Tuesday 28th July 2009 - Herpetology - The Mad Snake Lady (and crew) - Syd and friends were good enough to come along to the Paganlion on this night to give us a talk about all thing scaly.  Syd introduced the topic then, strangely enough, sprung with fluid motion into the subject of snakes - which is clearly dear to her heart!  It was a brilliant talk Syd, thanks a lot for doing such a great job. Now I'm more than a little nervous of snakes - but having met some of Syd's beasties, I may not be quite as worried by them in the future!  Syd has mentioned that she might come back and do a talk on the spiritual side of snakes in the future - we'll have to see.  Certainly this practical talk was good fun and despite nerves, I wouldn't have missed it for the world!  Rosie is a beautiful (if big & worrying to me) snaky type thing.

Tuesday 26th May 2009 - Pagan Paths - Keith - (At short Notice) - well, this was my first whole talk of my own writing for the Lion.  Essentially I done a run through of the main Pagan Paths - a brief wiz round Paganism if you will. I have no idea what people thought of it - certainly it was loaded with my own opinions and probably far too Witchy heavy for those of other Paths - but I have to speak of that I know!  if anyone else fancies penning a word or two on my talk (or for that matter any of the others at the Lion) just let me have your write ups & I'll publish away!

Tuesday 28th April, Subject: Transparent Tarot, Speaker: Emily Carding - Today we met Emily who was good enough to come all the way from Hastings to talk to the Paganlion!  I was pleased to note that there was a good turn out tonight, so maybe it's the interesting subjects that get bums on seats.  Emily told us about the development & evolution of her Transparent tarot deck and the ways in which it is used.  It was fascinating to see how the creativity of the artist had driven the concept of the desk in frankly revolutionary ways.  I know that some of the Tarot readers from the Lion were very captivated by these cards!  Emily was also kind enough to show us a little about her new oracle deck - but if I told you any more about that Emily would have to shoot me :-) Anyway, the Lion's thanks go out to Emily for a great little talk, perhaps you'll come back again if (no WHEN) you get the deck of the Shee into print? If you want to read more about Emily's Transparent Trot Click here for a review of the subject! Ps - Nice tights Syd - hee, hee!

Tuesday 24th March, Subject: Dowsing, Speaker: Our very own Jayne - (At Short Notice) - Jayne was originally going to give this talk in June!  However, we could not get a speaker for March :-( SO, with much a gallant thought Jayne move her talk to March and lost several months of preparation time.  Not that we knew about that on the day!  Jayne came up with a delightful talk that was both interesting and funny all at the same time!  We got to find out about the history of Dowsing and the various people that have lost, won and lost again, fortunes pursuing this craft. Jayne also bought along some home made dowsing tools, some plastic cups and an immense quantity of chocolate & sweeties!  We had great fun & put on more than a pound or two playing hunt the sweetie!  Our thanks to our resident sweetie for an entertaining talk - nice one Jayne!

4th Tuesday in February 2009, Subject: Virgin's Night 2009 - Various speakers were kind enough to brave the crowd (well I say crowd, there could have been more there - I mean, honestly, we offer victims to the fore & get a short turn out - what's a Pagan to do if the word Virgin's doesn't get bums on seats? So who came along & done what?

• Subject: A Druidic Taster, Speaker: Tracey

• Subject: Pagan Circles, Speaker: Jayne

• Subject: The Dark Goddess, Speaker: Chrissie

• Subject: Pagan Art, Speaker: Keith

• Subject: Modern Shamanism, Speaker: Cliff

• Subject: Marbles, Speaker: Karen

• Apologies: Dan & Julia

• Attending: Cliff, Steve, Denny, Martin, Paul, Julia, Karen, Tracey, Paul, Chrissie, Jayne, Tara & Keith
• Apologies: Lydia, Jude, Marion, Tiggi, Syd, Dave, Pat & Bill
• Discussions:  It was decided that it would be best to shift the time of Paganlion's moots to 8:000 for an 8:15 start as this seems to suit people better. We discussed the idea that if you miss a years worth of Paganlion do's then your membership would expire, all seemed content that this was a good idea, so looks like we'll be doing this.  Denny was good enough to volunteer to put ads for each of the events in the freebie papers for the Lion.  Cliff & Jayne said they weren't able to put as much in as they wanted to the Lion & were getting worried about turning up to open up.  Julia volunteered to open up on the 4th Tuesday days for the Lion and her offer was gratefully accepted.  We talked about the 2009 Yule do & Karen said that there was an alternate location possible - more to come as things emerge.  We also talked about putting money into the Yule pot at the start rather than the end - but as Syd wasn't at the AGM we didn't talk decide what to do.  We spoke about Rituals for the year and the members seem to not be enjoying the beach as much -  so we're on the look out for alternate venues if you know any?  We also discusses speakers & Keith got the job of booking the coming year. We also agreed to put some money Karen's way for memorial trees at her new project (for Dave, Kevin & Max).  we mentioned the idea of organising a coach to go to a Wassailing next January and the fact the Cricketers now does food till 7:30 was also tabled!

Tuesday 25th March 2008 - Life in the Universe - Bill Forster - I'm afraid that personal matters kept me away from the moot tonight!  Jayne's been kind enough to provide the following write up. "Bill kindly agreed to talk to us on the subject of Life in The Universe which he managed very well despite suffering from an appalling cold and almost losing his voice. The subject matter was well received by an attentive audience who felt sufficiently inspired to share their own opinions and knowledge of the subject with the group. When the mathematical probabilities are examined, extrapolating on the infinite numbers and types of galaxies, the conclusion is that we are not alone; there are alternate life forms out there! Excellent pictures of outer space and some very strange rock formations on other planets were circulated causing puzzlement and conjecture as we tried to imagine what they were and what had caused them. In conclusion a very interesting and wide ranging subject which had the potential to go to infinity and beyond! Thanks Bill."

Tuesday 26th February 2008 - Virgins Night - Virgin's night (that's Paganlion's night for encouraging new speakers - who have chosen a topic "from the hat" at the January moot) went off quite well despite a few little changes to the advertised schedule.  Tracey hadn't had time to get her talk done because of serious healthy problems with her partner's dad. Robynne, Thea & Andy were all ill so they weren't able to attend. Now that did rather leave the schedule a little thin - Cliff scheduled to give a talk on the Northern Tradition, Jayne a talk on Dowsing and Julia with her talk on Initiation!  Fortunately I knew about this before the night - so I hastily (& I do mean hastily, I started to prepare at 6:30 on the night) picked one of the spare talks & tried to get it ready. Cliff gave his talk 1st & threw in a curve ball - turning his talk into a quiz on Goddess and Gods!  It was a good giggle Cliff, thanks for pulling it out of the hat :-)  It wasn't even breaking the rules of Virgin's night as you picked that topic for last years Virgin's night!! Jayne gave her talk on Dowsing, which was really an introduction to what could have been a much bigger talk!  Julia then gave her talk on Initiation and led an open discussion.  We then had one of the largest Paganlion raffles that we've had in ages and went promptly onto my talk. I'd picked Male Mysteries, I'm told that the talk was ok - but I can't recall much of it - I rambled for 20 minutes and had barely introduced the topic!  I wonder if what I talked about had any relevance to the subject?  Perhaps, one day, someone will tell me?

Tuesday 22nd of January 2008 - Paganlion AGM - The Paganlion AGM went off well - thanks to all who attended & those that sent apologies cos they couldn't make it! Here's a few highlights (other than the draw for Virgins Night - which I've put the details of on the 4th Tuesday page) what happened.

• Apologies from: Pat, Bill, Jim, Lynda, Denies, Steve, Dave, Marion & Syd.

• Announcements:  Lydia after many years of looking after the Paganlion Moot has stood down & will now be relaxing & no doubt heckling on s regular basis at the "naughty table"!  Jayne & Cliff have volunteered to take over Lydia's role for the Paganlion - so not only do we have new management -  we've got a Moot Mamma & Moot Papa (hee, hee - sorry couldn't resist that! There will no doubt be more from Cliff & Jayne on these pages once they sort out what they want to do and how they want to do it.  Karen announced that after a long time of doing it, someone else is going to have to help sort out the Yule raffle!  Our thanks to both Karen & Lydia - how we'd have managed all the great things that we've done with out you - I don't know!  Mark also announced that the Dragon Network Southend has been renamed to SeeDragons & that they will be organising regular events Paganlion will of course do all it can to support the new group.

• Discussions:  We discussed a load of things - what to do with the money we've raised over the year was first discussed.  The general feeling was that some sort of craft event, may be to build bat or bird boxes would be a good idea.  More on that when we sort something out.  I suggested that we do something about cleaning up Chalkwell beach for Earth day - again - more on that as soon as we get it sorted.  There were loads of suggestions for talks for the year - which again, we'll be sorting as soon as we can!  As ever - watch this space!

Tuesday November 27th, Subject: Vodou - Facts & Fallacies, Speaker/Performer: Mark Barwell, We did have the Leigh Mummers booked for tonight - but that not proved possible.  Mark being an all round good egg, has offered us this talk to take the Mummers slot. Mark gave a talk on Vodou to the Pagan Lion. For those of you that missed it (or those of you that want to hear it again), you can download the audio files (and accompanying sheets) at: Click Here. I think that having an audio transcript is a 1st for a talk at the lion. Mark's talk was (in my opinion) one of the best we've had in 2007, so it's well worth checking out!