Monday,Aug 28 2006, 08:59:28 AMWHERE ARE WE GOING?

Where Are We Going?

(This is a copy of an assembly “talk” I gave to the school “Claremont Fan Court School” in Esher, Surrey, UK.  (1986 ) This was my last day of teaching at this school and for ever!  It was a kind of farewell speech!  It went down well, and I recently discovered that I have kept a copy, and I thought it might be fun for my friends to see it!)

 

            A man told his wife one day ‘I’d like to travel to some strange planet one day’ She reminded him that ‘You are already there!’

 

            Facts are stranger than fiction, sometimes.  Without you doing anything about it you are all travelling in SIX different ways at tremendous speeds, right now, whilst you are just sitting here listening to me.

 

            Firstly you are falling towards the centre of the Earth at the remarkable speed of 1cm every 100 years.  I.e. Britain is tilting so that its Eastern side is sinking into the North Sea.

           

            Secondly Britain is moving away from America at the rate of 1 inch per year!

 

            Thirdly the Earth is spinning like a top and our speed is roughly 500 Miles per hour (Even faster at the Equator, and ZERO at the Poles!)  This reminds me of the little boy who sat up all night wondering where the sun had gone. Eventually it dawned upon him!

 

            Fourthly we are orbiting the Sun once in 365 days at a speed of nearly 67,000 Miles per hour!

 

            Fifthly, our galaxy, The Milky Way which contains 250 Billion stars (suns), is spinning and as we are on the outer edge we are moving round at the astonishing speed of 374,000 Miles per hour.

 

            Last, but not least, the 100 odd Billion Galaxies are all moving away from each other, our estimated speed for this movement is about 200,000 miles per hour.   This mode of transport is best illustrated by demonstration.  (Here I blew up a balloon, marking some galaxies on the surface with a ballpoint pen, and watching the dots moving apart as the balloon increased in size.   I then let the balloon go and it whizzed off amongst the pupils LOL, - much laughter!)

 

            All this and you can do nothing about it.  We can do a lot about how we go about the surface, and I don’t mean just travel!

 

            Lord David Cecil once wrote:

     Life is a card game in which everyone is dealt a hand that he must accept.  His success will depend on his playing it as well as it can be played.  A large number of failures in life occur because people refuse to do this and instead insist on playing the hand they think they should have been dealt!

 

            A young woman was explaining to a friend why she had decided to marry one man rather than another.

    “When I was with John” She said “I thought he was the cleverest person in the world”.

    “Then Why didn’t you choose him?” the puzzled friend asked?

    “Because when I’m with Sam, I think I’m the cleverest person in the whole world”…………….

 

            Being a Quaker (Religious Society of Friends) I was impressed by this news item from the Hindustani Times in Delhi.

     When two feuding Sikh factions lined up with swords in hand to fight it out, a social worker persuaded them to settle their differences peacefully.  BUT Sikh honour demanded that blood be spilled.  So each man donated a pint of blood to the blood bank.

 

            Statistics show that, in China, a child is born every 47 seconds, reported a T.V. commentator.  “Isn’t it wonderful” remarked a view to her husband “That they manage to space them so regular”!

 

            We do have to be so careful how we read and interpret information, even more so when translation across languages takes place.

            A German student, who was staying with a Glasgow family to help him improve his English, asked the meaning of the Biblical expression “Mary was great with Child”.  He understood the explanation given.  Half an hour later he returned looking very puzzled.  “What then” he queried, “does this statement mean ‘Mr Smith is great with Children’?”

 

            One of life’s major mistakes is being the last member in a family to go down with ‘flu’ - after all the sympathy has run out!

 

            “What are little girls made of?” one little boy had asked his parents.  “Sugar & Spice and all things nice, of course!”

            “Hmpf” came the reply “It’s obvious that YOU’VE never tried biting one!”

 

            George Bernard Shaw once wrote ~ “Life is not a brief candle.  It is a splendid torch that I want to burn as brightly as possible before handing it on to future generations.”

            I think it is important that everyone has the chance to light their candles, but some, many in fact, in the third world, have barely a spark.  We who have, must fuel their lives, so that they too can hold their torches high and be proud to be part of the World.   Quakers believe that “there is that of God in everyone”.  One of the main features of a Quaker Meeting for Worship is the silence.  Let us use these next few minutes, of silence, to gather one’s own thoughts, and to think and pray for the strength to help make this a better world.

 

Copyright Chris Phillips 1986

Sunday,Aug 27 2006, 02:08:31 PMFreedom From Hunger 1963 ~ From an Igloo

I would like to tell you about a little venture I did in 1963.  Well that 1962/3 winter was awesome.  One of only two winters in my lifetime in which snow  and frost has lasted ALL winter, from Dec to March, in the UK.  Well on Dec 27th we had a foot deep lying snow. The deepest I had ever known  I was 23 that year.  Well that day whilst it was snowing all day I had cycled into the town centre (Tunbridge Wells, Kent UK) to take some pictures of the town under this wonderful snow!  (See my Webshots photo albums ~ if you want an invite please let me have your email address, or just go to Webshots and search for "Philcovers")

Well on my way home I found that my sister and her friend (who are 8 years younger than me)  had rolled the most enormous snowball, and couldn't move it any more, and they wanted it at our house, another 30 foot on the grass verge.  So I was asked to help.  We managed to get it to the grass verge outside our gate and there it would not move any further!  During lunch we decided to turn the large snow ball into an igloo.  So we went to work collcting  loads of snow and making it into snow bricks and carving out the snow ball, it became a large snow house, 8 foot tall with an entrance, and a south facing window  (Which I made by putting water into to rectangular pan and left to freeze over night, and placed it in the hole next morning.)  The next day we made the slightly curved tunnel entrance, and it was finished!  At night we took my portable tape recorder and some candles and listened to taped pop music of the time.  Then we decided to put a notice on the outside saying  "Solve the Housing Problem ~ Build an Igloo"  And also  a collection box for Freedom From Hunger Year campaign.

On Dec 31st a group of about  8 of us went in it at 11.50 pm and came out just after midnight!.  The first time in my life that I had seen in the new year in an Igloo!

The igloo lasted about a week, and yes  people passing HAD REALLY PUT IN SOME MONEY, not much  but 37 shillings & 6 Pence   (or something like that). We sent the money in to the Town collection and heard nothing more.

When in Dec 63, I was in the Student Common room of the Swansea University, where I was for one year training to be a teacher, I was looking through all the daily national newspapers, and was DELIGHTED TO SEE the inside middle pages  main headline in the Daily Sketch

"AND FROM AN IGLOO IN TUNBRIDGE WELLS"

The double page spread (I still have that copy) highlighted a  lot of ways that money had been raised all over the UK for the Freedom From Hunger campaign, and they used OUR IGLOO as the main headline!   And we had only collected  37 shillings!

Was I surprised!

I know it wasn't much, but it all added up to the other collections and someome somewhere had a little more to eat.

*SMILES*

Chris

Friday,Aug 25 2006, 08:01:43 AM~#~ FRIENDS 2B or not B?~#~

With all due respect to anyone who asks to be added to my friends list. Please note.

I normally only add people whom I have had "conversations"  with in the groups or forums or personal messages, and I feel that we have a degree of respect towards each other, even if we don't actually agree on things.

I am sorry but unless I know you in real life, or from Yahoo, or MySpace, etc or as in above from Zorpia, I will not just ADD new people. You may be nicest or best people, but I would rather know something about you first.  There are 22 people on my pending list, most of whom I have never met or seen before. They will stay on pending, so that no offence is caused, and if at some later date I get to know you I may add you.

I hope no offence or upset is caused.

Take care everyone

*SMILES*

 

 

Monday,Aug 21 2006, 07:49:03 AM~#~ Diet Drinks - BEWARE READ THIS PLEASE ~#~

This is a message I have copied from a Care2 group I am in.
IF ANYONE is or knows of anyone who has had similar symptons please read and ACT at once>......

Subject: SWEET, BUT POISON - A MUST READ-
In October of 2001, my sister started getting very sick. She had stomach spasms and she was having a hard time getting around. Walking was a major chore. It took everything she had just to get out of bed; she was in so much pain. By March 2002, she had undergone several tissue and muscle biopsies and was on 24 various prescription medications. The doctors could not determine what was wrong with her. She was in so much pain, and so sick.she just knew she was dying. She put her house, bank accounts, life insurance, etc., in her oldest daughter's name, and made sure that her younger children were to be taken care of. She also wanted her last hooray, so she planned a trip to Florida (basically in a wheelchair) for March 22nd. On March 19 I called her to ask how her most recent tests went, and she said they didn't find anything on the test, but they believe she had MS. I recalled an article a friend of mine e-mailed to me and I asked my sister if she drank diet soda? She told me that she did. As a matter of fact, she was getting ready to crack one open that moment. I told her not to open it, and to stop drinking the diet soda ! I e-mailed her the article my friend, a lawyer, had sent. My sister called me within 32 hours after our phone conversation and told me she had stopped drinking the diet soda AND she could walk! The muscle spasms went away. She said she didn't feel 100% but she sure felt a lot better. She told me she was going to her doctor with this article and would call me when she got home. Well, she called me, and said her doctor was amazed! He is going to call all of his MS patients to find out if they consumed artificial sweeteners of any kind. In a nutshell, she was being poisoned by the Aspartame in the diet soda... and literally dying a slow and miserable death. When she got to Florida March 22, all she had to take was one pill, and that was a pill for the Aspartame poisoning! She is well on her way to a complete recovery. And she is walking! No wheelchair! This article saved her life. If it says 'SUGAR FREE' on the label; DO NOT EVEN THINK ABOUT IT! I have spent several days lecturing at the WORLD ENVIRONMENTAL CONFERENCE on "ASPARTAME", marketed as 'NutraSweet,' 'Equal,' and 'Spoonful.' In the keynote address by the EPA, it was announced that in the United States in 2001 there is an epidemic of multiple sclerosis and systemic lupus . It was difficult to determine exactly what toxin was causing this to be rampant. I stood up and said that I was there to lecture on exactly that subject. I will explain why Aspartame is so dangerous: When the temperature of this sweetener exceeds 86 degrees F, the wood alcohol in ASPARTAME converts to formaldehyde and then to formic acid, which in turn causes metabolic acidosis. Formic acid is the poison found in the sting of fire ants. The methanol toxicity mimics, among other conditions, multiple sclerosis and systemic lupus. Many people were being diagnosed in error. Although multiple sclerosis is not a death sentence, Methanol toxicity is! Systemic lupus has become almost as rampant as multiple sclerosis, especially with Diet Coke and Diet Pepsi drinkers. The victim usually does not know that the Aspartame is the culprit. He or she continues its use; irritating the lupus to such a degree that it may become a life-threatening condition. We have seen patients with systemic lupus become asymptotic, once taken off diet sodas. In cases of those diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis, most of the symptoms disappear. We've seen many cases where vision loss returned and hearing loss improved markedly. This also applies to cases of tinnitus and fibromyalgia. During a lecture, I said, "If you are using ASPARTAME (NutraSweet, Equal, Spoonful, etc) and you suffer from fibromyalgia symptoms, spasms, shooting, pains, numbness in your legs, cramps, vertigo, dizziness, headaches, tinnitus, joint pain, unexplainable depression, anxiety attacks, slurred speech, blurred vision, or memory loss.you probably have ASPARTAME poisoning"; People were jumping up during the lecture saying, "I have some of these symptoms" Is it reversible? " Yes! Yes! Yes! STOP drinking diet sodas and be alert for Aspartame on food labels! Many products are fortified with it! This is a serious problem. Dr. Espart (one of my speakers) remarked that so many people seem to be symptomatic for MS and during his recent visit to a hospice, a nurse stated that six of her friends, who were heavy Diet Coke addicts, had all been diagnosed with MS. This is beyond coincidence! Diet soda is NOT a diet product! It is a chemically altered, multiple SODIUM (salt) and ASPARTAME containing product that actually makes you crave carbohydrates. It is far more likely to make you GAIN weight! These products also contain formaldehyde, which stores in the fat cells, particularly in the hips and thighs. Formaldehyde is an absolute toxin and is used primarily to preserve "tissue specimens"; Many products we use every day contain this chemical but we SHOULD NOT store it IN our body!

PLEASE PASS THIS ON TO ANYONE who

1) has these symptoms
2) drinks a lot of "sugar Free"  stuff.

Love Peace

Chris

Thursday,Aug 17 2006, 11:37:41 AMScarborough is not just in UK

http://www2.scarboroughtoday.co.uk/aroundtheworld/

<a href="http://www2.scarboroughtoday.co.uk/aroundtheworld/">click here</a>

You may be interested in this site if you live in Scarborough, or HAVE lived in Scarborough or have visited Scarborough!  (all or any one of 14 of them lol)

*SMILES*

Chris

Why not join my Scarborough group?
<a href="http://groups.zorpia.com/i_am_from_scarborough">Click here to join the group.</a>