Recently, I got offered a position at Merscom Games to be a flash developer for social media games. Everything is happening quite quickly and it made me realize a couple things.
- I have a lot to get done to move to another city so I’m going to have to take a break from blogging.
- I have been blogging too frequently to put the quality in I would like.
So, for the next couple weeks I’m going to take a break from my scheduled blogging times. When I come back I’m reducing the amount of scheduled posts to 2 a week. I will do this by staggering the posts. So one week I will do a Just Another Magic Monday post along with a Flash Friday post. The following week will consist of a Sunday Funnies post and a Wednesday Warrior post.
Hopefully this change will allow for me to put more time into my blog posts. At the same time, it should help me to continue to post even when certain major events occur.
So, until I am settled – adieu.
Finally, we have reached the 10th metaphor in Matthew Fox’s book The Hidden Spiruality of Men – Ten Metaphors to Awaken the Sacred Masculine. As a man who is a father but not a grandfather I wondered what I would be able to get out of this metaphor. As I am writing these blog posts with the hopes that I can help others, what can someone who is neither a grandfather or even a father get from this metaphor. For my second reading of this metaphor though, I did get something out of for myself and hopefully for others. We have already had a few father metaphors, what is Grandfather Sky and how is it different?
The Grandfatherly Heart
Grandfather Sky, the grandfatherly heart, isn’t that different in relationship to the father metaphors than the relationship between grandfathers and fathers ( and sons for that matter ). Grandfather Sky is the father metaphors at new stage of life. Where the father metaphors are still about providing for family and community through (great) work, Grandfather sky is about providing for family and community through wisdom.
Beyond just sharing its own wisdom, the Grandfatherly Heart is also about taking in the wisdom of youth – be that the sons or be that the fathers. The Grandfatherly Heart knows enough to know that there is much he doesn’t know. Thus, Grandfather Sky, learns from youth as much as they teach the youth.
My Own Experiences
In reading this chapter again I remember a conversation I had with my step-father in law regarding his relationship with my sons. I couldn’t ask for a better grandfather figure in my sons’ lives than him and I was telling him how much I appreciate him. He D’Artagnan and Draegan so much time and I know when I come home I often don’t have the focus or energy to give the same amount of myself to them as he does. He just smiled and told me it was the same for him with his kids. He reminded me, I have to drum up the energy every day and he only has to do it when we come to visit. His energy, his heart is not only a gift to my sons but it is a gift to me as well.
Then there are the projects. Both my step father in law and father in law spend time doing projects with my kids. Often woodworking projects, something they are both good at and I have no experience in. I so appreciate their passing down of wisdom to the boys. That is the Grandfatherly Heart giving freely, not so much wisdom, but love of a craft.
My Inner Grandfather
Rather than wait the many years until I, possibly, become a literal grandfather I decided to take a look at what this metaphor means for me right now. Often the modern versions of the father looks at their actual work as the way they define themselves. The grandfather, on the other hand, now looks at their family, their communities and their contributions as the way they define themselves. There is also the difference in relationship to death. The grandfatherly heart is much more aware of death, and accepting of it. It is, after all, a natural part of life and they know enough to see it for what it is. In this way Grandfather Sky is connected to the Hunter-Gatherer who just sees death as and extremely natural part of life. In a recent national geographic article on the Hazda, they have only begun to bury their dead in recent decades after pressure from governments. Instead they just let nature take its course. It takes a bit for my modern mind to even deal with that – even though it makes perfect sense.
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Tags: Men's Studies, spirituality
Before I got into magic there were a lot of magicians I had never heard of but should have. I still have many more to learn about. Of course, with magic there are so many types of magic that this fact is not that surprising.
Many of my past Just Another Magic Monday posts have shown off card manipulators as I learned about some of them. However, recently I posted about Go Magic Go and the Royal Road to Card Magic. I did this because I’ve decided to make 2010 a magical year for me and those are the tools I am using myself to gain some magical confidence. The Royal Road to Card Magic isn’t a book about card manipulation even if it does have some utility flourishes. Instead, it is a book about good old fashioned card magic.
For many people, card magic is the reason they think they don’t like magic. Since card magic is so easy for people to get started at, many people learn the tricks but don’t learn how to really perform them. Without the performance a trick is just a trick and rarely, if ever, entertains. Thank goodness for my pro wrestling background, I already understand this fact.
Card magic can be extremely entertaining though. In the hands of the right performer, a simple deck of cards can be all someone needs to entertain any group of people. In the magical world many would say that Bill Malone is one of the best card magic entertainers there is. I only learned about him while talking with an old friend about my new journey into magic. In the following video Bill Malone does a lot of magic, but you may not even notice it because the routine is so entertaining.
Enjoy Bill Malone’s – Sam the Bellhop
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Tags: bill malone, Cards, Magic
Eliza Coupe on Scrubs
I love flight of the conchords. I also love Scrubs. I am also a fan of comedy and the french language. These 4 things came together in the first season of Flight of the Conchords. Watching season 9 of Scrubs, where Eliza Coupe plays Dr. Denise Mahoney I am constantly thinking about “A Kiss Is Not A Contract.”
Definitely No Sugar
Of course, the number one song and video for me from the series is Foux De Fa Fa. If you ever took French in high school and have forgotten everything since this should be pretty funny for you. If you are a francophile with a sense of humor( like myself ), enjoy.
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Tags: Eliza Coupe, Flight of the Conchords, Music, Scrubs, video
With Flash CS4 ( and CS3 for that matter ) comes a great utility for simple visual effects, the Transition Manager and accompanying transitions. With this tool you can use some common transitions without much complex coding on your side. The following is a list of the available transitions.
import fl.transitions.*; var transitionMgr:TransitionManager = new TransitionManager( myClip ); var params:Object = new Object(); params.type = Fade; params.direction = Transition.IN; var transition:Transition = transitionMgr.startTransition( params );
import fl.transitions.*; var params:Object = new Object(); params.type = Fade; params.direction = Transition.IN; var transition:Transition = TransitionManager.start( myClip, params );
Using Parameters
The two transition methods both take a parameters object, but you might be wondering what goes in the object. That depends on a few things and here are some options.
- The type is required – enter one of the 10 above.
- Other common properties for all transitions include
- direction – choices are Transition.IN and Transition.OUT ( default is Transition.IN )
- duration – this is measured in seconds
- easing – This is a function. I believe the default is None.none;
- You can add parameters specific to the fade type you are using( i.e. numStrips for a Blinds transition )
When does it end?
When looking at the documentation for the Transition and Transition Manager classes, there appears to be a problem. If you want to do something when the transition(s) are done there doesn’t appear to be any events that tell you when this occurs. The truth is there are events that get fired, the documentation is just lacking. The events that get fired are of type flash.event.Event and there are no constants to give you any auto completion help.
For the transitions the following events may be fired:
- “transitionInDone”
- “transitionOutDone”
- “transitionProgress”
The TransitionManager fires the following 2 events
- “allTransitionsInDone”
- “allTransitionsOutDone”
Example
With all the above in mind I thought I would show each of the different transitions and the events that fire. Each transition uses all of its defaults, but you do get to choose the direction so you can see the different complete events 
One Last Thing
The Transition classes unfortunately are only coded to work with MovieClip instances. For many people who don’t code in MovieClips you may have to find a different solution but for most users of Flash CS4+ this shouldn’t be a problem.
If you liked this post please subscribe to my RSS feed and/or follow me on Twitter. If you only want to see my Flash Friday posts you can follow the subscribe to the Flash Friday feed. How’s that for alliteration Until next time keep on coding.
Tags: example, Flash, transitions
The 9th metaphor in the book The Hidden Spiruality of Men – Ten Metaphors to Awaken the Sacred Masculine is titled earth father. For me my journey into men’s studies and down the spiritual path of the sacred masculine comes from asking questions about being a father. In my first post on numinous masculine sexuality I discussed how sexuality and questioning how to raise 2 boys to not be ashamed of sex like I was (and still am somewhat) was a major catalyst for this exploration. Between my first steps, in the book Fire in The Belly and currently these Wednesday Warrior posts I focused on much more of what it means to be masculine and that has guided me quite well on my fatherhood journey.
Earth Father – sacred masculine central
Fatherhood is central to the sacred masculine. From this book alone you can see how it is linked to each of the other 9 metaphors:
- Father Sky – Also a father metaphor, father sky is more distant than the Earth Father. One must not forget the importance of solitude and space in masculinity/fatherhood which Father Sky provides.
- The Green Man – This one is linked as another earth metaphor. Earth Father is grounded, much like the Green Man. Being a good steward of our planet is a great way to provide for our children and our children’s children.
- Icarus and Daedalus – Another father metaphor, or a rather a parable to learn from. Fathers must not only be willing to teach their children, but learn from them as well.
- Hunter-Gatherers – In modern society this is hard to see. Where are the rites of passage from boyhood to manhood ? How can we as men create the important psychological and spiritual aspects of these for our children?
- Spiritual Warriors – As a father, what do we fight for? What do we value? We reap what we sow in regards to the Spiritual Warrior’s connection to the Earth Father. We must lead by example.
- Masculine Sexuality, Numinous Sexuality – I do not want my sons to learn that sex = shame. I want them to be powerful individuals in all aspects of their lives.
- Our Cosmic and Animal Bodies – As fathers how do we take care of our bodies? Our children’s? Once again, leading by example has us teach our children respect for themselves.
- The Blue Man – In all the trials and tribulations of fathering, there must be compassion, there must be a loving heart.
- Grandfather Sky:The Grandfatherly Heart – The father begets the grandfather, ’nuff said
Earth Father – not just for fathers
While the earth father and fathering are central to the sacred masculine they do not refer only to literal fatherhood. Literal fatherhood is just the most obvious place to access it. In a post ( or two ) on my old blog I discussed Mr. Miyagi from the Karate Kid. No one would say that there is not an earth father being portrayed in those films and yet he is not a literal father. A powerful force, the mentor. The mentor spreads earth father energy out into the community. Perhaps you have a memory of a teacher that became your mentor at one point. They are out there and you can be one too. It doesn’t take much but time and caring, but mostly caring.
Paternal energy doesn’t stop with men either. The earth father’s paternal energy can be tapped into by women ( and is ) in the same way that men can tap into the earth mother’s maternal energy. A literal father and literal mother both tap into paternal and maternal energies, it takes both to raise a child.
Being a stand for the community
The Earth Father takes a look at the world he is leaving for his children, and his children’s children, and strives to make it the best he can make it for them. To do this he must stand for his community and in his community. Helping others and helping the environment are the keys. For a while I’ve been wondering if I could find a mens group in my area. Recently I’ve actually thought about the possibility of actually being the one to create a mens group in my area for this very reason. By being a stand for those around us to be great, we get to live in greatness.
These are of course my take on earth father energies. I’d love to hear others. Perhaps you aren’t a literal father and have a take on it. Maybe you are a grandfather who has reach the next level of fatherhood. Maybe you are a woman reading this and care to share with us your perspective. Whatever your view I’d love to hear it in the comments. Of course, keep in mind that I barely touch the topic and this is a great book to read yourself as you will most likely get something else out of it than I.
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Tags: Fatherhood, Masculinity, Men's Studies, parenting, spirituality
As a magician, I can’t in good conscious tip any methods on my blog because there is no way to tell if my reader is a magician or not. However, I am still a novice myself and I know how hard it is to find good methods to learn magic. So, I will gladly share some of the better ways I find to learn some magic if you too are wanting to learn the arcane arts
My JAMM posts are the perfect place to do this on occasion.
Today’s JAMM post, as you have probably already figured out, is me recommending the book The Royal Road to Card Magic. But that is not all. I didn’t start making my way through this book until I came across an podcast series called Go Magic Go. Unfortunately, this podcast isn’t still being created so you have to do a little, technical, leg work in order to find it. I’ve done the work for you so just point your RSS reader to http://thetrapdoor.libsyn.com/rss.
If you don’t know what an RSS reader is, a great online tool is Google Reader. Just click the “Add A Subscription” button and add the URL above. While your at it, do the same with http://ducharme.cc to follow the blog you are currently reading.
Back to the topic at hand. The Royal Road To Card Magic is the book they work through in a special series of podcasts Go Magic Go did for beginners. Even though the book is written well and you can get a lot out of it on your own, what you get from the beginner series podcasts is almost like a virtual magic mentor. You get tips for practicing, things to watch out for and other information that you would only get from making mistakes yourself. I still haven’t gotten through the book because I’m going quite slow ( as recommended by the Go Magic Go podcast ) and still was learning some very powerful techniques and tricks almost immediately.
Here is the first lesson to get you started:
For less than $10, this book is a gold mine of magical technique. It goes well with the fact that card magic is a nice inexpensive way to start learning magic theory. The Go Magic Go podcasts are free and come with a wealth of information for anyone serious about magic. So I highly recommend listening to more than just the Beginner Series podcasts.
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Tags: book, Cards, go magic go, Magic, podcast
In the past I have asked you to watch the guild. Mostly because it is a fun web show and partly because it has Felicia Day (also a good reason to watch Dr. Horrible’s Sing Along Blog). Those same two reasons, and because Felicia day mentioned it on Facebook, had me check out the Legend of Neil.
The name itself didn’t tell me anything about the show. Immediately upon visiting the show’s site though told me all I needed to know. The Legend of Neil is a show loosely based on the original Legend of Zelda. A game many people of my generation look upon fondly. In Game Informer magazine’s 200th edition they listed the the top 200 games of all time and Legend of Zelda came in at number 1.
Kill Link!
The Legend of Neil twists these happy memories a bit. Mostly by loosely basing it of memories of the game rather than going back into the game for research. They then pervert by well thinking,”what would a drunk guy who got transported into the game because asphyxiated himself with the controller probably see in game?” Maybe Zelda is less caucasian than the games would have us believe. Perhaps the fairy’s are a bit frisky.
Did I mention that the fairy is played by Felicia Day? It’s not a role I would expect to see her in but according to Sandeep Parikh ( the Guild’s Zaboo ) this is the type of improv she does all the time. In fact the first episode I watched was The Legend of Neil’s musical episode where a spoof of “My Favorite Things” gets a little uncomfortable for a more normal elf.
Legend of Neil, Season 2, Ep. 3 — The Musical
The funniest line comes in early when Felicia the Fairy says, “Oh, i don’t know. I’m not really into online musicals”. Nice.
I’ve now watched the whole 2 seasons of Neil and am hoping for a season 3. Have you seen Legend of Neil? What were your favorite parts? There are lots of other classic video game shows floating around the web, what do you like. All I can say is this made me want to play Legend of Zelda again and now my 6 year old is learning about games through one of the games I grew up with. Sweet.
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Tags: Felicia Day, Humor, The Legend of Neil, video
2010 is looking to be an exciting year in the world of Flash. For the first Flash Friday post of the New Year I thought I would go over some of the big new things I am looking forward to in 2010.
Flash Player 10.1
Flash truly goes mobile this year and this is made possible by many of the changes in flash player 10.1. Many performance optimizations have been made to the player to allow better performance and this will help out, not only mobile, but all forms of the flash player. Mobile devices also require new interface methodologies and thus flash player 10.1 will be able to handle multitouch events and gestures. This is huge in mobile but will also be making a difference on the desktop with another thing I am looking forward to AIR 2.0.
AIR 2.0
Flash Player 10.1 is at the heart of the newest version of the AIR runtime. Along with some of the other benefits of Flash Player 10.1 such as gesture events there are some AIR only improvements. As a former audio professional the access to the Microphone sound is exciting. Other stuff I’m looking forward to are global error handling, detection of USB devices, more sockets and file promises.
Flash Builder 4
Flex builder is being rebranded as Flash Builder and there are lots of changes. I’ve been a fan of Degrafa for a while so the new graphic changes are something I’m looking forward to. The new spark architecture will take some getting used to but the design flexibility will be nice. Though I’ve got an e-article available on Amazon that will be mostly worthless, the better integration between Flash Builder and Flash CS5 will make my life much easier.
Flash CS5
The big thing with this new version of Flash CS5 is IPhone application development. Unfortunately, at this time it looks like that’s the closest that the I-platform is coming to having flash in 2010 unless something major changes. Everyone else having flash in the mobile market may be the catalyst that makes this happen. Speaking of a catalyst…
Flash Catalyst
I’ve been looking forward to this for a long time. Better integration between a design tools and Flash Builder. I’ve loved using Flex Builder since Flex 2 and Flash Catalyst will ( hopefully ) make a dramatic change in our office workflow. Also, this could be a boon for user experience architecting if all is done correct.
So what else is coming? What are you looking forward to? I’ve only touched on what Adobe has announced here but maybe you’ve heard a rumor.
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The eight metaphor in The Hidden Spirituality of Men – Ten Metaphors to Awaken the Sacred Masculine is The Blue Man. The words alone might make you think of the Blue Man Group. Other than Intel commercials I don’t really know much about them, but maybe there is something to their bright blue faces.
The first time I read this chapter I noticed how the metaphor itself comes from meditation induced visions of a blue man that represented strong spiritual imagery. Inspired I did a limited, but purposeful, meditation on the Blue Man as I drifted off to dream land. It was then that I had a powerful dream which I covered in an earlier blog post. I was looking forward to rereading this chapter and seeing if, once again, I would have a dream of significance.
What is the Blue Man?
The Blue Man, as I said before comes from two different stories. One of Swami Muktananda and the other of Hildegard of Bingen. Both tell of being in some meditative or prayer state and seeing a vision of a man in blue or a man bathed in sapphire light. To them the man represented God and all things it was pure love and compassion. Not only was it God in all things but it was God in them while at the same time being themselves in God.
When I originally read this metaphor and pondered what it was saying, my Western mind that has been surrounded by Christianity went to the concept of Jesus as Christ. As a devout agnostic who has often bordered on atheistic beliefs I made a jump that many Christians might find uncomfortable. Could it be that Jesus, instead of being the son of God and God itself was really just a normal person who took on embodying the blue man. From that thought I jumped to prophets from other religions as well, they all could be blue men and the rest of us are so deaf to our own divinity they look like Gods to us. When I reread the chapter I saw that the author said as much in his own writing .
Expanding our Consciousness
If the Blue Man is God in all things, God inside of us and in turn ourselves in God, every thing in God then a whole new world opens up to us. We can look at all the crisis in the world without being overwhelmed. We can instead look and see opportunities to make a difference in the world and for others. What may start as anger can be honed by our compassion and turned into positive action.
The Blue Man and The Spiritual Warrior
In my post about The Spiritual Warrior I brought up the topic of a great work several times. What I never really touched on, probably because I needed to reread this chapter to understand, is where does the warrior come up with his great work? The Blue Man is the answer. The Blue Man is a creative energy that can take a man’s anger and mix it with compassion to come up with a path for the warrior to walk. In the book, the author used the examples of Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr. to show how they took their anger, wrapped it in compassion and made social art.
The Blue Man as an artist
The Blue Man is an artist. In the examples of Gandhi and King he is an artist that creates divine works which positively impact society. All art can do that, and for some who think they are not artists the first step is finding their artistic voice. Through the practice of speaking through art a man can find and strengthen his voice. As he gets stronger that voice can make a difference in somebody’s life. Perhaps this is where the Blue Man Group got the inspiration for the name of their troop. A voice without words, only art.
Just Add Compassion
I can’t stress enough the value of compassion in my own spiritual journey through this book thus far. It has improved the quality of my personal relationships – with my wife, my two boys, my family, my friends and my coworkers. When I have seen a problem, usually in my own communication with others, I’ve been reminded to add compassion and things have become easy. Compassion has me give up my need to be right or sometimes, when I have a little compassion for myself, it has me be more joyful.
The Blue Man is all about compassion. It is almost as if he is there asking, “How can you be more compassionate?” Christian’s might ask, “What would Jesus Do?” After all, Jesus was a Blue Man or at least I think so. Making a difference with compassion has you let go of being right and making others wrong so that you can actually connect with people and not only make a difference but and impact. Perhaps the people you touch will take some of that compassion with them.
Conclusion
So far, I haven’t had another significant dream or vision as I’ve reread this chapter. However, I have only re-finished it tonight so if an epiphany comes I will be sure to share it with you in the morning. But I would like to hear about you. Have you had any visions that you might relate to The Blue Man? If so, what was it like? Was the color blue prominent and/or powerful in the vision? I would love to hear about other’s visions as they seek out The Blue Man. After all, it is the end of a decade and the beginning of a new one – what a great time to have a vision to live into.
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