Celebrating Spring

I'm glad August is done. It has been a very ordinary month for me. I've been home sick or sad more than I've been at work it feels like. I am really fed up with it. I actually love my job and the kids I teach, so I have been pretty flat the last couple of days. I guess there was just too much to deal with last month.

My tulips are popping up. One of my students brought a handful of tulips (his mother deposited them at the office)for me last week. I love them. Andy planted a dozen bulbs for me last year and this will be my second bunch of flowers from him. It's fun to watch them arrive as they are right now.

Today I went for a stroll (there was nothing brisk about it) to the local shops in the sunshine. I haven't exercised for so long and I had to get out of the house. I was starting to feel sorry for myself-blah! I wore my hat and sunnies and I'm glad I did because I read The Age: Victorians need to slip, slop, slap in Spring.

"Victorians are being warned not to leave their sun protection until summer with the Cancer Council of Victoria saying ultraviolet (UV) ray levels are already at a point where they can cause damage leading to skin cancer."

I listened to some podcasts I had downloaded. I love my iPod. I had an mp3 player but itunes is so easy to use. I have subscribed to some of the ABC radio programs and I have all my music on it.

Rhonda came over and it was great to have a laugh with her. The beginning of the new season I am declaring a fresh start for myself.

ThoughtAudio.com - an audio book publisher providing free audio book downloads and podcasts of philosophy and classic literature titles.

If you enjoy listenting to books read to you, download these to your MP3 player. I love audio books. You can listent to them before you go to sleep, in bed and don't get cold hands from having them poking out from under the covers.
ThoughtAudio.com - an audio book publisher providing free audio book downloads and podcasts of philosophy and classic literature titles.

Podcasts and Theatre of the Mind

I listened to podcasts from Theatre of the Mind this week whilst I was walking. There are plenty on that site and they are quite interesting but contain a bit of promotion of their products, which are meditation CD's. There are also articles on these things on that website/blog. The woman behind the business also mentioned Joseph Chiltern Pearce who wrote one of my favourite books "Magical Child"
I have used these types of audio meditation and found them to be very good at improving my clarity and well being. It reminded me how effective they are and I am intending to find a timeslot in my day to include 30 minutes of it again. I am also going to find a space in my home to use exclusively for meditation.
bk_keywords:Chiltern Pearce.

I actually LOVE Podcasts

Checking myself out as I admit I do from time to time I found this site: Opinmind linking to my blog about podcasts. They have a thumbs down above my column. This could mean my post doesn't rate with them, but I think (in order to keep my ego in tact), they are putting my post in with the people who don't like podcasts. It is obviously a robot that dug my little obscure post up, because if a human had read my post, I would be in the thumbs up column. Which is where I would rather be by the way!!

Discovering Podcasts

I have been aware of them for a while, but until I went away and actually listened to the dozen or so I had collected, I really had no appreciation for podcasting. It is a very cool thing though and tonight I have tried to find them but found it a bit difficult. It seems I have to stumble upon them as I did with the two I mentioned in my last post.

But I did find this Yahoo! Podcasts and whilst I haven't fully explored it yet, it looks like a very good starting point, so I thought I would put the link here. If I find anything really good specifically I will mention it here.

The ABC website have lots too and I listened to a couple of Triple J ones as well as listening to New Dimensions (can't download though) and The Book Show. I love the ABC website.

Podcasts and Walking

I think one thing that has made walking easier for me is that I have been downloading some podcasts to listen to whilst I walk. It is dark still at 6.00 in the morning so there isn't much to see and listening to a podcast makes the time spent doubly valuable to me. This week I have been listening to Steve Pavlina's podcasts:http://www.stevepavlina.com/audio/
I also found a site that I am going to try on the weekend, which has heaps of audios :http://www.audiodharma.org/talks-gil.html, I haven't listened to them yet, but they look interesting. It's a fabulous resource though.