An Experiment

[ecosophia]

I have a favor to ask of you, dear readers... 

Several years ago, in a conversation with friends, one of them mentioned the way that their family members spent hours at a time in what amounts to a trance, staring blankly at a television screen, as though the jerky little colored shapes on the glass screen actually mattered. It occurred to me that there was a curious bit of folklore that paralleled this. 

In the folklore of the Celtic countries, glamour -- the ability to push illusions on people, which faeries are said to have -- can be combated in several ways, but the most important involves a knife or some other piece of sharp iron or steel. There are traditional reasons for this in occult philosophy, which we don't have to get into here. It struck me, though, that it was worth experimenting to see if the same thing would help counter the glamour of the television. 

The short form is that it worked. My friend put a small pocketknife, open, under the television, and the other members of his family basically lost interest in it. 

I've advised the same thing several more times, with equally good results. In one case, the television just up and quit working; in the others, though, having a sharp knife under the television seems to lead to a steady loss of interest in those jerky little colored shapes on the glass screen. It also seems to have a similar effect on obsessive interest in the internet. 

So here's what I'd like to ask. Those of you who are still unfortunate enough to live someplace with a television -- give it a try. See if you can hide a small pocketknife with the blade open under the television. Those of you who have home internet access, try hiding one under your router. Do this, and see what happens. 

If anyone wants an incantation to go with this little bit of natural magic, it's hard to beat Kipling's poem: 

"Gold for the mistress, silver for the maid,
Copper for the craftsman, cunning at his trade;
'Good!' said the baron, sitting in his hall,
'But iron, cold iron, is the master of them all.'"

Give it a try and let me know what results you get...

Comments

[ecosophia]

I admit I haven't yet been able to think of a way to apply this to cell phones. One step at a time...

[auntlili]

Bury a knife under a cell tower? Is there a size threshold for these things?

[ecosophia]

Good question. I suspect it would need to be closer than that.

[(Anonymous)]

I was thinking, for my particular case, of storing a razorblade in the back of my phone case. Perhaps a piece of box cutter blade, thinking of the necessity for a sharp point información on it...

[(Anonymous)]

A small metal nail file tucked inside a phone case, maybe?

[ecosophia]

Only if the nail file has a sharp point. That's crucial, according to the theory.

[(Anonymous)]

Phones connect automatically to wi-fi if available to save the data from the plan. This should work at given location as well.

- Just did my own 'set up' - very cool idea! Will report.

[temporaryreality]

I went the router route - as we're on a low-budget cell plan with a data limit internet is used on phones only at home.

[elf]

Pin or needle in the phone case? Many folding cellphone cases have a pocket for credit cards; it'd be easy to put a needle in a way that's very unlikely to poke anyone. It's a bit more tricky with the outside-wrapper-only cases but still possible.

Razor Blade/Box Cutter Blade?

[(Anonymous)]

Seems like these might work well taped on the back of 'smart' phones. I'm inclined to think that these 24/7 mobile TV/prosthetic brains are far, far worse than television.
JW in W. Mass