Mac's Picks is a collection of family friendly interesting and useful sites, updated weekly. These sites are family friendly, and cover subjects dealing with a focus on the family as a whole, search, internet, internet radio, news, health, medical resources, household hints, education, educational resources, recipes, food, strange, different, help pages, homework, kids, diy, 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 How Info" link on the right side of this page.

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

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A neighbour and good friend of ours recently had a breast cancer scare. Thankfully it was caught in time and a minor operation has proved successful, though she will be monitored over time. This made me think of organizations like the Y-ME National Breast Cancer Organization, whose site shows you that a) you are not alone and b) what happens next if you wish to help support this person yourself. The organization is in the US only apparently, but one hopes that there are similar organizations world wide. Breast cancer remains one of the top health priorities in all societies. Have a look - maybe you can help as well.

Being an old University lecturer I, and many others, learned and were convinced of the validity of Work-Learning Research - Dale's Cone Of Experience which states that most people retain only 10% or what they read, 20% of what we read, 30% of what we hear, etc. If, like me, you took it that the research supposedly done to make that graph was genuine, guess what? The graph is a phoney. Have a look and see why.

Once you've read that site, you might want to keep up with the blog of the fellow who blew the whistle on this old educational myth. You'll find his blog at Will at Work Learning and in particular read his 3 November 2006 blog and you'll see where the info in the previous link got its origin. I feel that all educators should read this blog entry if no other. Let's keep education honest.

When planning a meal one often thinks "I should also ensure that I'm eating the proper nutritional foods as well as making something that tastes good and is easy to prepare." That's where The World's Healthiest Foods Feeling Great site comes into play. It admittedly has a bias towards non-meat meals and foods (labelling one category of food recipes as Dead Animals kind of points that out) but the recipes still sound pretty good. Have a look. It might be the one site to add some interesting meals to your arsenal of good recipe sites.

You may well find, when surfing the net, that some really good looking animation software is employed to make your visit to that particular site more interesting and informative. Your computer may well need to have the Flash Player software added to it to view those animations. Thus, hop over to the Adobe Flash Player Download Center and follow the instructions. They are easy to follow and the software is free. Enjoy.

There is a growing group of people who develop things for our use under the Open Source banner, meaning that they are not producing the software to make money but rather as a service to the Internet community. Thus the site named Open Directory - Computer Software has a lot of free software for you to download and use. The rule of thumb here is to take only what you actually will use. Don't clutter up your system with things you have no use for. Having said that, have a look and download for free some pretty amazing products.

When a new movie is released we try to find out if we feel it would be suitable for our young grandsons or not. One way of determining that is to visit the Kid Movies View DVD Releases from Universal Studios Home Entertainment site. You can usually tell pretty much from the movie trailers here what you deem appropriate and what you don't. Great site.

When you were in school did your teacher take you on field trips? Keeping in mind that our planet now has different priorities than it thought it did way back then, the Field Trip Earth site is an interesting one for educators and students alike as it delves into the intricacies of wildlife preservation. Have a look. This could be an important resource for your class as well.

Ever thought of setting up your own computer network in your own home? It's not that difficult if you have the right tools, which include sites like the homePCnetwork site. Here you'll find answers to many of the questions you may have about how to make things work and run smoothly and safely as well. If you have multiple computers in your house, why not network them together and share resources?

You all know that the Internet Society (ISOC) is the organization that sets the rules as far as communication protocol is concerned for us all. Did you know that they have a virtual library of resources that, most likely, your ISP needs more than you do? This one I would suggest passing on to your ISP as it can be a great boon to them to have to refer to. The Internet Society (ISOC) Publications Guest Editors site is also excellent material for you to come to grips with, though most will say that it is beyond their initial understanding or need to know. Having said that, maybe that's a good reason to study computing science in itself - to assist ISOC to make this valuable resource all the better for us all.

When your birthday rolls around have you ever thought "I wonder if anything of import happened in the world on the day I was born?" Well, the On This Day site will show you what did happen on your birth date and it can be fascinating stuff. If anyone should know, the folks at the NY Times, the host of this site, should. Mine is interesting, but not necessarily something one would celebrate. How about yours?

Some blogs are meant to be read with a serious side to your thinking, while some seem to be there simply to show you how silly we all can be at times. For instance, the blog titled Small Town Misfit " Blog Archive " Monster Garage is composed of great small town stories from the local news, in particular from the local police blotter. This one is a keeper. I chuckled for a long time, and hope you do as well. 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. ;-)