Why The Fully Funded Push Towards DTTV

Millions, perhaps billions, of dollars have been spent to notice the American public that we must all comply with FCC regulations that analog tv will no longer be available for general media and that we must all convert to digital terrestrial television.

We've had DTT for a decade and, for the most recent years at least, the benefits of digital tv have truly improved the standard of tubing for many of us -- TiVO, HDTV, On-Demand programming and so on. So why are they spending so much money and using so many resources, both public and private, to ensure everyone is on board the DTT expressway?

Because corporations and commerial interests realize that much of their intended sales demographic watches free tv -- children.

Corporations know that it is not enough to pander to the working force, the taxpayer and the "tweens". Commercial interest reaches as far as toddlers and any mind that is set in front of a set that spoonfeeds them branding by animated fantastical spokescreatures. Get the 4-year old to recognize nike, Pepsi-Co or Ford Motors and you have a loyal consumer for life.

Free tv is full of kids-targeted marketing. Digital cable tv is where you will find artful, witty, cynical and ironic product placement, but on free tv, everything is vanilla bean. Free tv is for the masses who decide they are not interested in niche media.

If corporations and commercial interests LOSE this vast audience in 2009, they will suffer the bottom line in 2029 -- and i don't mean 8:30pm. The money invested in the public service announcements and news channel segments are long-term investments.

It's not at all benign, let alone generous. It is just another method corporations and commercial interest dictate how we receive content. They are not so much interested in our ability to receive digital content as much as they are hellbent on ensuring we continue to receive their commercials, product placement programs and betrothed news channels.

I love tv -- I just miss the days when television was innocent. Or rather, I miss the days when I thought tv was my friend. LOL!!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_terrestrial_television

A Well-Informed Society Spreads Neither Fear Nor Disease

This is an article from the Drug Policy Alliance (http://www.drugpolicy.org) which I am sharing with you to demonstrate the difference in attitude -- and real results -- when a society feels compelled and responsible for being informed, rather than demanding to be entertained and sensationalized to for receiving socio-political information. I accept that Americans want their media to be stimulating. I just hope that we as a collective audience initiate a shift towards responsible editorials, objective corporate influence and/or exposure in schools and government, and a return to trustworthy news reporting.

---

Canada's West Coast Leads the Americas in Drug Policy Reform
November 19, 2008

Special thanks to Gillian Maxwell, community activist and spokesperson for the Insite Community Safety Campaign in Vancouver, BC for her input on this article.

"British Columbia has been leading the hemisphere in drug policy reform for years. The most recent civic elections confirm this point, and demonstrate the power of effective policy advocacy and public education.

In 1998, there was an HIV epidemic declared and an urgent need for new drug policies based on harm reduction. Service organizers and public health officials did as much as they could. According to Vancouver community activist Gillian Maxwell, "the severity of the situation necessitated a lot of actions very quickly." She continued, noting, "a lot of education went on over an intense few years." Thanks to their education and advocacy efforts, the first safer injection facility in North America was opened in 2003 – and despite federal government pressure, Insite remains open. Elected officials in British Columbia are accountable to a well-informed public.

Gregor Robertson, mayor-elect of Vancouver, supports Insite and even wants to revamp the city's Four Pillars approach to drug policy – prevention, treatment, harm reduction and enforcement – with interactive, peer-led education programs that can help prevent future drug addictions. Robertson won by a landslide against his leading opponent who was running on a Law and Order platform that would have seen no further investment in safe injection facilities.

The new mayor-elect in nearby Victoria is also supportive of harm reduction efforts. Dean Fortin, who has served on the city council in Victoria, will work to find a permanent location for the city's syringe exchange program, and see that it has sufficient funding.

Joining the Victoria city council this year will be longtime medical cannabis activist Philippe Lucas, who wrote the British Columbia Green Party platform on substance abuse and marijuana. Elections in other parts of the province bode well for drug policy reform, too – like in Grand Forks, where former Marijuana Party leader Brian Taylor is the new mayor-elect."

Arctic Ghost Has Left The Building

I feel a three dog night chill under my skin as I bid "Adieu" to my most recent stray guest.

Where I live, I see a lot of stray dogs, some living off the rural streets while others are understimulated puppies running away for some heated adventures. The 55mph road that runs across my neighborhood is why I have invited so many strays into my back yard, feeding and blanketing them until Animal Control comes to collect. I have called on their services often over the past 4 years, even calling them for Col. Tishi Meizer before I adopted her off the street as my own pack diva. The Original.

And Col. Tishi Mei-Mei has seen these strays come and go. I have never had difficulty turning our guests over to the pound. I support their work by registering my pack members and spaying and neutering. But today, my heart wrenched as I said good-bye and good luck to Arctic Ghost, a female white husky puppy with igloo eyes.

Arctic Ghost came around my property yesterday. I first was notified of her presence by my pack as they barked and scratched at the front door and then raced to the back door where they can access the backyard from a tear in the screen compliments of The Colonel. My pack ran to the back gate and their barking stopped as they smelled the stray white dog with the bushy bushy tail on the other side. I watched the stray wander around the side dirt road for a few minutes, then I went back to doing the dishes.

My pack ran frantically back inside the house to the front door which was closed and they started barking and scratching at the front door. I shuushed them back and when I went outside in the front, the stray husky was smelling around my truck then went to my nextdoor neighbors' then made her way across the 55mph street avoiding honking, braking diesel trucks and black H3s. Still, I went back to my chores. Oftentimes, neighborhood dogs just go out for the day and return home before their people get home and realize otherwise.

Tishi and Bella Dora have gotten out their fair share of escapes and have always come home when I start shaking their walking collars and lead... sometimes bringing with them other wanderlusting canines. When I have recognized them from my walks, I have returned escaped dogs to their homes. When strays have collars, I call and coordinate pick-up. When dogs have no ID and look dirty, injured and/or hungry, I take them in, usually overnight, and notify Animal Control.

Arctic Ghost was dirty, hungry and looked like easy-pickings for unneutered studs, dominant bitches and inattentive dog-on-the-street-hit-n-running speeders. I put her in my locked back yard and called the pound for a pick-up. They said they will come out that afternoon which was good because with the husky puppy in heat, she was spotting and getting my pack all riled up, particularly Tishi Meizer. I had to keep them separate or one of them was going to get hurt. As much as I love Tishi, she tends to get herself into fights with dogs who kick her ass. A purebred husky pup in heat under my watch was not going to learn how to be insecure by my Lil Babette.

While I was in the backyard keeping the dogs calm and picking up their dogpiles, I noticed Tishi go to the door in attention. I figured it was Animal Control coming to pick-up Arctic Ghost. I went inside and when I got to the front door, I saw an official notice stating that the officer had been by a half hour ago and will return tomorrow for the stray. For some reason and predictably, I freaked out!

I called Animal Control back all angry and told them to cancel my call for pick-up as I have let the stray go. I was pissed that we were simply in the backyard and all the officer had to do was say "hello" or something to get my attention over the fence. It would have been so easy for them to do their job -- but instead, the officer wrote an earlier time on the notice than when she had actually come, and just took off! By the time I saw the notice and called Animal Control back, the officer had gone offshift. I was livid with the call center rep who responded when I told her I let the stray go with, "Why did you do that?" I yelled at her on my cf, "I did my job so you can do your job and then instead of doing her job, the officer just left for the day?!?!?!"

I think I smashed the cf on my desk before disconnecting -- I can still hang-up on someone in the digital age ;-p thankfully, blackberries are constructed sturdily. Still can make calls despite my overreacting.

Yes, I kicked the stray out of my backyard. I told her, "Go! Git!!"

For the next hour my dogs who were inside the house kept up their barking and running from the backyard to the front door. I was seething with bad attitude. Angry at all the commotion, I yelled at my pack to get back and then went outside the front. There, sitting under my truck bed like a black stray dog did four years ago, was Arctic Ghost. She wagged her magnificent tail and shot me a "Oh, c'mon" twinkle in her stare.

Of course, I took her back to the safety and comfort of my backyard. This time, I prepared dinner for all of the doggies: roast beef and brown rice with carrots. I serve myself a small plate before adding their doggy supplements and portioning out. I fed my pack inside my house first, then gave a bowl to Arctic Ghost in the back yard. She loved it and ate it all up. She made a friend for life that day! A friend that cooks for her!

I called Animal Control again and the patient call center rep took my information for the third time and spent a good minute apologizing for the inconvenience and thanking me for calling her back, also accepting my apologies for the way I took out my frustrations on her.

The thing is, this is what I do. I commit without discussion to helping others and doing what is required of the situation -- not what I need or even what is best for my loved ones, just, simply, what is required of the situation. Objectively. The good feelings I get from acting on my sense of altruism is addictive! And true to addictive personalities, the first obstacle that I hit or the first resistance I sense, however slight, I lose my marbles and behave embarrassingly.

Fortunately for me, Arctic Ghost would not allow me to pass up the opportunity to do good by her. She kept giving me another chance to do what was just. Right. When I took her back the second time, we looked eye to eye on the same level and I saw her relief. At the time, I figured it was because she was tired from running around on the streets, it was getting dark and colder now and she wanted a hot meal and a warm place to spend the night.

When my man returned home after dark, he informed me that one of our friends' dog was stabbed to death earlier in the afternoon. Around the same time I was going mental with Arctic Ghost, a post-partum depressed cokehead was stabbing a purebred boxer to death with a kitchen knife as my friend sustained slash wounds trying to keep his babymama off his puppy.

Imagine seeing the crime scene and then seeing the eyes of Arctic Ghost. My man did just that. And thank god I was able to recapitulate before he came home so that we could share a feeling of active participation. You see, two weeks ago, both my man and I asked our friend if he would like us to take his boxer for a while, at least until things worked out between him and his babymama. At the time, he turned us down because the boxer was the one energy that was pure love in their home -- attentive to the little children and to our friend. When my man visited yesterday just hours after the police hauled away the dog-killer for two years in prison (yes, two years -- i am psycho-crying again), our friend said to him sadly, "Maybe you shudda taken him for a bit."

As much good as I say I do with my experiences, I did not do good by our friend and his boxer. I did not do good with Arctic Ghost. But she gave me a chance to ressurect myself. Yes, she did.

I enjoyed my evening with my pack and with our guest. this morning when Animal Control returned to collect her, I had Arctic Ghost tethered in the front yard so she would not be missed again. With her gone, I finally bawled and wrote to my man:

"i am bawling my eyes out... i really got attached to her, to her lesson for me and to her stunning eyes. if only tishi weren't so insecure, it would have been great to spend more time with her, but they took her just now.

"i know it is best for everyone -- most of all her owners who i am sure are going crazy not knowing where she is. she looked like she knew her way home, but being a puppy on the loose in heat, i didnt think she would make it home before she got herself into trouble. lots of other dogs walking around may want to take her out or stud her, if a passing car doesn't inattentively run her over first.

"i felt her resist going into the pound truck -- i guess she felt the energy from the crates. i am just telling myself that it was the best thing to do. i appreciate you telling me about how you feel about the pound and still going with my actions of giving her care over to them. if it's okay with you, when we get our first check in a couple of weeks, can we call the pound to see if anyone has picked her up and if not, maybe we can go get her back? i am not asking for an answer now, we will feel for it when the time comes. i just wanted to share how much my experience with her energy means to me."

Sacred Whores and Trick Hos - Part 5

A question I get asked a lot is "What is the difference between Sacred Whores and Trick Hos?" and it seems self explanatory, doesn't it? Yet, I suppose if the question keeps coming up, the confusion is in the wording of the question.

Sacred. This is a loaded word these days; however, trace the entymology: sacrum.

Sacrum: "bone at the base of the spine," 1753, from L.L. os sacrum "sacred bone," from L. os "bone" + sacrum, neut. of sacer "sacred." Said to be so called because the bone was the part of animals that was offered in sacrifices.

As a Sacred Whore, I sacrifice something in every session, but never -- ever, bitches -- my soul. In fact, what I do sacrifice, nourishes my soul... nourishes my partners' souls... nourishes the Absolute. It is definitely a process that did not begin with me nor will it end with me, but I am most useful to the process as long as I adhere to the sacred aspects of sexual ritual. It is about being in the moment where one is free of analysis, free of judgment, free of design. The only standard is that of being present.

Trick. http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/trick

I don't wish to insult ur intelligence with a verbose explanation of what a Trick is.

So, in practice, Trick Hos are all about getting as much money out of a trick as physically, mentally and emotionally possible. One pro I was talking to tonight explained it like this: "This job is 90% lies and the best liars know that a good lie is 2 parts Truth, 1 part Lie."

Imagine if you had that cocktail everytime you engaged sexually with someone -- sheeyat. Is there ANY confusion why Sacred Whores exhist BECAUSE of Trick Hos?!?!

Spiritually possible. That's what I get out of my sessions. Everything spiritually possible. And it's inexplicable. That's why when you look at the books and nothing else, you may come to the conclusion that I don't have a fucken clue as to what I'm doing. But you didn't look into my party's eyes. Truer, you didn't look through my party's eyes.

It's something I will have not only to tolerate, but also to incorporate in the way I project my art: the judgment of Trick Hos when I am incapable of judging them. It is the fulfillment of my childhood training that women will be my harshest critics. Bring it!

My conversation with aforementioned girl at the CR was very revealing. Well, she did all the talking... while I read her. It was just like at Madame Cleo's when I was working there to satiate my nymphomania and the other bitches be talking about what I do in my sessions behind my back and just always chiding about my game. Back then, I deserved it as I was fucked up, seriously. I was no where close to being Sacred. However, I behaved on a parallel pane.

It was my intense training with the guidance of Toltec Shaman Koyote and his community of sacred workers that began the refinement process from nymphomaniac to sacred sexual artist... from self-gratification to self-sacrifice.

Diamonds From The Rough

Alan blotted his upper lip with a pressed monogrammed handkerchief. His Gucci logo cufflink clicked on the wristband of his Bvlgari Steel Crono.

"May I offer you an evian, Mr. Mills?"

Before Alan could respond, the not-unattractive woman with the slick hair bun and gap-toothed smile was pressing on the teal "ICM" button.

"Yes, Ms. Guzman?" broadcasted over the speaker phone.

"Victor, two evians, please." Her gray flannel suit was tasteful in its classic lines but Alan considered the hemline a touch short for her age. She sat down opposite him at the glass desk. It reminded Alan of the transparent counter on Entertainment Tonight, except Ms. Guzman's desk was equipped with a functioning glass drawer. Neatly organized within transparent compartments were its contents: a leather portfolio with Memento Mortuary embossed in silver on the cover, a perfectly unused eraser, Waterford fountain pen and pencil, a silver-handled letter opener, and white vinyl-coated paper clips in three different sizes. Ms. Guzman crossed her legs under the desk. Her gray opaque tights with sheer pin-striping detail flattered her legs.

Alan tucked his handkerchief back in his inside jacket pocket and returned Ms. Guzman's smile as the lanky college student - who'd greeted him at the vestibule wearing a three-piece suit that was patently prêt à porter - entered the glass enclosed office with two bottles of evian on a serving tray.

The young man placed two silver plated coasters with the Memento Mortuary logo atop the desk. He uncapped the bottled waters and placed them on the coasters. Finally, a short stack of cocktail napkins, also with the Memento Mortuary logo. He left the room carrying the tray as if there were still items on it.

Alan reached for his water. Ms. Guzman placed a tri-fold glossy brochure in his outstretched palm. He held the brochure for a stunned moment, looked at Ms. Guzman who was leaning towards him - arms crossed but friendly on the desk - and brought the brochure in to read.

"As you know, Mr. Mills," nary a whistle from her gap, "cremation has been traditionally accepted in many cultures for millennia."

Alan looked at the colored photographs - gold and platinum accented against Caesar's Purple velvet. "Just not in our culture," he replied as he scanned the images of bejeweled plates, vases, lockets and other jewelry until he found the design he'd inquired about.

"There are no hard rules when it comes to celebrating the lives of those we love. The carbon pressing technology of today produces brilliant results that could not have been imagined before the 21st century," Ms. Guzman explained in a chest voice that amplified through the glass desk. "Ashes to ashes; dust to dust? Bethany, Conner, and Donny..." she paused.

Alan swallowed the tumbling knot climbing his throat as the three names lingered.

"What culture can prepare you for that?" Ms. Guzman suggested as she leaned closer. She pointed to a paragraph in the middle of the brochure. The paragraph title read Color - The Auras. "Mrs. Mills will never have to visit a grave site once, much less for three different birthdays, on Mother's Day, Fa-- I'm sorry, Mr. Mills," her neck reddening. "I don't know what came over me."

Alan grinned politely. Eerie, that a woman he met ten minutes ago would say the same thing his wife of ten years had said.

*

"Alan, my babies," she cried from the hospital bed where she lay in traction for six weeks after the Expedition had rolled over on the I-5 between picking up the twins from soccer practice and dropping off Bethany at her 4-H meeting. The coma had spared her sanity at the cost of her memories. When she had regained consciousness, Alan had to tell her that their 9-year old angel and 7-year old twin stars had gone to Heaven. "Three graves to dig, three birthdays to grieve, three lives to miss... Alan, I miss them already. They call this surviving? They say I am lucky to be alive? Tell them to leave at once! Tell them all to fucking leave me alone!"

*

"Where do you need me to sign?" Alan asked.

Ms. Guzman smiled again and wiped an evian bottle down with a napkin and handed it to Alan. "Please, refresh yourself while I complete the contract."

As Alan sipped, Ms. Guzman filled out one of the forms that was in the leather portfolio. She referred to his Lifestyle Editor, Vogue Magazine business card presented during introductions to complete his contact information. She made five X strokes where he needed to sign. Ms. Guzman flipped it around so the contract was rightside-up for Alan and said, "For this design, it will be $89,000 plus 8.5% sales tax for a total of $96,565. How would you like to settle the account, Mr. Mills?"

Alan thought about the life insurance money sitting in the checking account. "AmEx," he replied.

*

Zita woke to her husband's minty-fresh breath on her neck and tapwater-chilled lips on her shouder as Alan kissed her softly. She opened her eyes and stared blankly at red numbers on her alarm clock. 11:34 AM. He didn't even let her sleep in on their anniversary. "What's wrong?" Zita asked without turning to look at her husband of ten years. "Is company coming over?"

"No, honey," Alan said with a strange lift to his tone, just like the time he convinced her into cremating her children in an oven. "Happy Anniversary," he said in between soft kisses on her shoulder.

Zita recoiled from his lips, scrunching her face.

Alan put an arm around her shoulders and the other under her knees. He lifted her off the bed and carried her naked body to the living room where he had lit candles around the polar bear skin rug. He placed her gently on the floor, slightly concerned that his wife was so light.

For the first time since she broke her back, Zita allowed herself to feel the moment - she was blissfully alive. The thick, long fur pampered her skin. Goosebumps.

Alan knelt on one knee and held up a tiny leather box with "MM" embossed in silver on the flip top.

Zita's fashion model eyes widened on cue as she opened the box. Inside, the platinum ring with the three clear and different colored stones twinkled against Caesar's Purple velvet.

"Do you see their auras, Zita?" Alan asked, his tone lifting.

Zita did see. Bethany's yellow. Conner's indigo. And Donald's green - her little leprechaun.

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