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Should I Check E-Mail? What Are the Rules?



Patti Wood, MA, Certified Speaking Professional - The Body Language Expert. For more body language insights go to her website at www.PattiWood.net. Check out Patti's website for her new book "SNAP, Making the Most of First Impressions, Body Language and Charisma" at www.snapfirstimpressions.com. Also check out Patti's YouTube channel at http://youtube.com/user/bodylanguageexpert.

Read the Text or Not, Funny Cartoon about the Disrespect of Texting While You are With Someone




Patti Wood, MA, Certified Speaking Professional - The Body Language Expert. For more body language insights go to her website at www.PattiWood.net. Check out Patti's website for her new book "SNAP, Making the Most of First Impressions, Body Language and Charisma" at www.snapfirstimpressions.com. Also check out Patti's YouTube channel at http://youtube.com/user/bodylanguageexpert.

Does Angelina Jolie Really Have Chicken Pox? Angelina's Body Language, is She Lying?

Does Angelina Jolie Really Have Chicken Pox? Angelina's Body Language, is She Lying?


A body language expert Patti Wood
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WnxoEIJMsUc

Is Angelina lying about her Chicken Pox. Well, I can tell you she is having a really good time telling the world she can’t go to her Unbroken Events because she has Chicken Pox.

She starts the recording with the words “I just want to be clear and honest.” These are not the typical words of someone who is just sending out a message that she has Chicken Pox.  These are not the normal first words for any apology stantement, the  baseline of a normal “I am sick” announcement is to start with what you are most upset about which should be, "I am sick!"  In an honest message the emotional message comes out first. It is a limbic brain response. Typically your nonverbal delivery will also show your emotions. You should see her have the facial expressions of pain, or discomfort of being sick and or contriteness at having to miss the events. Instead she has a rather frozen face and monotones delivery of very logical words, “I just want to be clear and honest.” The words themselves are words a liar uses before they lie. Honest people don’t say they have to be clear and honest.”
Next notice in the video what she does with her head as she says, “…Clear and honest.” See how her head jerks back as she says it.  I call that a "heat retreat." We retreat under threat, and liars often, pull back or retreat in some way when they are lying. She could have the Chicken Pox, but she does NOT want to be clear and honest in this message.

Also notice what happens as she says  the words Chicken Pox. On the YouTube video this is a the .17 time marker. She smiles. Yes, sometimes people give a cover smile when delivering bad news, but this is not a cover smile. The corners of the mouth go down in a cover smile and the eyes don't typically move. Notice how the coursers of both sides of her mouth go up, her eyebrows go up and her eyes open and most significantly her head goes up. We go up when we are happy and joyful. She is happy. Yes, oddly she is happy not sad, that is not a surprised smile. That is a happy smile.

Notice that her eyes are not inflamed, as they might be if she had chicken pox, notice though her voice is lowered it is forced and has subdued strength. It is not scratchy and strained as it might be for someone who has chicken pox. She might have them, but they have not hit full force yet.

Finally, one of the most interesting statements is “I just can’t believe it.” If you watch her say that statement, you see it is sincere. It has the normal FEEL SHOW SAY of an honest statement. You see her go back slightly, you see the surprise on her face, you’re here her voice change and then you hear the words silvered that match that emotional statement of disbelief. But here is the thing.  She could be in disbelief about Chicken Pox. But the pause before she makes that statement in the context of what she is saying is long, and sometimes liars, hold a true thought in the mind and they talk about something they are lying about in order to have an authentic delivery. In this case she could authentically be in disbelief that she has the chicken pox, but she could also be in that moment be thinking about and in disbelief about the emails about her that where released.
In any case she is not normal in much of her nonverbal delivery at anytime and she is not normal in the delivery of her I have Chicken Pox delivery.

Late last night I got a call to read this video for Radaronline, but know that they misquoted me. This have me saying things I did not say. For example I did not say, "She was giving her worst acting..." and I did not say, "There are a couple of physical things that are obvious."   http://radaronline.com/exclusives/2014/12/angelina-jolie-body-lanugage-rips-apart-patt-wood/

Patti Wood, MA, Certified Speaking Professional - The Body Language Expert. For more body language insights go to her website at www.PattiWood.net. Check out Patti's website for her new book "SNAP, Making the Most of First Impressions, Body Language and Charisma" at www.snapfirstimpressions.com. Also check out Patti's YouTube channel at http://youtube.com/user/bodylanguageexpert.

Lady Gaga and Taylor Kinney Body Language Read in Life & Style Next Week


Check next week's Life & Style for Patti's body language read of Taylor Kinney and Lady Gaga.





Patti Wood, MA, Certified Speaking Professional - The Body Language Expert. For more body language insights go to her website at www.PattiWood.net. Check out Patti's website for her new book "SNAP, Making the Most of First Impressions, Body Language and Charisma" at www.snapfirstimpressions.com. Also check out Patti's YouTube channel at http://youtube.co
m/user/bodylanguageexpert.

Top Six Classic Christmas Movies

The Best Christmas Movies in Black and White that are Undiscovered Gems

I am a purest when it comes to Christmas tree lights.  Though every Christmas of my young life, my dad spent hours stringing the big green, yellow and blue colored bulbs on our tree. My first little tree when I was in grad school and all the tree lights since have been white.
Maybe it relates to my favorite Christmas movies, which are all black and white. I am a huge classic movie fan.  I love how well written and well-acted they are. I love how funny and innocent they are. Children don’t talk back to their parents. Couples are kind to one another and there is no horror, seldom nastiness and the good guy or gal always wins.  I had a black and white TV well into the 90s because my main TV viewing was classic black and white movies. So, it makes sense that at Christmas my favorite films, except for White Christmas are in black and white. (And even White Christmas is a remake of the black and white film Holiday Inn.) In classic Christmas movies the stories are simple and heartwarming, but unlike many current Hallmark and Lifetime holiday movies the dialogue is clever and the acting is fabulous.  Several of these movies have had modern remakes, but stick with the originals.

Here are the six classic films that I watch every year!



Christmas in Connecticut (1945)
One of my absolute favorites!
Barbara Stanwyck as a big-city food writer, who, it turns out, can’t cook and doesn’t have the country farm she claims to own. Unfortunately, those facts are not known to the magazine’s owner (the incomparable Sydney Greenstreet of “Casablanca” and “The Maltese Falcon” fame), who believes his writer is a married homemaker. He not only directs her to provide a Christmas meal for a recovering war veteran, he decides to join them. Hilarity, as they say, ensues. The war hero, Jefferson Jones, is played by one of the sweetest actors Dennis Morgan.


Holiday Affair (1949)
It is a romantic comedy from 1949. Robert Mitchum, Janet Leigh (from Pyscho), Wendell Corey and Harry Morgan star in the film. Set during the holiday season in New York City, this story centers on a war widow, who is a secret shopper for a large department store. She brings home a big toy train that she has to return as part of her work, and her little boy finds it.  She runs into a war veteran and a complicated romance with hilarity ensues.


The Shop Around the Corner (1940)
Most people have heard about or seen Jimmy Stewart in “It’s a Wonderful Life,” but this movie is not so famous little gem. Stewart is working in a shop, only to find that the pen pal he has fallen in love with is a co-worker named Klara (Margaret Sullavan) who he can’t stand. Frank Morgan of “Wizard of Oz” fame is store owner Hugo Matuschek, and Joseph Schildkraut turns in a fine performance as Stewart’s nemesis, Ferencz Vadas. This, of course, was remade as “You’ve Got Mail.” “Shop” is infinitely better.


The Man Who Came to Dinner  (1942)
The wittiest of the Christmas movies starts Monty Woolley stars as acerbic theater critic Sheridan Whiteside, the man who came to dinner, broke his leg on an icy patch and seemingly never plans to leave. There is slapstick comedy and very funny dialogue.  The cast includes Bette Davis, Ann Sheridan, Billie Burke and Jimmy Durante.


The Thin Man (1934)
This is one of my favorite movies, period! I love the whole Thin Man series. It’s, not a traditional Christmas movie, but this murder whodunit starring William Powell and Myrna Loy as married sleuths Nick and Nora Charles is set at Christmastime. The chemistry between the leads is a delight to watch and the dialogue is as snappy as it gets a Christmas gift in itself. By the way, the title doesn’t refer to Powell’s character, but to the missing professor he’s trying to track down. 


Holiday (1938)
It is a 1938 film directed by George Cukor, a remake of the 1930 film of the same name.
I love love love this film. It is actually up in my top five films of all time right after Shashank Redemption.  It’s a very playful and funny romantic comedy which tells the story of a man who has worked hard since he was a young boy to achieve great success and now plans to enjoy life to its fullest.  He meets a girl and plans to get married. His wealthy finance makes him choose between his free-thinking lifestyle or her and the big wedding gift of a house, with attached the tradition (and drudgery), of her wealthy family. The movie was adapted by Donald Ogden Stewart and Sidney Buchman from the play by Philip Barry and stars Katharine Hepburn, Cary Grant and features Doris Nolan, Lew Ayres, and Edward Everett Horton, who played the same role he had played in the 1930 version.


Patti Wood, MA, Certified Speaking Professional - The Body Language Expert. For more body language insights go to her website at www.PattiWood.net. Check out Patti's website for her new book "SNAP, Making the Most of First Impressions, Body Language and Charisma" at www.snapfirstimpressions.com. Also check out Patti's YouTube channel at http://youtube.com/user/bodylanguageexpert.