We recently had our first guys retreat for the students here in Auckland. (In the past we’ve had a leader’s retreat for the guys, this year we opened it up to all). The retreat was three days, and a great opportunity to connect with those who have got involved more recently. Specifically we:

• Had four talks given. I spoke on “What it Means to be a Hero”, a study on the character of Daniel.
• Spent time getting to know others over meals (we ate plenty) and games.
• Challenged the guys to grow in their walk with the Lord, and build good community to support each other in doing so.

The retreat was a success, and looks like it’ll be something we’ll do again in the future.

Everyone likes to read, even if it’s just a little bit, sometimes! (I mean, you reading this post is proof of that, right?)

As previously mentioned, I’m currently reading The Kingdom of Couches by Will Walker.

In talking about the Bible, operating manuals and complexity, Walker writes:

Nobody reads operating manuals for pleasure, because they tend to be boring. Brett gets the impression that some students we meet with find the Bible boring. They only read it because they are supposed to or because they need to find a solution of some sort. Very few read the Bible because they long to discover the depth of mystery that is God and man and relationship between the two.

Well mister Walker, call me a geek, but I like to read operating manuals! OK, so I don’t read them terribly often, but they can be fun; You can’t tell me I’m the only one who reads instruction booklets just in case I’ve missed out some exciting feature or easy way to achieve a certain result with the latest new gadget!

I’ve recently finished reading “Canon EOS 40D” and Flash Photography with Canon EOS Cameras (Not quite a manual as such, but a great 60-odd page article on flash photography!) See? Manuals can be exciting!

I’d like to hear what you’re reading this summer (or winter if you’re on that side of the world)! I’d also be keen to hear what the last operating manual that you enjoyed reading was!

My recent post 100 Things to do Before I die is part of a competition at Litemind, where we had to write a list of something.

Here are my three favourite entries:

1. 150 Funniest Resume Mistakes, Bloopers and Blunders Ever – Some of these are pretty hilarious!
2. 35 Guaranteed Ways to Increase Your RSS Subscribers – While some of the ideas listed here are things that blog owners might hear often, there are also some things listed that I haven’t thought of or read before. If you have a blog, check it out!
3. Ten Things I Didn’t Know Until Last Week – Random trivia is something I enjoy from time to time. For quite a few of these I found myself saying, “Oh, I didn’t know that!”

Good luck to all those who entered the competition. For those of you who didn’t, check out the entires at Litemind (link above), there’s some good content out there!

Editors Note: This post is meant to be having fun. Take it with a grain of salt, it’s not serious!

Why do people place a different value on couples than what they do on singles? As a single yourself, I am ashamed at the seemingly weighted importance you place on linking to those who are married on your blog. To clarify, I am talking about the links contained in the right-hand sidebar on your website. If one wanted to find a link to my website from yours, they would first have to trudge through an extremely long list of links entitled pair, then through the on topic category list, only to find the single list below the archive list!

This is an outrage and I demand an explanation! As if today’s media wasn’t already enough, trying to tell us what is important and how we should live! And now I see you are openly siding with the man on this issue!