Advent Calendar 2011:Day 1 of The Christmas Adventures of the Purple Elephant and the little mouse

Fynn the Steiff bear who was the first guest to confirm this year!

The Purple Elephant and the little mouse had really hoped to start things early this year they really had! But you see it was the owner of the production house that caused everything to go all awry. As you would recall yesterday at the opening of the Advent calendar exactly six days late this year they had to go and bring her into the virtual reality of the blogosphere back into the imaginary house in which they live! To do so they had to cross the lines between virtual and real...cartoon and flesh...driving many a human to the psychiatric chair when they had beheld the glowing cartoony forms of the Purple Elephant and little mouse. But they really had no choice...and now although the Purple Elephant and the little mouse had in their virtual world started planning for the Holidays well in advance in fact as early as November during nanowrimo! There was no owner present in the production house to write about their adventures and so really all their work just went up in cyberspace without enough HTML to keep it grounded for you readers to see on your computer screen!

So forgive the Purple Elephant and little mouse this year if they are a bit more scattered and stressed as the Purple Elephant runs about making lots of noise while the little mouse scampers even faster to get things in place for the many house guests that no doubt will again be arriving this year! It really wasn't their fault that things didn't get started earlier it was just that there was simply no writer there! And if anything goes wrong just blame those monkeys!

So speaking of house guests the Purple Elephant and little mouse have heard the news that has been confirmed early on that the bears will be visiting again this year. In fact a new bear from London will also be arriving this year. They got that news since October really when the owner of the production house was over that way. Now what they understand is that the bear is not really an English bear exactly although he lives in London. In fact he is really German in origin with 'knopf im ohr' translated into English as 'button in ear'. He is indeed a Steiff bear...not the fancy limited edition type nope Fynn lives in his box with a yellow tag pinned down by the button in his ear so he is an unlimited edition bear. Which basically means Fynn has many other Fynn brothers and they sure do get around in their boxes traveling to all parts of the globe! However those Fynn bears seem to be very early birds as yes folks Fynn the Steiff bear was the first confirmed guest to be visiting the Meady's Musings production house this year! He had RSVP-ed to the Purple Elephant since October and had asked that the little mouse try as much as possible to be the one to pick him up at the airport as he had a very special surprise that couldn't wait!

So this has just been adding to the anxiety of the little mouse as he has been scampering about the house and occasionally going into corners to take perhaps a break and from what his body posture at least looks like...to pray?

But as we end the story for today on The Christmas Adventures of the Purple Elephant with the little mouse we all have to pray and hope that even though the start is indeed late all will be well that ends well and it will still be a grand holiday!

Advent Calendar 2011: The Opening and Happy St. Nicholas Day!

We at the Meady's Musings Production House have left many a story untold this year and many a blog post unfinished and unposted! You our readers must realize it really was never our intent! However we were just too taken up with travelling to different lands and putting on real live blog displays on UCP this year but mostly too involved in our day job! Yes as you know we must pay the bills and we have just been putting our shoulder to the wheel all year long this year!

But we really have just gone and done it now! As we've started our Advent calendar late now too! The Purple Elephant and Little Mouse were just very cross indeed and so they had to make it out of their imaginary house over into our real world to let us know just how they felt! And it wasn't a good sight I will tell you for many a passerby to see a cartoony looking elephant purple at that with a cartoony looking mouse on this back scolding a real life lady on the street! In fact many of the passersby ended up on the psychiatric chair! And for that we at the production house all yell out an 'Oh dear!' But it must have been worth it for here we are to declare the Advent Calendar 2011 open!

The rules again this year will be that on Meady's Musings we will be telling the story of 'The Christmas Adventures of the Purple Elephant with the little mouse' of course at times we may pause for a little this and that.

And on UCP-Universal Collective Prayer we will be keeping to the reverence and prayer of the season.

However there will be days that the two blogs will collide like today as we join to launch the calendar and celebrate St. Nicholas Day! Yes Happy St. Nicholas Day 2011 folks! So although the Advent calendar is declared open late this year it is not that bad as it is on this very special day that celebrates that old saint of giving whom has forever been Americanised as a fat man in a red and white suit!

As we celebrate the day this year we look back at these times when we asked:

Do you believe in Santa Claus?

and when we said:

Yes Virginia there is a Santa Claus!

And remind you again this year that if you need to learn more about St. Nicholas the St. Nicholas Center is a pretty good place to start!

And remind you that we do believe in Santa Claus as we also recall the gift giving that was done for the baby Jesus!

Maniac Mondays: Introducing 'The Turtle' and his Yoga Moves!

All pictures are copyright of The Meady's Musings Production House 2011.


We have a new inhabitant at the Meady's Musings Production House and we've been so enthused by him/her (we can't tell but the niece of nepotistic fame over on the UCP desk is the one who brought him to the house and she says he is a she i.e. it's a female of the species but that it may be for us a male he will be and so not a she!) over the last few months that we've begun to observe him so closely that we think it's now madness and so hence the new inhabitant is solely responsible for bringing back the Maniac Mondays blog postings! LOL!

The new inhabitant is a red slider turtle seen here.



He was living outside the production house for a while now but only a few months ago was he fully adopted into the house as one of the animal inhabitants of the Meady's Musings Production House...along with the Purple Elephant and little mouse themselves and the monkeys, bears and other elephants. Now we have to say we never thought we'd accept a non-mammal into the house this warmly...but indeed we have to admit it is now the case...one of the Meady's Musings Production House's animals is a reptile! OMG! Cold blooded...strange eyes and all! I can tell you it has the little mouse a bit jumpy because he doesn't want the other kind of reptiles around and they will not even be named!

But back to the turtle...like the other animals at the house he doesn't have any particular name as humans do and in his case he doesn't even have a colour and size connotation to him like how The Purple Elephant and the little mouse do. Nope he just goes by 'The Turtle'. And sometimes we become so fascinated by his moves in his aquarium we call him 'Our Turtle Love'. Yep for now he lives in an aquarium but we are considering to have The Purple Elephant dig him a pond and fill it with some water soon as he seems to be growing and growing this turtle!

However while he continues to in his aquarium live he continues to amuse us with his yoga moves...the ancient yogis already have a pose named after him:

'Kurmasana (Yoga Turtle Pose) – This pose is marvelous for reducing fat from the hips and belly.'

(And we hope he doesn't learn moves from some ninja master mimicking his moves from his aquarium as we don't quite think we'd want a child aged ninja red slider turtle on our hands! Cheesy we know...but then that's pizza...dudes!:P)

So here are some of our other pics of him as we admire how he sleeps on a bed of rocks as he basks under his sunlamp and we learn from his yoga moves!






And we now all live 'Happy Together' in the Meady's Musings Production House...as we welcome 'The Turtles'! :)

Tumultuous Thursdays: Just Where Does All That Energy Go: Are Inanimate Objects Storehouses for the Energy of Animate Beings?

Full Moon, Trinidad Feb 2010. Copyright of the Meady's Musings Production House

We've not blogged in such a long time that we're quite wondering if we've forgotten just how! But we're eager to ask a question here on Tumultuous Thursdays as we jump right back into it hoping that blogging is like riding a bike and you just never forget how! :) So let's get to it and over the weeks we will explain to you where we've been or what we've been up to since we've been away...but now my dear readers of this here blog...on to the question!

JUST WHERE OR WHERE DOES ALL THAT ENERGY GO-Are Inanimate Objects Storehouses for the Energy of Animate Beings?

Now we know what you're immediately thinking...well...no where! As according to the law of conservation of energy matter is neither created nor destroyed and so the energy goes no where it's just circulating all around! But that's not what we mean exactly when we asked the question. What we're wondering about is first of all according to Physics all matter has energy whether it is present in an animate or inanimate being. However according to Metaphysics one might see the types of energy as distinct in an animate object as opposed to an inanimate object...no? I mean what's the difference?

Well this questioning today on Tumultuous Thursdays began when a friend of the Production House a one Mr. Sharma dropped by and was going on about:

"can our old house or a car or a school or a tree send out thoughts in the global consciousness field to reach us in altered state of our local consciousness like dream or meditation?"

Now we had to first of all give Mr. Sharma a cup of tea and a cozy place to sit on our living room sofa, call over some other friends...notify the owner of the Production House and allow the Purple Elephant to trumpet while the little mouse put up another pot of tea before we all got to sitting around the room thinking and talking...and it was a question indeed!

We postulated that indeed inanimate objects may be storehouses for our energy...and then over time they slowly let it out again...sort of potential energy slowly becoming kinetic energy over time...I dare say at that thought the little mouse got a bit scared and kept staring at the baseball in one corner of the room and the cricket ball on the other....thinking one might just jump out at him! But not a ball in the house moved!

But surely this must be some of the things that psychokinesis is made up of no?

Perhaps when us animate objects interact with inanimate objects a bit of our conscious energy stays with them...either stored up to be released again later or reflected right away back at us or into the Universal space time continuum! :)

But the little mouse got even more scared at the thought of energy being stored up and released later on...he was about to have the Purple Elephant throw out all used items from the house...when we all allayed his fears...with the grandmotherly quote:

"No harm can come to those who pray!" And the guys from the UCP desk took him away to do just that!

But then with the little mouse gone we did admit that such stuff was what the creepy horror movies that will remain unnamed are made up of no? But not all energy is bad my readers and there must be good energy too...it just might have been too much of a buzz kill for Hollywood to ever highlight it in film! Although there was Casper the friendly ghost!:)

But it really is something to think about no? And it's also probably the kind of thing that Feng Shui and Vaastu Shastra considers...the energy present in inanimate objects and it's impact on us animate beings!

But hey it was just our rambling thoughts today...after all it is a Tumultuous Thursday and things can get a little bumpy!

So that's it for today folks and we hope to be blogging more again out of the Production House soon...but we dare say we missed sharing those tunes with you guys out there in the blogosphere...so after all the talks were done the Purple Elephant got out his old 45s and we all danced to 'Dream a little dream of me'...after all it was a Tumultous Thursday! :)

The Purple Elephant with the Little Mouse Presents Our Guest Blog: 6 Simple Ways to Live a Sustainable Lifestyle!

Here is the thing…the Purple Elephant with the little mouse hiding behind his ears as usual went to the market to buy some potatoes, corn and ochro (okra) for this soup the owner of the production house was making as all the monkeys had fallen ill with flu. While walking in the market the little mouse squealed and hid perfectly out of sight behind the Purple Elephant’s ear and then he whispered look down there. At that point the Purple Elephant felt a paw crawling up his knee and looked down to see a brown shiny coat dog. It’s just a dog he said to the little mouse…and then the little mouse peeped out from behind his ear again…

“Ooh...that’s nice…for a second I thought it was a giant rat and you know how rats like to bully us mice and I really wasn’t in the mood for such an altercation!” said the little mouse.

“Oh India and Thailand…these mouse and rat games…sometimes I think they are more bothersome than cat and mouse ones!" said the Purple Elephant as he scooped up the tiny brown dog with his long purple trunk! It was then he noticed the dog have a pendant around his chain and wait...lo and behold it wasn't a pendant really but a USB drive and the dog kept licking it...sometimes lapping it entirely into his mouth!

The Purple Elephant whisked the USB drive from the dog and threw it up to the little mouse who immediatley pushed the drive into his notebook to see on it was a blog...this blog from the good people at no other site but...THE DOG ATE MY BLOG (blog no longer exists)! The little mouse read it and felt it would have a home here at the Meady's Musings Production House and so he called up the owner when she gave it a yes well the Purple Elephant waved his giant purple trunk and here it is for you to read! Enjoy it!:)


6 Simple Ways to Live a Sustainable Lifestyle

Joy Paley is a guest blogger for My Dog Ate My Blog (blog no longer exists) and a writer on the Guide to Online Schools (blog no longer exists).

These days, everywhere you look someone is giving tips to live a “greener” lifestyle. While it makes sense to keep the earth in mind, a lot of these tips aren’t that easily implemented by people who are on a budget or lack certain skills. Sure, I’d love to install solar panels on my roof or a low-flow plumbing system, but right now what I really need are sustainable tips that help the earth and my pocketbook. So I did some research to bring you these six tips that you can put into practice at home—without expert skills or a lot of money.

Start a Home Compost
Home composts aren’t just for tree huggers and eccentrics anymore. They’re a simple way to considerably green up your home, by reducing the amount of waste you send to the landfill. Instead of putting those food scraps in the garbage, just throw them into a small outdoor bin. Composting takes little effort: Sprinkle some water on your bin of old food, stir it up, and nature will take its course, turning your waste into free yard fertilizer. And, you’ll be saving money by reducing your garbage bill. Here’s a quick guide to getting started.

Collect Rainwater
Why waste money paying for water when you can get it for free? Just set a barrel or old garbage bin under your gutters when you’re expecting a rain shower, and you’ll be doing mother nature a favor. Instead of leaving your sprinklers on all throughout the year, you’ll be able to water your yard with the barrels you collect. This water is a lot easier on the earth because unlike tap water, it’s not being diverted away from streams and natural reservoirs to get your house.

Join a CSA
CSA stands for Community Supported Agriculture, a type of organization that lets the local community support nearby growers who practice sustainable farming. When you join a CSA you’re essentially buying into a farmer’s harvest—helping fund the costs of getting the crop into the ground and tending it. In return, you get a share of their harvest in the form of a weekly produce delivery to your home or a distribution point near you. Use this page to find a list of CSAs in your region.

Use DIY Home Cleaners
Many home cleaners contain noxious chemicals that are harmful to manufacture and pollute our water supplies when they run down the drain. For most daily cleaning jobs you don’t even need those harsh chemicals; you can actually make cheap, nontoxic solutions from ingredients you already have at home. Vinegar, baking soda, and lemons are some examples. National Geographic has a roundup of the essential DIY household cleaners.

Eat Less Meat
Did you know that if you cut out one meal of chicken every week for a year and replaced it with vegetarian food, it would be equivalent to taking half a million cars off the road? Even if you can’t imagine yourself going vegetarian, removing just one meal of meat a week can drastically cut down the greenhouse gases that result from raising livestock. These simple veggie recipes can get you started.

Buy a Power Strip
Some electronics are real energy suckers—they keep drawing energy from the wall, even whey are turned completely off! Plugging all your electronics into a handy power strip is a simple way to ensure that they’re cut off from the power source and won’t be wasting energy when you’re not using them. It’s a handy way to be frugal and save energy.

Tumultuous Thursdays: Kundalini Yoga, the Shiv and Shakti and Shiv as Potential Energy

UCP/Meady's Musings Production does not own the rights for this image.

A friend came over to the Meady's Musings Production House and the Purple Elephant quickly threw his long purple trunk forward to open the door. The friend entered and said hello and then quickly went over to the guys at the UCP desk and asked them if they were interested in a course in kundalini yoga. It was quite an interesting course but seeing as the owner of the Production House hardly ever pays the guys at the UCP desk a single penny even...no one unfortunately could afford the fees! :( But it got the guys at the UCP desk who are currently writing about this Festival of Shiv 2011 to thinking and they went over to the guys who write the Tumultuous Thursdays blog posts on Meady's Musings and well...this joint blog that is both about religion and metaphysics was born and today appears on both UCP's Festival of Shiv and Meady's Musings' Tumultuous Thursdays! :)

Now kundalini yoga and yoga as a whole is often associated with Baba Shiv as he is seen as the mahayogi and in the image at the start of the post you can see where Shiv's iconography itself can be used to describe the elements of Kundalini yoga and as a whole the key body/energy points in yoga. And this website titled Kundalini Awakening appears to be a very good research source for anyone wanting to know more about the theories behind kundalini yoga.

However the rest of the blog post will delve more into the shiv/shakti relationship that comes out of the study of kundalini yoga and more so the concept that shiv is potential energy and shakti kinetic energy.

Let's define the two terms in Physics as defined by the Free Dictionary:

POTENTIAL ENERGY: (noun)The energy of a particle or system of particles derived from position, or condition, rather than motion. A raised weight, coiled spring, or charged battery has potential energy.

KINETIC ENERGY:(noun)The energy possessed by a body because of its motion, equal to one half the mass of the body times the square of its speed.

Now in Hinduism it is not only seen that Shiv is like potential energy and Shakti like kinetic energy...it is also seen that both Shiv and Shakti are one...so really it is one being that is at one point potential energy and then at another point kinetic energy.

So let's see it as if Shiv is sitting there in meditative post and then while in meditation he thinks up Shakti as this moving dancing female being...then after she manifests from his thoughts as dancing kinetic energy before him he eventually is also aroused and starts to dance with her...his potential energy is converted to kinetic energy!

Seen in the dance of Shiv and Shakti it would look something like this:


Seen in the metaphysical sense as it's impact on the creation and/or destruction it would be something like this:


Think about it is all the potential energy is eventually converted to kinetic energy ...it you have a coil of string and it has this potential energy in it as it is all coiled up but then begins to unravel as its potential energy converts to kinetic energy...what happens when all the string is unraveled? Well you no longer have a ball of string?

Hey but this is no doom's day blogpost or anything...after all this is a joint blogpost on Tumultuous Thrusdays and UCP i.e. Universal Collective Prayer...but we are just analysing some of the aspects of Shiv here and realising more so now how he might be seen as the God of destruction and how his cosmic dance of destruction...or the Nataraj dance has become so world famous...as he gets up from his coiled potential energy position and dances uncoiling as kinetic energy flows! But remember that energy is neither created nor destroyed so the kinetic energy again can become potential as another ball of string or the cosmos is reformed....Jai Bholenath! :)

Slumbering Saturdays....ahmm...Studious Saturdays: Here We Write!

OK so today is the day that Slumbering Saturdays was suppose to have become Studious Saturdays...but it didn't go as well as planned and after a hard week of full time work and a late Friday night...well most of Saturday was spent Slumbering and then Erranding...but as we get to the end of what was suppose to be a Studious Saturday...we are filled with little reproach!

You see we still plan to fill the last hours of the night with some writing and continue to have a strong visualization for next Saturday...us getting up in the wee hours of the morning...sitting at our writing desk...writing away...a few thousand words even before the sun comes up! :)

But for tonight we still did a little bit write...so we will call it a truce and say it is still the launch of Studious Saturdays if you like!

Look forward to blogs on other days of the week as normally themed i.e. Maniac Mondays, Tumultuous Thursdays and even Funtastic Fridays if we might!

And on our sister blog UCP we shall be launching this year's festival of Shiv! So look for that this Monday!

So until then...to all a good night!

And hope you all enjoyed the cartoon above and the associated movie clip below! :)