During a recent stop over in Los Angeles I had the opportunity to go and visit Cunard White Star Line’s RMS Queen Mary ocean liner. The Queen Mary is a remarkable piece of engineering, technology and trans-atlantic shipping history. She is safely moored in Long Beach, California. The City of Long Beach purchased the Queen Mary in 1971 for 1 million pounds and saved her from the scrap yard. She is now a floating attraction, hotel and living museum.

For 30 years, the Queen Mary provided weekly service from Southampton, England to New York, USA. She connected Great Britain and Europe with the new world both physically and politically until the jet age ended her trans atlantic service in 1968. The Queen Mary is still one of the fastest ocean liners ever built. She sails under steam at an impressive 53 km/h (29 knots) and can carry 3,240 passengers and crew.

During World War 2, the Queen Mary was requisitioned by Great Britain to carry Australian and New Zealand troops to the northern hemisphere conflicts. She is such a vast ship that she carried more than 15,000 troops at a time. Winston Churchill  is reported to have said her service in World War 2 cut the conflict’s duration by a year.

Next year it will be the Queen Mary’s 75th anniversary. She has been replaced by Cunard’s handsome Queen Mary 2. The Queen Mary 2 still provides trans-atlantic passenger service and is the only ocean liner in service today.  In 2006 the two name sakes famously met each other at the Port of Long Beach (see photo above). Although the QM2 is almost twice the size of the QM1, in my mind she is not twice the boat! I bet they both do a great cup of tea though!!!

Nigel on the lido deck.

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We are excited to support the launch of Ranfurly Apparel in the U.S. market. The Ranfurly range features machine washable, easy care merino blends. This is a uniquely New Zealand story. The merino is grown in New Zealand, the fabric is made in New Zealand, and, the garments are designed and manufactured in New Zealand. The photos were taken at the launch trade show in Chicago this month.

Nigel.  

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Welcome to our new look blog loyal readers and followers of the zone!

We hope you enjoy the slick new look and feel.

While you’re here why not visit our brand new website as well by clicking the timezoneone.com link above.

Enjoy!

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Embracing a cause makes good business sense. Nothing builds brand loyalty among today’s increasingly hard-to-please consumers like a company’s proven commitment to a worthy cause. Other things being equal, many consumers would rather do business with a company that stands for something beyond profits.

Mission Pickle

Our very own zoner Fearon is working with Pickle’s People to help bring the brand to life.

Pickle’s People is about inspiring positive attitudes and actions in children, and making the world a better place through finding our inner pickle.
Their products are designed to encourage, inspire and connect. Through honest, positive messaging our apparel, accessories and other products present creative, simple, fun life lessons for our little ones.
A portion of every sale will go to improving the lives of children through partnerships with various non-profit organizations.
You can become a friend of Pickles People on Facebook.

- Hamish

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Having your first kid is stressful, scary as hell, and drop dead amazing all at once. But, should you be fortunate to share the responsibilities with a spouse, you have the ability to tag team all the screams, cries, vomit, and piss on the walls. You have one responsibility and you do everything you can to take care of that little bugger.

Having another kid, on the other hand, evens out the teams. Now you need to worry about KID A (I love Radiohead) and KID B. You have to worry about meeting each of their needs. And you have to worry about how they both interact with you and your wife, and how they interact with each other.

I was Daddy Day Care yesterday as my Wife was a little under the weather.  Talk about hard work!  I was so happy to go to work today just to get a break!  I have a new respect for the stay at home Mum (notice I said Mum not Mom – I am still a Kiwi at heart!)…

- Hamish

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Since I last blogged, the Chicago Blackhawks won the Stanley Cup for the first time in ages.  The city went crazy.  Richie and I spent the afternoon wandering through the celebration parade in between World Cup soccer matches (it was a good Friday!).  Over 2 million people turned out for the parade.

That meant the end of the Hockey season and Baseball is in full swing.  And guess what – the Chicago White Sox lead their division and are currently the hottest team in baseball!  Since June 9, American League Central-leading Chicago is 33-11 overall and 18-1 at home. Before the surge, the Sox were 24-33 and 9 1/2 games behind Minnesota. They are now 60-45 and 1 1/2 ahead.  The White Sox last won the World Series in 2005.

No team has ever won all four major championships at the same time.  We have the hockey – we are looking good in the baseball – the Bulls (basketball) are resurgent – unfortunately the Bears (football) suck… almost as much as this 1985 promo shot of them…

- Hamish

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“A home page should be useful if you want it to be used.”

The official Web sites for most consumer brands aren’t very exciting. You can pretty much bet on what you’ll see: A huge photo of the product, a button you click to see a list of ingredients or retail locations, perhaps some company history — and of course the ubiquitous “Contact Us” form. With the exception of some fancy Flash graphics (meant to impress viewers, but more often something that gets in their way), it seems like many home pages are trapped in time.

Well, it is time for home pages to become more interactive and engaging.

A growing number of major brands have taken a hard look at their home pages lately, rebuilding them into platforms that shatter the old cyber-billboard model in order to give consumers not just a page to visit, but a portal for learning and interacting. These new-generation home pages are becoming less isolated and more fully integrated into the Web. They feature more social cross-pollination. They also offer a lighter user experience (a refreshingly sparing use of Flash gimmickry) and are more search-friendly. Overall, the pages strive to achieve a greater depth of brand experience, be that selling actual products or simply cementing existing customer relationships.

- Hamish

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Firstly, I get bonus points (according to David’s last blog) for using a māori word in my title. “Mōrena” means good morning and is becoming integrated into New Zealand’s everyday language. It’s always used on Radio New Zealand which is where I heard this next important piece of kiwiana news. New Zealand is now celebrating the winner of its Supreme Pie Competition. The meat pie (meat and pastry) has always been a good part of a Kiwi’s diet from the early days of the school Tuck Shop/Canteen pie to a pie for lunch at your first job all the way to the family pie, New Zealander’s have always loved a great pie.

This year’s winner, Pat Lam (I know, appropriate name), has won the award for several years in a row. This years entry, a creamy mushroom, bacon and cheese combination (salivating already), won top pie out a record 4336 entries! The top baker, not a rotund, chuckly fellow from a quaint country bakery, is a Cambodian refugee who came to New Zealand 15 years ago!

Ka pai, Pat!

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My blogging this week took on a bit of a robot them, so here’s some more robot news.

Some clever blokes here in New Zealand (who are originally from Scotland, but have been calling God’s Own their own for 20 odd years) have created a pair of robot legs for paraplegics. Find out more at rexbionics.com

There are also robots taking over Chicago at the moment so be careful out there.

But don’t worry too much about robots enslaving us over any time soon, they’re still trying to master the basics, but they’re pretty fast learners as you’ll see below…

Now I’m off to prepare for the arrival of baby number 2, so expect baby photos next week, ā, kaua a wareware, it’s māori language week next week, so if you use a māori word between now and August 2nd you receive quadruple bonus points and your points in the next round are worth double!

David McLeod

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I don’t know how they get away with this and I’m concerned about the amount of paint used and the mess that is left behind, but I’m still impressed by the effort made for this entertaining, albeit unscientific, look at evolution.

And because that’s nearing the 10 minute mark here’s a little something for folks with either short attention spans or tight deadlines – saying that, if you have any deadline, being short or otherwise, you shouldn’t be looking at this blog, so this is just for the folks with short attention spans, who probably stopped reading by now. Here’s a robot doing cool things in the world of painting stuff on walls.

The Facadeprinter is a simple, software controlled robot that fires paintballs at walls in precise patterns. You’ll find a better explanation here.

David McLeod

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