached we are, the less suffering. when we can focus on the new homes or adventures our far away loved ones can have without us, instead of thinking about how much we miss them, it frees our thinking minds!
And perhaps in this “We Are All Connected” metaphysical world, it frees them too! The frequencies are all intermingling.
What is bound on earth is bound in heaven?
My YouTube channel
JIGGLE BUTT has been continuing to work out and get some views and Likes.
These daily videos hold me accountable to get my daily exercise in AND promote my husband’s original songs too! Thus, I love it!
I really hope to encourage others over 60 to create their own Jiggle Butt videos too!
Yours in consciousness-expansion as we evolve and revolve during our mystical awakening. All while doing-my-egoless-best, to take you on a limitless, spiraling thought ride to better health, through doing more with ease, to help us sustain the JOY in our lives! (With lots of Gratitude throughout.)
Sheila “Spiral Sister” Murrey
The information provided is for educational purposes only and is not intended to treat, diagnose or prescribe.
About us
My husband is an award-winning illustrator, plus he’s a seasoned guitarist, bass player, and songwriter (with over 400 original songs). You can view some of his artwork and listen to many of his songs at: https://www.youtube.com/user/richardmurrey
I wrote about some of these scams before, but this article by Rebecca Keegan for The Hollywood Reporter was full of more details than I ever thought of when it comes to these scammers (and why they want to move your chat to Telegram)!
I almost hate to comment on YouTube or Facebook posts of people I don’t know, because invariably some scammer tries to lure me to another platform or chat. Ugh! It’s so annoying!
Gullible
I’m gullible at times or in a mood to see how far they’ll go, so I play along—for a little while. But I tell you, 100% of the time, it’s a scammer.
Don’t waste your time on them, please. And certainly NEVER send bitcoin, money, gift cards, etc. to anyone you don’t know!
Link to my YouTube channel
JIGGLE BUTT has been continuing to work out and get some views and Likes. These keeps me accountable to get my daily exercise in AND promote my husband’s original songs too! Thus, I love it! I really hope to encourage others over 60 to create their own Jiggle Butt videos too!
Yours in consciousness-expansion as we evolve and revolve during our mystical awakening. All while doing-my-egoless-best, to take you on a limitless, spiraling thought ride to better health, through doing more with ease, to help us sustain the JOY in our lives! (With lots of Gratitude throughout.)
Sheila “Spiral Sister” Murrey
The information provided is for educational purposes only and is not intended to treat, diagnose or prescribe.
About us
My husband is an award-winning illustrator, plus he’s a seasoned guitarist, bass player, and songwriter (with over 400 original songs). You can view some of his artwork and listen to many of his songs at: https://www.youtube.com/user/richardmurrey
It’s taken a good 14 days for me to recuperate from a sucky summer cold. And I’ll tell ya, I am not jumping back to the good near as fast as I used to!
I wrote some of this before, but let me break it down more fully here:
I spent over $1,000 (mostly on the hotel for four nights and gas for my daughter’s car) and rode shotgun in my daughter’s car (with my daughter driving), her 8-year old twins in the second seat, and her 13-year old daughter in the third row seat.
Ah, yes, travelin’ with the children. So much fun! Add to this that the trip was some 14-plus hours (each way) from New Hampshire to my home state–and all to attend my 45th high school reunion. However, joy of joys (note my extreme sarcasm) a mere three HOURS before I was to go to the reunion dinner, I got all feverish and started experiencing the chills, big time! No way could I attend! And that was super annoying. All I could do was lay in bed, shivering, and wrapping myself in towels, and anything else I could easily grab.
Alone in the hotel room
My daughter had taken the girls to her dad’s house about a half hour from the hotel and my best friend and her husband were going to pick me up and take me to the reunion dinner that I’d already pre-paid for. Sad to say, I had to call them and give them the bad news that I’d suddenly taken ill. Mind you, the sciatica I’d experienced months ago that the chiropractor had fixed, returned the night before! Ugh! It was enough to deal with the sciatica again, plus the sore hip that had been bothering me for a couple of months, so I couldn’t imagine anything else going wrong. But it sure did! I was quite the mess!
To relieve the sciatica and hip issues, I’d thought it would be a good idea to take a hot bath. We don’t have a bath tub at home so I’d brought an herbal packet with me in case there was a tub in the hotel bathroom (and there was).
So, about 3pm on the day of the reunion dinner, and yes, while all the girls were away, I’d gotten into the tub. By now, you might guess what was to happen. I used the handrail to get into the tub, but slipped on the way to sit down and yes, I guess it re-aligned my back because the sciatica went away (and hasn’t returned). And I wouldn’t think a hot bath would bring on a fever, but something did!
I get the whole “correlation isn’t causation” thought-process and while I laid shivering in bed that came to my mind, as well as when I had gotten chilled a couple days before (while taking the girls swimming in the hotel indoor pool). Between the chill and then the hot bath a couple days later though? I don’t know. My guess now is that everything converged to reduce my immunity and then, whatever my daughter had when we left, took hold of me. I tend to pick up stuff just within a few days of exposure. And sitting next to her in the car for all of those hours makes the most sense to cause me to get ill.
Yours in consciousness-expansion as we evolve and revolve during our mystical awakening. All while doing-my-egoless-best, to take you on a limitless, spiraling thought ride to better health, through doing more with ease, to help us sustain the JOY in our lives! (With lots of Gratitude throughout.)
Sheila “Spiral Sister” Murrey
The information provided is for educational purposes only and is not intended to treat, diagnose or prescribe.
About us
My husband is an award-winning illustrator, plus he’s a seasoned guitarist, bass player, and songwriter (with over 400 original songs). You can view some of his artwork and listen to many of his songs at: https://www.youtube.com/user/richardmurrey
Yours in consciousness-expansion as we evolve and revolve during our mystical awakening. All while doing-my-egoless-best, to take you on a limitless, spiraling thought ride to better health, through doing more with ease, to help us sustain the JOY in our lives! (With lots of Gratitude throughout.)
Sheila “Spiral Sister” Murrey
The information provided is for educational purposes only and is not intended to treat, diagnose or prescribe.
About us
My husband is an award-winning illustrator, plus he’s a seasoned guitarist, bass player, and songwriter (with over 400 original songs). You can view some of his artwork and listen to many of his songs at: https://www.youtube.com/user/richardmurrey
While I have been sick, I have been analyzing Facebook Stories and whether I should continue creating Jiggle Butt videos (either focusing on only creating one-song short videos (Shorts) or the longer 10-minute videos plus a daily Short as I have been.
I don’t understand why most people see the first one or two Facebook Stories I share, but whether I share one or twenty at a time, the outcome of viewers usually goes something like this:
22 people see the first Story. 9 see the second. Only 2 see ALL of the Stories. This is disheartening. But seems to be a trend. So, why bother?
Does anyone know why the number of viewers drop dramatically on these Stories? I watch other friends’ Stories who share a LOT more Stories each day than I do!
22 views of this first Facebook Story (a meme I like)9 views of this second Facebook Story (a meme I like)5 views of the next Facebook Story (a friend’s health meme I like)2 views of this Facebook Story (my text about Jiggle Butt), and the same two friends viewed the rest of the Stories (I didn’t even share anything political in my Stories today)
I’m seeking friends who are open to learn from me and vulnerable enough to let me know. But I seek no praise or validation anymore. I am not sharing to people please.
Yours in consciousness-expansion as we evolve and revolve during our mystical awakening. All while doing-my-egoless-best, to take you on a limitless, spiraling thought ride to better health, through doing more with ease, to help us sustain the JOY in our lives! (With lots of Gratitude throughout.)
Sheila “Spiral Sister” Murrey
The information provided is for educational purposes only and is not intended to treat, diagnose or prescribe.
About us
My husband is an award-winning illustrator, plus he’s a seasoned guitarist, bass player, and songwriter (with over 400 original songs). You can view some of his artwork and listen to many of his songs at: https://www.youtube.com/user/richardmurrey
Ah, doesn’t the TV series, Dexter, just check all of our multifaceted and moral ambiguity boxes?!? Ugh, yeeeaaasssss! A guilty pleasure to watch, I say.
Moral ambiguities abound
Sometimes most of us, if we’re honest, while taking a fearless moral inventory, have wished to take out vengeful, violent retribution on someone at some time in our lives. I can’t be alone in this. Especially when one considers Dexter’s appeal.
Even if we catch our vengeful thought before it becomes a feeling. Even if we feel the tug before intellectualizing it. It’s there. Seething. That righteous moral authority to take action to right a wrong or save an innocent from harm.
I think this is why we like, or dare I say, love, Dexter Morgan. The handsome yet unassuming Clark Kent type star character of the show that bears his name.
First came the original Dexter series. Ah! Miami. I loved the setting for this series. It gave me Miami Vice vibes. Of course also because it was another police drama. But Dexter had more of a gritty edge. Dexter was brilliantly written (where sadly, Miami Vice fell flat in its story lines on several episodes).
And the original Dexter spent a good chunk of time building and fleshing out great characters! Something Miami Vice attempted to do, but didn’t quite accomplish. (I always wanted more background on Gina and more martial arts from Lt. Castillo). The Shield (plenty of moral ambiguities on it as well) actually did a better job.
The original Dexter also had incredible guest stars, like John Lithgow and Tom Hanks’ son, Colin Hanks. Now, Keith Carradine was pretty amazing too, as well as the lovely Julie Benz.
Now, I must admit, I have always been a Michael C. Hall fan too, since Six Feet Under (another one of my favorite shows, and another show full of moral ambiguities too!). So, right off the bat, Dexter was a must see. And every season of the original was expertly executed IMHO. The writing from Scott Buck returns (yes, Scott was also a writer on Six Feet Under), and he’s even sharper this time around! (Pun happily intended.) You know Dexter’s adopted father, played by the fantastic James Remar, had to have come from Buck because it’s a play right out of Six Feet Under!
The Dexter franchise can keep growing as far as I’m concerned, it’s continuing to explode and explore multifaceted possibilities.
In Dexter: New Blood, Dexter has a son, played by Jack Alcott, who is fast becoming adept at continuing to “follow the code.” He eerily seems very good at following in Dexters footsteps, while bringing his own heart and style to the table. The supporting cast in this show is amazing too!
In Dexter: Original Sin, Patrick Gibson is well cast as a young Dexter and almost creepily gives us something that’s not often found. A way to look back in time and into the formation of the mind of our anti-hero. And I’m a big Christian Slater fan, so though Scott Buck was missing from the writing cast on this show, I couldn’t keep from watching this with glee! I thought most of the cast were spot on in their portrayal of their characters. Almost as if in reality they are big fans of the original Dexter too!
Of course by Dexter: Resurrection we get several of the characters from the original Dexter back, including James Remar (yay!), which is deliciously delightful. Plus, some characters (the ones who didn’t make it to the series end) return within memory flashbacks—three guesses as to why!
This franchise TV series may be sinful, and one I will have to answer for one day, but if it quenches any hint of me committing any physical act of moral retribution, while entertaining me… ah, how could it be that bad?
Yours in consciousness-expansion as we evolve and revolve during our mystical awakening. All while doing-my-egoless-best, to take you on a limitless, spiraling thought ride to better health, through doing more with ease, to help us sustain the JOY in our lives! (With lots of Gratitude throughout.)
Sheila “Spiral Sister” Murrey
The information provided is for educational purposes only and is not intended to treat, diagnose or prescribe.
About us
My husband is an award-winning illustrator, plus he’s a seasoned guitarist, bass player, and songwriter (with over 400 original songs). You can view some of his artwork and listen to many of his songs at: https://www.youtube.com/user/richardmurrey
Sadly, I missed seeing many friends. People I have known most of my life, one since I was 3 years old!
I had a list. A To Do list of everyone I wanted to see, and especially loved ones I wanted my daughter to see again and my granddaughters to meet. (My daughter rarely visits our home state and town either!)
I won’t share my list, suffice to say I had a list of 11 family and close friends I wanted to see over the course of four days. I had reached out to the oldest folks (like my uncle who is nearly 80 and “second mom” who is 85), but the others all use Facebook.
I had posted on Facebook (not only on my personal page, but on the high school reunion group posts too) about when and where we’d be staying (name of the hotel and dates) for TWO MONTHS prior to going on this trip, so that hopefully, friends could do their part and arrange their schedules to have time to visit with us. I sent individual Messenger messages to several, but I am simply not going to feel guilty for not calling or texting everyone. There comes a time when folks need to acknowledge “the road runs both ways.” I spent over $1,000 to make this trip happen, and traveled over 14 hours in a car with three children (ages 13 and 8 year old twins)! I refuse to chase people down! There’s a point when you have to know you did all you could, and I have reached that point.
Thursday
Upon arrival, so that my daughter could sleep after driving all night, I took the girls to the hotel indoor pool. We all got in and I enjoyed the coolness of the water and that it quickly reduced the swelling in my ankles from having ridden in the car over 14 hours. I wore compression socks, but my ankles puffed up anyway. Go figure.
At 63, it’s always something.
Note: I was cold after getting out of the pool but the girls weren’t done, so I wrapped myself in towls and sat down. I just happened to sit under a big air conditioner vent and it was blowing fairly swiftly. That exposure, plus the mold I smelled in the hotel gym from a leaking air conditioner (the carpet was still wet!) may have also contributed to me getting sick. But one can never really know what causes these things.
My daughter and I specifically chose this hotel for its indoor pool and because of its central location to many friends. In particular, it’s near to our dear family friends’ home and just across the river from my high school reunion activities (thinking if nothing else, it would make it easy for people to come see me (as I knew I wouldn’t have a car – my daughter planned to take the girls to see her dad who lived a half hour away).
Friday afternoon
I had the whole afternoon free when my daughter took the girls to visit her dad’s side of the family. My son was still enroute from North Carolina, so I reached out to several friends to see if anyone might want to visit with me.
My “second mom” (what I have called Liz since my mom passed away in 2017), came over to see me and we visited for about an hour in the hotel lobby. I took a short video so I could get a screen capture). While we were visiting, she was using cough drops but I don’t know if she had a bug. She had said she went to the doctor that morning and had to pickup her prescription at a pharmacy near the hotel.
Liz and Sheila
One school friend and her husband stopped to talk with us (we were the first two gals in our class to accept/allow our hair to go gray – at our 30th high school reunion)! Her husband is of German ancestry and they noted Liz’s accent (as she’s German), thus they got a bit of Liz’s immigration story, young adult story (Liz had been a model in Germany). I wish I had audio recorded that! It’s a great story!
When Liz left, I walked her to her car, hugged and kissed her on the cheek.
Friday 6pm I was to meet my cousin Greg’s widow and one of my oldest friends (and more) at the neighborhood ice cream social. They all wanted to meet Marie and the girls. We didn’t make it there because just as we were headed in that direction, my son showed up at our hotel after driving over 9 hours from North Carolina. Of course, since I hadn’t seen him in 3 years, I put family first! I’m glad I did. (Special note: Matt brought us fresh squash from his garden!)
Susan messaged me to see where we were when she didn’t see us at the social and I invited her to stop by the hotel on her way home. She did! And we all had a great visit in our hotel room til nearly midnight.
Sheila and Susan
As I walked Susan out to her car, sciatica hit me, running down both of my legs! I had prepared for that though, having brought all my creams and lotions for my sore hip! I thought that would be the only potential pitfalls to going on this trip. I was wrong.
Saturday 6pm Go to reunion dinner. I had prepaid for my ticket to go, but by 3pm I began feeling horrible and had a fever. I called my uncle and he said a prayer for me. Knowing my best friend and her heart-transplanted husband would pick me up and take me to the event, meant I might potentially pass something on to them, plus I was feeling worse by the minute! Thus by 5pm I made the call to stay in bed and not attend the reunion dinner. Yes, of course I was bummed! I had several friends who wanted to visit with me and vice versa. But I knew isolation would be the best at that point.
Spiral thought: Before the prayer, my uncle had asked me what I would take for this discomfort if I were home. N-acetyl-cysteine (NAC) immediately came to mind. He had never heard of it. I had a feeling he would go buy some and bring it to me. But here’s what happened. When my daughter had told me she woke up feeling bad the Wednesday morning of the evening we were to leave New Hampshire, I had added 3 NAC capsules to my weekly pill container and put a piece of paper in with them that simply said, NAC! I rarely need this supplement and knew I wouldn’t recognize it later. And then I completely forgot about packing them! Ha! When I woke up Sunday morning I went to take my daily supplements and I noticed the paper in one of the other day’s compartments. I immediately thought “this is an answer to the prayer”! I popped a NAC capsule and immediately began feeling a bit better! Of course, I continued taking what my daughter had brought too, which she generously offered to share, some over-the-counter sinus medication, vitamin C lozenges, etc. but I knew I probably wouldn’t see anyone else on my list at that point.
Sunday
Go to the cemetery and see/take pic of mom and dad’s burial marker:
My parents burial markers. Unfortunately, it costs thousands of dollars to have upright tombstones made these days, so this likely the only markers they will have. And I have accepted that. As dad communicated to me, “Live while you’re living.” I know from their now vantage point, grave markers are of no concern.
I had agreed to go to home church with my uncle and aunt, so I canceled that but agreed we would stop by so they could see my daughter and meet her girls. Turns out, my son followed us there (and beat us there because we stopped at my best friend’s house so she and her husband could meet my granddaughters. My bestie doesn’t take no for an answer. She knew I wouldn’t have missed our reunion event unless it was serious. And they could have had a longer visit with us earlier on Saturday, but God has a way of orchestrating things for the best outcome of ALL. And though it was aggravating to me that I felt like I had to jump through hoops to make the visit happen, I have to accept it unfolded in the best way, and for the best.
While we were at my uncle’s house—I wanted my girls to smell the roses from the rosebush that grandmother had planted over 50-60 years ago; but I had also wanted to show uncle Jim the pictures from the Cole site I had found online (that I had saved on my phone); and I had wanted to ask if he might perform laying on of hands regarding the tinnitus, hip, etc.
The videos of my mom’s memorial with my uncle presiding (and the house that my grandparents built) are still available on my YouTube channel if you want to see:
Part 1 of 3 – My mom’s memorial service (2017)
I had wanted to visit with my cousin Greg’s widow, Susan (to see my dad’s baptism video that Greg had captured). Thankfully, they had attended the baptism in 2017 when I couldn’t make it. (I had already flown up for mom’s memorial and couldn’t do another trip that year). Susan has the video (on Greg’s older phone) but it wasn’t available for me to see. Old phones can be harder to charge, etc.
High on my list had also been to visit my longtime church friend, Cheryl (she’s a university hospital nursing teacher). It’s always tricky trying to visit her because she lives a few hours from my hometown. She had wanted a copy of my holistic health book. Now, I will sign and mail her a copy instead. We missed each other by mere minutes! She had driven in on Saturday to visit her 101 year old grandmother. I was going to go there (because I had known her too, Ginny knew both of my grandparents quite well), but when I started feeling bad, I knew I didn’t want to subject Cheryl’s grandmother to “whatever” I had.
My daughter had a priority to take her girls to visit their nana and papa (my first ex husband). (They have recently moved back to the area). The got to go visit them twice! It also turned out well because my son was able to go too! He hadn’t seen his dad in years (maybe 20 years?) and they had become estranged. So, I continue to consider and recognize this trip was to teach me the importance of “Family first”!
Yes, it’s disappointing when one travels so far and then I wasn’t able to get to either social event where friends we’re going to gather, but as I have said before… I’m seeing the yin and yang ☯️ of it ALL. And even more so I appreciate something my daughter says a lot, “Family first”!
Several friends reached out to me when I missed the reunion dinner, that they heard I was ill and that they hoped I felt better soon. I chatted with each as best I could even in my diminished state.
A few asked me how I thought I got sick and the only four thoughts that came to me (while I was laying in bed so feverish with the chills Saturday night ) was:
Caught it from my daughter (as I sat next to her on the 14 hour drive); she had been coughing and sneezing all the way, but had thought she just had allergies
Caught from friend who had just been in a doctors office (we know medical offices are often good breeding grounds for these bugs)
Getting chilled after swimming, I am also sensitive to chlorine and I had smelled strong chlorine in the pool area
I hope the family I missed will make an effort to see me at some point, as this trip is probably one I won’t make again. Unless I completely change my mind and body, which isn’t outside the realm of possibility. I just don’t know how likely that is to happen.
Yours in consciousness-expansion as we evolve and revolve during our mystical awakening. All while doing-my-egoless-best, to take you on a limitless, spiraling thought ride to better health, through doing more with ease, to help us sustain the JOY in our lives! (With lots of Gratitude throughout.)
Sheila “Spiral Sister” Murrey
The information provided is for educational purposes only and is not intended to treat, diagnose or prescribe.
About us
My husband is an award-winning illustrator, plus he’s a seasoned guitarist, bass player, and songwriter (with over 400 original songs). You can view some of his artwork and listen to many of his songs at: https://www.youtube.com/user/richardmurrey
Integrating the Spirals 