A hag stone. Weekly Recap 11/13/2023

One of the coolest things I’ve ever found was a hag stone. And I certainly kept it. It would have been rude not to!

If you’re not familiar with this term, a hag stone is basically just a rock with a naturally occurring hole through the middle. Sounds simple, right? And yet I’ve only ever found one in my entire life. Metaphysically, they’re thought to have healing or protective properties. There’s also silly legends about being able to see faeries or through someone’s disguise if you stare through the hole.

I can’t verify their efficacy for these purposes because I’ve honestly never tried. I just consider it a gift from the universe and keep it in one of my drawers as a momento.

I can’t remember how I first heard about hag stones (probably while doing some research on crystals), but as soon as I read about them, I knew I wanted one. I was actually puzzled as to why I had never seen one before — turns out they’re pretty rare in my neck of the woods.

One week in particular, I decided it was time to find one of these stones. I went to the beach, walked along the shore, and it washed up right in front of me. Maybe that’s not the most interesting story, but it truly felt like the universe was just giving me what I had asked for. I always keep my eyes open now, but I’ve never seen another one.

If you find a hole-y stone in your path, make sure you hang onto it!

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Good morning and happy Monday, friends!

I recorded music every day this past week. As as result, I’ve been able to share all of the following songs in video format:

• IO Pan!
• We All Come from the Goddess
• Ring of Fire
• Music Can Change the World
• Air I Am
• All My Loving
• Release
• Call to the Ancestors

But I haven’t just been recording and filming. I’ve filled out paperwork with the US Copyright Office, pushed out releases to streaming platforms, and heck, I even designed some album cover art.

It makes me feel good to slap images and titles on things.

As a result of the past week’s efforts, you can now stream some of my original music on pretty much any platform. That includes Spotify, YouTube Music, Apple Music, Amazon Music, and like 50 others that I can’t even keep track of. All of the audio files are also available on my Patreon page as downloads.

Am I satisfied with the overall recording quality? Of course not, but as I said last week it’s cleared by my new “lack of perfection” attitude. Usually I say “perfect is the enemy of good,” but in this case I’ll say “good is the enemy of okay.”

Am I happy with the quantity of content I’ve been able to put out? Heck yeah! I think in the past week I’ve been able to accomplish more in terms of “releases” than I have in my entire life.

Am I going to ask myself more rhetorical questions? Nope. Not right now anyway. I think the important thing is that I’m having fun with it. I’m able to share some of my music — and my versions of songs that I like. I’ve been going with a mix of originals, regular covers, and pagan chants or songs. I think I’ll continue with this mix and see how that works out.

In the realm of the mundane, Selene and I ordered a new dining room table. Oh no, I feel a rant coming. It would be impossible for me to adequately convey the amount of hatred I harbor for our current table — it’s literally the bane of my dining existence. It wobbles and squeaks. I can hear it at night when I’m trying to sleep. No, seriously, our cats jump up on it all night and it makes terrible squeaking noises. I’ve taken it apart and put it back together twice. Last time I added extra pieces of wood for bracing and a bunch of construction screws, but it’s so incredibly broken that pieces will just randomly fall off. Also, anything hot sticks to it. Did you just put a paper plate with hot food on the table? Well, now it’s glued there and has to be removed with a razor blade. Anyway, I suggested we have a bonfire. I’m imagining something like the scene from Office Space, but with a table and axe instead of a printer and baseball bat. End of rant.

I’m working out a time to film Episode 5 of M3. It’ll be coming out later this month. I’m looking forward to it!

My goal this week is the same as last week: Record and upload a song every day. Better get to it!

Cheers!