Modern ruins of prehistoric proportions

18 06 2010

These ruins are abandoned American theme parks, and I was surprised to see the Prehistoric Forest in Irish Hills, Michigan listed among them. I remember driving by there when I was kid, but I’m not sure we ever went in. Deer Forest in Coloma, now that I remember, delightfully cheesy and still open to this day.

Video of the dilapidated Lincoln Park in Dartmouth, Massachusettes, shows pictures of slender saplings growing up through weathered benches like blades of grass through spring snow.

Abandoned American Theme Parks

Enjoy this list of Michigan oddities around the state

Genie emerging from his lamp along Storybook Lane, Deer Forest, Coloma (image from deerforest.com)





Fanny packs!

16 06 2010

I just knew it. When military jackets and peg leg jeans came back into fashion, I knew it wouldn’t be too long until fanny packs made a way back into our lives. Wendy Williams just ran a montage of celebrity photos on her TV show, including Drew Barrymore and Donna Karan, wearing trendy fanny packs (aka “belt bags”). Rihanna is sporting a double-decker Louis Vuitton bag above.

I love the portability factor. I carry lip balm and mints in my disc golf bag and find they tend to collect dust and moisture, no matter how deep I pack them. Add to that the extra stooping to get into your bag when you’re on the course, well… the belt pack is beginning to sound alright.

If I see one I like, I just may buy one. Just try not to laugh when you see me wearing it.





Red planet, blue planet

15 06 2010

A computer rendering of Mars from the University of Colorado’s geological sciences department shows a vast ocean covering a third of the surface of the red planet. The imaging, based on surface data from nearly a decade of NASA and ESA orbiting missions, suggests a planet capable of life, an alternate view for what many consider to be a barren, angry planet. (It is, after all, named after the God of War and potentially capable of Martians who might vaporize us with a ray gun. Or eat our brains.)

I like this new view of Mars. The red planet plays a key role in my natal astrology chart: The Sun, Moon and Saturn in Aries (governed by Mars) ignite near the Piscean tip of my watery grand trine like a red hot horseshoe plunged into a barrel of cold water. Fiery me is impatient and unstoppable. Watery me is reclusive and serene. Together they forge balance: composure with impulse and eagerness with reserve. I’m glad to have this new image of Mars to reflect on when I’m feeling burnt (or soaked) from imbalance in my own life.

Science Daily’s article: Ancient Ocean May Have Covered Third of Mars





Columns, singing and the power of sound

11 06 2010

I’ve been fascinated with vibrational medicine ever since my first stint in grad school when Fritjof Capra’s The Web of Life: A New Scientific Understanding of Living Systems was required reading. I had already discovered the work of Louise Hay and Joan Borysenko, offering mind-body-spirit approaches to healing and wellness. In Capra’s exposition, I found information which shifted my world view in the direction of my soul’s longing— that of the esoteric, of the seemingly hidden forces of the intangible on the tangible.

I am reminded of John 1:1 in the Bible: “In the beginning, there was the word”— anecdotal evidence of the power of sound to create somethingness (physical) from nothingness (non-physical).

Sound temples are my latest fascination. Michael Tellinger has been researching artifacts, including the phenomenon of stone circles worldwide, hinting at an ancient global society. In one ancient circle, he found stones of a material composition that ring when you strike them. Imagine a megalithic stone structure, activated by striking, that begins to ring and interacts with the other stones around it that also begin to ring, which creates a harmonic in a circular structure, suggested to be a standing wave by Tellinger.

Aerial reconstruction of Woodhenge (UK)

Some of these structures were activated by human voice, possibly in groups, akin to singing in church today. Were these purely ceremonial sites, or are these relics of an aeon’s old technological age? If the latter, what was the energy produced by these sound emanations harnessed for?

Looking to science, I find an article in Archaelogy Today’s online edition: The Life of Meresamun: A Temple Singer in Ancient Egypt. Meresamun was a part-time singer and musician in the interior of the Temple of Amun (also known as Amun-Ra) at Karnak, likely from a long lineage of women who entertained in service to the temple, and in Mere’s case, a wealthy family, as the remains of her coffin indicate. In her time— around 800 BC in Thebes, Egypt— women were singers, priestesses or “wives of god,” inside the temple, while men played instruments outside the temple.

Temple of Amun Karnak Floor Plan

I look further and find photos of the Hypostyle Hall in the interior and a floor plan of the temple. The columns are huge and arranged inside a rectangular wall in straight rows unlike the older megalithic stone circles, a four sided enclosure rather than an open, circular perimeter. (Some, like Woodhenge, with interior concentric rings.)

But Meresamun’s life history is a mere three thousand years ago, and Tellinger suggests that the civilization who built the stone circles and other megaliths world wide were perhaps 450,000 years ago in our timeline, back in the Paleozoic Era, itself another fascinating hypothesis.

Tellinger is touring the US early this autumn and you may be able to hear him present his evidence live in a city near you. If not, watch Tellinger discuss his controversial theory on man as a slave species on his website, slavespecies.com. His book is also available on Amazon.com.

Read about Meresamun in the book that accompanied the 2009 exhibit in Chicago’s ARCE (American Research Center in Egypt) and Oriental Institute.





Conan’s manly dance-off

2 06 2010

Conan O’Brien’s traveling hijinx, here with Steven Colbert and John Stewart.








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