Mac's Picks is a collection of family friendly interesting and useful sites, updated weekly. These sites may be search engines, medical resources, household hints, educational resources, recipe sites, sites I call "head scratchers", and/or new sites dealing with all kinds of things of use to the general internet community. To find the criteria I use, simply click on the "Why and How Info" link on the right side of this page.

This page is updated on a weekly basis, each Tuesday evening Australian (Queensland) time (GMT + 9 hours according to the world clock). Please come back and visit us often.

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I am away on a trip to New Zealand tomorrow, but would like to keep informed about what is happening back in Australia while I'm there. One way to do that is to go to a cyber-cafe (or borrow a friend's net-enabled computer for a while) and go to The Sydney Morning Herald site for a look. This is one of Australia's better-known newspapers and I recommend it for a look at what's happening on the Aussie scene. Enjoy.

I just love innovation, and even innovation in blogs (weB LOGs). I had to have a look at Ethel the Blog and found it to be biting commentary on things in general. The author doesn't expect everyone to agree with him, but he does have some interesting thoughts to consider. Enjoy.

While in New Zealand I will be staying with a long time dear friend (and my old golfing partner) who has tried over the years to acquaint me with the various wonderful plants and flowers we might see in her garden or on a golf course. Unfortunately I have the memory of a gold fish so that hasn't been very successful. However, if I have access to the Botany Encyclopedia of Plants and Botanical Dictionary. and she throws one of those Latin names at me of some exotic plant, I might be able to find it here. Great resource for any gardener and well worth a bookmark.

Here in Australia, vast distances between people and places sometimes makes home schooling not an option, but a necessity. Of course, some parents take that responsibility on themselves in other circumstances as well. One of the sites that may well be of interest and useful to anyone who is involved in education, especially from home, is the Homeschool World The World's Most Visited Homeschool Site site. Yes, it's devoted to homeschool but it has good ideas for other teachers and students as well. Have a look.

While in New Zealand, though I am a diabetic and watch what I eat, with a little judicious searching I can find all kinds of yummy meals at the cuisine.co.nz food and recipe search site. They do have some interesting things to try out, and being New Zealanders, you know it will be innovative. Hungry yet?

One of the things all homeowners have to take into consideration is the maintenance and repair of things around their property. Don't do it and you have a decline in value of your property which is not good for anyone. The Home Maintenance And Repair site has all kinds of useful information to do just that, maintain your home. I would suggest this site is definitely worth a bookmark.

Aussies have a "caertoon" reputation of being macho 'non-politically-correct' sort of folk. And yet, the Lawlink NSW Sex discrimination Your rights site would go a long way to disproving that image. This is a great site full of all kinds of information about what to do if you feel that you have been discriminated against because of your gender. Have a look, and maybe encourage your own lawmakers to put up a similar site in your area.

I am one of those strange people who actually enjoys going to museums and seeing things from the past. However, I found myself squirming a little when I had a look at the Scientific, Medical and Mechanical Antiques museum online. I'm sure glad I live now rather than when these were in common use. Haven't we come a long way?

Speaking of scary, one of Hollywood's scariest people is remembered on The Vincent Price Film Site. This is a tribute to the man and his acting prowess, and it is well and lovingly done by the Webmaster. If you are interested in the acting credits of a wonderful actor, have a look.

Here in Australia there is a tremendous amount of sport that takes place. We just had the exciting Australian Open Tennis Tournament, and we still have the Cricket series going on, including some pretty exciting one day matches between Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Zimbabwe, India, and Pakistan, to name a few. To see the latest hop over to the Welcome to the home of Australian Cricket site and have a read. You'll be assured of keeping up with one of the country's national sports here.

Have you ever studied the way people walk? Sure you have - maybe sitting in a coffee shop and watching people walk by. But, have you ever wondered why they have the gait they have? If you hop over to the BMLwalker site and play with the sliders on the left and watch the walker at the same time you'll see how any particular walking pattern is created. I wonder if this would help actors to learn how to walk as the character they portray? It might.

I love a good chuckle and I was pleasantly surprised to find that The Illustrated Guide To Breaking Your Computer had me chuckling for a long time. Good and funny material with an emotion that most computer users face at one time or another. Enjoy.

Rebecca Game of "Digital Women - Women with their modems running...", is a graphic designer who is superb to say the least. Rebecca designed this "new look" web site specifically for me, and I can't praise her work enough. Her site, dedicated to women on the net, is worth seeing and bookmarking for future reference. If you are looking for links of interest to women, please visit her site. And if you need the best graphic designer on the planet, I seriously can't recommend her more highly. Oh yes, and when you visit her site, tell her Mac sent you. Thank you Rebecca. I am eternally grateful for your assistance and expertise. ;-)