Wagaliciousness Begins Here!

As I sit here eating yet another Samoa, I remember my single-digit days when I’d don my green uniform, carefully arrange my badge-encrusted sash, and head out to knock on neighbors’ doors, Girl Scout cookie order sheet in hand. There was an iceberg in my stomach and my knees knocked as I pressed the first doorbell, though the fear eventually subsided. The more front doors that were opened by smiling people the smaller the iceberg became, the more stable my knees became, and the more fun I started having, whether those people bought any cookies or not.

I wonder how many successful women started that way. Did you?

This is Girl Scout Week. Not to take anything away from the more testosterone-laden half of society, this week is designed to shine a spotlight on the more than 50 million women who’ve been part of Girl Scouts, plus the girls currently in the program.

Were you part of a scouting program? If so, it’s likely that you grew up learning more leadership skills, better communicatio...

Have you ever thought about harnessing up 16 sled dogs, putting them in front of a sled loaded with dog food, survival gear, and a few protein bars for you, and heading out for a week or two into arctic weather, 1128 miles of rugged trail conditions, and wildlife that might want to hurt you?

Yeah, me neither! Yet that’s just what thirty-three otherwise rational humans are doing right now.

There were forty mushers – 7 mushers withdrew from the Iditarod before it even started. Came to their senses, you might say? Many others would join that chorus – for the thirty-three mushers, this is what they’ve waited and trained for their entire lives. The challenge of what’s called the Last Great Race on Earth is one they feel they’re up for, and the “prove it” is happening now on the windswept wilderness between Fairbanks and Nome, Alaska. Some teams will be on the trail for eight or 9 days, most far longer, and some teams will scratch along the way, ending their shot at completing the Iditarod...

There are people celebrating across America and around the world today. It’s both Global and National Drink Wine Day, and it’s a great reason to look at whatever it is you love from a different vantage point.

We’ll start with wine: people who love wine so much that they’ve made a hobby or a business of it are called oenophiles. It’s a fun word to say – E no file – and it’s fun to see what these people have in common. They love wine so much that they’ve studied and collected it, they travel to the wine regions of the world to learn about its origins, and they learn about food so they can create inspired pairings. Since wine relaxes most people, oenophiles are often pretty laid-back, and since moderate consumption has been touted to create healthier cholesterol levels, maybe they’re even less prone to heart attacks.

What do you love?  

I love dog sports. I’ve owned dogs and shown dogs in conformation, obedience, rally obedience, agility, and so many more sports, and I love the fun of ...

Have you ever trained a puppy? You got this squirmy, silly, sweet ball of fluff and suddenly you either had to teach the puppy rules and manners, or else you had to live with the random chewing and smelly little mistakes that happen without training.

For most of the last century, dog training was best described as “jerk and yell.” You put a training collar on your dog and as soon as he did something wrong, you issued a verbal correction (often “NO!!”) and jerked on the collar. Thankfully, dog training has come a looooooong way since then. Dolphin trainer Karen Pryor wrote a breakthrough book in 1984 entitled “Don’t Shoot the Dog! – The New Art of Teaching and Training.” Through her work with dolphins, she saw that positive reinforcement was the fastest, most reliable way of teaching any species. The book is considered foundational to those who train their dogs in this century and is also a very useful look at how to train people.

Yes, people. In her book, Karen describes specific pos...

Have you ever heard the phrase “delicious anticipation?” This is one of those times when two words make magic when they get together, because they so perfectly describe something wonderful.

Delicious anticipation – what is it, why do you want it, and how do you get it?

Delicious anticipation was the excitement you had imagining what was in those holiday gifts with ribbons and bright paper and your name on them. Delicious anticipation is the butterflies you feel as you dress for a date with someone you love. Delicious anticipation is the fun you have planning a big vacation. Delicious anticipation is seeing your ideal home in your imagination and knowing that it will be yours one day. Delicious anticipation is you tuning in to your dreams and enjoying the movie of them as it plays inside your head.

Delicious anticipation is when your imagination meets your unfolding life. It’s second nature to some people, and for others it needs to be cultivated and practiced. There’s no right or wr...

Today, let’s talk about hugs. Are you a hugger? I am. Whenever I feel a connection to someone my default is to want to hug them. Not everyone’s a hugger, though, so occasionally the hug impulse has to be squelched.

Why do humans hug? Have you ever wondered about that? Turns out, hugging is addictive behavior. Hugging is also crucial to infants, helping them survive, and hugging is one of the best ways to lower stress in your body.

Hugs feel good. Hugs are good. But how do they constitute “addictive behavior” in humans? Because the act of being in a hug, whether initiating or accepting it, releases dopamine, serotonin, and oxytocin, which are the natural feel-good chemicals in our bodies. Physical touch, hugs included, triggers the release of endorphins, our bodies’ natural painkillers.

Turns out, we love hugging and being hugged because we love the way it makes us feel. We have an addiction to our own “happy drugs” and hugs satisfy the need to feel accepted, included, and loved. If ...

‘Tis the season that those of us in the northern hemisphere bundle up. And those of us with dogs, especially the small and relatively hairless ones, bundle their dogs up, too. If that’s you today, you have unwittingly celebrated today’s fun holiday – it’s Dress Up Your Pet Day.

I’m not ashamed to admit it – for most of my life I would have scoffed at this holiday, so if you’re rolling your eyes, it’s ok. I have had Siberian Huskies all my adult life, and they’re a breed that needs no bundling up in cold weather. Mother Nature literally designed them to be comfy in arctic conditions. I’ve never bought a coat or sweater for my dogs, and the only time any of them have worn booties is when they were loaned to a friend to run on his sled dog team for the winter. So no, I’m not someone who dresses up her dogs, except maybe at Halloween for a quick photo op.

That is, until I got my current Siberian, Kacey. It was during the pandemic lockdown that she moved from my friend Lisa’s house to min...

If there’s a high-water mark for brains, Alfred Nobel probably etched it. In his last will, signed in Paris on November 27^th, 1895, he left the bulk of his fortune to a special prize fund. He passed away just over a year later, and his legacy lives on today with the awarding of this year’s Nobel Prizes.

Nobel wanted the money he’d made in his varied and successful life to be invested well, and each year the organization he created would award monetary prizes. The categories he specified are those he was most interested in during his own life: physics, chemistry, physiology or medicine, literature, and peace. The awards would go to “those who, during the preceding year, shall have conferred the greatest benefit to humankind.”

Which brings us to we mere mortals – what is our benefit to humankind? It’s common for people to wonder what their purpose in this life is, and to wonder if they’re doing enough to “earn their keep” in this world. If your thoughts occasionally venture down roads ...

Are you stuffed full of holidays like I am? In the span of six days, we’ve celebrated Thanksgiving, Black Friday, Cyber Monday and now Giving Tuesday. It’s been an expensive, exhausting six days for a lot of people!

As the calendar rolls around to the end of another year, this time between Thanksgiving and New Year’s Eve is filled with to-do’s – those you need to do, plus those that others need or want you to do. Especially when it comes to family gatherings, we put a lot of heavy expectations on ourselves. And the music doesn’t help, with holiday songs proclaiming that it’s the most wonderful time of the year, describing idyllic snow scenes, fireplaces, and true love, and of course we can’t forget the poignant longing in songs talking about missing loved ones at the holidays.

I’m not here to remind you of the extra stress you carry this time of year. Nope, as with every issue, this newsletter contains helpful information that’ll make it easier for you to shed the stress and have mor...

Maybe the Grinch had something to do with it. Or maybe it was the late Joan Rivers, a comedienne famous for her “Can we talk” question as she launched into pointed, comical griping about someone who was annoying her.

November 19^th – today – is Have a Bad Day Day. And the Voice of Wagaliciousness, the person who helps you keep your emotional balance while the world around you wobbles out of control, wants you to celebrate this with gusto.

I do want you to be prepared, in case someone tells you to have a bad day today. Please don’t punch them!

There’s a very positive reason for this negative-sounding holiday: we can’t all “have a nice day” every day. As a matter of fact, much as we’d like to, most of us don’t even string together an entire 24 hours without at least a little bit of badness in it. It’s a lovely goal to “have a nice day” every day, and the tools and coping skills that help you “have a nice day” as often as possible are what I dish up in this weekly newsletter and blog, a...