Psychic Sensation in New York

Oh my goodness... the shock of this experience makes a woman who is never short of words find it hard to find any to explain... but bear with me. Lunchtime - well late lunch at 2.30/3pm - and I'm about to find this Chinese take-out place that a colleague in the New York office has recommended to me. It’s still freezing cold and if I was not a good eater, I’d be going to the crap deli a couple of doors down. But, the bloating and the wind I’ve had because of this crap food is worth braving the cold for.

Anyway, so I've literally walked out of the building and am trying to get my bearing - the whole grid system in the US still baffles me! "I've got something I need to tell you. Will you let me read you? I see a smile on your face, but you're not smiling inside are you?"

A psychic... This lady accosted me on the street. She was short, personable and certainly looked a lot warmer than I did, wearing her big fur coat (possibly made of real fur, and going by the huge office she works in - yes, Londoners out there, this psychic had an office just off Park Avenue itself). I was so taken aback that she literally took my hand and led me to this plush office. I think I was so marvelled by how plush the office was that I wasn’t taking anything she was saying in. She had her logo emblazoned onto the glass and everything was so professional. Nothing like the psychic fairs I’ve seen before. I bet some chief executives would sell their right arm to have a plush office like this lady.

All I heard when we spoke on the street was “free reading” and thought, “yeah, why not?”. But in a split second – my furry mitts had only just touched the handles on the leather chairs in the reception area – yes, reception area - before she was offering to do all this “work” for me.

Now, don’t get me wrong… I do believe that some people genuinely have a gift and can “see” things. But I also think that some of these people have excellent sales techniques. Sir Alan Sugar would snap this lady up for The Apprentice any day.

This psychic genuinely seemed to care, though. But she was also quite forceful in her approach. By the end of our conversation, I had almost had a nervous breakdown, and my free reading hadn’t really told me anything, let alone shed any light on this work that I needed doing. But what was firmly engraved on my brain was the $1,000 price tag. At this point, all comatose was shocked out of my system. $1,000 – did she think the woolly hat I was wearing was from Bloomingdales or something?

Needless to say, my refusal brought a swift end to our “session”…

…but I did bump into her again in the street a couple of days later – as fate would have it. She had come out to see her “worker” was doing what she was paying him to do. Poor guy was strapped to a sign in the freezing cold, but we all have to earn out crust somehow…