James' Rambling

Banana Bread

2010-06-17T18:16:00.002+12:00

Emma over at Craving Fresh posted a recipe for banana bread, so I thought I'd have a go at making some. After I recruited expert helpers of course, don't want to have to do too much work! Only problem with the great helpers approach is they tend to help with the eating as well. Such is life!

Here's our nicely frozen, over-ripe bananas

This is Tim with some chocolate, it has absolutely nothing to do with banana bread, but serves as a reminder that chocolate is always good to have, and to eat, and then not to have. Hmmm

Putting the eggs in the bowl.

Mixing the wet ingredients

Dry Ingredients

The recipe page open on my computer...

Mixing the wet and dry ingredients

Pouring the mixture into the pan

In the oven...

Unfortunately I forgot the snap a picture of the finished product. But I can say it was quite tasty, tasted pretty much like banana cake to me, but sliced really well. I don't think a normal banana cake would hold together if you cut it into thin slices.

Anyway there you go world, I can bake!

And I'm Back!

2010-05-13T21:34:00.002+12:00

An article written by my brother recently referred to me as his 'blog mentor'.

I thought it is really rather bad that his blog mentor hasn't written a blog post since last year.

Luckily while I've been slacking off others have stepped up to the plate.

Emma with 'Craving Fresh' a cooking blog "inspiration to live and eat well" - Highly recommended!
Liz with "Lizzie Hollies Recipes" another recipe blog. Less content than Craving Fresh but that carrot cake sounds yummy!
Daniel with Dan's Articles covering current events, his take on life, and more.

Speaking of cooking blogs, Joseph often claims he'd like to start one. What happened to that idea Joe?

So, perhaps not my best blogpost ever, but it's a start.

I guess I'll have to learn the tricks of the trade from my mentee

Modern Scripture...

2009-04-19T13:47:00.002+12:00

I had to share these great rewriten bible verses:

Psalm 141:3
Set a guard, O Lord, over my keyboard;
keep watch over the door of my send button!

James 1:19
Know this, my beloved brothers: let every person be quick to read, slow to reply all, slow to click send.

Proverbs 10:19
When blogging is abundant, transgression is not lacking, but whoever restrains his keyboard is prudent.

Proverbs 12:18
There is one whose comments on blogs are like sword thrusts, but the comments of the wise brings healing.

Proverbs 14:7
Don't follow the Twitter feed of a fool, for there you do not meet words of knowledge.

Proverbs 12:23
A prudent man conceals knowledge, but the Twitter feed of fools proclaims folly.

Via Josh Harris

3 Rabbis

2009-03-22T11:47:00.006+13:00

I finished reading Scott Orson Card's Speaker for the Dead last night (actually early this morning).

It interests me how much insight some Sci-Fi and Fantasy writers have about religion.
This short piece (as a chapter introduction) is very interesting...

A great rabbi stands teaching in the marketplace. It happens that husband finds proof that morning of his wife's adultery, and a mob carries he to the marketplace to stone her to Death. (There is a familiar version of this story, but a friend of mine, a speaker for the dead, has told me of two other rabbis that faced the same situation. These are the ones I'm going to tell you.)

The rabbi walks forward and stands beside the woman. Out of respect for him the mob forbears, and waits with stones heavy in their hands. "Is there anyone here" he says to them, "who has not desired an other man's wife, and another woman's husband?"

They murmur and say, "We all know that desire. But rabbi, none of us has acted on it."

The rabbi says, "Then kneel down and give thanks to God that made you strong."
He takes the woman by the hand and leads her out of the market. Just before he lets her go, he whispers to her, "Tell the lord magistrate who saved his mistress. Then he'll know I am his loyal servant."

So the Woman Lives, because the community is too corupt to protect itself from disorder.

Another rabbi, another city. He goes to her and stops the mob, as in the other story, and says, "Which of you is without sin? Let him cast the first stone"
The people are abashed, and they forget their unity of purpose in the memory of there own individual sins. Someday, they think, I may be like this woman, and I'll hope for forgiveness and another chance. I should treat her the way I wish to be treated.

As they open their hands and let the stones fall to the ground, the rabbi picks up one of the fallen stones, lifts it high over the woman's head and throws it straight down with all his might. It crushes her skull and dashes her brains on to the cobblestones..

"Nor am I without sin", he says to the people. "But if we allow only perfect people to enforce the law, the law will soon be dead, and our city with it."

So the woman died because her community was too rigid to endure her deviance.

The famous version of the story is noteworthy because it is so startlingly rare in our experience. Most communities lurch between decay and rigor mortis, and when they veer too far, they die. Only one rabbi dared to expect of us such a perfect balance that we could preserve the law and still forgive the deviation. So of course, we killed him.

- Orson Scott Card

How's that for a thought leading in to easter? Have you ever looked at some thing Jesus said or did, and thought about what the alternatives might be?
Have you thought about what you might have done? Would you have had the guts to convict the sinners, but yet forgive the sin?

James

Information Diet

2009-02-03T18:24:00.005+13:00

Homophily

I watched a very interesting video last night by Ethan Zuckerman who runs a site called 'Global Voices'.
HatTip: LibraryThing

He labeled the talk 'Building a Better Gatekeeper' and explores the idea that as we get more and more of an internet culture we can find ourselves 'flocking together', or in other words surrounding ourselves with like minded people, and information.

I know this isn't really something new, people having been doing it for years, I know for myself apart from work I almost never socialize with people who aren't from Christian circles. This is largely a result of my up bringing and beliefs, I like hanging out with Christians, I know how to relate to them, they know how to relate to me. I even pride myself on the diversity of my friends given the different streams of christianity they represent.

I'm probably not going to die because I don't talk to many homosexual gothic satanists, but perhaps my lack of diversity in my relationships could (has?) lead to me misunderstanding the world around me?

Likewise as a New Zealander I often (even if only in my own head) criticize America for it's inward focus yet how much to I know about Kenya or Uzbekistan (Does such a place actually exist?)

How often do we find that exactly what frustrates us in others is actually present in ourselves?

Chick Flicks

I remember watching Bride and Prejudice a while a go (Yes ladies I do watch chick flicks), I remember it because for the first time I understood Darcy's point of view from the original story. For those that don't know in the original story, Mr Darcy advises his friend Bingley not to marry a girl he has met in the country. He and She are of different classes, different cultures, different lives Marrying her would be a disaster. (not in those words but I think that's the general idea)

Naturally, As a modern westerner of the 21st century I thought 'What a biggot'!

However when I saw (in Bride and Prejudice) a young american man fall in love with a girl from india I thought all those same things. I could just see myself telling my friend "What do you think you are doing? Your culture is different, your religion is different, your family is different. Marrying this girl will not work!

Same story different place, but it brings it more alive to me...

Echo Chambers

I think that same kind of reaction was caused when I watch Ethan's talk, I was convicted of my own tenancy to return to the familar, to surround myself with an echo chamber, people and information that reinforces rather than challenges my thinking, my belief, my interests.

If you are anything like me, you will vaguely remember the first time you drank coffee, I don't remember where I was or why I tasted it BUT it tasted horrible.
Now I love little better than a good cup of espresso, what's changed? The coffee? No, it's me. What was once disgusting has become a treat.
Coffee may not be a good example given its addictive nature, and less that positive side effects but the idea stands:) Just like learning to eat vegetables when you were young. They can go from a chore to a joy.*

A Balanced Diet

Ethan talks about the Broccoli vs Chocolate Cake problem. Even people who really like broccoli would probably prefer a nice piece cake over a head of broccoli. We do the same kinds of things with our information needs, we read the 'chocolate cake' blogs, news stories, and friendships. Now there's nothing wrong with chocolate cake, but if we just eat cake we would probably find we are lacking a balanced diet.

Is it the same for our information/interests/relationships? Do we need to work on developing a more balanced diet? If we do make the effort, perhaps we'll find that we really enjoy the new things we learn and new ideas we encounter? Even if it takes a little while prehaps we can add a whole new joy to our lives? Too optimistic? I don't know.

Regardless what I have said, I strongly suggest you head over to http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/616 and have a listen. Perhaps you'll be convicted too.

* However, I am still trying to learn to enjoy raw tomato at age 24.

Sermon Quotes

2009-02-01T12:32:00.003+13:00

Well, since it'd been such a very long time since I posted to my blog, I thought I'd better do something.

Went to Gateway Church in Hamilton this morning. The pastor (Don Barry) spoke about the tension between calvininsm and arminianism and why it is important for us to grapple with the paradox these theological positions create. Rather than discuss that debate, especially since I'm still rather struggling with it myself. I thought I'd share a couple of quotable Quotes from the message.

Idea's have consequences.
- Don Barry

It's God's will that man chooses.
- Jack Hayford

Pentecostalism is often guilty of having the fire without the fireplace.
- Don Barry

If you don't like mystery, you probably won't enjoy the christan life.
- G K Chesterton

There's theology everywhere.
- Don Barry

Abide

2008-04-22T21:42:00.005+12:00

You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you. Remain in me, and I will remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me.
I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. - John 15:3-5

Remain in me, and I will remain in you.

One of most outrageous beliefs in Christianity is the idea that God the most powerful, majestic, incredible being in all the world lives 'in' us. Corinthians 3:16 says this "Don't you know that you yourselves are God's temple and that God's Spirit lives in you?" That blows my mind! It is one of those paradoxical statements, how can x be in y but y be in x? Yet despite this Him living in me connection, I also need to be in Him. It is still up to me to remain or abide in Him. I read a commentary on John 15 today, and the main point the author made was that the focus of this passage is that we need to abide in him, the passage is about abiding, not about future judgement, or trying glean some magical formula out of connections with the world of viticulture. Jesus point is clear. Live your life for me, and I'll be part of your life. To borrow some words from Bono, "Stop asking God to bless what you’re doing. Get involved in what God is doing".

Abide in Him, and He will abide in you. Sounds like a good deal to me, even if it does involve a little bit of pruning :)

The Grapes

2008-04-21T22:05:00.003+12:00

Following on from yesterday with the second verse in John 15, Jesus begins to explain what the father does as the 'gardener' or as the ESV puts it 'the vinedresser'.

He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes so that it will be more fruitful.

The first part of this verse scares me, would God really cut people off from the vine? Just for failing to bear fruit?
While this should scare us a little, we need to put it in context. It seems likely that this cutting off would refer to the judgment day, when God would say "This one was never part of the vine" ‘I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers.’ Surely if one has remained in God, he would have at least born some fruit!

When we are connected to the vine, we WILL bear fruit. But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness,gentleness and self–control. Against such things there is no law. Think of it this way the 'fruit' or result of being in the Spirit (or in the vine) is Love, Joy, Peace etc. When we are living in the Spirit, the fruit will come, Our character has to change. Which begs the question, in your life do you see those fruit? What does that say about how connected you are to the vine?

The second half of the verse makes a very important point, just because we have had some fruit doesn't mean we can sit back and relax till the rapture. Jesus tells us that we will be pruned. I can't imagine that being pruned is particularly comfortable. It requires us to let go of things that we want to hold on to. For example, I may be being pruned at this very moment. Right now I'd really rather be in bed going to sleep that writing this, but I know that God has called me to spend more time with His word, struggling to understand it, thinking on it, writing about it. I don't have all the answers or all the right things to say, I'll probably one day look back on my thoughts here an laugh, Yet I'm doing my best to follow my God.

So how do we get connected?

Rico has made some good comments on what it means to be "Truly Connected to the True Vine" have a read of those, but as usual I have some thoughts of my own :)

Firstly we need to remember that maintaining a connection takes effort. Think about some of the people you used to be friends with, perhaps they moved to a different city? You started going to a different church? No longer see them at Uni?
You may have noticed that if you want to maintain relationships with people you have to put in some effort. You have to remember to think of that person, make time for them, put them before other less important things. Easier said than done (for me at least)

It is the same with our relationship with Jesus, many times we neglect him, forget about him, choose other much less important things over him. This is not good enough.

Secondly, We need to stand strong. As a vine branch if I don't hold tight and build a strong connection with the vine, and hold on to the truth around me at the first storm my connection would be severed. Too many people drop their connection to the vine simply because the feel like it would be easier to let go.

Well I think that's me for today, I'm going to keep thinking about how to strengthen my connection to the Vine. Let's get practical what are some things we can do to cultivate this connection?
Blogging all this for me is one.
What else can you think of?

The Vine

2008-04-20T10:12:00.005+12:00

A friend of mine has challenged me to join in him in blogging his bible studies.
I'm taking him up on his challenge, starting, as he suggested with John 15.

John 15:1
"I am the true vine, and my father is the gardener."

The first thing that jumps out at me in this verse are the words 'I Am'. They make me think back to Moses and the burning bush where Moses asks God 'Who should I say has sent me'? To which God replies "Tell them 'I AM' has sent you". Now I'm sure that the two words 'I am' were spoken regularly in Jesus' day^[1], as they are now, but I does give us a reminder of Christ's deity. John's gospel picks up on this "I Am" theme by including 7 different times when Jesus says 'I Am'.
1. “I am the bread of life” (6:35)
2. “I am the light of the world” (8:12; 9:5)
3. “I am the door” (10:7, 9)
4. “I am the good shepherd” (10:11)
5. “I am the resurrection and the life” (11:25)
6. “I am the way, the truth, and the life” (14:6)
7. “I am the true vine” (15:1)
^[2]

Just as the words 'I am' were significant in that they signify Jesus deity, the vine is also suggestive. Throughout the old testament, prophets used the image of a vine to describe Israel, the chosen people of God. By saying He is the 'True' vine Jesus is really saying that only those in him are truly children of God. You are not a child of God by growing your own vine, nor by being a branch of the right pedigree, only by being connected as a branch of Jesus, the True vine do we really become Sons or Daughter of God.

Well that's all I've got time to write for now, but will write again tomorrow. Please feel free to comment on what I've written here, I'd love to discuss it with you all. Especially in how we can get truly connected with the 'True Vine'...

James
[1] - I have heard that the Greek for this is a emphatic (or forceful/notable) construction, suggesting that perhaps Jesus is saying this in a more meaningful that I might say "I am 23 years old"
[2] - Dunnett, W. M. 2001. Exploring the New Testament. Originally published: New Testament survey. Wheaton, Ill. : Evangelical Teacher Training Association, c1963, in series: Broadening your biblical horizons. Crossway Books: Wheaton, Ill.

Identity

2007-09-13T14:03:00.000+12:00

I was at my parents house a few weeks ago and as I got up to leave I said these words.
"Right, Uncle James had better go home now"

It occurred to me at that point that neither my niece or nephew was present :) After everyone had enjoyed a short 'laugh at James' session I left.

However since that moment I've been thinking about what I said. What would posses me to refer to myself as 'Uncle James' to my Mother, Father and Brother?

I guess the answer is that being an uncle has become so significantly a part of my identity that I have come to think of myself in that role. This practice might sound a little strange but think about it. People like my mother have 'Mum' as their primary identity, my Grandmother thinks of her self as 'Nana', and I have (without a lot of conscious thought) taken on the identity of uncle.

I have other identities too, for example My brother likes to call me Jeeves. This may sound strange but I love that nick name because (for me at least) if conjures up the image of the efficient servant, always striving to do that best for his master. That's an identity I try to build into my persona, into my actions. I want to be, a servant of Jesus, a servant of others, and some who helps others to achieve their best.

Other times we take on identities that are not good for us, 'geek', 'fool'. Now I like to refer to myself as a 'professional computer geek' and I think it is important to recognise our status as sinners, in our need for God's forgiveness, and certainly at times I've been a fool. But if we take those kinds of 'names' or identities upon ourselves they can hurt us.

Anyway, It's kind of cool to see a new part of my identity forming. When I add a new facet my identity it shows that I'm growing as a person. In the future I hope to add more, Husband, Father, Pastor (well in someways I already am), etc.

This got me thinking, as Christians there are 'identities' we should be taking upon ourselves.
The first one that came to mind was that we are 'priests' (assuming you follow the prodestant view of the priesthood of all believers). Just as I have to grow in understanding how to be an uncle to my niece and nephew (and to my other nephew who is on his way) we should learn to become and accept the identity put on us through Christ. As 'priests' we are able to pray for others, talk to God, offer ourselves as a living sacrifice etc.

A friend of mine shared last night how they had (on a missions trip no less!) been told they couldn't prayer for people, that praying for others was for the elders! Those words had stuck with them for a long time, making them shy away from publicly praying for other believers. A vital part of their Identity was missing, I think they realise that now and are stepping into their priesthood, Exciting times!

Can you think of other 'identities' we should take on as Christians?

Hints: See Cat's side bar, Matt 19:14, Eph 5:24-25 (now that's a weird one for a guy to accept!)

Taken up by Wonder

2007-08-14T17:03:00.000+12:00

In an article I read today called "Taken up by Wonder", Margaret Manning shares about how a friend of hers introduced her to gardening:

"She knew that gardening would introduce me to the extraordinary in the ordinary. You cannot help but begin to pay attention to the tiniest details as you garden, and in turn, begin to notice all kinds of other awe-producing details all around you. The varieties of the color green in the trees, grasses, plants and shrubs, the nuances of blue and aqua hues that shimmer on lakes and oceans, and the little creatures that share the world with us--birds, rabbits, coyotes, skunk, deer, dogs, and cats."

It made me think of quote from the movie Amazing Grace, which you should see if you get the chance.

William Wilberforce is lying in the wet grass, looking at spiderwebs, and flowers when his servant approaches, looking slightly surprised to find his master rolling around on the ground.

The Wilberforce's explanation is fascinating (Note: this is not supposed to be word for word, I'm going from memory here :)
William:

"I know if isn't normal to be lying down on wet grass you know"

Servant:

"It's not my place to question sir."

William:

"It's God you know, here I am in the prime of life ready to embark on my career and make some of the biggest decisions in life, and all I want to do is look at cobwebs and smell flowers."

It seems to me that Wilberforce had been captured by the beauty that God places around us every day.

Margret Manning goes on to say:

"Indeed, the psalmist suggests that the very detailed elements of creation proclaim the glory and worship of God: 'The heavens are telling of the glory of God; and their expanse is declaring the work of his hands!' (Psalm 19:1)."

When was the last time you stopped to admire a cobweb, or spent time in a garden smelling flowers. Some times we make our lives too busy to enjoy God's creation.

Why not give it a try?

Serving up the Fruit

2007-08-01T16:26:00.000+12:00

Galatians 5: 22- 23:

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.

At Eastside Apo's Saturday night service this week Clive Smit made an off handed comment about serving up the fruit of the spirit to those around us. This shouldn't be a massive revelation, but it suddenly dawned on me, the fruit of the spirit is served up to others.
We (or maybe it was just me?) think of the fruit of the spirit as something we should get, something we should acquire but actually the fruit of the spirit is what we serve up to others. That doesn't mean we shouldn't try to be more filled with the fruit of the spirit, it just moves the focus not on what I should put in my life, but on how my life affects others.

Who benefits when you show patience, love, self-control, etc? Sure there is some benefit to me in that it might grow me or save me from upsetting a friend but the one who really benefits is the person I am patient with, the person who doesn't get a tongue lashing because I showed self-control.

No wonder there is no law against such things! The Fruit of the Spirit are first and foremost gifts to the world.

Leadership on the Mind

2007-07-12T16:08:00.000+12:00

I was reading a little bit of lifehack.org the other day and ran across this article on leadership.

The article is an interesting read, but what struck my attention was this paragraph:

Leadership seems to be on everyone’s minds one these days. Educators talk about “teaching leadership”, religious and charitable organizations host “leadership development” programs , businesses invest heavily in “leadership training”.

It's true isn't it? Everywhere you look seems to be someone else doing leadership training or developing leaders around them etc.

Is this a relatively new thing? It seems that is has been around most of my life but then I'm only 22.

Is the leadership development stuff we do today formalizing informal things from the past?
Is it something new that we had over looked? A passing fad?

Any thoughts?

Seeds 2 - Finances

2007-07-08T14:31:00.000+12:00

In my last blog post I talked about seeds of plans that God has put in us. How they take time to grow, and often need to endure hardships to get there.

Today I want to tackle another Christian 'seed' analogy. This time it relates to finances...

Recently Clive wrote about this in his blog series on "Prepare to Prosper" by Joyce Meyer
Here is a quote from Joyce's book:

"God has been showing me that many people sow without ever enjoying the harvest He would love to give them because they are not properly caring for the seed sown."

Clearly a seed analogy there.
Here is Clive's Comment:

Joyce believes that a key missing element in why we don't see our financial seed (giving) come to harvest is because we have not watered our seed.

As much as I love Clive, I'm not so sure that I agree with him (and Joyce).
When you plant a seed, you expect a harvest but what kind of harvest do you expect? One of the same type as a the seed you sow of course!

Many people make the mistake that because they are sowing seeds by giving, then they should receive a financial harvest. Money for Money right?

I don't think so, I'm willing to be proven wrong but I think when you sow into the kingdom of God, you are doing just that, sowing into God's purpose.
When we give money to a church or Christian organization, It is like we have exchanged that money for some 'kingdom seed' and planted that in the ground. Our seed grows to produce some more of God's kingdom not some more cash.

I'm not trying to say that God doesn't want to bless us, or prosper us financially. I'm just thinking that if he does that, it is probably because doing anything to further God's kingdom attracts his blessing. Not because some seed has matured and we are reaping a harvest.

If you want breakthrough in your relationships, you need to work on your relationships, if you want breakthrough in your finances, you need to work on your finances, if you want breakthrough in your love for others, try loving others? It is no good working away in one area and expect to see God change us in another. As we know (for some reason) God likes to do things here on earth through us, he even works through us on us!

I happen to believe that giving money away makes good financial sense. It forces us to live within the money that we have because we need to use some of it to give away. I also think it makes sense to save money, earn interest, or invested it. That is planting financial seed, seed that will reap a financial harvest. As James MacPherson said this morning, Nigerians who want to give us millions of dollars or pyramid marketing schemes are not God's financial plan for your life.

Have you ever heard people talking about how to find the perfect spouse? Be the perfect spouse.
I think that kind of analogy works here, If you want to attract the blessing of God, be the kind of person that God wants to bless. Who does he want to bless? Those he knows you will use his blessing to further his kingdom. Anyway that's a message for another day...

I know what I have said is a little different to what we are often taught. Have a got it all wrong? Do I miss the point somewhere?

I'd love to hear from you, just leave a comment or send me an email: james@jambe.cjb.net

A Seed and A Journey

2007-06-10T17:00:00.000+12:00

I went to Thrive City Church in Hamilton a couple of weeks ago, The pastor Steve Jeffares was talking from the Parable of the Mustard Seed.

He talked about the way we as christians often tend to look at the seed God has given us. We look at the seed and compare it to others, "so and so has this great calling on his/her life, all I know how to do is cook and clean". It is easy to look at a seed and see it as insignificant.

Have you ever held a seed in your hand? Doesn't it look so small and vulnerable? But even a small seed (as in the case of a mustard seed) can grow into a tree big enough for birds to perch on. We shouldn't look on what God has given us as a insignificant job or talent. We should treasure it as a seed from God, water it, give it sunlight, and plant it in good soil.

We shouldn't look at what the seed looks like, instead we should look at how we are growing it.

I was think about seeds and this though came to mind, seeds don't turn into trees, carrots or whatever overnight. Each seed has to complete a long journey in becoming what they should be. Some seeds actually need to be near a forest fire or choked in smoke before they will start to grow. As a seed is growing it must withstand storms and frosts, fires and downpours, few seeds have an easy journey. It is like that in life we all have to weather the storms of life + stay strong, stay on the journey that has been laid out before us.

I talked to a girl at church today who is looking for a job that uses the skills she learned in her studies. She said, "I really felt like God led me to study what I did, It is my passion, yet I can't seem to find a job that uses it. I'm starting to feel like all that study might have been a waste of time." (not an exact quote but close enough :) What came to mind? A Seed and Journey.

Journey's aren't easy or short, if they were they won't deserve the name. Completing a journey is a great accomplishment. Of course it is hard, of course you will wonder if you have it all wrong, but stick in there, finish the race, finish the journey.

Jesus used the analogy of plants/seed quite a lot during his time on earth, why do you think that is?
Can you think of other examples in the bible of people being compared to plants, trees, or seeds?

I'd love to hear your thoughts on this...

Amazon thinks I should find God!

2007-05-28T17:54:00.002+12:00

I know that humorous Amazon.com recommendations are 'old hat' but I had to share this one...

Thanks Amazon but I've already found him...

Blogging explosion

2007-05-20T15:26:00.000+12:00

Over the last few weeks there has been what you could only really call a blogging explosion at my church. A number of the leaders in the youth and young adults ministries have started blogging and commenting on others blogs.

So far we have:
Clive Smit - South African, Youth Pastor, Leadership guru in the making.
Jeremy Sargent - Evangelist Extraordinaire, Leads "Here I am Send Me".
Kenrick (Rico) Smith - Passionate Life Group leader, Has a personal vendetta to make sure I have a joyful life. Thanks Bro!
Cat Taylor - According to her blog she's a 22year old princess! She also helps leads the girls life groups for the church's student ministry.
Rachael Rickard - PA to the senior pastor, Married to the head of the production ministry. She claims sound techs wives are going to get the biggest mansions in heaven!
Ryan O'Connor - Computer Science student, Always keen to help out somewhere.

I'm excited to see this blogging, it great to see people I know sharing their thoughts with the world and getting feedback from others.

I hope to see lots more posts and comments from all of you!

Let me know if I've missed anyone... Wykie, you need more than just photos bro...

Library Cogs

2007-03-02T15:30:00.000+13:00

I work for the University of Waikato Library in New Zealand. One of our goals for 2007 was to start a blog, naturally starting a blog is the easy part. Keeping it going will be a little harder...

Anyway if you are interested in libraries, computer support, or other geeky type things check out LibraryCogs - http://librarycogs.blogspot.com.

Helpdesk, I'm having trouble with my book....

2007-02-14T13:58:00.000+13:00

I'm not usually big on posting youtube videos, but this one really had me laughing. I guess working as a computer support person in a library might make it a bit funnier...

Enjoy.

Julian Beever

2007-02-08T09:26:00.000+13:00

According to my web statistics a fair number of people are finding my site by searching for "Julian Beever's Life". I guess they must be discovering an old post of mine on Julian Beever's optical illusion pavement drawings.

Unfortunately I don't know very much about his life, but I'm always willing to please so I'll tell you want I do know. According to his website has been making pavement drawings for over ten years and has worked in the U.K., Belgium, France, The Netherlands, Germany, the USA and Australia. Apparently he started pavement drawings to finance his travels around the globe.

The BBC has a great article from last year on him, The Pavement Picasso. Which gives more information on the drawings, but not a lot about his life other than that he got started with pavement drawings while working in a Punch & Judy show in York. And that the ten years claimed on Julian's site is actually more like 15 now...

Julian Beever doing a pavement Drawing for Aveeno in Union Square, New York

For those who still want to know more, Eric Shackle has an interesting article, relating to Julian's recent pavement drawing in New York's Union Square.

See Also:
* Video of Julian Beever doing the union square pavement drawing
* Julian Beever's Flickr Photos
* Julian Beevers Website
* More pavement drawing photos
* Info about the art work and how it works
* ART OF ANAMORPHOSIS

Jesus preaches more about heaven than hell!

2007-01-30T16:32:00.000+13:00

It isn't exactly surprising that Jesus mentions heaven more often than he mentions hell (at least when considering his words as recorded in the bible.) However it seems to be persistent myth that Jesus really talks about hell more than heaven! I don't know where that idea came from, but it annoys me when preachers don't bother to do the research to find out if what they say is true or not. Every time I hear some one say, the bible says more about X than it does about Y, or Jesus talks about Z 3 times more often than he mentions Q. I'm alway skeptical...

Thanks to Frank Ritche for doing the math.
Did Jesus Preach About Heaven or Hell More?

Luceo non Uro

2006-12-27T11:10:00.000+13:00

While in Colchester England, I saw a key ring bearing the name "Mackenzie" on it. Seeing as McKenzie is my middle name, I couldn't resist buying it. Yes that is right my middle name is McKenzie, it comes from my Dad's mothers maiden name I think. It seems like a bit of tradition if you look at my family history of maintaining the mothers maiden name as a middle name for the eldest son.

Anyway, On the keyring is the Mackenzie clan motto "Luceo non Uro" which literally means "I shine, not burn". Apparently the saying came from blacksmithing or smithing in general, where one had to make sure that the metal you were working with didn't get burned, but shone in the heat. [1]

I think that is quite a cool motto when applied to life, We need to balance the hardships/heat in our lives so that we continue to grow and to shine but we also need to make sure we don't let life burn and scar us. The motto reads like it is a choice, which I think it often is. We do choose how we react to circumstances.

Are you going to allow yourself to burn or to shine?

5 things Google should give us all for Christmas

2006-12-15T14:12:00.000+13:00

Like all good ideas, more than one person has them :)
Panda Search Engine News beat me to the "google christmas presents" idea...

Here are mine anyway:

1. Put http:// back in the urls

Like many avid google users I use the google personalized search feature, this has benefits in that you are able to look back at what you searched for and found, but it has the disadvantage that the link you click on in the search results isn't the real link. It redirects through google's tracking servers.
The problem is now that you can't look up a site then right click copy url and paste it into an email. You can select the url under the result and copy and paste that, but you have to add your own http:// to get the mail client to recognise it as a link. Since Yahoo also seems to do that same thing there may well be a very good reason for not displaying the http:// but it would be good to atleast hear it so that I can think of all the people I am helping each time I type http://

2. Speed up google analytics

I'm sick of waiting seeing "waiting for ssl.analytics.google.com" in my firefox status bar. It is also the reason I don't use it on my blog. I trialled it for a while but it just seemed to slow everything down. If it was me I'd go for a minimalist approach. Just get people to but a really small image on their site and record the hit at the server end. We don't need the fancy javascript stuff...

3. Make Picasa Web Albums manageable with picasa

When I heard about picasa web albums I was excited. This was going to mean I could create and manage albums in picasa and publish them on the web. Hoorary! The reality
left something to be desired. Picasa basically is just a tool you can use to upload files to picasa web, what we really need is something that will keep the same albums synchonised, eg. you say put this album on the web and as you add or remove files they magically appear in the right place on line.

4. Add a "grab contacts" button to Gmail

I often get emailed other peoples email addresses, or see people I need to email cc'd into an email I get. I would be great if there was an easy way to add these people into the address book.

5. GCal Outlook Sync.

People have been asking for this for a while, and some people have even developed some work arounds, but none of the ones I've tried work reliably for me. I think this is something google need to develop before Google Calendar really takes off in the business world.
Update: Syncmycal provides an excellent and free solution for this! Thanks Vaibhav.

5.5 Rest

Have a good break, and come up with a whole lot of better ideas to do next year...

Update: Matt Cutts likes my list!
And see Pandia again for a round up of blog posts on this topic.

2007 Technology Pioneers

2006-12-07T09:47:00.000+13:00

The World Economic Forum has just announced the technology pioneers they have invited to their annual meeting in Davos, Switzerland. Apparently getting to davos is every entrepreneur's dream.

So congratulations to those companies who made it:
http://www.weforum.org/en/about/Technology%20Pioneers/SelectedTechPioneers/2007TechPioneers/IT/index.htm

WEF, might need to hire one of these to technology pioneers to updated the titles on these pages so it doesn't display as "(untitled)" in the web browser...

Vision

2006-11-25T17:29:00.000+13:00

I read a good definition of vision today.

Vision is a picture of the future that produces passion.

- Bill Hybels (in Courageous Leadership)

SF book meme

2006-11-20T13:08:00.000+13:00

There is a 'meme' going around at the moment about Science Fiction Books
I found it from Simon Chamberlain who saw it on "Walt At Random" who found out about it from "Thinking out Loud" who was triggered off by "The Essential Kit".

These kinds of things go on and on around the internet all the time. Normally I am not interested but I have been getting into science fiction a little bit recently so it is interesting to see what books other think are good.

Here are the rules:
Bold the ones you have read, strike through the ones you read and hated, italicize those you started but never finished, put a star next to the ones you love, and put a [?] beside ones that you think you may have read but can't really remember. Just to add to the fun I have added another option [!] a book I own but haven't yet had a chance to read, or in my case because my brother borrowed it and hasn't gotten around to giving it back...

Now it is interesting to see what an individual blogger has read and thinks is good etc, but I think this is an example of where aggregation would be really helpful. It would be cool if we could see that 86% of people who did this survey liked JRR Tolkien's Lord of the Rings Trilogy. I think this potential for aggregation is why sites like LibraryThing, Delicious, Flickr and other "social" sites are so popular. People want to see how there content, likes and dislikes, etc compare with other people.

Anyway enough rambling here is my list.

1. The Lord of the Rings, J.R.R. Tolkien *
2. The Foundation Trilogy, Isaac Asimov *
3. Dune, Frank Herbert
4. Stranger in a Strange Land, Robert A. Heinlein
5. A Wizard of Earthsea, Ursula K. Le Guin
6. Neuromancer, William Gibson
7. Childhood’s End, Arthur C. Clarke
8. Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, Philip K. Dick
9. The Mists of Avalon, Marion Zimmer Bradley
10. Fahrenheit 451, Ray Bradbury
11. The Book of the New Sun, Gene Wolfe
12. A Canticle for Leibowitz, Walter M. Miller, Jr.
13. The Caves of Steel, Isaac Asimov
14. Children of the Atom, Wilmar Shiras
15. Cities in Flight, James Blish
16. The Colour of Magic, Terry Pratchett
17. Dangerous Visions, edited by Harlan Ellison
18. Deathbird Stories, Harlan Ellison
19. The Demolished Man, Alfred Bester
20. Dhalgren, Samuel R. Delany
21. Dragonflight, Anne McCaffrey
22. Ender’s Game, Orson Scott Card
23. The First Chronicles of Thomas Covenant the Unbeliever, Stephen R. Donaldson
24. The Forever War, Joe Haldeman
25. Gateway, Frederik Pohl
26. Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, J.K. Rowling
27. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams*
28. I Am Legend, Richard Matheson
29. Interview with the Vampire, Anne Rice
30. The Left Hand of Darkness, Ursula K. Le Guin
31. Little, Big, John Crowley
32. Lord of Light, Roger Zelazny
33. The Man in the High Castle, Philip K. Dick
34. Mission of Gravity, Hal Clement
35. More Than Human, Theodore Sturgeon
36. The Rediscovery of Man, Cordwainer Smith
37. On the Beach, Nevil Shute [!]
38. Rendezvous with Rama, Arthur C. Clarke
39. Ringworld, Larry Niven
40. Rogue Moon, Algis Budrys
41. The Silmarillion, J.R.R. Tolkien
42. Slaughterhouse-5, Kurt Vonnegut
43. Snow Crash, Neal Stephenson *
44. Stand on Zanzibar, John Brunner
45. The Stars My Destination, Alfred Bester
46. Starship Troopers, Robert A. Heinlein
47. Stormbringer, Michael Moorcock
48. The Sword of Shannara, Terry Brooks
49. Timescape, Gregory Benford
50. To Your Scattered Bodies Go, Philip Jose Farmer

NZ -> UK -> US ->NZ

2006-11-11T20:09:00.000+13:00

I have finally succeeded in uploading all my photo from the my trip. Since it has taken me so long i though I should probably go through and link to all the blog posts about my trip. It started off being a sort of travelog type thing but due to time constrains deteriorates into just photos from the various places I visited.

Roughly in order of events:
Flying Brunskills
Colchester
Lavenham
Bury St Edmonds
Westminster Abby, Big Ben and The London Eye
Changing of the Guards (Buckingham Palace)
Greenwich (The Royal Observatory, Maritime Museum, Thames Barrier)
Windsor Castle (The Queens Weekend Residence)
The British Museum
Sherlock Holmes Museum
The Tower of London
HMS Belfast
San Francisco
BEA World Conference

In the Chair

2006-11-09T16:43:00.000+13:00

A interesting company has just opened its doors, it offers you the ability to play your instrument along with professional bands and orchestras. Their software gives you feed back on how well you are playing and fitting in the with the music. See: http://www.inthechair.com/

I play drums and sometimes saxophone (both very badly due to the fact that I never practice) in a band (The Jandal Society) one of the best things about it is that I get to hear how my instrument sounds with other musicians rather than how it sounds in my bedroom. In other words In the Chair has just given us all one less reason to meet with people in real life! Someone please tell me there isn't a Secondlife Orchestra?

Cynicism aside, I think this is a really good idea it will help people to achieve a higher level of playing, before they join a band and have to learn how to play for real...

First and Follow Sets Page - Updated

2006-11-08T19:30:00.000+13:00

This probably isn't that relevant to many people, but I just wanted to let the world know that I have finally gotten around to updating my First and Follow Sets page. It now displays correctly on any unicode complient browser.

If you are wondering what First and Follow sets are, they are used by computers when 'compiling' software.

Time - Best Inventions of 2006

2006-11-08T14:22:00.000+13:00

Time has released it's annual "best inventions of the year feature". Check it out online here:
http://www.time.com/time/2006/techguide/bestinventions/

Here are some of my favorites:

- This saw senses when it comes into contact with something soft (like a finger) and automatically stops the blade. It must have been a bit of fun testing it, "Hey mate, just stick your finger into this spinning saw blade, Oh argh I was sure I had it right that time, oh well you still have 9 fingers".

- How cool would it be to sleep on a bed suspended from the floor by magnets!

- This machine sucks fresh water out of the air. That has to be the coolest thing since sliced bread.

- This one turns straw into a useful building material. No more big bad wolf stories with this tool in the picture.

A Tiger at Hamilton Zoo

2006-11-03T12:41:00.000+13:00

I'm testing out another photo site called Zooomr it has some cool features, but flickr does seem to be catching up adding geo locations etc. It will be interesting to see what zooomr brings out next.

Groom and Groomsmen

2006-11-02T17:01:00.001+13:00

Groom and Groomsmen, originally uploaded by Azzaroni.

Yes, I was a groomsman once...

Photo Credits: Stephen Barker www.barkerphotography.co.nz

James Brunny tees off at Pitch n Putt

2006-11-02T16:55:00.001+13:00

James Brunny tees off at Pitch n Putt, originally uploaded by Azzaroni.

I didn't know I was now called "James Brunny" but I guess that will have to do.
Note: I don't really know how to play golf.

A Sea Gull in a fountain

2006-11-01T21:51:00.001+13:00

A Sea Gull in a fountain, originally uploaded by jambe.

Just one of many novelties in beautiful Sausalito

Mother Duck and Ducklings

2006-11-01T21:50:00.001+13:00

IMG_0136, originally uploaded by jambe.

Bethany aka The Dog

2006-11-01T21:49:00.003+13:00

Bethany aka The Dog, originally uploaded by jambe.

The Dog

2006-11-01T21:49:00.001+13:00

The Dog, originally uploaded by jambe.

Well I posted a photo of the cat and a pigeon, now it is time for the dog. (Only about 365 million more animals to go, I'm glad I only have to feed them when everyone else is away!)

A baby duck in lilypads

2006-11-01T21:47:00.001+13:00

A baby duck in lilypads, originally uploaded by jambe.

This has got to be one of my favourite photo's that I have taken.

A white pigeon

2006-11-01T21:23:00.001+13:00

A white pigeon, originally uploaded by jambe.

The Cat

2006-11-01T20:56:00.001+13:00

Our Cat, originally uploaded by jambe.

It is a pretty well know fact that you are not a "real" blogger until you have posted a photo of your cat. Actually this cat belongs to my sister, but it will have to do :)

Dan

2006-11-01T20:14:00.001+13:00

Dan, originally uploaded by jambe.

Here is one of my favourite shots from my new camera. It is so good to be able to control depth of field!

Java in 25 years?

2006-10-17T13:56:00.000+13:00

I just read this post over at O'Reilly Radar: http://radar.oreilly.com/archives/2006/10/cobol_the_undea.html

This paragraph caught my attention

The future news is that twenty five years from now, we'll all be saying the same thing about Java: "what? I thought that died in 2010 when IBM switched to Haskell! Oh no, banks are still writing Java code—and their new programmers only want to use Smalltalk. We can only hire 50 year olds to program in Java! Thank heavens all those Indian programmers from the offshoring boom of the early 2000s are looking for something to do to cover the cost of Chinese lessons ...."

It is always interesting to see what people think will happen in the future, even if it is supposed to be joke. I think it is facinating that we all think that China will some how be the next super power. I agree that it is entirely possible, China but couldn't it just as easily be the chinese who have to learn Indian? I mean heck those are the guys who wrote all our computer programs. Won't we want to be able to communicate effectively with them?

BEA World 2006

2006-09-25T18:15:00.000+12:00

Finally I get to the reason for my trip, BEA World 2006.
This is the annual conference for BEA the company that makes weblogic server.

This year they anounced a number of new products most notible was the SOA 360 initiative and their microService Architecture.

Of course the highlight for me was receieving a portal award for our "mypapers" system which I must admit I had very little todo with. I'm the second from the left in the photo.

BEA Press Release - Waikato Press Release

San Francisco

2006-09-25T18:14:00.002+12:00

San Francisco is a nice city, I was a little surprised how many beggars there were on the streets through. If you are visiting be prepared to have to tell a whole bunch of people that you don't have a spare "quarter". Otherwise I'd recomend the place...

The golden gate bridge, probably one of the most photographed bridges in the world.

Golden gate again this time from the salsolito ferry.

The machinary running San Francisco's famous cable cars.

Alcatraz!

China Town

There are quite a few murals in San Fran because the graffiti artists respect the muralists work and don't deface it. People often get a mural painted as a sort of graffiti deterant...

A Fire Truck

The ferry building

The Salsalito Ferry

A Lawn Sculpture.

Part of the City

And one final Golden Gate Bridge photo to finish it off...

HMS Belfast

2006-09-25T18:12:00.000+12:00

The HMS Belfast, one of the last world war II cruisers still a float. It is now a floating museum sitting in the calm water of the Thames in London.

One the original boats from HMS Belfast Hosted on Zooomr

Apparently this is one of the very last boats of it's kind, used during world war II.

HMS Belfast Radio Tower Hosted on Zooomr

One Of the many big guns on The Belfast (HMS Belfast) Hosted on Zooomr

The Two 8in Gun Turrets (HMS Belfast) Hosted on Zooomr

Apparently these guns have been aimed to blow up the M1 Motorway!

Me a Prisoner! (HMS Belfast) Hosted on Zooomr

Part of the Gear box (HMS Belfast) Hosted on Zooomr

The Tower of London

2006-09-06T23:15:00.002+12:00

The Tower of London Hosted on Zooomr

This is the building the houses the Crown Jewels (The Tower of London) Hosted on Zooomr

Some Ruins of an earlier verison of the castle (The Tower of London) Hosted on Zooomr

Crows are Part of the landscape (The Tower of London) Hosted on Zooomr

A suit of Armour with Horse (The Tower of London) Hosted on Zooomr

A model of the castle (The Tower of London) Hosted on Zooomr

Sherlock Holmes Museum

2006-09-06T23:15:00.000+12:00

I have to admit the Sherlock Holmes museum was a little bit of a let down after all the amazing museums I got to see in london. It feels a little too fake for my liking, but it was interesting.

Me Standing outside the Sherlock Holmes Museum (London) Hosted on Zooomr

The Famous Monograph (Sherlock Holmes Museum) Hosted on Zooomr

Sherlock's Sitting Room (Sherlock Holmes Museum) Hosted on Zooomr

Me Chatting to Sherlock and Dr. Watson (Sherlock Holmes Museum) Hosted on Zooomr

British Museum

2006-09-06T23:14:00.000+12:00

The British Museum is absolutely huge so if you are in london I remend taking the british museums walking tour. I can't remember the exact details but it leaves from holburn station and isn't too expensive.

Hoborn Unground Station Hosted on Zooomr

The Entrance to the British Museum Hosted on Zooomr

The Museum's main entrance, the building stretches out from here on both sides.

Glass Roof (British Museum) Hosted on Zooomr

The Rosetta Stone (The British Museum) Hosted on Zooomr

The highlight of the trip for me was seeing the Rosetta Stone, which enabled scientists to decypher hieroglyfics for the first time. Amazing to see something like this in a country so far away from where it was found.

Our Guide explaining the stone sculpture (The British Museum) Hosted on Zooomr

Horse Sculpture (British Museum) Hosted on Zooomr

Horse and Rider Sculpture (The British Museum) Hosted on Zooomr

Windsor Castle

2006-09-03T23:15:00.000+12:00

Me with Two Babies...

The Center Tower at Windsor Castle

My Niece

Greenwich Means Time

2006-09-01T22:18:00.000+12:00

If you are visiting London, I highly recommend a visit to Greenwich. It has history coming out it's ears and a number of good museums to look at. It was probably my favourite place I visited in London, so that is saying something. Ok, yes I know I am a geek :)
If you want to make the trip, I recommend taking the boat ride rather than the under/over ground, the driver gives a voluntary not official commentary as you go up the river which is highly cynical and very funny.

The inevitable "London Eye" photo

"Big Ben" which is actually part of the houses of Parliament, something I didn't quite click to until I visited it myself...

This building houses the London Aquarium, I walked past it many times but didn't actually go in.

Another photo of the London eye

On of the supports on the millennium bridge

A monument made out of some priceless artifact from Egypt or some such place.

A Train Station

The HMS Belfast, I visited her later on during my time in London. Stay tuned for more photos...

The Tower Bridge

I think this is the royal observatory college or something.

The Cutty Sark (an old ship in dry dock in Greenwich)

The Millennium Dome, Apparently it is the biggest building of its type in the world. According to the boat driver that is mostly because no one else is stupid enough to build one...

I think this is supposed to be some kind of art work?

The Thames Barrier, Cost some colossal sum to build but apparently has already paid for itself many times over by saving London from flooding.

It is hard to see in these photos how big these things are. I'm thinking at least 3 stories high.

The Maritime Museum Entrance (Can't take photo's inside)

The "Queens house"

The Royal Observatory, Greenwich

The Royal Observatory, Greenwich (again)

The Royal Observatory's time ball thing, apparently that ball drops at 1pm on the dot. An ancient custom to help ships synchronise their clocks.

I just couldn't resist another photo of it :)

London looking down from the Observatory. It's a pretty good view from up there.

The Famous Clock at the royal observatory

The Entrance to the Thames walking tunnel

Inside the tunnel on the way back home, I lost my boat ticket. Which is not something I recommend doing (Losing you ticket that is :)

Changing of the Guards

2006-08-30T22:39:00.000+12:00

If you are in london for a bit of time it probably worth going to see the Changing of the guards at Buckingham Palace, expect it to be very crowded and to be stuck in the crowd for a long time...

People Waiting to see the Place Guards arrive

A police horse keeping an eye on the crowd

The Band marching towards the gates

The Gates at Buckingham Palace

The Band walking past us

On of the soldiers

A close up of part of the band

Entering the gates

Westminster Abbey, Big Ben and the London Eye

2006-08-30T09:30:00.000+12:00

Westminster Abbey

Me Carrying "Big Ben"

The London Eye, the worlds largest ferris wheel. Apparently it only make 16,000 british pounds an hour! I haven't been on it yet, but it is on the todo list.

This chalk drawing was apparently 6 weeks work! It isn't actually drawn on the side walk, it is a black sheet of paper taped down. Amazing detail though...

A Tame Squrriel in St James Park London

Bury St Edmond

2006-08-28T21:30:00.000+12:00

The most interesting part of Bury St Edmond is the abbey complex. According to the dictionary an abbey is a complex that contains or once contained a convent or monastry.

A plaque with some information about they Abbey

One of the two Abbey Gates, which would have once controlled access to the Abbey

A view of the main church building at the abbey. This was once dwarfed by a larger building which not is little more than a bunch of ruins.

A view of the church's spire, which was a suprising recent addition added in year 2000, just in time to usher in the new millenium.

A 3d model of what the orignal abbey complex would have looked like. Having seen this I understand much better the concept of an abbey as portrayed in books such as redwall. The complex has large protective walls (almost like a castle) and many buildings supplying all different services.

(note: there is a large spire missing from the model).

Some ruins from the orignal abbey complex.

Lavenham

2006-08-28T21:03:00.000+12:00

Lavenham is a very small town. It seems like it is almost entirely contained within 2 streets.
It's main claim to fame seems to be a very nice looking church with a large tower at one end. Apparently the tower was built in memory of a rich parishioner who died (Using his money of course).

It also seems to have a bunch of "crooked houses" built in the style of the one on the left. This is actually the old hall, rather than a house...

One paticular house was called the crooked house and millions of people stood around photographing it. I didn't take a photo on principle because it really wasn't any more crooked than a bunch of other houses on the same street...

Stain Glass window inside Lavenham Church

The Church at Lavenham

The Church at Lavenham again

Colchester

2006-08-28T11:36:00.000+12:00

Colchester is an interesting place, apparently the first city in England. It was founded by the romans as their english capital. It has a rich history including being the location of a big seige when the local Anglosaxons decided romans had gone a little too far. Boudica Queen of the Iceni led the revolt, she and her army sacked Colchester and left little of the roman ruins for us to enjoy today. As well as the castle, an ancient roman wall, and an interesting looking tower thing (Not quite sure where that fits in the history) there are some other attractions which I didn't get to see such as colchester zoo and a clock museum. To find out more about colchester have a look at http://www.visitcolchester.com/ and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colchester

A manicured garden commemorating 200 years of "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star". Apparently it was written here in Colchester in 1806!

Our little party in front of a Statue in Colchester.

My Brother in law, Sister, neice and Me in front of Colchester Castle which was built on the ruins of an ancient roman temple.

A tomb stone for a roman solder (inside Colchester Castle)

Colchester, Lavenham and Bury St Edmonds

2006-08-28T10:18:00.000+12:00

This weekend we drove to Colchester (Englands first city and home of "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star") and then on to Lavenham and Bury St Edmonds (neither of which I had heard of before) it was a nice drive and enabled me to see some small english country towns and the general english country side. For me the most interesting of the places was colchester even if there aren't many roman ruins left and it has become a bit of a "party town". I'll try to post some information and photos about these places soon. In the mean time you can look at them using google maps...

Colchester

My Photos and Comments

Lavenham

My Photos and Comments

Bury St Edmonds
Abby Ruins (Bury St Edmonds)

My Photos and Comments

Flying Brunskills

2006-08-25T04:38:00.000+12:00

My family has been nicknamed "the flying Brunskills" for as long as I can remember. The name is actually quite descriptive, as we do tend to do things suddenly out of the blue and we also tend to decide to do something the do it imediately. Why wait once you have decided? Examples include my Father leaving a promising law career and moving to Australia to study the bible, then again later leaving a secure job as a pastor in new zealand for the freezing cold Canada before returning to new zealand as an unpaid missionary! So interms of crazy things to do, this is really pretty minor, but less than two weeks ago my work told me they were sending me to San Francisco for the BEA World Conference in September. I decided that since I am in need of a holiday, and it wouldn't cost me too much more to travel from San Francisco to London and back I should do it. I am now sitting my sisters house in london having travelled halfway around the world. During my trip I'll be posting photos and possibly some comentary (depends how much time I get on my computer) on this blog.

As long as I have enough space, I'll probably be uploading the photo's to picasaweb as well.

Trip to London

2006-08-25T04:36:00.001+12:00

Sunrise looking forward.

2006-08-25T04:36:00.000+12:00

Sunrise (I flew out in the sunset then flew into the sunrise, it was quite an awesome experience)

2006-08-25T04:35:00.001+12:00

The beginnings of sunrise.

2006-08-25T04:35:00.000+12:00

Sunset Again...

2006-08-25T04:34:00.001+12:00

Sunset flying over America

2006-08-25T04:34:00.000+12:00

Golden Gate Bridge (I think) I've always wanted to take a photo of it :)

It turns out this isn't actually the Golden Gate bridge (which is pretty obvious seeing as this isn't a suspension bridge). I think this is the "bay bridge".
I did get a photograph of the Golden Gate though, but from the ground rather than in the air.

2006-08-25T04:33:00.000+12:00

Flying out into the Sunset (As I am leaving San Francisco)

2006-08-25T04:32:00.000+12:00

Jet Exhust (photo taken as we begin our take off in SFO)

2006-08-25T04:31:00.000+12:00

UA953 - The United Airlines 777 I travelled on from SFO (San Francisco) to LHR (Heathrow, London)

2006-08-25T04:30:00.001+12:00

The Airport Museum in San Francisco Airport. Spent quite a bit of my transit time here.

2006-08-25T04:30:00.000+12:00

"How to fly" a book on display at San Francisco Airport

2006-08-25T04:27:00.001+12:00

Learn how to fly with these great books...

2006-08-25T04:27:00.000+12:00

San Francisco International Airport

University of Otago Library

2006-06-16T23:34:00.000+12:00

Some pictures of Otago University Library in Dunedin New Zealand. A very nice building!

Study rooms over looking the library

Omaru Stone wall.

What's with all these evangelists?

2006-05-26T21:52:00.000+12:00

Over the last little while I have been noticing the word evangelist pop up all over the place, particularly in reference to job descriptions in web2.0 companies. Probably the most obvious one is Vint Cerf who was recently hired by Google as "Chief Internet Evangelist". Is this a new meaning for the word "Evangelist"?

On my linguistics blog (A Word a While) I investigate.
See: AWAW: Evangelist

Tags: evangelist evangelism web2.0 languagechange linguistics awaw

Of Living Dogs and Dead Lions

2006-04-06T19:28:00.000+12:00

I just found out a guy I know has just published a book. It is called Of Living Dogs and Dead Lions. It is about two young (12ish) boys growing up in Germany occupied Holland, one dutch one german.

The back cover of the book reads:

"12-year-old Piet finds himself experiencing extraordinary events in German occupied Holland during the summer of 1944. When he makes friends with the son of the town's german garrison commander, the villagers start to gossip. In the course of their adventures they stumble upon secret activities that if discovered could result in Piet's whole family being arrested and sent to prison."

It doesn't appear to be on amazon at the moment but it is on a site called lulu

I'll be posting a review as soon as I read it.

Way to go Adrian...

Who would you most like a job offer from?

2006-01-21T21:43:00.000+13:00

The guys at Blogflux have just released a new polling system. So I thought I'd have a go at doing one...

&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;a href="http://not-a-real-namespace/http://polls.blogflux.com/poll-77.html"&amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;Take the poll&amp;amp;amp;lt;/a&amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;lt;br /&amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;lt;br /&amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;lt;a href="http://not-a-real-namespace/http://polls.blogflux.com/"&amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;Free Poll by Blog Flux&amp;amp;amp;lt;/a&amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;lt;/div&amp;amp;amp;gt;

The thing I think will be most useful about this system is that anyone who wants to use this poll can. Please go ahead and post it on your blog, then your readers can contribute to the same poll.

If you want to post this poll on your own blog or website just view the source on this page.

Google Librarians Newsletter - No Meta Tags?

2006-01-21T13:33:00.000+13:00

I haven't had a chance to read all of the latest Google Librarians Newsletter, but I was struck straight away by the lack of page metadata. There is no page title, in fact not even the "meta" tags that are a part of almost every webpage on the net. For a newsletter aimed a librarians (Metadata experts) I am surpised by that oversight.
It is just plain bad practice to publish a webpage with out a title...

The latest Articles are:
Beyond Algorithms: A Librarian's Guide to Finding Web Sites You Can Trust - Karen G. Schneider
How Does Google Determine Which Web Sites Are the Most "Trusted"? - Matt Cutts

On the good side of things, it is now possible (it probably always was but I only just figured out how) to subscribe to an RSS feed for the newsletter. This is done by going to the librarians newsletter google groups page. There is an XML Icon on the bottom of the page for subscription options. Not this will subscribe you to the group, not the full text of the articles, but it is a good start.

Relative links in bloglines

2006-01-19T18:13:00.000+13:00

I was just reading this post from a sun blog and clicked on the link to another sun blog called Sunfleet and was awarded a bloglines 404 (ie page not found). Now the blog author did use the syntax ../../sunrise/ to point to the blog which doesn't make a lot of sense in a rss feed, but it wouldn't be hard for bloglines resolve it to a real link. Google Reader seems to handle it nicely. Even a best effort solution would be better than giving the average user a 404...

(I would show you what it looks like in bloglines and google reader, but I can't figure out how to link to usable pages.)

Mike Davidson: iPod Giveaway #7: Design a Steve Jobs Movie Poster

2006-01-18T13:28:00.000+13:00

Only on a mac...

Mike Davidson: iPod Giveaway #7: Design a Steve Jobs Movie Poster

Note the contest is over: We have a winner

Be sure that the Truth will find you out...

2006-01-10T23:15:00.000+13:00

Is it just me or are both AskJeeves (aka Bloglines) and Technorati claiming to have provided the data for A recent Dateline show about blogging?

Technorati and Dateline NBC
Hot Topics on the Blogosphere

UPDATE:
Thanks to Niall Kennedy I now know that NBC enlisted the help of Technorati and Blogpulse to get data for their show, howevever dateline made the final decision on what to do with the data.
Here is a quote from the dateline blog:
"So for this segment, we read through some of the postings online and enlisted the help of two companies that monitor Internet buzz (Technorati and Blogpulse) to find the most blogged-about topics on the ‘Net this week." - Inside Dateline: A jog through blogs
In this Dateline Blog Post Ask Jeeves is not listed as providing any information, which might be an error.

2006 - The Year of the Unique ID?

2006-01-10T21:21:00.000+13:00

While people like me are publishing automatic produced predictions for 2006 others like David Weinberger are taking a more serious look at what might be happening this year.

Journal Of Hyperlinked organization - December 5, 2005: "Last year, it was Web 2.0 and tagging. This year, it's going to be unique IDs (UIDs), and for the same reason that Web 2.0 and tagging matter: The Web is going miscellaneous." <SNIP> "Which is why I think UIDs are more likely than global UIDs. Competing groups will come up with their own schemes, perhaps labeling incommensurate objects, and then as the need becomes pressing, we'll map the systems together, however awkwardly. That may require a lot of footnotes, but experience has shown (anyone remember SGML?) that we're better off having relatively local groups succeed at ID'ing objects and then knitting them together than waiting for the World Council on Numbering Things to come up with a global standard. That hasn't happened since Adam and Eve, and even they made an arbitrary decision to names classes of things ('Let's call them 'dogs'') and not particulars ('Let's name that thing 'Rover' and that thing 'Fido'')."

The full article is quite an interesting read, and I think he is right that Unique ID's will be come increasingly important in the next few years of internet history. But this will only happen as this ID's become more (a) useful and (b) visible.
I will talk about (b) first:
(b) Currently there are a whole lot of ID's that we do not see, traditionally the model has been to "hide the ugly id's" so that we don't scare away our users. The same has been true of the likes of RSS and other "computer read" information. Traditionally we have tried to hide all the techie stuff but the rss movement has shown that by exposing some of the raw data, people are suddenly able to do some very cool stuff.
Examples of openly available UID's are already occurring today, want to link to a flickr photo?
It has a unique id : http://www.flickr.com/photos/jambe/59292611/
a url on del.icio.us?
http://del.icio.us/url/721fee21274647cb65c1e67389669aed

These ID's are specific to the individual sites involved and don't help you find photo's that are essentially the same, or find to url's that point to the same website. But they are the first step in what David is talking about. They are also both URL's which you have to say are the most common unique ID's in use today. A lot of UID systems build upon URL's for this reason. This practice doesn't fit very well with the completely random style UID's David W seems to be advocating.

(a) Usefulness - Unique ID's have always been useful, they are used in almost every database, printed on cars, used on the internet, and in networking. However so far there has been little emphasis on exposing these numbers to users. I think that visibility and usefulness will go hand in hand, as UID's become exposed, they will suddenly become more useful, and the more useful they are the more that are likely to be made available.

I also think it is worth noting that small groups creating Unique ID's creates a naturally hierarchical structure (which seems to go against Dr. Weinberger's Internet philosophy - he is a philosopher BTW)

Example hierarchy (This hierarchy doesn't really exist, all the names are all made up):
root-> Microsoft's UID's -> BLOG_ID
                                 -> PERSON_ID
         -> Google's UID's -> UNINVERSAL_INFORMATION_ID
                                     -> ADSENSE_PERSON_ID

Now I guess If everyone started using Microsofts PERSON_ID system (may repeat these are all fictional names) the hierarchical structure would be largely meaningless, but it does show that hierarchies do exist, and they do have uses. If you haven't read about the tagging/tree debate, before you definitely should... I'm still trying to form an opinion.

Automatic Dotcom Predictions for 2006

2005-12-22T13:16:00.000+13:00

Thanks to Matt McAlister's Dotcom Predicter, I bring to you for the first time James' dotcom predictions for 2006!

(Whats the bet Matt gets a whole lot of links out of creating this predicter?)

I had no Idea what would come out when I filled out his form, but some of it actually makes sense...

The Funniest thing is that bit where is says Jeremy Zawodny would up set Tim Bray for supporting Atom. Actually Tim would be over the moon if Jeremy was to start supporting Atom.

----------------------------------------------------
Last year I made several predctions that now seem ridiculously humble. But a few ideas were pretty close. I've got a feeling that 2006 will be a big year, and here are some of the reasons why:

1. A Mt View startup is going to open our eyes to some new ways that The Semantic Web can influence culture. John Battelle's Search Blog will pick up on this and run several cover stories on the founders.
2. Jeremy Zawodny will be in the spotlight for his decision to support ATOM. This will upset Tim Bray, and the blogosphere will react interesting. The noise will quiet before the end of the year and it will all be forgotten soon after the shock.
3. a9.com will see their stock skyrocket after their search business starts taking off. We've seen it coming for a while now, but 2006 will be the year it really kicks into gear.
4. Either del.icio.us or akamai will seek to expand their content delivery business by acquiring wink.com. squidoo.com will be overlooked in the process, and they will see a management shakeout later in the year.
5. One of the big leaders in the steel industry will wake up to the threat of the Internet and the Web 2.0 trends. After months of speculation, they will make a key acquisition that will shake up the landscape for years to come.
----------------------------------------------------

SNARF from Microsoft Research

2005-12-16T09:26:00.000+13:00

Microsoft has recently released a tool that users information about who you email, and who emails you to attempt to prioritise your inbox. I'm about to try it now...

(Microsoft Outlook Only)

Google releases Firefox extensions

2005-12-15T22:24:00.000+13:00

Google has just announced 2 new firefox extentions.

One is a sort of one page blogosphere search, telling you what the world is saying about the current page. And the other is designed to warn you about dangerous sites. Which I guess is google's entry into the anti-phishing toolbar arena along with other players:
NetCraft Anti-Phishing Toolbar (Internet Explorer)
Microsofts Phishing Filter (Internet Explorer)
Outfoxed (Firefox)

It is great idea for search engines to help protect customers computers, they have the right data in their index, and they want the data they will learn by giving away a service like this (all the urls that you visit). It seems like a fair trade to me, others will have their privacy concerns...

It appears that google safe browsing is only available for users in USA, with is a little bit sad for people like me in New Zealand. Interestingly Glen Murphy (the guy who wrote the google blog post) is an Austalian, so prehaps there is some hope for those of us who live down under...

BTW: Can we get it as a web service please google? It would be awesome if we could dynamically block sites at an isp or work place before you even get to the site!

Yahoo! gets del.icio.us

2005-12-10T11:46:00.000+13:00

This will make things interesting! Will MyWeb become del.icio.us? Or will they keep them both seporately? - I doubt it

I like the way yahoo is working very hard to integrate different services into the yahoo family of products, and makes it very easy for users like me to have a single login, and don't have to worry about signing up for everything seporately. They are innovating my aquisition, but at least they are willing to innovate!

Joshua (from del.icio.us says):
"I look forward to continuing my vision of social and community memory, and taking it to the next level with the del.icio.us community and Yahoo!"

I'm looking forward to seeing it happen...

Viruses: not a Linux problem?

2005-09-17T21:47:00.000+12:00

Ever heard the phrase "I use linux, so I don't have to worry about using a virus scanner. Linux doesn't get viruses!" Famous last words! Viruslist.com has an interesting blog post on the topic.
Viruses: not a Linux problem? : Virus Analyst's Diary - "More and more organizations are starting to use Linux alongside Windows, with a Linux file-server storing Windows applications. These files can be infected at desktop level, with infected files then being stored on the server. Organizations must therefore accept the necessity of scanning the Linux server to protect against malicious code attacks.
"

Ngata dictionary — Online English<->Maori Dictionary

2005-09-13T09:16:00.000+12:00

Interested in learning Maori? Want to translate a sign or greeting?
Try this fantastic site:

Ngata dictionary From Learning Media

Slashdot | Jonathan Zdziarski Answers

2005-09-12T14:29:00.000+12:00

Jonathan Zdziarski creator of DSPAM, was interviewed recently on Slashdot.
I found ther interview interesting, I hope you do too :)

Slashdot | Jonathan Zdziarski Answers

Looking for a good blog?

2005-09-02T19:26:00.000+12:00

Technorati has just released a new service that aims to make it easy to find blogs.
Its called "Blogfinder" and it seems to work fairly well, but it is based largely on people "Claiming" and "Tagging" their blogs.
Which has some nice effects, such as the fact that my blog (A Word A While) is currently the only the only blog listed under "Lingustics"...

See for yourself:
More blogs about lingusitics.

It reminds me that I must get around to updating AWAW this weekend...
It might be called "A Word A While" but it certainly has been a while!

Flickr Magazine

2005-08-21T12:51:00.000+12:00

Have you always wanted to invent a magazine cover?
Here's your chance!
1. Upload a picture to flickr (or find one that is already there)
2. Head over to this site and put in all the details.
3. Admire your creation.
4. See what others have done...

Free access to a unix server!

2005-08-19T21:30:00.000+12:00

Are you interested in Learning how to operate linux/unix? I turns out there is a non-profit organisation in the us that allows free accounts on a unix server on the internet! You can host your own website, check your mail, do just about anything!

Heres what they have to say about themselves:
--------------------
The Super Dimension Fortress is a networked community of free software
authors, teachers, students, researchers, hobbyists, enthusiasts and
the blind. It is operated as a federally recognised non-profit 501(c)(7)
and is supported by its members.

Our mission is to provide remotely accessible computing facilities for
the advancement of public education, cultural enrichment, scientific
research and recreation. Members can interact electronically with each
other regardless of their location using passive or interactive forums.
Further purposes include the recreational exchange of information
concerning the Liberal and Fine Arts.

Members have UNIX shell access to games, email, usenet, chat, bboard,
webspace, gopherspace, programming utilities, archivers, browsers, and
more. The SDF community is made up of caring, highly skilled people who
operate behind the scenes to maintain a non-commercial INTERNET."
--------------------

Check it out www.freeshell.org

A mention in the press!

2005-08-11T11:36:00.000+12:00

Some times it pays to be first :)

A few weeks ago, I made a quick comment on Robert Scoble's Blog. I mentioned that he had made a mistake in reading the number of blog posts that link to his weblog. See his post here

Little did I know that David Berlind over at ZDNet would mention me in responding to Schoble! Check it out for yourself:
Microsoft's Scoble questions ZDNet's agenda

The Book of Ecclesiastes

2005-08-10T18:29:00.000+12:00

Ecclesiates has always been one of my favorites books in the Bible. I love the way that solomon shares his own thoughts and fears on life.
Khouse have just put an article online about the book. Here's a quick quote:
"Ecclesiastes is different from any other book of the Bible. It does not dwell on the covenant, the election of Israel, redemption, prophecy, sacred history, or the temple. Its focus is on man the creature, his life on earth, and the inscrutability of God and His ways. Ecclesiastes goes beyond the other wisdom literature to emphasize the fact that human life and human goals, as ends in themselves and apart from God, are futile and meaningless." - Read more at Koinonia house

Is man made to work?

2005-08-09T10:01:00.000+12:00

I love this quote from Paul Graham:
"As societies get richer, they learn something about work that's a lot like what they learn about diet. We know now that the healthiest diet is the one our peasant ancestors were forced to eat because they were poor. Like rich food, idleness only seems desirable when you don't get enough of it. I think we were designed to work, just as we were designed to eat a certain amount of fiber, and we feel bad if we don't." Paul Graham - What Business Can Learn from Open Source.

Isn't it funny that the grass always seems greener on the other side of the fence? Because we have to work we wish we didn't! If, like me, you have had times in your life when you didn't have much to do, you soon realize how empty that kind of existence is.
Rick Waren made this point in his book, "The Purpose Driven Life". We are not here on earth to sit around an make life as easy as possible for ourselves. Instead we are here for a mission (a purpose), to make Jesus known throughout out the world, to live in fellowship with one another, to worship God, and to serve others.
Notice the last point, serving others?
Serving others is the basis of open source software, the open source movement is fueled by people who say, I am willing to give my time and effort so that I am able to help others get great software. Without this attitude I suggest that open source wouldn't get very far.

Optical Illusions on pavement

2005-08-05T09:43:00.000+12:00

These pavement drawings are amazing!

Here is a globe (Commissioned for live8):

From the other side:

See more pavement drawings at Julian Beevers Website:
Julian Beever's pavement drawings

A car powered by Air!

2005-07-20T11:53:00.000+12:00

I remember as a kid imagining myself as the inventor of an air powered car. Of course as I grew older I learned that it was pretty much imposible. Others don't seem to lose faith so quickly:

The MDI Air Car - the world's cleanest car.

It is running on compressed air, which means it does need to be 'charged' or 'filled' up every so often. But you can't deny that is runs on air :)

Another Photo...

2005-07-18T19:05:00.000+12:00

I've been experimenting lately with some close up photographs.
Here is an example:

I have labeled this Photo "A Leaf, A Branch and an Island"

To see more closeups visit my photos tagged "closeups".

How to Write More Clearly, Think More Clearly, and Learn Complex Material More Easily

2005-07-14T16:31:00.000+12:00

How to Write More Clearly, Think More Clearly, and Learn Complex Material More Easily - This is a very interesting presentation, Not only does it communicate ways to learn and write, it talks about logic, and how to evaluate an argument. Highly recommended...

Note: The above presentation was writen by Michael Covington

Google is Expanding

2005-06-29T17:19:00.000+12:00

The next big thing in search! Google Heart...

foldedspace.org: Get Rich Slowly!

2005-06-22T16:27:00.000+12:00

Yet another article for you to read:

foldedspace.org: Get Rich Slowly!:

Quote from the author: "I've read over a dozen books on personal finance. Recurring themes have become evident."

dervala.net: Strong Language

2005-06-22T10:03:00.000+12:00

dervala.net: Strong Language: "Engineers, scientists, and military officers often turn out good prose. Their sentences may not always be limpid, lyrical or arresting, but as writers they are capable of a clarity and precision that academics and marketers often can’t or won’t match."

While this statement may be a generalisation, I stand with the first comment for this article. "Hear Hear".

Small is the New Big

2005-06-20T15:19:00.000+12:00

I thought it was interesting what Seth Godin (who I gather is an author of some kind) said about Churches in his article: Small is the New Big!

He said this, "A small church has a minister with the time to visit you in the hospital when you’re sick."
It is so true! In our Mega-Church culture, we have moved away from churches that have time for indivduals, we now have churches that just serve some arbitrary (though admirable) vision. Personally, I hope Seth is right and we start to move back towards smaller, more personable churches... With a the right lessons learn along the way of course :)