Nostalgia sucks.

While walking home tonight, an ex-boyfriend from four years ago wandered into my train of thought for no apparent reason. I was listening to the Beastie Boys on my iPod and the next thing I knew...BAM! There he was right in my stream of consciousness.

I got to thinking about heartbreak and what exactly constitutes a broken heart. This boyfriend in particular broke my heart. Matter of factly, he is the only one that has the privilege of earning that title. And man...did he break it good. Nice and good. He might as well have ripped out the organ like Robert De Niro did in "Frankenstein" while attacking Helena Bonham Carter's character. That's what it felt like at least (disclaimer: This boyfriend did not look like a gimped up Robert De Niro).

Anyway, when I got home I looked up "heartbreak" on Wikipedia. There is actually a pretty extensive entry on the subject. They even have a list of symptoms (I had 18 out of the 20 listed after the aforementioned break up):

A perceived tightness of the chest, similar to an anxiety attack
Stomach ache and/or loss of appetite
Partial or complete insomnia
Anger
Shock
Nostalgia
Apathy (loss of interest)
Feelings of loneliness
Feelings of hopelessness and despair
Loss of self-respect and/or self-esteem
Medical or psychological illness (e.g. depression)
Suicidal thoughts (in extreme cases)
Nausea
Denial
Fatigue
The thousand-yard stare
Constant or Frequent crying
A feeling of complete emptiness
Feelings of being sad
Feeling of emptiness

However, my point is this: Wikipedia does an excellent job of summing up heartbreak by pin pointing how much it sucks. Kudos Wikipedia. You've done it again.

Be sure to take the new survey!

What are your thoughts on voodoo? I want to know! Take the survey on the upper left hand side of this blog. Just don't get on Wikipedia to research the topic. And don't watch the "The Witches of Eastwick". It'll mess you up!

Whoa! Voodou is voodoo is hoodoo!

Some of you might be wondering why I've gotten on this voodoo kick all of a sudden. Well, I think someone has given me a voodoo doll (pictures to come shortly) in the guise of a present, so I'm during my public research just in case my plane back to America next weeks goes down in a hell fire of flames. If so, you'll know why. I've been cursed apparently.

Thanks to a kind reader of this blog, I was given the Wikipedia address to learn about voodoo, which is also known as "voodou". And some call it "hoodoo". Basically, it's scarier than I had originally thought.

Here is what Wikipedia had to say:

"Vodou has come to be associated in the popular mind with the lore about Satanism, zombies and "voodoo dolls." While there is evidence of zombie creation, it is a minor phenomenon within rural Haitian culture and not a part of the Vodou religion as such. Such things fall under the auspices of the bokor or sorcerer rather than the priest of the Loa.

The practice of sticking pins in dolls has history in European folk magic, but its exact origins are unclear. How it became known as a method of cursing an individual by some followers of what has come to be called New Orleans Voodoo, which is a local variant of hoodoo, is a mystery. Some speculate that it was used as a means of self defense to intimidate superstitious slave owners. This practice is not unique to New Orleans voodoo, however, and has as much basis in European-based magical devices such as the poppet and the nkisi or bocio of West and Central Africa.

These are in fact power objects, what in Haiti would be referred to as pwen, rather than magical surrogates for an intended target of sorcery whether for boon or for bane. Such voodoo dolls are not a feature of Haitian religion, although dolls intended for tourists may be found in the Iron Market in Port au Prince. The practice became closely associated with the Vodou religions in the public mind through the vehicle of horror movies and popular novels.

There is a practice in Haiti of nailing crude poppets with a discarded shoe on trees near the cemetery to act as messengers to the otherworld, which is very different in function from how poppets are portrayed as being used by voodoo worshippers in popular media and imagination, ie. for purposes of sympathetic magic towards another person. Another use of dolls in authentic Vodou practice is the incorporation of plastic doll babies in altars and objects used to represent or honor the spirits, or in pwen, which recalls the aforementioned use of bocio and nkisi figures in Africa."

Granted, my faith in voodoo dolls has waned since the 10th grade when my best friend and I bought a voodoo doll to represent our English teacher, who shall remain nameless. I pushed at least a dozen pins into that damn doll and this teacher never even once winced. Maybe it was a crap voodoo doll or something. I still hold out a glimmer of hope. And this is exactly why this creepy voodoo-esque gift is scaring the pants off of me. How do you get rid of a curse? Do I have to regift the doll? Can I destroy it (i.e. throw it on the subway tracks or burn it for warmth)? Anybody who is learned in the field of voodou, voodoo and/or hoodoo, please get it touch.

UPDATE: Voodoo exists - just not in doll form.

I found voodoo on Wikipedia. I was spelling it "voo doo." My mistake.

Here is what Wikipedia had to offer...

Voodoo
See also: Haitian Vodou, Louisiana Voodoo, West African Vodun

Voodoo is a religious tradition originating in West Africa, which became prominent in the New World due to the importation of African slaves. West African Vodun is the original form of the religion; Haitian Vodou and Louisiana Voodoo are its descendants in the New World.

Can that entry get any more boring? God. Snoozefest. I'd like to take this moment to ask someone to update Wikipedia. Jazz up the voodoo entry a bit. A little pizzazz never hurt anyone.

Weird. No voodoo on Wikipedia.

I've become addicted to Wikipedia lately. For example, I spent three hours on the site the other night. It's insane how addicting it can be.

Shockingly, they don't have an online article about voodoo, you know, in the black magic sense. They have a bunch of music-related posts (apparently the Spice Girls released a song called "Voodoo"), but nothing on the art of poking dolls with pins, etc. What's the deal?

Am I lame and just not able to find the info, even though it's probably in plain sight on Wikipedia?