Inspiration

Many years ago, I had a dream in which I invented a ZemBord™, a wooden hemisphere upon which I could sit cross-legged, and rock gently in all 360 degrees while meditating. [The name is exactly as it was spelt and styled in my dream - Zem, not zen, Bord, not board, and the trademark symbol.] To my delight, my friend Richard B built me one! Sadly, it had one big drawback - its weight would indent any wooden floor, and it will not move on a carpet. It can only function on a smooth, hard, surface. And so it sat for a long while, unused, in my parents' garage. Now, it finds itself in Jakubowizna, in daily use, on a hard, smooth floor. Is it the only one in the world, I wonder?

I use it for back-extension exercise - lying down on it, my navel exactly over the spindle hole in the centre, I adopt a neutral position, hands clasped behind my head, legs extended. I then arch my back, lifting my legs so my thighs are no longer in contact with the wood - they curve upward and around, like a scorpion's sting. This has the effect of shifting my centre of gravity forward. Slowly; I start to rock forward, until the tip of my nose touches the floor. I hold this position for the count of five, before returning my legs to the straight position, rocking backwards as I do to the neutral position. I repeat this eight times - catch my breath - and do a second set of eight back extensions. I have to do this bare-chested; if I wear a shirt, I slide off! Recommended to me by Paul W. as a complementary antidote to doing plank exercises, I see online that these can be done on a large, inflatable ball. However, the ZemBord™ is clearly superior for this.

It is also a meditation aid, a place to sit and think, or just let the stream of consciousness go. And so it was last night, after waking up from a dream (phew!) and then not being able to return to sleep, that I sat on the ZemBord™ in the darkened front room. Suddenly - a flash of inspiration. Out of nowhere. Two entirely unrelated things linked! The triangular containers from Castello Danablu cheese (a dietary staple for me), and the moss that I had been cutting out from between the patio tiles at the weekend. And below, dear reader, is the result. Note the different colours of moss - the brighter green are from the patio to the east of the house, that get the least sunlight; the more scorched ones are from the southern patio, exposed to most hours of direct sunshine.

I was happy with the result - this is what I had been inspired to do while rocking on the ZemBord™. Now - I can see a whole world of interior decorating open up to indoor moss... I need to learn how to care for them... The six can be broken into two semicircles of three containers. To something - like this (below). Between them stands the Laibstein (from the German - Laib, loaf, and Stein - stone). A beautifully symmetrical and weighty ornament, found in a local field.

Returning to the subject of the ZemBord™, yesterday I watched a YouTube interview with Bruce R. Fenton (@GeologicalSETI on Twitter), about the mystery of tektites - in particular the ones found in the Australasian strewnfield, the result of an event that occurred about 788,000 years ago. Molten glass flying through the Earth's upper atmosphere cooled to form 'buttons' that look like the one below.

We know that they're not volcanic in origin (the strewnfield covers an area far vaster than any terrestrial volcano could ever reach, maybe about 20% of the earth's surface); they're not from lunar volcanoes (wrong mineral content); and if they were from an asteroid impact of this scale, there would have been a mass-extinction event - one didn't happen 788,000 years ago. Indeed, something else happened at that exact time - a series of rapid mutations in human genes which sharply increased the gulf between Homo sapiens and other primates. Bruce Fenton believes the two are connected.

The ZemBord™ is like a flat-topped button tektite; a dream that inspired me many years ago - synchronicities are everywhere, if you are open to them.

This time eight years ago:
Food shopping and dietary update

This time nine years ago:
Photos from the Radom Air Show, part 1

This time ten years ago:
Offloading PKP's risk at W-wa Jeziorki

This time 12 years ago:
Time to be stuffing yourself with fresh fruit

This time 13 years ago:
First notes of autumn in the air

This time 15 years ago:
Large spider catches fly