Archive for August, 2005

Human Cultural Evolution

Wednesday, August 31st, 2005

If we think about it at this juncture, clearly there is little to commend this Judaeo/ Christian/Islamic God if he is represented by the people who led this church. Pagans have a far better history and stand foursquare and ‘head and shoulders’ above this God of this often re-written Bible. The separation of man from his soul; man from his equal (woman); man from Nature and man from most all that is good; is all I see! Maybe Melchizedek or some other Biblical character (like the Mormon secret society is named after) will be raised up and made a new savior. Maybe it will be John the Baptist (the Johannites and Benjaminites) or it might even be one of the censored people of the Bible like Jasher who will be re-cycled and make it appear they’ve changed. Whatever it is, I don’t want the same structure and would like to see people DOING what Jesus did. Thinking for themselves and communing with his soul ‘within’ to touch the beauty in all nature!

We can’t expect people to read such a totally different picture of history and not challenge our ideas. We are including the best scholars we can and yet there will be many who are so threatened they will say all kinds of bad things about us. We know that there are risks and that the ‘powers that be’ will not help make this ’stuff’ become common knowledge. The Hermetic ‘cults’ of Egypt and Greece that were so popular when people were allowed to follow knowledge (more) in the early Hellenistic times were from Isis and Osiris. They were the founders of Egypt who were not Gods. Like Moses and Jesus who the rabbis tell us became the object of hero worship so it has often been with great people once they are dead. Priests take the peoples’ good opinion of their heroes and turn them into ‘cults’ with themselves as the key interpreters.

Readers who study hard and have an open mind will find a veritable mine field of ‘stuff’ to try to sift through in order to find any essence of truth. I see some great truth might exist as I contemplate the naturally growing nanotubes and lattices or helixes that all energy manifests through. The whole universe vibrates according to an intelligent design such as mathematically demonstrated by Dembski. There is no reason to have made Darwin out to be a pure evolutionist. His Theory of Love is just as important. Although he was forced to differentiate himself from Lamarck he was in fact inspired by him. Few enough are the scientists who see there are divergent forces at work in all truthful outcomes. The quality of energy is as important as the quantity of energy, in whatever forces impact mutation. It is not unreasonable to say there is a collective force with purpose in some Divinely Providential construct. It is folly however, to think a mere human might fully comprehend it. That kind of ideology smacks of religious claptrap, I know. Nonetheless I propose there is merit in Dembski and all open-minded evaluations of what might be. We are often seeing the science or present fad therein proclaims an absolute proof that is subsequently proven false. I like the atomic physicists who were called atom-mysticists at first. Neils Bohr was one of them and he observed something like the following: “A great truth has an opposite, which is also true. A trivial truth has an opposite which is only a falsehood.”

We have endured the ‘experts’ of mechanistic professionalism far too long. Their ego has made them cling to fads and fictions with the most ignorant among us. When Edison’s phonograph was presented to the Paris Academy of Sciences they throttled the presenter as they claimed he was a ventriloquist. At the end of the 19th Century a Patent Office Official said they should close down because everything that could be discovered had been already patented. This is the kind of sunshine law that all bureaucracies should install but not because they are right about no more inventions being possible. Even worse is the early 20th Century Britannica proclaiming torture was a thing of the past in ‘civilized’ Europe? Clearly we must do our own thinking.

“Although Darwin was in the habit of repudiating violently any intimation that he had profited from Lamarck, we have already seen that he was acquainted at an early age with English versions of the latter’s work and in 1845 there is a reference in an unpublished letter to Lyell (Biblio: In the possession of the American Philosophical Society, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.) regarding ‘my volumes of Lamarck.’” (1)

Lamarckian evolutionary theory allows for the mix of creation and the impact of directed creative and psychic or soulful participation. If God is everything and we all act in concert, there is a powerful collective force to be reckoned with. We might even change the nature of our Noble leaders by holding them in the light. Let us not cling to theory that faith or fad alone limits and selects facts to fit the prevailing ‘norm’. Dembski must not be censored and censured by the biologists who fight to maintain their stranglehold on evolutionary theory. Charles Fort and Arthur Koestler are as wise as any who have ‘observed’ in the last century and they would not encourage such censure, I am sure. Creation should not be laid at the feet of God and we are part of God, we must act responsibly and with right action and thought. Come with me, and bring an open-mind that you can assimilate and later test. I will endeavour to see the ‘light’ in all its harmonizing glory. Barthold Niebuhr put the adventure in these relevant words:

“He who calls what has vanished back again into being, enjoys a BLISS like that of

creating.”

Thor Heyerdahl was such a person. His insight changed a lot of academic attitudes as he proved many things held sacred were anything but correct. We need to provide far better reason for a change in opinions than the prevailing paradigm if only because they have such a stranglehold on opinion. The propagandists have many writers and academics at their beck and call. This has been true for many millennia, and they have had the ability to destroy most evidence that would disprove their fictions or myths. That is one reason why linguistics and botany or other forensic tools are the best evidences for our effort to present an alternative history. Even when a 99% archaeological certainty that fits facts and established criteria to keep much truth out of the realm of accepted evidence – such as the Roman statue or head found in Mexico – there are those who debunk it or make it seem unimportant.

My personal knowledge of statues at Chichen Itza convinces me there were many Etruscan and Greek artisans at work in Central America. If you ever go there be sure to drop in on the Villas Archaeologique. As you read Heyerdahl in the following quote be cognizant that five separate forensic labs have concurred that cocaine from Peru was part of the diet the mummies of Egypt enjoyed. Balabanova was well aware of the implications of this upon world history. That is why she had all the other labs test her results. Lanning provides artefacts detailing those involved in this trade. These secrets were very important to the potion makers or pharmacists of the ancient world. Hallucinatory drugs probably started the Phoenicians down this road a long time before Egypt. Our artefacts and evidence on stone and bas-reliefs includes the ancient handshake of the Phoenician enterprise that I think Moses and his family benefited from for a very long time.

“Preconceived opinions on the lack of maritime activity in pre-Spanish America have also affected the botanical discussions of the origin of the common garden bean, ‘Phaseolus vulgaris’. Last century Könicke, in a paper on the home of the garden bean, pointed out that this crop plant was formerly generally accepted as having been cultivated in Europe by the ancient Greeks and Romans, under the name of Dolickos, Phaseolus, etc. The cultivation of the same bean among the Aborigines of America was therefore explained as the result of its post-Columbian introduction from the Old World by the early Spaniards. (2) This was the theory until Wittmack discovered in 1880 the common garden bean among the archaeological excavations of Reiss and Stübel at the prehistoric cemetery of Ancon, Peru. (3) It was there found interred as food with mummy burials long antedating the European discovery of America. Here was suddenly ample proof of the pre-European cultivation of ‘Phaseolus’ in America, and beans were subsequently recovered from pre-Incan sites along the entire coast of Peru. At this time, however, pre-Columbian specimens of the ‘European’ bean were no longer accessible. The view was taken, therefore, that the Old World ‘Phaseolus’ must after all have originated in aboriginal ‘America’, and been carried back thence to Europe by the early Spaniards. (4)

{Some have gone so far as to say that bird droppings are the result of all these plant migration. The Yam or American sweet potato turned the tide for the champion of Euro-centric history in botany and zoology. He had to confess he had been wrong after decades of fighting the point. Why then do we celebrate the SLAVER Columbus? Is it not to maintain a colonial secret of deceit upon which our sovereign nations are founded? The Incans had a style of government that utopian philosophers like Sir Francis Bacon used as the model in writing about possible forms of great government.}

More recently Hutchison, Silow and Stephens pointed out, with corroborative botanical evidence, that the ‘Phaseolus’ beans represent but one more indication of contact between the Old and New World before Columbus. (5) The same problem concerns varieties of the lima bean, ‘Phaseolus lunatus’, growing wild in Guatemala and common in the earliest Chimu and Nazca graves of coastal Peru. In 1950 Sauer points to certain very early genetic peculiarities of a race of lima beans of primitive characteristics long under cultivation in parts of Indonesia and Indo-China, and says: ‘If, then, south-eastern Asia should prove to be a reservoir of the more primitive lima beans, long since extinct in Peru and Mexico, a further problem of the time and manner of trans-Pacific connection is raised by which the American bean was communicated to the native population across the Pacific.’ (6) The same problem is also raised by a related bean, the jackbean, or swordbean, ‘Canavalia’ sp. Stoner and Anderson have called attention to the following: ‘The sword bean (‘Canavalia’), widely cultivated throughout the Pacific and always considered to be of Old World origin, is now known from prehistoric sites along the coasts of both South America and Mexico.’ (7) ‘Canavalia’ beans excavated from the stratified deposits at Huaca Prieta on the Pacific coast of Peru, date from between 3000 and 1000 BC. (8) Sauer states that its archaeological distribution and relation to wild species now indicate the jackbean as a New World domesticate. (9)

The above brief survey will show that, not only has anthropological thought for nearly a century been biased by ethno-botanical evidence, but to a quite considerable extent anthropological presuppositions have similarly affected American botany. The literature on the origin and spread of certain American and Pacific island cultigens demonstrates that many botanical assumptions have been based on the conviction that the New World was isolated from the rest of the world prior to the voyage of Columbus. Similarly, it has been taken for granted that only Indonesian craft could move eastwards into the open Pacific, whereas the culture of the South American people was presumably confined to their own coastal waters due to the lack of seaworthy craft. The material reviewed above shows that there is adequate evidence of aboriginal export of American plants into the adjacent part of the Pacific island area… Merrill favours Africa as the original homeland of the gourd, and proposes that it reached America across the Atlantic. (10) If the 13-chromosomed cultivated Old World cotton, together with wild American species, were actually employed in the hybridization of the 26 chromosomed New World cotton species then an overseas introduction from the Old World is by far shorter and easier with the westward drifts across the open Atlantic than against the elements across the six times wider Pacific, where no 13-chromosomed cottons exist. The coconut was relayed straight across the Pacific. If it originated in tropic America where all related genera occur, it must have spread with the earliest Pacific voyagers, since it was present in Indonesia at the beginning of the Christian era. The yam has a similar complete trans-Pacific distribution… the same strong ocean river, sweeping from Mexico straight to the Philippines should be taken into account.” (11)

The dyeing industry of Phoenician purple is in Peru as well as Mexico, and it was a critical and valuable export of Tyre. There are heraldic similarities and customs galore which we will continue to show. The purpose of adding these tidbits to all the other ones I have covered in other books is to demonstrate two things. First and foremost (for the purposes of this book), we can see academics and science are frequently wrong. Wrong, and motivated! Secondarily there is the matter of megaliths and henges, Pyramids and dolmen or Round Towers that are all over the World. They are key components of the Neolithic Library system that encompassed all the ‘Brotherhood’ of man in a spiritual and growth oriented culture of tolerance and egalitarian morals.

NOTES:

1) Darwin’s Century, Evolution and the Man Who Discovered It., by Loren Eisely, 1958, Doubleday, 1961, pg. 187.

2) Sea Routes to Polynesia, by Thor Heyerdahl, with editorial notes by Karl Jettmar, Ph.D., Professor of Ethnology, Univ. of Heidelberg, and a foreword by Hans W: son Ahlmann, Ph. D. former President of the International Geographical Union, 1968, Futura Publ., ed., 1974. brings us Könicke (1885, p.136) from pg. 73.

3) Ibid, Wittmack, (1880, p.176).

4) Ibid, Wittmack, (1886, 1888).

5) Ibid, Hutchinson, Silow and Stephens (1947, pg.138).

6) Ibid, Sauer (1950, p.502).

7) Ibid, Stoner and Anderson, (1949, p.392).

8) Ibid, Whitaker and Bird (1949, pg.2.).

9) Ibid, Sauer (1950, pg.499).

10) Ibid, Merrill (1950, pp.9-10).

11) Ibid, pgs. 73-76.

Author of Diverse Druids
Columnist for The ES Press Magazine

Guest ‘expert’ at World-Mysteries.com World-Mysteries.com

Nelly Furtado “Loose” Pop Music CD Review

Wednesday, August 31st, 2005

Richly talented Pop artist Nelly Furtado has released her latest album titled Loose and Wow! It’s really a good one.

I wish it weren’t the case but, it’s not everyday that I get a CD from an artist that I can just pop in and comfortably listen to from beginning to end. There is usually a song or two that I just can’t force myself to get through. Not at all the case with Loose. Every track is enjoyable and was pretty easy for me to listen to from start to finish.

Loose has a pleasantly varied, mix of 13 tracks that are very well written songs by this clearly outstanding artist. With many of the songs displaying a lot of the kind emotion that makes for a really great listen. Seemingly drawing from what I can only imagine are her own personal experiences. At different points touching on the most real emotions of love, and the pain of failed relationships can certainly be heard.

Loose is a first rate CD, delivering a little something for everyone. I give it my highest recommendation. It’s quite simply great listening. A must buy if you’re even mildly into Pop music.

While the entire CD is outstanding the truly standout tracks are Maneater [track 2], Showtime [track 5], and All Good Things [track 12].

My SmoothLee Bonus Pick, and the one that got Sore [...as in "Stuck On REpeat"] is track 3, Promiscuous. This is a great track!

Loose Release Notes:

Nelly Furtado originally released Loose on Jun 20, 2006 on the Geffen Records label.

CD Track List Follows:

1. Afraid - (with Attitude)
2. Maneater
3. Promiscuous - (featuring Timbaland)
4. Glow
5. Showtime
6. No Hay Igual
7. Te Busque - (featuring Juanes)
8. Say It Right
9. Do It
10. In God’s Hands
11. Wait For You
12. All Good Things (Come To An End)
13. Te Busque - (Bonus Track Spanish Version, with Juanes)

Get the information you want on your favorite smooth jazz songs and artists at

Shakespeare’s Sonnet XVIII, Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer’s Day?

Wednesday, August 31st, 2005

Shakespeare’s sonnets require time and effort to appreciate. Understanding the numerous meanings of the lines, the crisply made references, the brilliance of the images, and the complexity of the sound, rhythm and structure of the verse demands attention and experience. The rewards are plentiful as few writers have ever approached the richness of Shakespeare’s prose and poetry.

“Sonnet XVIII” is also known as, “Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer’s Day?” It was written around 1599 and published with over 150 other sonnets in 1609 by Thomas Thorpe.

The first 126 sonnets are written to a youth, a boy, probably about 19, and perhaps specifically, William Herbert, Earl of Pembroke. His initials, W.H., appear in Thorpe’s dedication, and the first volume of Shakespeare’s plays, published by two of his fellow actors, Herminge and Condell, after Shakespeare’s death, was dedicated to William Herbert.

“Sonnet XVIII” is one of the most famous of all of Shakespeare’s sonnets. It is written in the sonnet style that Shakespeare preferred, 14 lines long with three quatrains (four rhymed lines) and a couplet (a pair of rhymed lines).

The Sonnet praises the youth’s beauty and disposition, comparing and contrasting the youth to a summer day. Then the sonnet immortalizes the youth through the “eternal lines” of the sonnet.

First Quatrain

The first line announces the comparison of the youth with a summer day. But the second line says that the youth is more perfect than a summer day. “More temperate” can be interpreted as more gentle. A summer day can have excesses such as rough winds. In Shakespeare’s time May was considered a summer month, a reference in the third line. The fourth line contains the metaphor that summer holds a lease on the year, but the lease is of a short duration.

Second Quatrain

This quatrain details how the summer can be imperfect, traits that the youth does not possess. The fifth line personifies the sun as “the eye of heaven” which is sometimes too scorchingly hot. On the other hand, “his gold complexion,” the face of the sun, can be dimmed by overcast and clouds. According to line 7, all beautiful things (fair means beautiful) sometimes decline from their state of beauty or perfection by chance accidents or by natural events. “Untrimmed” in line 8 means a lack of decoration and perhaps refers to every beauty from line 7.

Third Quatrain

This quatrain explains that the youth will possess eternal beauty and perfection. In line 10 “ow’st” is short for ownest, meaning possess. In other words, the youth “shall not lose any of your beauty.” Line 11 says that death will not conquer life and may refer to the shades of classical literature (Virgil’s Aeneid) who wander helplessly in the underworld. In line 12 “eternal lines” refers to the undying lines of the sonnet. Shakespeare realized that the sonnet is able to achieve an eternal status, and that one could be immortalized within it.

The Final Couplet

The couplet is easy to interpret. For as long as humans live and breathe on earth with eyes that can see, this is how long these verses will live. And these verses celebrate the youth and continually renew the youth’s life.

“Shall I Compare Thee” is one of the most often quoted sonnets of Shakespeare. It is complex, yet elegant and memorable, and can be quoted by men and women alike. It has been enjoyed by all generations since Shakespeare and will continue to be enjoyed “so long as men can breathe, or eyes can see.”

Sonnet XVIII, Shall I Compare Thee?

By William Shakespeare

Shall I compare thee to a Summer’s day?

Thou are more lovely and more temperate:

Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,

And Summer’s lease hath all too short a date:

Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,

And often is his gold complexion dimm′d

And every fair from fair sometime declines,

By chance or nature’s changing course untrimm’d:

But thy eternal Summer shall not fade

Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st;

Nor shall Death brag thou wander’st in his shade,

When in eternal lines to time thou grow’st:

So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see,

So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

*****************************

Garry Gamber is a public school teacher. He writes articles about politics, real estate, health and nutrition, and internet dating services. He is the owner of Anchorage-Homes.com Anchorage-Homes.com and TheDatingAdvisor.com TheDatingAdvisor.com.

Guitar Lesson: Mary Had A Little Lamb For Beginners

Wednesday, August 31st, 2005

Have you ever played a melody on a guitar? Well, if not let this be the first time! I will show you how to play Mary Had A Little Lamb on one string with one finger on your left hand and one finger on your right.

What string you use on your or somebody elses guitar doesn′t matter. It’s a matter of personal choice.

As you know Mary Had A Little Lamb is a popular nursery rhyme. Here is the first verse:

Mary had a little lamb

little lamb, little lamb

Mary had a little lamb

its fleece was white as snow

Thomas Edison used this poem in testing his invention of the phonograph in 1877. It became the first audio recording to be successfully made and played back.

Let’s start by playing on a string of your choice. Play the string with the thumb. If you play the string three times with your right hand thumb we can write it down like this:

0-0-0

If you press down the string on the second fret with your left hand first finger and play it three times and then lift your finger and play on the open string three times like you did before it will look like this:

2-2-2-0-0-0

Got the idea? Well, to play Mary Had A Little Lamb you need two more notes. Press down your first finger on the fourth fret and then on your seventh fret and you have all the necessary notes. The song looks like this:

4-2-0-2-4-4-4–2-2-2–4-7-7

4-2-0-2-4-4-4-4-2-2-4-2-0

If you still have questions you can ask a guitar playing friend to help you. She or he will probably be proud to help you.

If this melody is a little bit to easy for you, you can show it to a not guitar playing friend. Many people start to smile when they can play something on the guitar for the first time!

Peter Edvinsson is a musician, composer and music teacher. Visit his site Capotasto Music and download your capotastomusic.com free sheet music and learn to play resources at capotastomusic.com capotastomusic.com

Autumn Brilliance: Photographing Autumn’s Light and Color

Tuesday, August 30th, 2005

Autumn is a second spring when every leaf is a flower. - Albert Camus

Autumn is my favorite time for taking pictures. The color in autumn images is brilliant and warm. Most people think of beautiful New England landscapes when they think of peak leaf peeping season. I think about the brilliant light and backdrop of color for my chosen fields of photography — floral and portraiture. Certainly, fall’s reds, yellows, and oranges make brilliant subjects. Alternatively, however, the brightly colored leaves make a beautiful backdrop for the remaining garden flowers or for wonderful natural light portraits.

Because the sun comes up later and goes down earlier, a photographer does not need to awaken early or stay out past dinner to get the perfect light. The sun is low on the horizon this time of year. This is the light a photographer seeks for maximum color potential and even lighting. Late afternoon sunlight through the leaves provides great opportunities for photographers.

If you do choose to make the leaves your prime subject this season, consider looking at them a little differently. Try looking at them closely, rather than from a landscapist’s distance. Brilliant color combinations of leaves are a hallmark for fall. As a macro floral photographer, my work is all in the details. The veins of red running up sunny yellow, remaining summer green surrounding orange centers , and the brown speckles dotting deep red leaves show palettes only available to the photographer this time of year.

For portraits, use the details of the leaves for inspiration. Dress a little girl in orange and place her against a background of red and green maple leaves. Use a soft brown hat to frame the face of a little girl standing in a sunflower patch. Dress a little boy in a bright red tie for the same patch of sunflowers. Mix and match autumn colors for a family portrait.

Every season provides unique opportunities for memorable photographs. Autumn’s light and fabulous color provide something just a little extra special.

Some Tips for Autumn Photography:

1. Seek a spot to photograph that shades the hotspots of light, yet bathes the subject with that warm October glow. With careful positioning, backlighting through autumn leaves can provide a magnificent backdrop for any subject.

2. When photographing at midday, the lighting can create harsh, unflattering shadows. If it is necessary to photograph when the sun is overhead, seek to have the sun over your shoulder. If you look around the sky at this time of day, you will see that the sky appears bluest when the sun is in this position over your shoulder.

3. A polarizing filter can be used to enhance the blue sky providing a nice contrast to brilliantly colored leaves.

4. For those using an SLR camera that gives control over depth-of-field, set your camera to a wide-aperture (small f-stop number) and focus on your subject. This will blur the background (how much depends on your lens) and will make your subject stand out against the beautiful colors.

Melissa Mannon is a natural light garden photographer based in New Hampshire. She has won numerous awards for her garden portraits and flower photography. See her monthly newsletter and image gallery at melissamannonphotography.com www.melissamannonphotography.com.

Enjoy Driving with Audio Books

Tuesday, August 30th, 2005

Did you know that A trucker working to the legal limit in the U.S. can rack up to 3,432 driving hours a year—nearly 10 times that of the average New York commuter or enough to listen to the unabridged audio book version of Bill Clinton’s My Life 77 times? (Publishing Trends, Market Partners International, September 2005).

Think of the way audio books could optimize your time management. Audio books can turn the day to a 26 hours day. Yes, audio books can add extra two hours each day. Still not convinced?
Did you know that The average rush hour driver will spend an additional 62 hours stuck in traffic—at standstill—each year and that More than 97 million workers drive alone to work each day.

Well, enough with that pile of useless data, Think about yourself – what have you been doing while driving - Listening to the radio? Making unnecessary calls with your mobile phone? Wasting valuable time?
Now close your eyes and imagine you could read the last edition of the New York Times, Read the last Harry Potter book or learn Chinese – all simultaneously while driving your car. Now open your eyes and stop dreaming, you can do it all now. The only difference is that you are going to use a new method of reading – listening to audio books.

And it is so easy: You may get audio books in different formats from books on tapes and audio books on CD to downloadable audio books. You can get it from different sources – libraries, book and music stores and online audio book sources. You could buy audio books, rent audio books and even get free audio books.
According to eBrain Market Research survey, 71% of the audio book listeners listen to them on long car trips.
Believe me I couldn’t wait getting into the heavy morning traffic listening to the audio book “IT” by Stephen king. In fact, I couldn’t resist listening to it at home after work. I love audio books.

Paton Jackson is the head of 911 corp. We have made a comprehensive research about audio books. Let us share with you our findings – the best audio books sources, titles and much more audio book information only on 911makemoretime.com/audio books bible.htm Online audio book rental services and more. The audio book bible.

Using Water Fountains as Memorials

Tuesday, August 30th, 2005

Much like a statue, water fountains are also used to commemorate an individual’s memorable existence or notable achievement. While fountains are often constructed of some kind of statuary, obviously the difference lies in the addition of falling water. The sound of falling water brings on the feeling of peace and the sight of it reflection. Adding water to a solid form instantly changes a simple object into a tangible and living thing. Unlike a statue (no matter how elaborate the statue is in itself), water fountains trigger much sentiment and idealism.

In “Song of the Spirits over the Water” by Johann Wolfgang Goethe it is written, “A mortal’s soul seems like the water, from heaven coming to heaven rising again renewed then to earth descending ever changing.” Certainly, using a water fountain as a memorial goes a long way in adding continuity. It is as though what has passed or died still lives and will continue living for eternity.

Who do Fountains Represent?

While fountains as memorials have been used throughout Europe as well as the United States, it is really a world wide practice. Fountains as memorials have often been used for royalty, great heroes or notable politicians such as the Shaftesbury Memorial Fountain located in Piccadilly Circus, London. This fountain designed by Alfred Gilbert in 1893 was built as a monument for Anthony Ashley-Cooper, earl of Shaftesbury. Ashley-Cooper was a politician who worked tirelessly in English social and educational reform.

While it seems that many fountains are used as a memorial for mostly males, one commemorative fountain representative of a woman is the Josephine Shaw Lowell Memorial Fountain located in Bryant Park behind the New York Public Library. Built in 1912, this fountain was the first prominent memorial honoring a woman. The beauty of this gentle yet powerful fountain symbolizes the strong and beautiful character of Lowell who was an inspiration in charitable giving.

Aside from mere mortal souls, water fountain memorials are also used to celebrate the life of religious icons. These are particularly popular in countries heavily influenced by religion such as Catholicism or Hinduism. Many families have table top water fountains in their homes to place at homemade altars running the fountains non-stop. Various table top Buddha fountains are particularly popular as they not only celebrate Buddha but are thought to bring good luck to the families that have the fountains running non-stop.

Where Memorial Fountains are Located

Most, hugely impressive memorial fountains are located in public parks and squares. Obviously, communities and architects who take the time to recognize a significant and historical figure would want as many people to view the memorial as possible.

Memorial fountains are special in a way that no other fountain is. While many fountains are used as décor or to impress the public, memorial fountains are truly erected for remembering not only the person they are built for, but also to reflect on our own lives. Memorial fountains make us stop to think about the character of which the fountain represents but also to think about our own societal contributions and inspire us to such greatness as those they commemorate.

Elizabeth Jean writes water fountain and related articles for garden-fountains.com Garden-Fountains.com, the #1 destination on the internet for wall fountains, garden fountains, and garden-fountains.com/Categories.bok?category=Garden Fountains Distinctive Water Features.

Spiritual And Physical Needs Of Krishna

Tuesday, August 30th, 2005

Hiranyaksa means one who has his eyes always on gold. Many years ago when I first joined the movement I would feel a definite antipathy towards persons like Hiranyaksa. Now I feel quite different (hopefully I have not become a demon!).

When I read about Hiranyaksa and his ilk I feel sorry for how they are suffering due to their great desires and needs. So what we did today in class is to analyze the needs that Hiranyaksa had that caused him to have such emotional outbursts against God. These emotional outbursts were actually unfortunate expressions of his unmet needs.

What were Hiranyaksa’s needs? He needed autonomy for example. What he did not realize was that in this material world the spirit soul can never really fulfill its need for autonomy as it is controlled at every step by the three modes of material nature. The Gita teaches us this.

The soul can never have absolute autonomy since the only autonomous person is Krishna (and even He is controlled by Radha’s love). Krishna is Svarat or independent. Whereas we are dependent.

But the need for autonomy is there in all of us and is a natural need; not something that we should suppress. This need can be expressed in the proper way in the spiritual realm where we get the opportunity to serve Krishna out of love. So in other word the need for autonomy is not bad, it is just that we should understand how to properly fulfill it.

Hiranyaksa’s problem was that he did not understand how to fulfill that need. Similarly with other needs; such as the need for love, nurturance, play, celebration, integrity, interdependence, spirituality, etc. We simply should learn how to properly satisfy these needs in Krishna consciousness,otherwise they will remain unsatisfied (burning like fire) and we will continually be experiencing unpleasant emotions such as anger, confusion, hopelessness, loneliness, envy, etc.

Therefore when we have some negative feelings, we should not try to suppress or repress these feelings. By suppression or repression the feelings either become more pronounced our come out in some other way (sublimation) that cause more pain.

We should become more aware of the negative feelings when they rise to the surface and trace out what unfulfilled need we have that is the cause of those feelings. Then we can focus that need in a Krishna conscious way, and the negative feeling will be replaced with a positive feeling of confidence, joyousness, optimism, etc.

And when we hear of someone else having negative feelings we will understand how to help them understand the source of those feelings (unmet needs) and how to meet their needs properly. Pure Krishna consciousness is a celebration at every minute.

It is as Srila Prabhupada said a vacation for the soul-real play. By presenting Krishna consciousness without any ulterior motive we can exhibit true integrity. By living in a society of advanced Vaisnavas we can rejoice in interdependence (notice I did not say dependence) as we experience appreciation, consideration, empathy, etc.

By taking shelter of Krishna all of our physical and spiritual needs will be taken care of by the Lord. By acting in harmony with the desires of Krishna we can experience real spiritual communion; of the soul.

For more Krishna conscious philosophy, please visit bkgoswami.com/ BKGoswami.com/. If you want to buy Hare Krishna gifts and books, please visit krishnashop.info/ KrishnaShop.info/.

art4krishna.com/merchant/signup.html If you are a Krishna Conscious artist and you want to sell your artwork, Click Here To Create An Artist Account.

The Fine Art of Mediocrity

Monday, August 29th, 2005

Traditionally, an artist is expected to wait to be “discovered” before he or she is able to earn any real money. And, that process dictates that one drag their portfolio from gallery to gallery, hoping to land a “showing”; have their work displayed in said gallery so an elite group of anal-retentive patrons with hefty checkbooks can decide whether or not one’s work is good enough for the rest of the world to see. Amazing, huh?

I gave this a shot. I had a few showings and even sold a few paintings. I even got published a time or two and figured that that was about as good as it was ever going to get, that “being discovered” or “arriving” in the art world was never going to happen for me. I would never be another Andy Warhol or Jackson Pollock!

I was quite depressed for a time, then finally realized that most artists in the world were probably never going to be great; another Warhol or Pollock. I also realized that “greatness″ is a very illusive concept that is often defined as much by luck as it is by true talent. The belief that sustained me was that the average person does not have to recognize greatness, they only have to know what they like. And, I knew that if people like something, they will buy that something regardless. The trick, then, was to bypass the art establishment and take it direct to the people; let them decide.

For the past three years, I have been offering my less-than-great artistic services to the average person via the internet. I am proud to say that I have not had to suffer through another “showing” in all that time and that I am making a comfortable living just being myself; mediocre.

I provide “cute” little drawings that will never hang anywhere more prominent than the wall of Joe Blow’s den.

Bill Trantham is a self-taught artist, living in Oklahoma City. He is retired from mental health counseling and enjoying creating caricature drawings for people via his website.

sillybill.com sillybill.com

Practicing With a Metronome

Monday, August 29th, 2005

A metronome is a device that produces a regulated pulse, and is used to establish a steady beat, or tempo, measured in beats per minute (BPM). Dietrich Nikolaus Winkel is credited with inventing this device in Amsterdam in 1812. Ludwig van Beethoven was the first major composer to use the metronome. Of course, with the advent of electronics, and then the internet, there are a wide variety of metronomes today that are in many respects superior to the old wind-up models!

If you want to be a fast and clean flatpicker, one of the smartest things you can do is to practice using a metronome. You might say, “I don’t have a metronome.” Well, I will not allow you to use that as an excuse–because you can now go to an online metronome any time you wish, and it doesn’t cost you a cent! Just go to:

metronomeonline.com/

So, now you have a metronome. Now you may wonder, “Why do I need a metronome?” You may think you have a perfectly good sense of rhythm. Be prepared to be shocked when you start to practice with a metronome. Though you think you are playing those bluegrass licks, fiddle tunes, or lead guitar breaks quite well, you may discover that you are playing some of the parts well, while you are quite sloppy on other parts–and you didn’t even know it–until it was exposed by that nasty, mean metronome!

How do you begin to practice with the metronome? Decide which tune you want to practice and adjust the timing of the metronome until its rhythm is at a pace that is much slower than you would ever play the tune. Yes, that’s right–much slower! By forcing yourself to play slower you are really getting in touch with what is actually going on in the piece of music you are playing. You are becoming intimate with it. Plus, you are establishing the pattern by which your fingers will learn to obey your brain, and your brain will learn what to tell your fingers to do. Rob Gravelle, guitarist for Ivory Knight, suggested, “In my opinion the purpose of practice is to fine tune the muscle memory so that the muscles obey the brain with a minimum of conscious intervention - whether the practice is for music, sports, whatever…”

When you are playing your guitar at an abnormally slow pace you will find out that you didn’t really know those licks as well as you thought you did. You were fooling yourself. Now, after this humbling experience, and after you have played the tune many times at that painfully slow cadence, kick it up a notch (as Emeril would say!). Set the metronome one step faster and repeatedly play the piece at the new setting. Then take it up another notch. And another. However, never set the metronome at a speed beyond which you can play the whole piece you are practicing cleanly and with perfect timing.

Before you set the speed too high, listen to the notes you are playing within each measure. Consider the context and richness of each note. Experiment by accenting several notes in each phrase. Then play the same phrases and accent different notes. You are setting the stage to express some great dynamics that you had never considered!

Gradually, take the metronome to a higher speed. This is where it gets to be fun! You learn to play the whole piece (including the most difficult licks) perfectly at one pace and you reward yourself by graduating to the level.

I have found the metronome to be a most valuable tool in terms of instilling confidence for playing acoustic guitar solos. Practice with a metronome and don’t take shortcuts: The reward will be well worth the effort!

Copyright © 2007 Lee Griffith. All rights reserved.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Lee Griffith is an avid acoustic guitar player and a vintage instrument enthusiast. He invites you to receive a FREE REPORT on a revolutionary acoustic guitar lesson kit, along with his weekly newsletter via email. just click on optin.flatpickpost.com optin.flatpickpost.com

Check out Lee’s blog, “The Flatpick Post” at flatpickpost.com flatpickpost.com