Inside this edition:

— a quote worth remembering —

"Without the valleys, I could not have enjoyed the mountains."  —Author: Skeeter Davis

«  Information Making News  »

Will Jennifer Aniston be calling?? In one of her first TV interviews
since filing for divorce from Brad Pitt earlier this year, Aniston, while appearing on 'Oprah' recently said, "I'm doing well, it's the media that won't move on." When Oprah asked Aniston if she was ready to "start the whole dating thing again," the 36-year-old actress emphatically replied, "yes" it's time.

Note to Jennifer: call me, (my number is in the book) For Aniston fans, Click here for a very large, close-up image of Jennifer.

a Flight 93 Memorial... The Bruderhof Peace Barn is a project of the 5th-8th grade students of the Spring Valley School in Farmington, Pa. These students have converted an old barn into a memorial for the heroes of Flight 93. The new Peace Barn website has a beautiful online Flight 93 Memorial with pictures and biographies of all the passengers and crew. See it here.
Also see a Flight 93 TIMELINE

What's your credit score?... As of Sept. 1, all U.S. consumers will be able to order free copies of their credit reports. This is due to a new federal law, the Fair and Accurate Credit Transactions Act (FACTA), adopted by Congress in 2003. Other states already had access to their credit reports, but now consumers in all states are able to order one free credit report annually from each of the nationwide credit bureaus ... Equifax, Experian and Trans Union. Because your credit report is an important part of many credit-scoring systems, it is important to make sure it's accurate before you submit a credit application. To get copies of your report, contact any or all of the three major credit reporting agencies:
Equifax: 800-685-1111   |   Trans Union: 800-916-8800
or Experian (formerly TRW): 888-397-3742

Proposal To Raise Retirement Age ...
Under current law, the age for retiring with full Social Security benefits is 65 years and six months. It is rising gradually until it reaches 67 for individuals born in 1960 or later. Raising the retirement age is one of three ideas that lawmakers are considering as they try to improve the solvency of Social Security. Sen. Charles Grassley, the 71-year-old Iowa Republican is proposing raising the retirement age to 69 before getting full Social Security benefits. Pa. Senator Rick Santorum agrees.
Read more about the story here.

Fantasia Barrino Reveals She's Illiterate... The singer, known to her fans as simply Fantasia, admits that while charming many American television viewers and wooing the judges to become a pop star, she was hiding the fact that she was barely able to read or write. Reading even simple things, she acknowledges, is difficult. She can barely make out or pronounce unfamiliar words. During a recent interview on ABC's 20/20, the 21-year-old R&B singer says she's signed record deals and contracts that she didn't read and couldn't understand. But the hardest part, she said, is not being able to read to Zion, her 4-year-old daughter. In her new book, "Life Is Not a Fairy Tale," the winner of American Idol 3 from 2004 talks about her struggles in life and how she had to memorize lyrics to unfamiliar songs and fake her way through some scripted portions of the televised talent show. You can read an excerpt from the book here.

Oprah ... the rich helping the rich
The topic on The Oprah Winfrey Show on Sept. 13th was, "If you have debt, this show is for you." Well, of course, it interested me. But geez, gimme a break. It turns out Oprah's guests were $160,000 in debt while the husband alone made $110,000 per year and had "only" $84,000 savings in their 401k plan.
Oprah ... can you help us?

and then followed up with a story of a (no doubt rich) family that buys their children expensive toys while also giving their teenagers access to their own credit cards with out-of-control and unlimited spending, but wonders ... what are we doing wrong? Oprah ... can you help us?

So Oprah gave them a money makeover and free counciling from her guest, Money expert Dave Ramsey. Geez, gimme a break!

Oprah is so far out of touch with the "common family"... And to put an exclamation point to my reasoning, this Oprah Show aired right after the tragedy of Hurricane Katrina, which by the way, did you notice how "dressed down" Oprah was for THAT show? She wore jogging pants and her hair looked like she hadn't washed it in days...( obviously, not wanting to show off her million dollar look).

I'm not alone in being critical of Oprah. Many others believe she has a feministic gender bias in many of her shows, and a double standard about certain behavior. Shows about infidelity, for example, often focus either on the cheating men, or on the cheated-on wives. Critics believe Winfrey pays inadequate attention to cheating women. See related site.

and did you hear the one about ...
In June 2005, Winfrey was denied entry to the luxury store Hermès in Paris, France. Oprah had arrived at the posh boutique 15 minutes after closing time, and although others were still shopping inside, she was treated as just a regular customer and denied access because "the store was closed." Turned away first by a security guard informing her the store was closed, she demanded to see the store manager. She was rebuffed next by a clerk and then finally the store manager. Refusing to leave, Oprah fumed, "do you know who I am?"

Upon hearing of the incident, the Hermes CEO offered in a call to Oprah's people, his apology and an invitation to have Winfrey come back to shop at the store, but in her response, Winfrey stated she would no longer shop at the store. In a press release later, Oprah said, "there is a difference between the store being closed and the store being closed to me. I just want to say shame on them for being so rude, anybody who's ever been snubbed because you were not chic enough or the right class or the right color or whatever - I don't know what it was - except it was very humiliating."

But after receiving some bad publicity of her playing "the celebrity card," Oprah didn't waste any time to smooth over the situation, in the new season of her syndicated TV show, she had on as guest Robert Chavez, the CEO from Hermes' Paris boutique. Oprah then got the apology she had demanded in front of her millions of viewers. You can read more of the story here.

and Remember when Oprah took on the beef industry? In 1996 she said she would not eat beef anymore and advised people not to eat it because of the madcow sickness outbreak in Europe. Oprah was accused of creating a "lynch mob mentality" among members of her studio audience to produce a "scary" story in order to get higher TV ratings. Read more here.

and Remember too when Oprah was lauded for that free car give away to her audience when it was actually Pontiac that donated the cars? In what was supposed to be a publicity stunt for Pontiac got backfired into an "all praise Oprah" by the media. Naturally, Oprah failed to mention that part to her audience and the fact that they would all be on the hook for taxes, license fees and delivery charges which came to about $7000. Continue reading here.
Now who's saying,
"Geez ... gimme a break! ... Oprah, can you help us?"

For those interested, there are many more comments on other Oprah Wifrey Shows here, and see her biography here.

    J-O-K-E  of  the  M-O-N-T-H

The non-competitiveness of the Cleveland Indians baseball team during the 1960s, 70s, and 80s became a subject for humor.

A standard joke of the time had a Judge asking a child in a parental custody battle which parent he preferred to live with.

The child says neither one, they both beat me. The Judge then asks the child who he does want to live with and the answer is "the Cleveland Indians, they don't beat anybody."

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« Computer Tips: »

How to Update Video Drivers?
-» First, find the make of your Video Card by:
-» Right-Click on your Desktop,
-» Click on Properties / Settings / Advanced / Adapter
-» Note your adapter type.
-» Second, Go Download the latest driver (example NVIDIA)
(If there aren't instructions at the download site, or if the driver isn't self installing, save/unzip the driver to it's very own folder.)
-» Thirdly, Uninstall your current adapter by:
-» Go to Go to START / SETTINGS / CONTROL PANEL / SYSTEM / (Hardware Tab) / DEVICE MANAGER, Double Click on DISPLAY ADAPTERS, Click the Adapter, Click the Remove Button and Reboot.
-» You will be prompted by Windows to install "New Hardware Found". If the driver is self installing, CANCEL that window, and double-click the self installer. Otherwise, click Next / Search For... and Specify the Location by Browsing to the folder for the driver that you saved. Once the drivers have been installed, Windows will ask you to restart your computer to complete the changes. Allow Windows to restart. Once you are back in Windows, you are done with the driver installation.
HINT: Do not run virus protection software in the background while installing the drivers. This prevents the driver from configuring itself properly. More help at TotallyDrivers.com

File Corruption in your Email ...
Whenever we hear warnings of threats to email, it's usually about viruses, worms or trojan horses but there is yet another - less discussed threat to our email called "file corruption." File Corruption is a term for damage to a file that prevents a computer program from being able to use it. For Outlook Express users, file corruption often means the disappearance of entire folders of saved e-mail. In an article by Tom Koch, he explains the common causes of corruption, how to avoid it, and how to recover messages if it occurs. Read his article here.

Time for a Quiz:
♫
What do they have in common?

- click here for answer -

You may know them by:
S.C. is Sharon Newman
T.B. is Lauren Fenmore
A.H. is Victoria Newman
L.B. is Christine Blair
and E.D. is Ashley Abbott

They're actresses on the
daytime soap opera
The Young and The Restless

Read Biographies at
Soap City.

(to hide the answer, click it again)

Did You Know?

A Quick Weather Forecast

To see weather conditions and a four-day forecast for your city or town, go to Google.com,
then type in the search box ...
weather (and your zip code)

15 minutes of Internet fame ...
MSN Filter is your one-stop shop for the inside scoop on what's happening across the Web, according to the people who know the most ... YOU! Whether it's music, sports, TV, style or technology, our team of bloggers will filter the best stories, photographs, links and other interesting tidbits that you've sent in. This is an opportunity to share your insider knowledge with the Filter community and get your 15 minutes of Internet fame.

How to keep PCs running like new ...
With Vista, the new client version of  Windows due next year, Microsoft is addressing what's become a sad truth for most people: PCs run more slowly over time. Vista will automatically de-fragment hard disks, make better use of memory to more quickly load programs, and include a new performance control panel that will identify performance bottlenecks, according to the company.

The goal is to keep PCs running like new long after they're purchased. "Certainly a year after a user gets a Vista system, if they do the sort of standard things we encourage users to do (install Windows updates, etc.), it should run the same as when they initially got it," said a group program manager in Microsoft's Windows division. See an overview of the features at Microsoft Windows Vista.

this just in:

Xbox 360 ...
to be available Nov. 22 Xbox.com

... also more and more ...
Bankruptcy clients ...
are flocking to file for creditor protection prior to the Oct. 17 start of a strict new federal bankruptcy law. See the most FAQ of Bankruptcy here.

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