Maebius Musings

Autumn has struck again, and with it a more formal shift in my mind to introspective stuff. It’s rather amazing how, if you pay attention, our bodies and minds react to the shifting seasons in subtle ways.

Whether it be force of habit, instinct, or a deeper change in our spirit, this time of year makes me crave stews and soups in hearty amounts. Summer is the time for salads and sandwiches, autumn means beef gravy, and thick rootstock veggies for dinner. Truly the “Meat and potato” season is upon us!

I’m not sure if it is entirely based on the availability of local foods either. With today’s supermarkets, I could eat strawberries all year, and have a pumpkin pie at will from the bakery counter. But I don’t favor those flavours heavily, except at seasonally appropriate times. Interesting!

In other news, I’ve decided to dedicate my meditation time, and part of my work-break-minutes to the art of Pendulum Divination.

I have a lovely little pendulum I made years ago, with a silver acorn ‘plumb-weight’, and seed beads along the ‘string’, comprosed of emerald, Carnelian, and moonstone threaded on black waxed-linen thread. It hangs a mere 7 inches (18cm) long, which might be too short according to some sites I found online, but is just perfect for keeping in my shirt-pocket at work.

I will make brief comment on my progress, throughout the month, which currently stands at “I made a nifty pendulum and plan to learn to use it“. Brief experimentation with a few other pendulums that I made or found lying around the house have led me to believe this particular one will work best and feels more natural to me.

Second pick of mine is a length of almost yarn-thick cotton string, 13inches(33cm) long, with either a bronze-dipped acorn on it, or a really cool hunk of quartz-like mineral on it (not a crystal, just a “hunk of whitish and grey rock” from the backyard.)

While the more formal gemstone bead and silver weight feels good for everyday practice and convenient carrying, the longer “cheap knock-off” one is almost calling for itself to be dedicated for Semi-Big Questions and at-home-only ponderings.

Perhaps those with more background in gemstone correspondences, and metaphysical hanging-weights can comment with thoughts on this finding?

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I don’t have much in the way of in-depth musings this week, due to Real Life sticking it’s nose into my free time. Instead, I bring you an unorganized listing from my notebook of ideas (If I get a musing topic, I’ll scribble it down for possible use later) Most times they don’t get posted or elaborated upon here due to being distracted or lack of time to fully research the links and ramifications I want to.
Feel free to comment upon these, or suggest topics for future musings!

1. How to organize/inspire guildmembers in Warcraft (or any online game) where it’s entirely voluntary to participate?
2. Is it cultural, habitual, genetic, or spiritual (or combo?) to crave specific foods at specific times of the year? Autumn means I hanker for stews and gravy, and lots of vinegar, and Oatmeal for breakfast. Summer means subs and salads, with fruit and nuts. Oatmeal in summer just doesn’t appeal to me, and doesn’t seem like it’s a “hot food vs cold cereal” kind of thing, unless extremely ingrained or instinctive.
3. How sad is it that our first PTA meeting last night (Parent Teachers Org, yep, we are THOSE types now I guess!) which covers all grades K-12, had a grand total of 13 parents there, including the 5 officers. They were all totally happy and excited to see four new faces from the new elementary-class parents (ie: us and another family). Education is important, people!!!
4. How scary is it that when the local BoyScout recruiter was at the school and I asked the starting age (since my nephew is now a Cub Scout), they wondered “Do you know anything about Scouting, other than the girls sell cookies” and I informed them that I am an Eagle-rank Scout and OA fellowship-rank, their eyes went all manic and near-yelled “Awesome! ZOMG! We need people to help in leadership roles!!” before they calmed down and asked if um.. Would you be willing to help out when your son gets older? Honestly, the replies were in that order and near-quoted. It was almost worrying.
5. Are new puppies granted supernatural powers of Cuteness, so that even when they pee on the floor in excitement when you get home from work, you scold them, but then have to turn and suppress a giggle when they tilt their head with the “I’m sorry daddy” look.
6. When is a good time to start teaching kids economics (allowance-giving)?
7. Escapism or Creativity: RPG games and spirituality! (elaborate later?)
8. How would our world be different if the moon didn’t rotate at the same pace as it orbits? (same side always faces earth).
9. Correspondances Askew: making the sun female and the moon male. (I read this somewhere, need to research and muse myself as a thought-experiment)
10. Coyote Beautiful. Honoring the trickster, with a nod to how he relates to the christian idea of Lucifer. ( possible title: ” playing at Advocating the Devil?”)
11. Raising rabbits, making money. Comments on how Savings accounts, mutual funds, and other “storing cash” methods can be used as a spiritual metaphor?
12. Penny pinching to lose an inch. How reducing/altering food habits can save your waistline and your pocketbook. Organic Exclusivity is probably not financially sustaining in today’s market, but there are plenty of things that are cheap and yummy.
13. The importance of being earnest (apologies to the original title): Pick a faith, ANY faith, and follow it. Even cultism has it’s value to some folk’s spiritual growth.\

That’s plenty for now, though I have a few more I may flesh out later as actual blogposts…

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I’m not even angry
I’m being so sincere right now
Even though you broke my heart and killed me
And tore me to pieces
And threw every piece into a fire
As they burned it hurt because
I was so happy for you
Now these points of data make a beautiful line
And we’re out of beta, we’re releasing on time
So I’m glad I got burned, think of all the things we learned
For the people who are still alive…

(credits link)

So um yeah… I was off work on vacation again last week (I’m actually starting to get tired of these darn mandatory vacations, interspersed with absolute-Hell-on-wheels of being the single and only guy at work while I AM here covering for my other co-worker. Totally understand he’s feeling the same frustration, too while I’m sitting at home.

Work is busy, we are missing our SLAs (service level agreements) which in part is almost a good thing since it shows we just can. not. do. it. with such a limited staffing here. Still, the customers get understandably irritated when it takes us three days to fix one of their problems, instead of the usual ‘few hours’. So there’s that hanging over us, and while understandable, that does not equal “acceptable” in the upper brass eyes. Other sites are struggling too, so the atmosphere here at work is to jump and cringe whenever the phone rings. Argh!
So, while I should probably have a Autumnal Equinox post up here, it doesn’t exist. I have not mused constructively in the past month at all really, (outside of stress-induced rantingn and escapist online game-playing).

I’m doing science, and I’m still alive.

That’s what I’m thankful for right now…..that, and October is almost here, bringing a return to sanity and sleep, and all that fun normal daily schedule stuff.

Still alive.
Still alive.

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I’m sure by now all you readers have been rather inundated with the media’s marketing of “little steps” to help save the planet. Green-washing aside, there are plenty of smaller steps you can do which may not single-handedly save every human on our little ball of dirt, but can help out a little bit and “make a difference to that one“. (ie: Loren Eisley‘s “The star thrower“)

Without stepping on too large a soapbox, I’ll propose a challenge-tagging to you all. I’ll list 5 small very tiny steps that I’ve taken this year, which have managed to stick in my routine for over two months now, and thus become “habit”. They are not huge things, but I’m fairly proud to have wrangled them into reality.

1. Started drinking less soda and coffee (still do on special weekends and during night-shift to help stay awake though!). It may not seem like a huge thing, but in prior posts, I’d been fairly addicted to Mountain Dew. So in addition to losing weight, I save a bit of money, and feel less sugar-drugged at work.
2. Canning our own food. Be it veggies, 40+ quarts of marinara, fruit jelly, beans, or liqueurs, the products of our garden and local farmstands now adorn our cupboards more than years past. We’ve saved money already, even buying new jars/lids/etc, and cemented in our habits a valuable sustainable kitchen-practice. While not being “green” in a more eco-mainstream sense, it does reduce the energy-cost of food we’d normally be buying at hte store shipped in from remote areas.
3. Garbage Reduction. All of our food-scraps gets fed to the chickens (recycled into EGGS!). Our paper-trash is collected and burned periodically, and plastics/cans are thankfully recycled each week as part of our regular garbage removal service. While I realize burning paper-trash releases CO2 and may impact global warming, I’ve yet to see research showing it makes MORE of a problem than hauling the trash to a landfill where it will rot and fume for years. Less trash, and recycling/refeeding of some trash reduce our impact in the long-term as a healthy eco-habit.
4. The CF lightbulb switch. Yes, it’s been mentioned to death, along with the haz-mat scare of containing mercury, but we’ve done it in most rooms. They honestly do last longer than incandescent bulbs, and are cheaper on electricity.
5. Started folding instead of crumpling. Sorry if this is a squeamish comment, but it deserves mentioning (at the very least for eccentric-maebius factor). Regarding bathroom tissue (TP), I used to unroll a good long bunch of sheets, and then crumple them up for posterior usage. Then, I read a report about the average number of sheets and realized I was far above that. So I started just using 5-7 sheets and folding it before using. I avoid paper-cuts at work (they have crappy TP, pun intended) and cut my usage almost in half. 4 sheets saved each time, = many more trips to the thinking chair before buying more rolls!

What have you done? (long-term habits from years ago are allowed, if they still make you feel a bit happier and secure knowing they count towards “helping the planet”.)

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Lately, images have been acting REALLY weird with my blogsite here. I’ve tried to fiddle with the layout and theme, hopefully to clean up any errors and such. Please forgive any wierdness in this particular post, and be warned.

Images and other testing continues after the break, in case your feedreaders don’t like things. Continue Reading »

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I’m not sure how to articulate it, so I hope the following short muse-rambling makes some sort of coherent sense.

Do all you folks seem to constantly have a soundtrack going in your head, usually quiet and behind the usual random brain-mutterings? When you look at a beautiful artwork, or see the sunrise, does your internal symphony crescendo with instruments appropriate to the medium? (harmonizing crickets even, if not harps and trumpets) Mine does.

When I seek out moments of solitude to center and think, and even when I am attempting to meditate in an eastern null-thought method, the hardest thing to quiet is that internal melody. The inner-thought is hard enough of course, but if I manage to get that wrangled, there’s usually some sniglet of tune or ear-worm of melody that is nigh-impossible to cancel out. The best I usually get to is to shift the song to something like Enya or a soft “meditation music” instead of something from the 80′s rock or modern alternative scene.

When I work nights, and am alone, or am driving to visit friends and relatives in Pennsylvania, I almost have this burning NEED to have the radio on. I go slightly nuts if it’s totally quiet beyond the sound of a car engine, or printer spewing paper. It’s weird.

Likewise, nothing gets the emotions fired up and makes time pass quickly like good tunes.

I’ve joked with my wife once about using my “time-warp” ability while driving, since if the radio is on while she sleeps in the back with the sprogling, we seem to make the trips in short time with no traffic. I can attest that even during these trips the spedometer and cruise-control are set appropriately, (no police-chase velocities are used), yet we always “make good time”. With the radio off and quietness around me, my own sense of time goes sluggish, and the clock.. just… stands…. still.

On a related note, I think this is why my favorite places to sleep are are festivals and camping. At the former, there is the ubiquitous drumming, which I’ve mentioned a love for often here. Even at regular campsites, there’s always some drifting music from other camper’s radios, or at least the summer buzz of crickets and katydids.

The really amusing thing is that I can’t really consider myself musically inclined. I don’t sing (other than fun kareoke games), don’t really play any instruments except the hand-drum at festivals (and even there, not well compared to the “Real Drummers”), and dance like a fish out of water. Yet, music is in my blood.
What about you folks?

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NOTE: seems adding imaged borked the post. Summary = kid loves kindergarden. Will try to re-write and upload pictures that won’t corrupt themselves.. Grr….
The sprog went to the Big House School yesterday for the first time. Kindergarden class!
The first day was a half-day, where parents got to follow along, meet & greet big brothe ..the teachers and administrators.
When we arrived, there was the usual large collection of milling kids, parents hovering nearby, and the staccato strobe of a zillion cameras every few seconds. I’ll willingly admit to adding to the light pollution here. (pictures below). Some kids were crying, some were stoutly ignoring the others in leu of the newfound class-toybox, and such. Our guy proceeded to hit the cubby-spot and hang his backpack, then go find some toys to play with and chatter to one of hte kids from his Pre-K class like old friends.

Second day was great, he was excited to eat “cheesy pizza” at the cafeteria. (More details to follow once I figure out why WordPress is acting up lately…. )

Firstly, is at school the first day, where parents got to visit. Doesn’t he look so big!
Here are a few small images I had to manually crop and fiddle with for some odd reason.

Second, waiting for the bus on Friday, excitedly telling “papa” all about the fun he will be having today!

Lastly, sprogling is getting on the bus for the first time. He did manage to look back through the window and wave, but otherwise, it was “See ya folks, I’m going to school!” in his mind.

At the end, a close-up high-res shot of the big boy from the “schoolyard” image, because it came out so well.

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As a catch-up post on mystical musings, I offer a dream from last night. Usually, I don’t really remember my dreams except in odd fragments. This one, was semi-lucid and really wierd!

It began with myself, (though a younger and not-looking-like me-at-all) walking with some unknown friends along a sort of paved walkway through some outdoor “commercial park” or modern college university-grounds. The grass at the sides of the walk was replaced by garbage and a few scraps of ruined chain-link fencing, composed mostly of black shingle-like things, and random other “back alley trash”. Otherwise, the buildings around me were clean and modern, somewhat heavy on domes or semi-austere roof-patterns (such as a university campus with separate classroom buildings and labs)

We were chatting about something random, when I tripped and stumbled onto the black shingle-stuff, and my companions were greatly worried about stepping from the path. At this point, a large towering figure rose from the shingle-trash (cartoon anime style). It looked featureless, just a rounded pillar of matter, with glowing, non-threatening and cartoony-yet-irritatable-surprised, red eyes. Clearly, and with a tone of warning, the ‘monster’ boomed “It has seen me?!!” and rattled back into a pile of lifeless junk.

Suddenly, colours were clearer, my friends vanished, and I felt elightened. I knew how the world worked, vividly, and unquestioningly, In that fuzzy dream-logic of Truth. I stepped back onto the walkway and noticed that as I stepped into a nearby building shadow, my footprints left faintly glowing marks which faded, like walking on damp soil where the water shimmers momentarily before drawing back underground.

Then, the dream shifted and I looked more like myself in real life. I was on a wide marble tile hallway, reminicent of the over-highway pedestrian bridges, and inside some huge sprawling complex. Outside, the sun was setting through large windows, and I was desperately trying to find something.

In one are of this impossibly large convention hall/mansion, there was a group of toga-clad practitioners of some yoga-like rituals. I glanced at them briefly, acknowledging their efforts at enlightenment while knowing in my dream-heart that is was wrong. There was no judgement in my thoughts, only a mental note that that works for them, but there was so much more under their reality. I knew The Answer, but could not articulate it to that group easily, and attempting it would only harm their own search with my ineptitude.

Yet I needed to find something. The place I needed to go. The room, the field, the Spot where my Answer fit, and could be contemplated by like-minded others. If only I could find it before morning. I was hurried, but not out of worry, and merely due to wishing to share the joy as soon as possible.

Other areas were passed through. Oudoor circles of dancers, prayer-groups, and academic scholars. All had a fragment of the Answer in their own way, but were not the groups I searched for. Indoor classrooms of Afro-cuban bonfire dancers, caltholic masses, aboriginal tribes, and whirling dirvishes were passed, with the same smiling acknowledgement of Truth-in-part.

There was more, and I remember wanting to write down my thoughts while semi-lucidly in-dreaming, but first I had to find the place I could sit down and be “home”.

Unfortunately, the sun set outside of the windows, and the final image from my dream was one of pausing to look outside and wonder at the sky. It was filled with rainbow clouds of nebulae, flashing meteors, and sparkling diamonds, like some sci-fi backdrop from the center of the galaxy. Then, funny enough, I know my dream-self laughed out loud as I muttered “My god, it’s full of stars!”

Even as I write this in the afternoon at work, I can almost still feel and accurately imagine some of the dream sequences. Specifically the glowing footprints, and the final imagery of walking through the halls and seeing hte satars. I was serene, yet driven, calm and yet energized with the clarity that a good night’s sleep and a good book gives you.

I’m not sure what it meant, but any dream that wakes me with tears in my eyes, my fingers tingling in that ‘Wow’ way, and a smile on my face, without any real reason to explain them, has to mean something…

What do you think?

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