Meghan's Musings

So how's everyone been?? A horror of epic proportions has been visit upon me! I've not been able to wear eye make-up since last Sunday! Last Friday the corner of my right eye was uncontrollably itchy. When I awoke to as sore eyelid Saturday I figured it was because I may have been to vigorous with my scratching. Then I noticed the lid was red and puffy. Said deformity didn't abate Sunday, and Monday morning Shiloh and I shuffled on down to the nearby Minute Clinic. The Nurse Practitioner looked at me and said, "You have a stye on your eye." (That was one of my own self-diagnoses thanks to Google.) She gave me drops to administer every four hours while awake and I must put a warm compress on it for 15 minutes 4 times a day. I also can't wear my contact lenses and I had to throw out all my eye make-up. I was able to find a kit of sixteen different colors through Victoria's Secret for a great price. That should be here on Monday, and I'...

Apple Cinnamon Sour Cream Coffee Cake. Third time was a charm for this scrumptious slice of heaven. I made it three times within a one week period. The first time was to take some for my quarterly visit (I'd like to up this to at least bi-weekly) with Christi, aka Super Friend . We ran into each other unexpectedly at the local playground, she'd just picked her boys up from school and brought the there - Shiloh and I were already there. (We made some new friends at the library, and that was mutually agreed upon time and day to bring the kids together. Also, this new friend is a native German speaker and her four-year-old is already bi-lingual. Time to get get the Duolingo front-and-center again!) Anyway.... Christi and I hadn't seen each other since the end of June, and she invited me up for coffee the next morning. I said I would bring something, she said she loves when I bring baked goods. Now I had to bring something good and original. (Not because she would slam the door...

I'm hard pressed to believe that the passage of the most awful of seasons has been a.) NOT AWFUL and b.) so rapid. As far as weather goes, this summer has been absolutely blissful! The windows and French doors have been open nearly the whole time - the use of air conditioners has been minimal. Only a handful of days were akin to breathing through a wet blanket and the sunshine has kept the dopamine up! I only hope that mother nature is equally mild through the cooler months.... Isaac's first day of school is next Wednesday. Which also means I need to get Miss Thang on a school schedule at home - that will NOT be fun. Just one more year before she's on the school bus! I'd like to give a shout out (yeah, that's right!) to the Middleboro Public Library! Who knew that a library was more than just a book-borrowing building?! Everyone? Oh... Ahem... Anywho... Because of Isaac's mandatory summer reading schedule, we went to the library at the start of his vacatio...

There has never been a performer like Robin Williams. While visiting with my sister, BIL and their friends vacationing in Mattapoisett Moday night, sis greeted my return from the kitchen with: "Meghan, Robin Williams died." My immediate, profound, exclamation was, "No f*ing way!" In Slate's TV editor, Willa Paskin's article  "Robin William's Engergy Was so Powerful He Didn't Know How Turn It Off." she makes some interesting points: A celebrity's unnatural demise can tarnish their image, at least for a while. Robin Williams was always "on" - unable to not endeavor to elicit laughter from those around him (I'm paraphrasing here). I'll let the pros pontificate the greater depths of this tragic loss. Even though he turned in some spectacular performances of a dark nature ( One Hour Photo , Insomnia ) laughter was obviously his life's driving force. My two favorite guffaw-enducing, quintessential Robin William...

Ready Player One,  by Ernest Cline, takes place in 2044 - a depressingly realistic future if humanity remains on it's current trajectory. The unlikely hero is dumpy, clever and sarcastic Wade Watts. He's orphaned and lives in a trailer park with his aunt, who has a Dickens-esque quality to her nastiness. He, like the multitude of the masses in this future, escapes his dreary surroundings each day into The Ontologically Anthropocentric Sensory Immersive Simulation (OASIS). (My favorite utilization of the OASIS is the public school system - the programming does't allow bullying or any other abusive behavior and language, and teachers can take students on virtual field trips, hence increasing the interest in their lessons.) In the OASIS, Wade's avatar is Parzival, and he's a gunter. Gunters are a subculture of "egg hunters" spawned because the mega-wealthy creator of the OASIS, James Donovan Halliday dies. He was an eccentric, borderline antisocial gen...

Channeling my inner Mel Gibson for just a moment - he's since been kicked to the curb! As mentioned previously, I am no longer in the employ of an institution which offers currency in exchange for services provided. While I'm thrilled to have cast off the chains of corporate servitude - I have exchanged those for the iron shackles (which, if I had any artistic proclivities, would probably be painted with some retro-new-agey-yogic pattern) of domesticity, which comes with its own challenges. I can no longer be sent to the principal's office - er HR manager's office - because I've shown too much cleavage. But because of the fighting, the screaming, and my personal favorite memory - the "nice hike" - which devolved into sobbing hysterics because Shiloh couldn't grasp "peeing in the woods" and Isaac flailing his arms about whilst screaming "All bugs must die!" - My gray matter is loosening from a tightly wound conduit that transmits...

"The Mandala is the Sanskrit word for "sacred circle." For thousands of years the creation of circular, often geometric designs has been part of spiritual practices around the world and almost every culture has revered the power of the circle. Eeastern cultures have used specific mandals for visual medication for many centuries; the Tibetan Buddhist Kalachakra, also know as the Wheel of Time, is probably one of the most famous mandals and symbolically illustrates the entire structure of the universe. Circular forms are found at the prehistoric Stonehenge monument in England and the 13th century labyrinth at the baste of Chartres Cathedral in France. Spiritual seekers have consistently created mandalas to bring forth the sacred through images and have evoked the circle in ritual and art making for the purpose of transcendence, mindfulness and wellness." I began contemplating how things have a tendency to "come full circle" after reading this blog post...