Hey! Sorry I've been gone so long. Actually, I was not gone, I was just away. Get it? No, probably not, but that's OK. We can't all be fucking geniuses, can we? So here are the first two amusing things I found...

• Fun With New Age Fuckheads, Part 1
  For your viewing pleasure, all the 1-star reviews of Eckhart Tolle's The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment. Actually, I was a little disappointed in these, as none is even close to expressing the venom this book so richly deserves. Of course, wishing to preserve what little is left of my sanity, I didn't actually read the fucking thing. I would, however, love to piss on Mr. Tolle from a great height. Heads up, motherfucker, here it comes!
  
  
• Listmania! Self Help Books for the Blossoming Psychopath
  After all that, I needed some comic relief. Fortunately, it wasn't long in coming. Whew! Now here's a guy (obviously a guy) I can relate to. Read his comments carefully. And be afraid. Very afraid. We are legion!

You've probably already guessed that I went shopping this evening. Yep. Running up the credit, pissing away the pittance I make off the suckers who buy my recommendations. Let me say right here that I strongly recommend the following, and a few of them are pret-ty fucking expensive. So go ahead, buy two. One for you, one for Mom.

• The Narcissistic and Borderline Disorders: An Integrated Developmental Approach
  For a cheaper, more accessible version, try Search For The Real Self: Unmasking the Personality Disorders of Our Age. This is where I first read about "abandonment depression" in 2002. (You know what I did last summer!) Don't try this one at home, kids.
  
  
• The Basic Fault: Therapeutic Aspects of Regression
  I read a paper by this guy, Balint, that was downright spooky. Psi-like effects in the transference. Inexplicable paranoid mind reading. Cool! Naturally, I wanted to know more.
  
  
• Object Relations in Psychoanalytic Theory
  The players in depth. The chapters on Kohut and Kernberg were so good, I had to buy the book. Don lent it to me and I didn't want to give it back. One of the co-authors is Stephen A. Mitchell, who wrote Can Love Last? The Fate of Romance over Time. Check chapter 4 on why intimacy and anger, love and hatred, aren't opposites. Contrary to the notions of many new-age fuckheads (see above).
  
  
• Psychoanalytic Terms and Concepts
  The jargon in depth. Don't leave the ward without it.
  
  
• Soul Murder: The Effects of Childhood Abuse and Deprivation
  A bit lighter fare to offset the clinical indigestion. "Soul murder is the perpetration of brutal or subtle acts against children that result in their emotional bondage to the abuser and, finally, in their psychic and spiritual annihilation."

C'mon, admit it. You missed me, didn't you?