thursday thoughts – random thoughts
Posted by maebius on 25 Sep 2008 at 10:03 am | Tagged as: Random, Uncategorized
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!
- How to organize/inspire guildmembers in Warcraft (or any online game) where it’s entirely voluntary to participate?
- 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.
- 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!!!
- 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.
- 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.
- When is a good time to start teaching kids economics (allowance-giving)?
- Escapism or Creativity: RPG games and spirituality! (elaborate later?)
- How would our world be different if the moon didn’t rotate at the same pace as it orbits? (same side always faces earth).
- Correspondances Askew: making the sun female and the moon male. (I read this somewhere, need to research and muse myself as a thought-experiment)
- 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?”)
- Raising rabbits, making money. Comments on how Savings accounts, mutual funds, and other “storing cash” methods can be used as a spiritual metaphor?
- 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.
- 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…
NETTLE WROTE: on 25 Sep 2008 at 10:41 am
1. No clue, but let me know if you figure it out. Not for gaming purposes – even in multiplayer games I find that I pretty much prefer soloing – but for any organization.
2. me too! I just moved into oatmeal mode. Cold cereal has completely lost its charm within the past week or so. Winter squash is starting to seem delicious again. Soon I will make pumpkin soup.
3. sad and kind of puzzling. I don’t have kids, as you know, but if I did I couldn’t even imagine sending them off to some institution without also involving myself in it.
4. no opinion there. My nephews were rejected from Scouts because their mom is an atheist and I hear about Pagan kids getting crap from the Scouts, so I have a kind of thumbs-down opinion of the organization, but I know it was really valuable for you and plenty of kids get great things out of it. Wondering how you plan to handle the religion thing.
5. I’m reminded of a scene from a novel. I don’t remember which one, but it was set in a culture where dog-eating was the norm. There’s a scene with a puppy that is destined for the stew-pot, but the puppy runs to the little girl in the story and deploys the most potent puppy weapon of all: total submissive helpless cuteness. She defends the puppy from the grownups, and the scene explains how she got a dog named Soup.
6. Right away. Or sooner.
7. Interesting!
8. hmmm…
9. The Japanese have a sun goddess and a moon god (or was it twins? can’t remember.) The Phoenicians also had a male moon god.
10. I’ve got this going on too, with Trickster imagery getting all tangled up with the Sacred Teacher.
11. how do you make money from rabbits? I can only think of fur and meat, but I don’t see Mrs. Maebius going that way. Angora wool?
12. sudden food intolerances work for that, too! it’s getting so that I can’t eat anything delicious without severe gastric distress. sigh.
13. It’s like music – you have to learn how to play someone else’s music before you strike off and write your own.
MAEBIUS WROTE: on 25 Sep 2008 at 12:28 pm
Here’s a few very brief elaborations while I’m on lunch…
3. sad and kind of puzzling. I don’t have kids, as you know, but if I did I couldn’t even imagine sending them off to some institution without also involving myself in it.
Re: PTO meeting…I KNOW! almost a WTF moment for me.
4. no opinion there. My nephews were rejected from Scouts because their mom is an atheist and I hear about Pagan kids getting crap from the Scouts, so I have a kind of thumbs-down opinion of the organization, but I know it was really valuable for you and plenty of kids get great things out of it. Wondering how you plan to handle the religion thing.
I’m totally basing my plans off my own scouting experience, which was wonderfully accepting and did not push the God issue much at all. However, I will admit that Atheism is specifically against one of the founding principles of Scouting, so will have to grudgingly lean towards their side with your sister. (not to judge your sister at ALL, but merely to admit my opinion regarding how her beliefs clash with the Boy Scouts of America)
Yes, the organization was founded on christian principles, which I shared in my early scouting career, but I turned pagan long before I left/graduated with the highest rank attainable.
There’s wording in the Scout Handbook specifically mentioning “belief in a higher power” as not necessarily pertaining to christian denominations (Jews, , etc are named as valid paths.) “Higher power” is the exact worded requirement, in my old scout book, and I plan to utilize that open mindedness for defense if necessary.
Also, taken from the Scout Oath (bolding mine)
. . . To do my duty to God . . .
Your family and religious leaders teach you about God and the ways you can serve. You do your duty to God by following the wisdom of those teachings every day and by respecting and defending the rights of others to practice their own beliefs.
words from the founder of Scouts himself:
[i]Reverence to God and reverence for one’s neighbor and reverence for oneself as a servant of God, is the basis for every form of religion. The method of expression of reverence to God varies with every sect and denomination. What sect or denomination a boy belongs to depends, as a rule on his parents’ wishes. It is they who decide. It is our business to respect their wishes and to second their efforts to inculcate reverence, what ever form of religion the boy professes.[/i] – [b]Lord R.S.S. Baden-Powell[/b]
Can you tell this is somewhat of a hot-button topic for me?!
11. how do you make money from rabbits? I can only think of fur and meat, but I don’t see Mrs. Maebius going that way. Angora wool?
Bad title there. The muse was specifically using the breeding rabbits metaphor, along with putting money in savings accounts, which grow in a potentially non-linear fashion towards greater numbers/wealth. Exploration of the metaphor for spiritual activity and meditation.
Fun, eh?!
Heck, with that scouting note, perhaps I should make that a post “Reconciling the BSA with pagan spirituality?”
NETTLE WROTE: on 25 Sep 2008 at 1:14 pm
this was the story I was thinking of:
http://www.commongroundcommonsense.org/forums/index.php?showtopic=55461
where the problem seems to be not so much the BSA itself as the locals being total asshats. Not much to be done about that in any case, and I guess it just depends on the luck of the draw for what kind of people your fellow scout parents are.
I seem to recall some sort of connection between Baden-Powell and the Druid movement in Britain the early 20th century – maybe through Seton? I think Hutton has a few things to say about the conjoined roots of modern paganism and Scouting.