Noah Levine - Dharma Punx teleseminar

Here's a link to a teleseminar that Noah Levine gave on Dharma Punx if any of you are interested in hearing his perspective on punk rock Buddhism...

"In this teleseminar, he discusses rebellion and the Four Noble Truths, his journey through 12-steps and addiction, his work in prisons, the importance of relationship in transformation, the challenges of living non-violently and the opportunity of growing a uniquely American Buddhist tradition that embraces tattoos and cheeseburgers alongside mindfulness meditation."

My spaced out life

I have just signed up for My Space and wow.. I'm addicted. I visit the site every day and was able to touch base with some old friends in this way.

Might I recommend the following groups / artists / My Space pages? Let me know if you know of others that I should check out.

http://www.myspace.com/ericstrip
http://www.myspace.com/meditateanddestroy
http://www.myspace.com/mcturgeon

You Gotta Hold the Handle

This blog cracks me up.

We just moved into our new offices at work and I felt like everywhere I went, I was discovering a new bit of technology which reinvented they way ordinary tasks have been done over the course of my short life.

For instance, the key to the office is a weird piece of electro-magnetized plastic in the shape of a giant mime's tear. Not having said key with one's person at all times will result in being locked in closets, screening rooms, cafeterias, freezers and other potential Area 51 scenarios.

There are days when I feel like such a luddite!!!

Crying over you

A few posts ago, I blogged about indie-alt-country boy singers making me cry and tonight it happened again - albeit for a different reason
While watching the evening news, there was mention to a spry 91 year old named Harold Hyde who lives in Ottawa who was beaten by attackers in his home. Well didn't I well up with tears after hearing how some local school children raised money to help him.

You can read all about it via this link.

Marcus Sadaka- you are one cool little dude for setting this up. Thank you for helping to make the world a better place.

Someone stop the rock and roll grampies

You got Keef Richards falling out of a coconut tree and launching himself off of his jet-ski and then Ozzy careening off of his all terrain vehicle.

I really think that an emerging growth industry is going to be providing round the clock assistance for these aging rockers, former extreme games participants and shock comedians...

Retreatin' season

I shared a good laugh with M one day as we were talking about 'retreatin' season' - that time of year when vacations come around and the itch to travel off to do meditation retreats or dathuns hits.

I was hoping to do the Warrior Assembly through Shambhala this year in Halifax but since Vermont is where it's taking place this year - I think I will need to postpone my plans. Also, given that I seem to have fallen out of touch with the center, I guess it might be best to reconnect before jumping in (I always over analyze these things and am sure that when I take my vows, my Buddhist name will be 'Thinking Lotus, Stopping Action")

All that aside, there will be a retreat taking place June 21st to 25th as in intensive introduction to Vipassana meditation for beginners but also suitable for people with experience.

The retreat will last from 5:00 PM on Wednesday to 2:30 on Sunday, at the
Villa Marguerite Retreat Centre - The Stable. If you are interested, check in with daryl.ross@concordia.ca

Oriah Mountain Dreamer (edited by Noah Levine)

When a punk rock bodhisattva meets a hippy new age poet- the following mash up happens...

I DON"T CARE... I don't care about what you do for a living. I want to know what you love most, and if you dare to face your demons. I don't care how old you are. I want to know if you will risk looking like a fool for love, for your dreams, for the adventure of beaing alive. I don't care what your fucking sign is, I want to know if you have touched the center of your sorrow, If you have been opened by life's betrayals or if you have become hard and closed from fear of further pain. I want to know if you can toleratepain,mine or your own, without trying to hide it or change it or fix it. I want to know if you can be with joy, mine or your own; If you can get crazy and dance, letting the energy fill you to the tips of your fingers and toes without cautioning us to be careful, be realistic or to remember the limitations of being human. I don't care if the story you are telling is true, I want to know if you can disappoint another to be true to yourself; if you can bear the accusation of betrayal and not betray your own soul. I want to know if you can be faithful and therefore trustworthy. I want to know if you can see beauty, even when it is not a pretty day, and if you can source your life from Wisdom and Compassion. I want to know if you can live with failure, yours and mine, and still stand up and shout gabba gabba hey, for no reason at all. I want to know if you can get up after the night of grief and despair. weary and bruised to the bone and do what needs to be done for the children. I don't care who you are, what band you are in or how cool you are. I want to know if you will stand in the middle of the fire with me and fight for what we know is right. I don't care what religion, race, sexual preference or political stance you have. I want to know what sustains you from the inside when all else falls away. I want to know if you can be alone with yourself, and if you truly like the company you keep in the empty moments.>>>>>Oriah Mountain Dreamer (edited by Noah Levine).

The Power of "The Hour"

Not sure how many people may have found this Blog on their own... Maybe through a drunken late night search for me if you were unfortunate enough to have dated me in high school or university... Maybe while searching for quasi-post-modern Buddhists who don't practice as much as they should and spend more time on the couch watching '24' than on the meditation cushion.... or like many of you, you have come about this Blog thanks to the link from CBC's The Hour

I'm getting lots of visits thanks to this and was just thinking about how powerful "The Hour's" website has become for linking like-minded people together - without even really trying (or I guess looking like it was trying to!) I'm looking forward to the show's site re-design but am hoping that my web traffic won't go down from it! (Maybe I can buy a skyscraper of ad space from the CBC on The Hour's website?)

Now here's hoping Rex Murphy will give me a shout out on Cross Country Checkup
Holla back Rex... Holla

Bob Mould and my broken heart

Picked up a copy of Punk Planet last week with the venerable Bob Mould on the cover. What a great read!

I remember the first time I heard "Makes no Sense at all" back in the early 90's and was struck by the gift that Mould had for capturing the poignancy of human suffereing and alienation.

"Don't Want to Know if you are Lonely" made it onto every mix-tape I made as a frustrated and broken-hearted mooney-eyed girl. Along with The Replacements 'Answering Machine', I would say that these are the two songs that captured an era for me - the era of learnging about the impermanence of love.

Crossing in the rain

Crossing in the rain,
originally uploaded by nouknouk.

My friend Roxana is off in Japan seeing the sites, visiting her boyfriend and taking incredible photos.

I'm feeling inspired by this photo - I guess given all of the rain going down here in MTL...

Bodhi Magazine

Just received my first issue of Bodhi magazine which I've recently subscribed to. It differs from the Shambhala Sun or Tricycle in that it doesn't feature as many glossy ads or features on Richard Gere as the aforementioned magazines. It gets right to the heart of the matter and describes its mission as follows:

"Bodhi means "wakefulness," and aims to convey this experience to the hearts of our readers. Each edition features articles, poems and experiential songs by awakened masters from the Buddhist tradition."

This Blog is Impermanent

In a recent article, Warren St. John wrote in The New York Times about how new media technologies such as Blogs and websites are now being used to immortalize those who have since passed on. There is also a website called My Death Space where people can pay their respects to those who with My Space pages who have since died. I think that this demonstrates the power of technology and how it helps to bring people together regardless of where they are situated. By sharing in their grief online, people are able to build tangible digital tributes through stories about thier friends and loved ones.

I was starting to think how people may start to build this into their wills requests like, 'I bequeath cousin Michael to pull the plug on my Blog when I pass away... ' or 'Please take down my profile from Suicide Girls' so my mom doesn't find it.'

It's so interesting to see how were are transforming and being transformed by new media....

Blogmandu

If you don't read Blogmandu , you are missing out on the best of the Buddhist-istic Blogs on the web.

I just finished reading an excellent post which was part of this week's Blogmandu round up on a weblog titled Doe-Do on the subject of emotional detachment and compassion. In this post, Mike Doe writes...

I want people to be realistic with emotions. The best thing that you can do in general is learn how to accept everything that you feel without discrimination. This will allow your heart to be open and compassionate. This is also hard practice.

One of the initial mistakes I made coming into Buddhism was that Buddhists are so serene and peace-loving that they never get angry. Storing away anger or envy or resentment doesn't allow one to work with the richness of that bullshit.. the truly earthiness of what it is to be human. In working with why we feel the emotions we feel and then seeing that these emotions are impermenant is the challenge.

Karma-friendly raid???

I'm looking for a friendly way to get rid of ants from my place. My currently relied upon technique involves me running to scoop them up with an old envelope, running the envelope under their little feet, rushing them to the balcony and then letting them go free (I'm sure only to have them run back inside to play amongst Bob's kibble and cookies under the sink).

I remember seeing a suction tube in a Buddhist magazine where you could suck up insects and release them outdoors. If I could find one of these again, it would be awesome. The only one I was able to find was an engine-powered version. ENGINE POWERED??? I guess technology has really caused an evolution in bug catchers. Maybe the iZapper isn't too far off (a nano-looking bug zapper slash mp3 player would be of interest to many I'm sure).

Anyone have any karma-friendly bug-eliminating suggestions?

the FAT balloon flying

the FAT balloon flying,
originally uploaded by missdju.

My friend has just completed her first illustration for Illustration Friday.

How fun! (If only I could draw!!!!)

Conjungation Sensation

Words,
originally uploaded by TMcG.

This is kind of how I feel when I'm mixed up in the world of conjugation. It's like a whirlwind of accents and letters flying at me.







Today I spent a few hours on my imparfait / plus que parfait and the notorious passé composé.

C'est bon ça!

This PSA brought to you by someone avoiding their homework....

May is MedicAlert Awareness Month.

As someone with life-threatening allergies, I know how vital it is to have a Medic Alert bracelet on me at all times. Thanfully I've never had any incidents where it's been of use, but knowing that my medical history can be found via a tiny little tag on my wrist is a pretty powerful security blanket for me.

To find out more about this important service check out their website .

Now I would like to get one of these fancy-smancy GPS tracking systems for Bob from Global Pet Finder.

Things I've done today to avoid homework

- Read the paper
- Baked bread
- Did 2 loads of laundry
- 2 Blog posts in one day
- Caught up on my Bloglines feeds
- Martha Stewartized my course binder (orgaization in the hopes of motivation didn't work)
- Pulled tufts of fur off of the dog (shedding season)
- Watched 'End of the Centrury' again and decided if I was a Ramone, I would be named Tee Tee
- Listened to some podcasts
- Diddled with new digital camera to figure out some functions I will never use
- Devised other 'important things' to do in order to avoid homework...

Pollen-hate

This past week has been a trying one. My seasonal allergies are acting up (no doubt thanks to the nice birch tree spreading its sex right in front of my window). Every night I've woken up at 3am with a leaky nose and days are spent honking and blowing my schnozz. I've hit a record repeated sneeze count of 8 and my eyes are blazing, itchy, red, little, leaking orbs.

Thankfully today is rainy.

Punk Rock Parents

Tonight I was walking with Bob and saw something that made me happy.

Paul Gott (from seminal Canadian punk band The Ripcordz ) lives in my neighborhood and I occasionally see him cruising around.Way back when I was an on-air programmer at Fredericton's campus radio station CHSR FM , I did one of my first on-air interviews with Paul and asked the most dreaded of all questions for any artist - 'Who are your influences?' He handled my naivite with gentleness and helped me through my 15 minutes of anti-fame.

Well tonight I noticed a platinum blond bob-haired punk mom headed my way pushing a stroller (Mamma Gott and Baby Gott). I thought about how cool it would be to have folks who were rebellious anarchists with scars from safety pins in their ears rather than the peace lovin' beatniks with brain scars from acid tabs.

Punk parents seem to be increasing in numbers as there are more and more websites such as: Punkrockparents.com available for those punk soccer moms/dads.

Warren Kinsella - politico-punker is another punk-rawk daddy. Read his blog- it is so vital to staying in the know.

Check out this article from USA Today on these rockin' ladies and while your at it, get educated about Grups- they're not as hardcore, but are still less mainstream than your average momma and pappa.

Look at this handsome guy

profile,
originally uploaded by TMcG.

How cute is this little pug? That's my guy.. Love this new camera

Allergy-Free Podcast

Woo hoo! Another podcast for me to check out - Leslea Harmon has created a website, clothing line and blog all relating to allergies in the news. Check out Allergyware.com for more information.

I just spent this morning filling up my iPod with some great new podcasts from CBC Radio One.

My ears are going to be very busy!

Got Miksang?

I'm sure I have one of the most boring flickr accounts out there. Several photos of Bob does not an interesting online photo experience make.

To resolve this, I'm going to pick up one of those snazzy little cameras that everyone's talking about. My main complaint about most digital cameras is that they are too big and bulky to carry around when inspiration hits.

Speaking of inspired photography, Miksang has always been interesting to me and hopefull someday, I will be able to take some courses (yes, more courses!!!)

'Through visual exercises and photographic assignments, each Miksang workshop is designed to allow eye and mind to be naturally synchronized, so that the experience of seeing could be undistracted and present-actually being there. Seeing in this way, each perception is complete, unfiltered, and fully appreciated. The visual world could be perceived directly, without the burden of our habitual likes and dislikes, associations, memories, all of which obscure clear perception. Without visual prejudice, we could then form the equivalent of what we have seen and express each perception precisely."

Reinvention

French classes at McGill have started up again for me and I'm loving it. I'm hoping two times a week should fill me with enough Francophonie to conjugate with the best of them. As exhausting as it is to rush from work to class, it's awesome to be back in classes and learning some useful skills.

I've also decided to go back and re-fresh my skills by taking Continuing Education courses at Concordia as well... A perfect compliment to my dusty PoliSci degree is to compliment it with some journalism courses so I'm going to go back to to books and take on an editing class this summer.

I adore writing so here's hoping that the structure of these courses will give me the kick in the arse that I need. I only wish that I could bring Bob along with me as he's not too happy that I'm away from him for so long.