Judy Garbow is merely hoping to lure a few individuals to the Bridgton Community Center on Saturday for a program offering a peek inside of the minds of animals.

Garbow, 55, of Cumberland is an animal communicator who says she uses telepathy, a form of nonverbal communication, to convey the thoughts or feelings of pets to their owners.

“I work with people and pets, usually companion animals,” said Garbow. “When people call someone like me, they are looking for information that can help their animals. And those issues usually go back to what’s happening in (the animal’s) environment.”

Garbow said that if there is stress, depression, anxiety or sickness in a home, animals will reflect that in their behavior.

“(Animals) are feeling beings that will do anything to show love, even to save your life if necessary,” said Garbow. “They want to help, but they can’t speak.”

Garbow, a former dental assistant, began practicing “energy work” 20 years ago. She owns the business Prisms on Main Street in Yarmouth, sharing office space with a veterinarian who specializes in holistic practices, chiropractic work and nutrition.

“I have had an interest in health, nutrition and alternative (forms of health care) all my life,” said Garbow. “I discovered that I was intuitive in animal communication and opened up to it really quickly. It’s not something you just walk into. It’s something you become over time.”

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Psychic fails at..psychic..ness

Pro tip: Don’t be specific with your cold reading guesses when you’re a ugly old lady pretending to be a psychic.

This is totally why I failed at being a psychic too. I’d go to do a reading where I’m in touch with the dead and then I’d be like, “I bet your husband’s death was a tragic one…WAS IT MARSHMALLOWS? DID HE DIE IN A VAT OF MARSHMALLOWS? I BET IT WAS MARSHMALLOWS.” Sure, it was a correct guess one out of the first ten thousand times, but it didn’t do much for my psychic street cred.

Phone companies f’ing you on text messages

It may be a shocker to learn that major corporations are f’ing you everywhere you go. Well, add another confirmation on that fact to the list: It costs you .20 for every text you send. It costs cell providers approximately 0 dollars. And 0 cents.

Telcos are ripping you off. If you are surprised by this, you may also be interested in some prime real estate I have for sale. It’s on the Moon.

But just because we all know that we are being scammed doesn’t make the manner of the sting any less interesting. A piece in the New York Times goes into some detail on the cost of text messages to the cell carriers and concludes that it is close to zero. An SMS doesn’t even take any bandwidth away from the regular channels which carry calls:

That’s why a message is so limited in length: it must not exceed the length of the message used for internal communication between tower and handset to set up a call. The channel uses space whether or not a text message is inserted.

I never thought this would be possible but, with this news, apparently the text photos I send women of my penis are somehow worth less than I had originally valuated them at. The cost-benefit analysis of this really makes me realize that, not only is my business model foolish, but frankly, it’ll never be profitable. But sometimes you have to take a hit financially to get your message out there. Really, it’s the closest thing to charity that I do.