www.equipbiz.co.nz survey

I've recently started a web design company. Website: www.equipbiz.co.nz
Having completed the website for the business, I thought a quick survey would be good so I can get some sort of idea of what people think.

Here's the link to the survey:
http://www.my3q.com/home2/172/theboybiggles/equipbizsurvey.phtml

It should only take 2 minutes at most.

If you know anyone else who might be interested in filling out the survey, that'd be cool.

Thanks for helping me out!

equipbiz is up and running

On the 7th of June, almost 3 weeks ago, I incorporated equipbiz © LTD NZ as a company, with the Companies office New Zealand. Following several days' somewhat frenzied work, and then two weeks of inactivity, (rather, a time of reflection and procrastination), I have spent yesterday, last night and this morning in ironing out some of the finer details regarding pricing and the appearance of the website itself. Named somewhat ironically, http://equipbiz.co.nz is now ready for anything that can be thrown at it.

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What else have I been up to...?

With Jono McGarvey, I made a new webpage for the purpose of coordinating the collecting of signatures for the Citizens Initiated Referendum in Christchurch, New Zealand. This CIR is to get rid of the new Anti-Smacking law.

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And I've given www.politik.co.nz a bit of a makeover...

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As well as revitalising this blog, and the Section59 blog as well....

Hmmm, and I've got an idea in my head for an original post... It's some sort of story based on real life... I'm just not sure what it is...

Have a good one.

Feeling sorry for tomatoes

http://www.lucidmovement.com/?p=9

For the Love of my Country

My new blog.
Andy Moore's web-development blog: HTML, CSS, JavaScript, Flash...
http://fortheloveofmycountry.blogspot.com
Named after the song "For the love of my Country", from the album Chrono, by Poor Old Lu.

Powerpoint And All Its Works

By Geoff Thomas, pastor of Alfred Place Baptist Church, Aberystwyth in Wales, UK. I had the honour of meeting this great preacher when I stayed, with my family, at his home. A strong Reformed Baptist man, Mr. Thomas also has a good sense of humour.
Article from www.banneroftruth.org
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My friend the national children's work coordinator of the Presbyterian Church in Wales writes to me to announce a "Creating a Powerpoint Presentation" Saturday Conference. It will be "A practical session to create a finished PowerPoint presentation" and costs £10 including a two course lunch. You will need to bring a laptop and your Microsoft PowerPoint software," I was told, and was warned, "There will be a restriction on the number of people who will be able to attend the courses."

For lectures and seminars one has no objections to blackboards and white boards and overhead projectors and Powerpoint, but one welcomes them to Sunday sermons as much as a girl would welcome being proposed to by her boy friend with the assistance of Powerpoint, or that a sincere apology were to be made via such a form of communication. So barriers are erected.

The Powerpoint presentation has much to answer for. It has gained ground in churches because it fits into the idea that the purpose of church services is for 'teaching' and also it goes along well with the current thinking that the first half of the service is about 'worship', that is singing, and that the second half is about 'Instruction for the Thinking Person who Brings a Notebook to Church', and in assisting them
Powerpoint comes into its own. But if your idea of Sunday services is that every part of them is for 'worship', and that the climactic aspect
of worship is hearing God speaking to us in the sermons during which the congregation are repenting and loving and pleading and trusting and praying because they are under the living word then Powerpoint is a fearful distraction. Dismantle the thing. What it does is give you the crusts but not the warm fresh bread inside and it's making the crusts thicker and more inedible. It tells you the MAIN POINTS; they are written there on the screen in large capitals, and they are often also on the Worship Sheet Sermon Outline printed beneath the songs of the day so that you can't miss the MAIN POINTS, but just in case you did miss them the speaker laboriously repeats them, reading his slide words word for word like a news anchor holding up the autocue. Pretty toe-curling stuff. But we don't want the crusts; we want the winsome convicting affectionate soul stirring contents.

If a preacher had ever grasped the grace of oratory then he let it go again the day someone introduced him to Powerpoint. A Cambridge Baptist pastor I heard could really use an overhead projector. No clumsy blunders as he picked up each slide in the right order, put them on the screen the correct way up, used the different coloured felt-tip pens for the sub-headings, moved away so that his shadow didn't obliterate the screen. The master of the OHP, what would he have done with a Powerpoint? Other amateur speakers develop a certain camaraderie with the congregation, with sympathetic smiling watchers as the slide is put on upside down or too near the top. That is never the problem with Powerpoint. It is utterly arrogant. At a recent wedding the groom, who was a preacher, gave his tongue-in-cheek speech with Powerpoint. It was not quite hilarious, but it was enough to make every other preacher present vow they would keep their Powerpoint locked away on the hard disc.

Powerpoint flattens everything to the same emotional level. The thunderings of Sinai, the crossing of the Red Sea, the raising of Lazarus, the cursed anathema and darkness of Golgotha, the furnace of hell, the beseechings of the gospel are all reduced to three bullet points and a bar chart. How will a pulpit that thinks in no more than three bullet points ever move a congregation by the incredible news of the incarnation of God the Son?

Soon there will be day conferences on the necessity of the preacher dressing down in the pulpit, but when a congregation decides that its
pulpit is a chinos and chambray free zone then that must be recognised throughout the entire church for the humanitarian gesture it is. The
sight of the gut falling over the belt is distracting. The greatest dress-down fallacy is that it makes preachers look cool. Formal workwear in the pulpit was like school uniform, it was claimed, and it built a barrier between the suited preacher and the smart casual of New Labour,
or fifty somethings abroad. But at least a suit contains the middle-aged body, lending it structure and boundaries, especially concealing the ministerial corporate stomach. The congregation are properly fearful that the distraction of the dressing down will be greater than the distraction of dressing up. Their minister is God's ambassador, knowing the terror of the Lord, warning sinners of hell, and persuading then to flee from the wrath to come to the crucified Redeemer who alone is life and salvation.

Abortion figures continue to be a tragedy for teens and families

Family First Media Release - 14 JUNE 2007 - www.familyfirst.org.nz

The abortion figures for 2006 released by Statistics NZ today continue to paint a terrible picture for our teenagers.

Since 1991, the number of 11-14 year olds having an abortion has increased by 144%. The number of abortions for 15-19 year olds has increased by 74%.

Each week, almost 80 teenagers have an abortion, and represent almost a quarter of all abortions performed in NZ.

"This is a tragedy for the unborn child, and for the girls involved, some as young as 11 ," says Bob McCoskrie, National Director. "It is also devastating for the extended family, who hopefully are aware of what has happened and can offer their support, rather than the young girl having been sneaked off for the abortion by Family Planning or a School Counselor."

"It also provides evidence that the myth of safe sex pushed by Family Planning, the AIDS Foundation and similar groups is miserably failing our vulnerable young people, who are being made even more vulnerable by then being encouraged to have an abortion," says Bob McCoskrie. "This is why 83% of parents in a recent US Zogby poll believe that programs should reinforce the abstinence message."

New Zealand has the second highest rate of teenage pregnancy among OECD countries, according to the recently released UNICEF Report on Child Maltreatment 2007. Last year, the teen fertility rate was 28.4 births per 1000 women aged between 15 and 19. Only the United States has a poorer rate.

Despite a small increase in total abortions in the past year, the number of abortions has increased by over 60% since 1990. At the same time as almost 18,000 abortions were being performed in NZ last year, adoptions totalled less than 90, according to the Adoption Option Trust.

"Abortions being performed at greater than 12 weeks has increased by 220%, despite all the pictures and scans we are seeing showing the fetal development of the unborn child," says Mr McCoskrie. "These images are obviously being kept hidden from some of the women seeking an abortion,"

"These latest figures show that the Abortion Supervisory Committee continues to fail both women and the unborn child."

Winston Churchill: the importance of our history

"…When one generation no longer esteems its own heritage and fails to pass the torch to its children, it is saying in essence that the very foundation principles and experiences that make the society what it is are no longer valid. This leaves that generation without any sense of definition or direction…" Winston Churchill.

A Hazy Shade of Winter

by Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel

Time, time, time, see whats become of me
While I looked around
For my possibilities
I was so hard to please
But look around, leaves are brown
And the sky is a hazy shade of winter

Hear the salvation army band
Down by the riverside, its bound to be a better ride
Than what youve got planned
Carry your cup in your hand
And look around, leaves are brown now
And the sky is a hazy shade of winter

Hang on to your hopes, my friend
Thats an easy thing to say, but if your hopes should pass away
Simply pretend
That you can build them again
Look around, the grass is high
The fields are ripe, its the springtime of my life

Ahhh, seasons change with the scenery
Weaving time in a tapestry
Wont you stop and remember me
At any convenient time
Funny how my memory slips while looking over manuscripts
Of unpublished rhyme
Drinking my vodka and lime

But look around, leaves are brown now
And the sky is a hazy shade of winter

Look around, leaves are brown
Theres a patch of snow on the ground...

locked in bill's dungeon

30 august, 2001 - by johnmichael patrick monty monteith
from http://www.sanitypages.com/comment/010830.htm

I was on my typical drive home from work on I-405 heading to Kirkland when I was looking out into the sky and saw a stream of bright lights blanketing the sky. In most cities one might think it came from a UFO, or perhaps a NASA experiment gone wrong, but here in the suburbs of Seattle it could only be one thing. A Microsoft operating system roll-out party. As I pondered how it was that Bill forgot to send me an invitation, suddenly a vehicle screamed by me in the emergency lane and nearly took out the front of my little Honda. It was a Ford Explorer with copies of Microsoft Office 2000 piled high inside.

I was so steamed that he almost hit me that I took it upon myself to follow him. As we started East on I-90 I reached a moment of confusion as I noticed it was an Eddie Baurer edition Ford Explorer. One often will find Ford Explorers filled with Microsoft software in the Seattle area. Just not Eddie Baurer Limited Editions. The ugly lime green one, no less. Clearly the only people in the Seattle area driving these two-tone monstrosities were current or former Microsoft employees. But why would one of Bill's Borg be hauling around copies of Office 2000? Sure, most people in the world could find some logical explanation for this. But not me. No. The only excuses I could think of were not pretty. Not pretty at all. Clearly foul play must be involved.

It came as little surprise that we drove right on to Microsoft headquarters and stopped in a packed car park. I watched from my spot as this short man with large rimmed glasses grabbed as many copies of software out of the back of his Explorer as he could carry, and then press the button on his remote to lock his vehicle. I quietly followed him into the crowd of Microsoft employees on a large front lawn boozing up and making merry. We had walked into the middle of the Windows XP roll-out party, although the short geeky dude in glasses was not stopping to try a plastic cup of bubbly. I managed to grab a glass or two during the chase for myself, however.

As I finished my last cup full we had finished walking past all of the people and the party and were walking through some woods. Well, if a collection of trees in the middle of the Microsoft campus could be called woods, that is. After a hundred yards of walking, in the middle of the Microsoft Forest, we came upon a large free-standing Windows XP sign with a digital clock counting the days to release on the left. While these signs were all over the Redmond campus to remind the clan of when the latest bible-ala-Microsoft would hit the streets, it seemed quite out of place in the middle of Software-Central-Park. I could only think it would serve as some sort of early-warning system for employees trying to escape campus on sunny days.

The Office 2000 delivery dude walked behind the sign, as I sat behind a tree in a cloak of shadows watching and waiting. After a few minutes, I thought he might just be trying to hide from me. Getting sick of the suspense, I quietly walked up and took a peek behind the sign. The dork was not there. Gone. Vanished. I had heard of Novell employees evaporating into thin air before, but never Microsoft. This was quite peculiar.

I searched for a more realistic explanation, and found a bizarre button hidden underneath the Microsoft sign. I pressed it and suddenly a trap door opened with a walkway to a hidden world below. Being the curious fellow I am, I walked down the old masonry stairs to the world below as the door above closed behind me. The space ahead revealed a dimly lit hallway, but lit by some strange futuristic lighting. The Tower of London meets Deep Space Nine.

Down the long hallways there were dozens of doors that opened to small rooms. The spaces behind the heavy wooden doors were dark and had various old computers setup inside. One room had a desk with an Amiga 1000 setup. The next an Atari 520ST. The next a Mac SE/30. Another with a Timex Sinclair. A dungeon of old out-of-date computer systems underneath Microsoft's Remond campus. Who would believe this? I was seeing it with my own eyes, and I could hardly believe it myself.

As I went further down the hallway I could hear a grown man screaming in agony. The sound stood the hair up on my neck as it bounced off each wall and permeated the long hallway. I started to run down the medieval chute to find where the sound was coming from, and eventually I came upon the room. It was locked from the outside, but a small slot was open to reveal the vile happenings inside. Two men were standing on either side of this poor soul sitting in a chair receiving the most heinous torture ever inflicted upon a person. All of those copies of Microsoft Office 2000 that the geek was carrying .. (I can barely type the words.) The God-forsaken individual was being forced to install copy after copy of Office 2000 on what looked to be a 90 MHz Pentium running Windows 98. How anyone could live through such torture is a mystery. It is likely he would reach triple digits in age before finding double digits in installations, yet there were still dozens more in the yuppie SUV I followed. I winced at the agonizing thought.

The man screamed from the inside, "Oh, save me! If I see one more completion window that shows complete and then starts completely over again, I might die!"

Suddenly a voice bellows behind me, "Enjoying the show?"

Click here to read the rest of the story

Download the Document Viewer and Web Browser for the Commodore 64/128

Russian Anthem / Vladimir Putin

Ballantyne's boys

Boys [should be] inured from childhood to trifling risks and slight dangers of every possible description, such as tumbling into ponds and off of trees, etc., in order to strengthen their nervous system.... They ought to practice leaping >off heights into deep water. They ought never to hesitate to cross a stream over a narrow unsafe plank for fear of a ducking. They ought never to decline to climb up a tree, to pull fruit merely because there is a possibility of their falling off and breaking their necks. I firmly believe that boys were intended to encounter all kinds of risks, in order to prepare them to meet and grapple with risks and dangers incident to man's career with cool, cautious self-possession....
—R.M. Ballantyne, The Gorilla Hunters

Eric Quayle, author of The Collector's Book of Boy's Stories explained that Ballantyne's characters:
...rescued helpless natives from a cruel death at the hands of cannibals, or dashed through smoke and flames to the side of the swooning heroine, or plunged without a moment's hesitation into the shark infested waters for the sake of an injured friend. And, at the end of their courageous display of selfless devotion to duty, they modestly refused to accept any thanks from the victims of the drama other than perhaps a firm shake of a gratefully outstretched hand of the one who had been snatched from the jaws of a fearful death.

Click here to read more about the author, R. M. Ballantyne, and to read some book reviews.

Geoff Botkin: Do children need socialization?

by Geoffrey Botkin
(An excerpt from his book The Great Escape)

    

American parents used to think something called age-segregated socialization was as important for a child as trips to the dentist. Socialization does have a profound influence on the child, but that influence is normally more harmful than helpful. The idea originated with a few radical 19th century educators who were self-professed socialists. They advocated public school socialization as the means by which to reduce an average child's rugged individuality, creativity and intellectual curiosity, so that adult compliance with change in society is easily achieved.
    
Of course, most parents are not worrying about the finer points of mass social engineering or the real intentions of John Dewey. They simply want their child to learn how to be popular and happy and comfortable among his peers. If a child is deprived of the regimented socialization of the public school environment, will he grow up to resemble a social freak, a nerd, or an egghead?
   
Homeschoolers have provided the answer. The evidence shows that when social graces, resourcefulness, personal confidence, and leadership abilities are measured, homeschooled youth turn out superior to their peers from school. Superior is not my word, but the word of the experts who have learned that socialization is merely a fancy term that describes how children become like one another, dependent on one another, dependent on a collective society and mentally and emotionally compliant. This kind of socialization is not good. It should be regarded as the threat that it is. It should be a very uncomfortable concept to parents who know what happens on today's school buses, in today's locker rooms, in today's restrooms, and on today's classroom TV sets. 
   
But, parents may ask, isn't it necessary to prepare a child for the real world? Of course it is. But it is not necessary to surrender a child to this world to prepare him to endure it. Homeschooled children know plenty about the real world. Many of them are learning that today's collapsed civilization is unacceptable. They are learning that it should be changed, and that it can be changed. 

   

It appears that the homeschooled children who grow up in family cultures, rather than anti-family cultures, are learning the leadership skills and acquiring the vision to renew American civilization along traditional lines. Family life is the real world, and the reason so many young families and marriages are failing is because our over-taxed, public school-dependent culture created dysfunctional families whose members rarely interacted with one another as they were growing up.