Here's the story behind said TV:
I hadn't been living at Gillespie Tower (in Muncie) for very long when there was a knock at my door.
At this time, I can't remember who the second person was, but I do remember that one of them was this nice and helpful guy named Tyrone.
They told me that they had a TV if I wanted it. I told them that I couldn't afford cable at the time and had no idea how long I'd be staying there. In short, I thought that it might be more useful to somebody else. It was then that they told me that (not sure if they said this just to get me to accept it or if it were true) it was a perfectly-good TV but they had to get rid of it and were about to give up and put it in the dumpster.
So I said that, if this were the case, I'd be glad to take it in and either find it a new home or else end up taking it with me when I moved back to Anderson.
Anyway, it just so happened that my next-door neighbor, Betty, was thinking about moving South to live with her family as soon as she could afford it, so she was selling some of her things to raise money for the trip. One of the things she'd be selling was a DVD player.
Anyway, it was cheap enough (I think it was around $10), and I wanted to help Betty out. So, I now had a DVD player and a TV with nothing to place it on. But this would be a kind of future "luxury" once I was back in my hometown with a library within walking distance where I could choose from scads of DVDs with the only "rent" being to present the library card I'd be getting once I had a physical address in Anderson.
Thus, the TV is still in my catch-all room in my apartment (how I'm using the room meant to be the bedroom), and I've already put the DVD player in storage over in Anderson.
Anyway, to make a long story a wee bit shorter, I don't have a TV on the ready at anytime that I might want to turn it on, so I wasn't even sure what was still on and what had been cancelled.
But I get to watch with neighbors. I saw this wonderful video (as live TV) at both Linda's place and Ronnie's place, for instance, and, before she ended up going to a nursing home, Jane and I loved to watch The Hallmark Channel together -- neat shows like The Waltons, Little House On The Prairie, and The Middle.
I'll get to watch Wheel Of Fortune and Family Feud with Linda frequently, and Fred &; I listen to the various cable stations with music from way-back-when.
As I indicated before, I was so out-of-the-loop that I had no idea what was still playing.
One day, I was at Ronnie's, and an advertisement for 60 Minutes came on -- along with information about what the upcoming (a few days from then) episode would be. I told him that I had no idea that 60 Minutes was still on the air. He told me that it was and that I was invited to watch it with him if I wanted to.
Most Sunday evenings, I'm down at Ronnie's watching this longtime TV tradition with him.
This last Sunday (July 31, 2016), the line-up was amazing. Here are the three features:
One
Two
Three
60 Minutes always delivers great quality in news features. A beautiful longtime friend (now deceased) has written at least one episode for this news magazine in the past.
The entire July 31 program was A+, but I was especially excited about the third portion.
As you can see from watching it, the setting for this story was a place in Africa called Tanzania -- and it just so happens that I'm quite familiar with some of the goings-on there.
There are certain things going on in that corner of the world that need to be changed because they are atrocious (A *TOTAL* UNDERstatement!!!)!!! This is a case of "tradition" where the more powerful keep the relatively-powerless under their collective thumb.
The heroes of this situation are those who are doing all they can to free the helpless and empower them.
For some time now, I've been trying to help such a person to make a difference. Her name is Rose Njilo, and she's getting the message out about the abuse and exploitation of girls and women. She has been assisted a lot by Suzanne "Snoopy" Puckett who also has her own personal goal of shutting down so-called boot-camps for wayward (meaning anything from being actual juvenile delinquents to simply not wanting to do their homework, clean their plates, etc.) youth where those in charge believe that subjecting these troubled/not always minding children and teens to demeaning talk and health-wrecking "exercise" is the way to make them be obedient.
I want to tell you the "biggie" when it comes to the kind of abuse that Rose is fighting against: female genital mutilation.
In case you don't know what that means in this case, here it is: getting your clitoris cut off so that you won't get any personal pleasure from sexual relations. It's the female-aimed version of castration.
This is usually done to females in Rose's neck of the woods when they are still of elementary school age -- MERE CHILDREN!!!
Why?
So they won't end up wanting to be with anybody but their husbands -- and not even wanting to be with them.
They're sex slaves (and slaves in general) in the worst sense of the word -- just individuals to cook, clean, and be sex toys to whichever man happens to end up with which one. Human droids!!!
Rose (and others, such as Snoopy and I) believe that these girls and women deserve better -- MUCH BETTER!!! -- and want to get the word out that help is needed!!!
Rose has a website where you can find out more, and we all hope that you will!!!
At this point, I also want to include the website of the amazing people in the 60 Minutes feature (India Howell, Peter Leon & Grace Mmassy, along with various others).
Hopefully, they'll be able to network with each other and grow even stronger in their quest to empower those who need empowering, whether they be women and girls who are being robbed of the chance to know the pleasure of lovemaking or children in need of a family atmosphere and a good education.
Please keep sharing this blog-entry with others. If you're able to donate cash and other things needed (e.g. textbooks, food, clothing, etc.), I hope you will. But, even if you're unable to do that, you're doing a whole lot just to keep this information circulating...
