Category Archives: READING MATTER

Books I read & recommend

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EX LIBRIS

February 16, 2026 LRS

Books are valuable possessions. Books require thousands of hours, or even a lifetime to write, edit, and print. Before the advent of the printing press in the 14th century books were written by hand — one at a time — and only aristocrats and priests could read them. Historically, wealthy and educated persons collected books in private libraries. Each book had a label, or “book plate” placed on the inside front cover of the book to identify the owner. A bookplate, also known as ex-librīs [Latin, “from the books of…”], is usually a small print or decorative label pasted into a book, often on the inside front cover, to indicate its owner. Simple typographical bookplates are termed “booklabels”. Bookplates typically bear a name, motto, device, coat-of-arms, crest, badge, or any motif that relates to the owner of the book, or is requested by him from the artist or designer. The name of the owner usually follows an inscription such as “from the books of . . . ” or “from the library of . . . “, or in Latin, ex libris …. Bookplates are important evidence for the provenance of books.Here are a few examples of Book Plates for Greta Garbo, Douglas Fairbanks, Sigmund Freud, and others:

SEE MORE FANTASITC EXLIBRIS PAGE PLATES HERE: http://blogs.yahoo.co.jp/ayu117/folder/1067532.html

HERE IS ANOTHER LINK:

http://cdm.lib.udel.edu/cdm4/browse.php?CISOROOT=/wab&CISOSTART=1,21

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YOUR COSMIC AGE

February 16, 2026 LRS

Republished by Blog Post Promoter

Time is a measurement of the motion of objects through space.

The planets in our solar system orbit around the sun. One orbit of the Earth takes one year. Meanwhile, our entire solar system orbits the center of the Milky Way galaxy. Our sun and solar system move at about 800 thousand kilometers an hour – that’s about 500 thousand miles an hour – in this huge orbit. So in 90 seconds, for example, we all move some 20,000 kilometers – or 12,500 miles – in orbit around the galaxy’s center.

Our Milky Way galaxy is a big place. Even at this blazing speed, it takes the sun approximately 225-250 million years to complete one journey around the galaxy’s center. This amount of time – the time it takes us to orbit the center of the galaxy – is sometimes called a “cosmic year.”

Revolve means “orbit around another body.” Earth revolves (or orbits) around the sun. The sun revolves around the center of the Milky Way galaxy.

On the other hand, rotate means “to spin on its axis”. The Earth rotates every 24 hours. The sun rotates, but not at a single rate across its surface. The movements of the sunspots indicate that the sun rotates once every 27 days at its equator, but only once in 31 days at its poles.

What about the Milky Way galaxy? Yes, the whole galaxy could be said to rotate, but like the sun it is spinning at different rates as you move outward from its center. At our sun’s distance from the center of the Milky Way, it’s rotating once about every 200 million years – defined by the length of time the sun takes to orbit the center of the galaxy.

If you are an Immortal Spiritual Being, how “old” are you in “Cosmic Years”? (this is a rhetorical question…)

...and other stuff, INSIDE THE BOOK, READING MATTER, THE OZ FACTORS

OZ FACTOR # 9: AGREEMENT

February 16, 2026 LRS

Republished by Blog Post Promoter

The Oz Factors

1/ We’ve Got to Verify It

2/ Are you a good witch?

3/ The Hour Glass

4/ Which way do we go?

5/ She Fell From a Star

6/ The Ruby Slippers

7/ We’re Not In Kansas Anymore

8/ Who’s Them?

9/ Doesn’t Anybody Believe Me?

10/ You Ain’t Using Your Head

11/ Over The Rainbow

12/ Seeing Reason

__________________

” Doesn’t anybody believe me?“–Dorothy

“Of course we believe you, Dorothy…“–Uncle Henry (from the 1937 film The Wizard of Oz)

Is reality really real?

As Dorothy discovered when she returned back to Kansas, her friends and family did not agree that the Land of Oz was “reality”.

Conversely, gaining agreement from one’s friends does not guarantee that the information agreed upon is true or workable or survival. Agreement is not necessarily reality. Although Man seems to crave agreement with his fellows, the fact that “everyone agrees that the world is flat” or that “the sun revolves around the Earth”, does not make it a reality.

History has shown that agreements among people have very frequently proven to be disastrous.

Example: Adolph Hitler gained the complete, unabated agreement of the majority of the German population before he led them into total self-destruction.

Lots of people agree when fast food franchise advertisements tell them that cheeseburgers, fries and milk shakes are good for them. We were, and still are, told, based on “medical research” that these foods contain nutrients from all the “four basic food groups”. This doesn’t change the fact that you get fat, develop hardened arteries and die an early death from heart disease or cancer if you keep eating cheeseburgers, fries and shakes.

The unprecedented multi-billion dollar profit margins earned by the beef and dairy industry and sugar growers in cooperation with the fast food restaurant cartels have a heavy influence on “truth in advertising”. In addition, the quality of information we receive, as consumers, from the American Medical Association regarding “the science of nutrition” is directly influenced by fast food commercial interests.

Only one generation ago the Japanese people were nearly free of heart disease and cancer. In just 20 short years, since they have openly adopted the Standard American Diet (SAD)–cheeseburgers/French fries/milk shakes and liquid caffeine-filled sugar water called cola–the incidence of heart disease and cancer among the Japanese people has skyrocketed. The Japanese agreement with Western lifestyles is killing them.

Reality is often heavily influenced by the Oz Factor of agreement. Agreements influence our perception of reality. A child’s perception of his environment, his religious and political ideas and viewpoints about people are often heavily influenced by agreement with his mother and father.

Be cautious with whom you agree. Carefully examine ideas and information before you agree. Just because the preacher says, “sex is evil” or the President says, “I’m not a crook”, does not make it reality. Be careful about agreeing with Wicked Witches and Wizards who promote unworkable solutions. By your own observation decide what is real in the Physical Universe and in Your Own Universe. Your reality is based on your agreements.”

— ExcerptED from THE OZ FACTORS, by Lawrence R. Spencer, Edited by Carol South

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THE WAY OF ALL-MOTHER

February 15, 2026 LRS

Republished by Blog Post Promoter

“The Self, the Spirit, creates illusion.
The delusion of Beings is that All is not an illusion.
One creates illusion, enjoying, renewing, destroying.
Creation and Joy of Being are The Way of All-Mother.
Beings pretend to be forms to play a game.
Beings may endows forms with sensation and feels pleasure therein.
Pain is a game of suffering forms.
Without a form, can one suffer?
One may forget One’s Self and become a form.
One becomes form: One loses The Way of All-Mother.
Benevolent Creation is Pleasure.
All-Mother is The Way of Eternal Pleasure”

LISTEN TO A SAMPLE OF THE AUDIOBOOK — Domain Expeditionary Force Rescue Mission

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GAIA MAI TAI RECIPE

February 15, 2026 LRS

Republished by Blog Post Promoter

* GAIA, meaning Earth, elated to the Avestan word gaiia ‘life;’ cf. Av. gaēθā ‘(material) world, totality of creatures’ and gaēθiia ‘belonging to/residing in the worldly/material sphere, material’; or perhaps Av, gairi ‘mountain’. Gaia is the ancestral mother of all life: the primal Mother Earth goddess. She is the immediate parent of Uranus (the sky), from whose sexual union she bore the Titans (themselves parents of many of the Olympian gods) and the Giants, and of Pontus (the sea), from whose union she bore the primordial sea gods.

Mai Tai is an alcoholic cocktail based on rum, Curaçao liqueur and lime juice, associated with Polynesian-style settings. “Maita’i” is the Tahitian word for “good”.