My3Cents

The lottery has been described as a tax on people who are bad at math. In point of fact, if you were given the choice of getting either a gift of $100 cash. Or $1million with the requirement that you had to gamble the entire $1million on the lottery and take all your winnings and do the same the next day and then do it again every day for 30 days ..... You'd come out ahead by taking the $100. I think I got this and the corresponding calculations from MotleyFool.com

Belle, It's worse than that. In earlier days they knew they were doing this. Two examples from the 80's when HQ used to have a "research" department. One guy who worked in that department had a degree from U of Chicago (I think) studying aramaic. He would contribute to way material, but would not allow anything to be published with his name on it because he knew their take went so against the recognized scholarly research and he didn't want to sour his reputation in case he ever desired to go back to the academic community. Another guy who worked in that department told me they knew that some of vpw's teachings were contradicted by all the existing biblical texts. However they took the position that vpw was right and if/when they could find earlier texts than those that had been found so far he was sure vpw would be proven right. If only I'd had the emotional maturity to act on the obvious ramifications of that information. But alas, it wasn't my time yet.

In the mid 80's before they started kicking people out, I was a branch leader. One of my twig leaders was a real mental case but was putting a lot of people through the class so my boss didn't believe me when I said there was a problem. (His boss - the limb leader - later appologized after the whole thing went down). But my immediate boss was an idiot. In one reproof session all he did was read me scriptures. Didn't say one word about why he thought those verses applied in my situation. I had already decided I didn't care what he thought so I just gave no response and left.

Not sure if this is what you want but I've used Sound Edit Pro to rip from tapes and LPs. It automatically breaks the songs into individual files.

I've said it before and still believe it that much of what went on in twi was not motivated by any plan, logic, or reason - short term or long term. It was motivated by pure emotion, and then held onto with an insane committment. I saw the debt thing evolve from what seemed like off-handed comments by vpw in the 70s. And he didn't really teach it hard. In fact he even took out a mortgage on the way HQ to buy Emporia. Various leaders would kick around the idea and discuss what was really meant by debt etc. Of course they were trying to start "word in business" then and business people know how useful debt can be. But over-all it wasn't that big a deal at that time. After I left (mid-80's) probably Martindale jumped on it as something he had a hair up his butt about and just kept getting more and more adament. I don't think there was any thought or planning about the consequences. Isn't it wonderful how when you know the truth, you don't have to worry about the consequences of what you think, belive, say or do?

I was kicked out of the corps (for about 10 minutes) and was stupid enough to stay. And actually it was for a good reason. As part of my job I had access to some of the way's tapes and I had been making copies for my personal collection. When vpw found out about it, he told me to "pack my bags". I was so distraught I talked to Bob Moynihan who said "He didn't say to leave, just to pack your bags. You better do what he said." So I did. We had a big corps meeting that night where I think we were all yelled at about other stuff and in the process my name was mentioned as having done something really stupid. Vpw said he's see me in the back after the meeting. In the backroom he asked if I had packed my bags and I was glad to be able to say yes. Then asked what I had to say for myself and I appologized so he told me I could stay. But the kicker is that since my situation was public (though the details of my crime were not) tons of people in our elder corps kept coming up to me and telling me how they had been kicked out at some point too. I started feeling like I was part of the club.

I was directed to this site from a link on Google's corporate site. I'm passing it on in case anyone finds it useful. http://www.spywareinfo.com/~merijn/downloads.html

One of the coolest is called Scrapbook which allows you to save a whole web page like saving a bookmark, except you get the whole page even if it's gone off line or been taken down. And you can organize them in a folder tree, and search etc.

Of course you're right. You're always right. Wish my mom had told me that. But then I didn't believe the stuff she told me anyway. But I did wear clean underware! Good to see you back Plots.

I stayed - but I quit TWI - they weren't big on booting people back then (mid 80s) and we asked some friends of our who had been in our area but were transferred out to move back with us. They got out same time as we did.

I was 5th corps and as I recall the principals were there when we got there. Don't know if they had changed before that. At that time it just meant running and eating well. We studied the Aerobics book by Kenneth Cooper that had just come out. There was talk and some action about trying to eat natural foods. And there was talk but very little action about getting people to quit smoking. The tie-in between physical and spirituality was not a big deal. And, of course nobody had the brains (or guts) to say "Hey! that's putting my body in harm's way - it violates a corps principal."

Forgot to mention RoboForm It keeps all your passwords and other info (name address, credit card etc) and uses it to fill in web pages. It remembers which web page goes with which username/password etc. And can even generate really hard to crack passwords like HG^7y[md] that you'd never remember if it didn't. Whenever you are on a new site with form fields, it asks if you want to save that new site so the next time you're there it will know what to put in. The stuff is all saved on your hard disk, can be password protected etc. Also has a place called SAFENOTES where you can write other stuff (like locker combinations and PINS you don't use on the web) and they are password protected too. I've been using it for years and several versions. There is a free version and a more robust one for $30. Two features I've never used: You can even save it to one of those USB key chain drives so it's never on any computer and you can use it on anymachine with a USB port. It also has a feature to transfer back and forth to a palm.

He also said the world would be a different place if Hitler had won! He didn't say it much or publically - but I did hear him say it.

I don't think he treated him that way. I think he thought he was taking the man's ideas and pursuing him. I think that vpw thought differently came as a genuine shock to him. Of course vpw probably never confronted him about it - just sat and stewed and mouthed off to Geer till he died. Then Geer thinking he was doing god's will expounded the POP. I left shortly after that, but from what I've heard, most of LCM's concious deviations from VPW came after he died. And I don't think craig was smart enough to con vpw.

Skyrider, I think you're being way to logical in asking these questions. All 3 men you mentioned had/have serious emotional problems. Most of the decisions of all types were made because of some emotion and then explained using logic or bible verses. And the emotions kept changing (as they always do). It's not uncommon that when people do this they actually believe their explanations but that doesn't mean they were the cause of the decisions.

I remember reading somewhere about a free program that would take your email and convert it to java code so the java code would be posted on your web site - in a browser people could see your email address and if they clicked on it it would work like normal (start the email program and address a message) but the code would not be intelligible to spiders looking to harvest email addresses. Unfortunately I don't remember where I read it - (PC Mag perhaps?)

Socks, I'd have to sort of disagree. From the perspective I had when I was in that seemed to be the case. Now that I know a bit more about how to manage an organization, and about different emotional and interpersonal strengths and weaknesses I'd have to say different. What I'd say now is he talked as if he had this vision - but had no consistency about any of the management of it - or even the priorities involved. He'd blow hot and cold. One day something or someone would be the greatest and next day it would not. There was never any logical plan. This was pawned off as "being spiritual" but in reality it's a very common pattern among alcoholics. The vision and the spirituality was a gloss put over the top that kept people like us from admiting what was really going on: A meglomaniac with poor judgement, impulsive outbursts and zero morals or character.

PixResizer http://bluefive.pair.com/pixresizer.htm A free program that resized digital images and converts from one format to anyother. Works on pictures one at a time or on a group in batch mode. Terrific for when you take a large pic with a digicam for printing and want to post or email a smaller version. Also for making thumbnails for a web site.

Hope, This was way before the full-time corps period but from when the late 70's early 80's I noticed that most of the full time on the field staff were not financially abundant. If they came on staff with any savings, they didn't have any left in a year or so. They had spent it for stuff the way didn't cover like vacations or medical needs. There were constant agruments with HQ about how high the heating bill was, who should live with them to split the rent etc. Made me realize I didn't want to be on staff. I believe this was when vpw was still involved. In fact now that I think of it, back in the early 70's when vpw fired Heefner and Doop and forced John Lynn to become more under HQ control a lot of the issues were about who controled the money. So this attitude goes way back.

Skyrider - I was around then but didn't hear anything about it. Can you elaborate? Twig Hopper was the little (six seater) plane wasn't it? I got to ride in it once.

My question about iPod (and other hard drive music devices) is - how easy is it to find a given song? I can imagine enjoying having all my music on one little box - especially to take with me. But when I get a bug in my head to hear a specific song that I know I have how easy/hard is it to find that one song among 2,000 or 10,000? With CD's if I can remember what CD it's on I can recognize it on the shelf. With music on my PC I can type and search for it by name. But how does it work on a Pod or other Hard Drive device?

Dealing with anger is not the same thing as not feeling any more anger. It's one thing to feel angry and another to act out that anger in unhelpful ways. Anger related to trauma may be in a different class altogether. This article may help: From Salon.com If you're not a member you can watch a quick ad and get access for a day. Well worth it in my opinion.

That means that god must have an foot! How blasphemous!

A living will is a simple document - it's not a will. A will is about what you want to happen to the things you own while you're alive. But a living will indicates if you want life support or not under certain circumstances. You can down load or buy the forms from lots of web sites. www.nolo.com is probably the best source for do-it-yourself legal stuff. There are legal requirements about how a will must be signed, witnessed etc. They vary by state. Be sure you do that part according to the rules.

Bob was a weenie. I knew him when he was brought into the way of NY (Rye) to replace Heefner. Then I knew him at HQ he was a region leader and together we hitch hiked out to Calif. to go on what later became LEAD. And I knew him a bit when he was at Rome City. At first I was in awe of him. I was young, he came in as my limb leader. But after knowing him for a while, and growing up a bit, I came to the conclusion that he was pretty gutless.