![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Lately I've been reading A Thousand Nights and a Night, several books on Mudras, and several sources on Mineralogy.
www.minerals.net offers a wealth of information on the latter subject. I found it yesterday after getting into a discussion with a coworker about the differences between Cubic Zirconia and Diamond. She thought that CZ was a man made version of Diamond, with basically the same chemical properties. I'd had the impression that CZ was more similar to Zircon (given the name) and had other differences, of density and refraction, etc. I wasn't all that sure of myself, though, since I'd never actually looked into the matter. I went online, did some research and found that my initial impression was correct. Diamond is a crystal of Carbon, CZ is Zirconium Oxide (Zircon is Zirconium Silicate). CZ also has a hardness of 8.5 to Diamond's 10, and a refractive index of 2.15 (+- .03) to Diamond's 2.43. I was surprised though, to find that CZ has the higher specific gravity.
In yesterday's mail I received two books I'd been eagerly awaiting. Sabrina Meska's second book on Mudras, (Power Mudras; Yoga Hand Postures for Women) and another book on the same subject, Mudras: Yoga in Your Hands, by Gertrud Hirschi. I'm not fit enough to do well with whole-body Yoga postures, but I've been finding the combination of meditation and hand postures very helpful in dealing with the stresses of my present situation. (Having the house up for sale, not knowing where I'll go from here, or when.) Hirschi's book has a greater number of mudras and more information on their cultural roots, but Meska's book has more useful photographs of the postures (showing the placement of the hands in relation to the whole body,) and she's chosen the set of mudras in this collection with a mind to the needs of modern western women. For instance, there's a mudra for strengthening the eyes of people who spend hours at the computer. It includes instructions for focusing both near, as the hands are brought close to the face, and further away as the hands are drawn apart.
www.minerals.net offers a wealth of information on the latter subject. I found it yesterday after getting into a discussion with a coworker about the differences between Cubic Zirconia and Diamond. She thought that CZ was a man made version of Diamond, with basically the same chemical properties. I'd had the impression that CZ was more similar to Zircon (given the name) and had other differences, of density and refraction, etc. I wasn't all that sure of myself, though, since I'd never actually looked into the matter. I went online, did some research and found that my initial impression was correct. Diamond is a crystal of Carbon, CZ is Zirconium Oxide (Zircon is Zirconium Silicate). CZ also has a hardness of 8.5 to Diamond's 10, and a refractive index of 2.15 (+- .03) to Diamond's 2.43. I was surprised though, to find that CZ has the higher specific gravity.
In yesterday's mail I received two books I'd been eagerly awaiting. Sabrina Meska's second book on Mudras, (Power Mudras; Yoga Hand Postures for Women) and another book on the same subject, Mudras: Yoga in Your Hands, by Gertrud Hirschi. I'm not fit enough to do well with whole-body Yoga postures, but I've been finding the combination of meditation and hand postures very helpful in dealing with the stresses of my present situation. (Having the house up for sale, not knowing where I'll go from here, or when.) Hirschi's book has a greater number of mudras and more information on their cultural roots, but Meska's book has more useful photographs of the postures (showing the placement of the hands in relation to the whole body,) and she's chosen the set of mudras in this collection with a mind to the needs of modern western women. For instance, there's a mudra for strengthening the eyes of people who spend hours at the computer. It includes instructions for focusing both near, as the hands are brought close to the face, and further away as the hands are drawn apart.