Today I Am Joined by Pravda Body-Language Expert Janine Driver

SHIMMY: Welcome to my windowsill, Janine Driver.

JANINE DRIVER: Nice to be here, Shimmy.

SHIMMY: I can't figure out why the Mayakovsky Tree looks so sad. His bark is peeling.

JANINE DRIVER: I'm sure it is. Without a doubt.

SHIMMY: Why does the squirrel rub its shabby belly along the bole of the Mayakovsky Tree? What does this mean, Janine Driver?

JANINE DRIVER: It's a connection they have together. It's something just personal between the two of them, like "I'm proud of you." It's something intimate between them.

SHIMMY: Even though the squirrel is fetid and I might get salmonella if I bit into its lush neck?

JANINE DRIVER: It's kind of a hip gesture that they're making. It's something personal between them.

SHIMMY: And so you hunt for the small change of gesture and genuflection in the depleted cashbox of tax collectors, traveling expenses, and other people's declensions!

JANINE DRIVER: You misquoted me on June 14. For those people interested in the facts, please visit YouTube and you can hear what I actually said.

SHIMMY: So when a squirrel crawls across a thin branch like an embezzler, we cannot be certain that this is not a terrorist-fist-jab?

JANINE DRIVER: You know, the mistake that a lot of body language experts make, Shimmy, is they say, "OK, the squirrel rubs its belly against the bole of the Mayakovsky Tree, so it means the Mayakovsky Tree is bored and disinterested."

SHIMMY: The squirrel just shook his hindquarters. What does that mean? Has our communication culture changed in America?

JANINE DRIVER: The War on Terror pigeonholes one gesture into a certain meaning. That's unscientific. The best thing to say is, "I don't care a spit for gangs of flowers and bulking bodies."

SHIMMY: Tell me what need is satisfied by the War on Terror's visible freezing of life?

JANINE DRIVER: Shimmy, the War on Terror is fundamentally nothing more than the leisure of going to see what has become banal.