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 often.

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Blogging is certainly one way of letting the world know what you think on just about any subject you feel the need to talk about or express an opinion on. However, some folk online (yours truly included) think there should be some form of control on what is being said. Indeed, it would not be the intent to limit what one says, but to protect the innocent from untruth or offensive reference of any kind. The EFF Legal Guide for Bloggers, EFF meaning the Electronic Frontier Foundation, one of the early and still best promoters of free speech on the Internet, has come up with some pretty good ideas, that maybe you, if you are a blogger or aspire to be one, should read. Have a look. After all, others may well come to rely on your honesty and unbiased discussion online too.

When one becomes unwell, one usually tries to find out what is wrong, what the implications are on one's life, and how to best treat that particular condition. The MedlinePlus Interactive Health Tutorials can actually do a lot to explain all of that, in an unbiased and clinical way. Not bad actually. If you have need of a good explanation for yourself or a loved one, this is one source you should be able to trust.

Children constantly amaze me. Some, at a reasonably young age, seem to have a grasp on politics and how it works, that most adults have yet to learn. One place it might be a good idea to take your young ones to is the FirstGov for Kids site. It's a good site put up by the US Government, and thus really is about how politics work in the US, but it still is a good primer on politics in general. Unfortunately it has a somewhat quirky, sometimes bothersome cursor attachment, but outside of that it's pretty good. Have a look. You might learn things as well.

I try to keep my eyes on various and new search engines because some of the newer ones are actually quite different. Obviously one also tries to ensure that none capture your browser so that they can then bombard you with ads, etc. I recently came across one called Search Tuna which lets you search by category or simply make a wild search. Not bad with results either I might add. Have a look and see if this one is worth adding to your arsenal of search capabilities. Remember, the trick is to not only do your search with one engine but do it with many. It's amazing the difference in results you can achieve by doing that. Give it a try.

Do you find, as I do, that families all over the world get stuck in a rut with meals? Most of us end up having the same thing, or at least the same sort of thing, week in and week out. Mainly, I believe, that is because we have limited resources to good recipes on our hands, and limited time to spend cooking different things. With over 15,000 recipes listed in the archives of Meals.com one would imagine that you could find something different, easy to prepare, and interesting enough to tempt you to give it a try. Have a look. Your taste buds might get lucky.

Does the study of the pyramids, ancient Egyptian civilizations and cultures, spark your interest? The British Museum recently launched a massive project titled simply Ancient Egypt which covers many of the recent discoveries in one of the pyramids in particular. Have a look. I find it fascinating.

Public libraries, for the most part, do a fantastic job for all of us. Many also have public access to the Internet for their public to use. Thus, many are trying to cope with new technology they really had no part in before, like blogging for instance. One such blog is called blogwithoutalibrary.net " blogging libraries and states that it is "a blog about what libraries are doing with blogs, rss, & other little technologies". Now that has to have implications in all kinds of places, including where you work. Not a bad idea to have a look and see how things like this can impact on your own company or place of work.

I love natural history and discovery of natural surroundings. For instance, the Electronic Biologia Centrali-Americana project, with over 50,000 images of over 18,000 plants and animals from Central America, is not only a massive project but also an insight into the natural surroundings in a place that many of us know little of. Have a look. You won't be disappointed.

I see young Potter has reappeared on bookshelves. And well done as well. However, did you know that Harry's creator, J.K. Rowling, has her own website? You can see it at the J.K.Rowling Official Site - Harry Potter and more site. It's great to see children reading again, I feel.

There seems to be an increase in the amount of fraud on the net. Unscrupulous people now not only try to steal money from folk by getting them to reveal account details by posing as a bank or auction site, but now they even prey on the good nature of people wishing to help those in terrible situations like the recent London tragedies, to suck money from the unsuspecting in the guise of helping those left behind. Thankfully there is now a site where, if you get one of these emails, you can report it online. The www.fraud.org site makes it easy to do just that, and report such unscrupulous people, and even has an international form for reporting it. Now that has to be good. Don't hesitate to report these fraudsters' folks. We don't need criminals like this preying on good net citizens.

I was recently pleased to find that there are now quite a few other net sites that do somewhat as I do and find sites that are good, useful to the whole family, and worthy of mention. Not only that, the site I'm about to show you is dedicated to giving Reviews of websites, including mine, so do have a look.

And to round out this week's finds, most of us think, at one time or another, that we have or had the worst job in the world. However, in the cold hard light of day most of us would admit that just isn't true. However, because there are jobs, and because there are people doing them, someone has to have the worst of the lot. You'll be interested to know that the Channel 4 - The Worst Jobs in History - Home site has that subject as its rational for being, and, before you look, you don't have the worst one in the history of the planet - trust me. *smiles*

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. ;-)