Jesus Seminar vs ACC

I went to a talk on Friday night titled
"Progressive Crristianity and the conspiracy to reinvent Jesus"
Now I should say that I am feeling a little in the spiritual doldrums at the moment and so having observed that various members of our congregation had been sufficiently enthused by the advertisment for the talk to fire off a few emails, I figured I would go and have a look.

Now I have to say that I went along blissfully ignorant of all the history here and listened to a somewhat negative talk presented by a somewhat un dynamic speaker.  The jist of the talk was to bring up claims by a mob called the "Jesus Seminar" and to refute those claims.  As I say somewhat negative.  OK so far and actually some of the points and the refutation (is that a word) were in themselves quite interesting.

However in the end it seemed we had one group of very dedicated people wound up about another small group of equally dedicated people. 

And nobody else really cares.

Perhaps we the people, God and the Church would be better served if they expended their energy preaching the gospel, caring for the needy and praying and giving thanks for a wonderful world.

OK so what were they on about.

Well it seems that "The Jesus Seminar" attempted some kind of psudo sceintific analysis of the bible to try to identify text that was a direct quote of Jesus or text that was sort of what Jesus may have said and text that someone else had written and passed it off as coming from Jesus.  OK sounds good to me.  I could really get into a good discussion on this over a glass of wine or coffee or round a camp fire but do we really need a whole organisation dedicated to this?

But what was their sin?
Well it appears that these guys have tried to deny the spiritual aspect of Jesus.  I understand that their claim is that Jesus was just a itinerant teacher and that he was not also God.  Our Chrstian belief is that Jesus is wholly human and wholly God at the same time. (post a correction if you wish).  I understand that they claim he was not crucified, and did not rise again.  Ooh on slippery ground there.

But who were the group hosting the talk you may ask.  Well so you might.  Turns out they are ACC. 

Not the Australian Crime Comission    http://www.crimecommission.gov.au/    (although that does sound approproiate given the gravity of the sin in question)

nor is it the Australian Christian Channel http://www.acctv.com.au/  (Although a little TV traction might make it all the more intersting)

Nor is it http://www.acc.org.au/  (Some kind of penecostal coordination body.)

The ACC it appears is a group formed in responde to a resolution that was debated by the UC on the issue of homo thexuals (said with emphasis) a while back. Resolution 84?.   The problem being that whether or not said issue was biblical depended on how one interpreted the bible and the "Jesus Seminar" don't interpret it the right way. 

So if you wish to discuss interpreting the bible, invite our family over for dinner, entertain the kids and we will work through all the issues over a glass of red.

and tim tams of course.

if you look very carefully, you will see tim tams on the table.


btw, the bad guys are at
http://tcpc.org/template/index.cfm

Bleeding Nose

Last night I discover Marcus on his bed with a bleeding nose.  There he has been sitting for the best part of an hour dripping into an ice cream container and me upstairs and everyone else downstairs.  No one seemed to be too concerned.  Megan was doing some bed time reading and prayers with one child and Marcus was on face book.  I later discover, he was describing his ailment and receiving messages of sympathy.

As I discover this situation, sudenly others become excited and phone calls are made and we discover that the Doc's locum service is over busy and can't come tonight.  So Put Marcus in the car and take him to the Taringa medical centre.  Along with his bucket of blood.  They try to refer us to the Wesley (private hospital) but the Wesley are having none of this and so its on to Royal Childrens (public hospital).

Surprisingly at Royal Children's we jump the queue of screaming babies and zoned out pre teens and get ushered straight in.  The phone call from Taringa must have oiled something.  There  are two counters staffed with between 5 and 8 people (varies through the night).  Marcus is whisked away.  I am pumped for information.  medicare number, privat health details, Marcus's birth date including year, Family doctors name and so on.  Each request resulting in a blank stare from me and a text to Megan.  The bucket of blood is weighed as 465g which the astute would recognise and meaning that we have about half a litre of blood.

Then the waiting begins. Actually it seemed to me that the bleedingwas beginning to stop while we sat there. Then they tell me that he will be staying in over night for observation.   I suggest that I will drop of his school uniform so he can check out in the morning and walk up to school.  They indiacted that Qld health would not allow that.  There are rules to follow and forms to fill in that will take I suspect several days.  After a while they shove a thing called a Rhino up his right nostril.  This is like a thin rubber tube wrapped in gause.  The idea is that once it is in, they can inflate it and the pressure will stop the bleeding.  They also tell us that he will be in a bed on the 4th floor and not too long after we discover this will be in a ward called "Surf ward".  OK so far.  They seem organised.

11pm and I ask whats going on.  "The beds not ready.  They are very busy up there". is the response.

Midnight passes.
I wonder why they can keep so many people busy feeding computers and yet can not find someone to make a bed.  In fact I wonder why they wait for a new body before making the bed.  Surely it would be more efficient to make the bed ready for a new patient.  Then you could get the patients out of emergency and into the wards quicker.  A conspiracy theorist might suggest that the procedure is designed to make the back log in emergency look bad and justify more people feeding computers.  But I would'nt think that.

I attempt to leave but I am told I can not leave until Marus is admitted and settled in his ward.
A nurse wheels in a recliner chair.  This is heaps better than the upright chair I had been attempting to sleep in.  Like airports, they have specifically insalled chairs designed to prevent people from lying down.

1am passes.
Finally a wardsman arrives and wheels Marcus's stretcher upstairs.  The lights are out.  No nurse anywhere to be seen.  The nurse riding shotgun with us flicked through some paperwork and established that we are to be bed 10 and a quick check confirms bed 10 to be un occupied.  So Marcus hops in.  A nurse appears and there is a huddled conversation.  This is called a "hand over".  I tell I am going and they look somwhat taken aback and I explain that he has been on sleepover before.  I am sure he will survive the night and they have a whole hospital to deal with any life threatening issues that may arise.

1:30am. 
I manage to leave

2:00 I arrive home.

It seems to me understandable that Qld Health can't get their pay system right.  If it takes two hours to do something simple like make a bed (remember they found it available almost immediatly) then one can hardly expect them to do something complicated like implement a complex computerised pay system.  Mind you, you then have to ask why, if its all so easy, could neither the Taringa medical centre nor the Marter handle something as simple as a bleeding nose.

Virtual Box

Virtualbox is a program that runs on a computer and inside this program you can set up another virtual computer.

I installed virtual box on my XP machine at work and it works great.  Networking and everything.

So on my net book I have windows 7 Starter.  I run virtual box and I have installed XP inside it.

BOOT XP FROM ISO
Created an ISO of the XP boot disk.
Put that on the local C drive.
In virtualbox, (Withh the new VM stopped),
  need to fill this in


WIRELESS
Problem:  The wireless network adapter of my windows 7 netbook is not seen in the virtual XP machine.
Had a look in the help and it did not help. Apparantly a bug.

CONNECTING TO LOCAL HARD DISK
With the VM stopped, right click & select settings
Choose 'sahred Folders'
On the right hand side click on the + sign
Navigate to folder.
Tick automount.
Run the virtual machine.
From inside the VM, run windows explorer (File manager)
Choose Map network Drive
Choose a drive letter and then choose browse.
Expand Virtual Box Shared Folders.
Click on the drive you wish to map to and click OK etc


http://forums.virtualbox.org/viewtopic.php?f=28&t=9697

Rocktober

This weekend just past, Frank and the boys went to Paul & cybele's country house near Stanthorpe.  This was a boys weekend.  Many of us did this two years ago.  This time we had use of the cottage which was such a blessing because the weather on Friday night was atrocious.  

At 2:45 I left work and headed for BGS.  Driving Daryn's ute which incidentally is much nicer to drive than mine.  

3:15 Picked up Marcus and headed home.

Packed and packed and packed some more.  It had been pretty busy so I had not packed and it appeared that the boys had basically followed my lead there.

Bryce arrived and then we managed to leave at about 5:30.

We stopped at a MacDonalds on the Ipswich bypass and again in Warwick for dessert.  Texted Megan at one stage to find the address and typed that into the GPS.  Finally in the driving rain we arrived.

Saturday AM dawned a nicer day although windy.  Very windy.  Soon established that the motor bike we had brought had a flat tyre and the valve stem had been ripped from the tube.  Inside the tyre.  Gerry provided some valuable advice on the location of the motor bike shop and as these places tend to only open on Saturday mornings, I high tailed it into Stanthorpe.

By this time young Bruce had managed to damage himself and so Alistair also took a quick trip into Stanthorpe to visit the hospital.

Changing the tyre turned out to be quite a challenge and was acomplished eventually after several hours.  The key difficulties were that the tyre is very small and tight and we had only two forks to use as tyre leavers (thank you Cybele).  Finally though it was back on and the bike revealed further challenges.  Over the weekedn we ended up having to use vice grips as a gear shift leaver and there was continual fiddling with the carbie as it was not running well and its operation would change with temperature.  However Dan got to have his first solo ride.  Actually two solo rides.  Mussy also managed to take the bike on his own.

There was a more successful bike story.  Hunter had been saving his pennies.  All 999 of them and had bought his own motor bike.  Being new it performed more consistently.  It was slightly larger and so Marcu, Hunter and Bryce managed to enjoy themselves on it.  I was impressed that we did not achieve a collision between the two bikes.

Saturday evening, we drove into town to the bowling place (forget its name).  But it would have to be the best bowling alley in Queensland.  Not only 10pin bowling but also indoor play equipment including bouncy castles, room of small plastic balls, climbing equipment, the usual array of arcade games and air hockey and pool and pizza.  Great pizza.  We did some kind of pizza and bowling deal which kept us entertained.  Then a bonus when the owner took us and showed us the mechanism that resets the pins.  Apparently the basic design is unchanged since the 1940s.  No computers.  Also I should note that the place was new and clean.  A great night out.

We drove back via flooded bridge.  Well 30mm of water to excite the kids.

Back at the ranch and pyromaniac training.  The plan of a big fire was abandoned due to high winds and Bob expressing a small concern for his tent which he ended up not sleeping in and choosing to sleep in the cosy cottage on the couch beside the fire.  Anyway back to teh story.  paul gave each of 4 families a flint and we had to gather some dry grass and kindling and start the fire using the flint.  A great challege that the Thomson's managed to excell in.

I went to bed and sometime later Chris and Dan went off to bed too.  Chris BTW, had set up his little tent and slept on his own in the elements.  Brrr.  Dan and I slept in the cottage.

Sunday breakfast was Bacon, Eggs, pancakes, baked beans etc etc. 

A bit more motor bike riding and then off to the lake for a spot of canoeing.

Pack up.

Drive home.

And that is that.  A great weekend.  Thanks every one.  Thanks Paul for organising.

Doing Battle With you guessed it - Telstra

Tonight I have been reminded once again why the national broadband plan is a puddle of %&*& and the reason is rain.  Well actualy the problem with the national broadband plan is not that having a fibre to the home would not be handy but actually I want is the internet in my car and at the park and when I go camping.  Basically the solution I want is wireless.  However I digress.

Tonight my fixed line became noisy so noisy in fact that when I went to call somone, I gave up and used my mobile instead.  Having done that it was time to do battle with telstra.

The ADSL service is on the same line and was still fuctioning although it seems a bit slow.  

Onto the Telstra web site and identify that the contact number is 13 22 00.  Amazingly the call is answered and I do the usual batte trying to make the computer voice thing understand.  Did you say "Fault" "Say Yes or No".  "Yes" I say and finally fater pushing a few buttons I get to speak to a human.  The worry is that the line is getting less noisy by the minute.

Now this guy calls me back on my mobile and wants me to unplug everything from the phone ine including the ADSL modem.  Then he wants a phone and that is hard to do.  Rumage through an old box of junk and wallah there is a T200.  More rumaging and I find a RJ12-RJ12 lead and we soon have the T200 plugged in.  he calls me on it and it is pretty clear.  Now this is a problem because we are getting off track.

Then he asks me to plug back in the ADSL modem and indeed it is slightly more noisy. Its probably the filter he advises.  Well blow me down I say but I have a brand spanking new one right here.  This performed no different.  Its the modem he advises.  Go and get a new one.  

So now we are at a bit of an impass.  The fault is in the line.  We know the problem is in the line and it returns whever it has been raining and as we all know it has been raining in Brisbane quite a bit recently.

So I guess the next thing is to get another modem.  Lets go dig in the junk box and see what we can find.

Tie Dying

Did my first tie dying in like 40 years.  See picture.  So I guess that makes me qualified to lead the kids club at church in doing tie dying.

This was done by starting with an old sheet and cutting off a piece.  Then using rubber bands to tie it into a sausage sort of looking thing.

Then I mixed up some dye which came in a small plastic bag.  10g for just under $10.  10g mixes with 250ml of water = 1 cup.  This rag used about half the mix.   So at that rate I reckon it will cost us $5 per T shirt just in dye.

 My suspicion is that there must be a cheaper way to buy dye but its not from spotlight.

The other thing is that putting on the ties is not so easy.  Basiccally rubber bands that you wrap on tightly.  The older kids could do it easily but I suspect that the younger ones may have a lot of trouble to get them tight enough.  I am going to try to get Chris, Dan & Jemma to each have a go to test this theory.

Update - I got Dan to have a go at putting a rubber band on a Tee shirt and indeed it is quite hard for him.

If anyone has any thoughts please send them through.

If anyone knows someone who does this sort of thing, I would not mind having a chat to them.

Also if you know where one can buy bulk dye cheap (not cheap dye in bulk), can you let me know that too.

Thats it for now.