Hm, Hummer, Little Hummer.

I went to a "Your Marketing Sucks" seminar yesterday, one of the speakers was from GM's Hummer Division. So, considering all the sexual content in media these days, that everyone's always bitching about, don't you think they'd've come up with a less R-rated name; especially for the child's version? Daddy's HUGE Hummer, Mommy's tight Hummer garage, Baby's Little Hummer toy. Hm.

Fictionwise has great ebooks! Yes, hold in your hands and read ebooks.

Fictionwise has great ebooks!
Fictionwise has great ebooks!

Somedays One Needs to Be a Two-Year Old Adult, Because What Good is Complete Self-less-ness ... If You Loose Yourself?

My music, my life, my heart, my soul
My music, my everything, I give my all
My wife, my daughter, my love, my dream
My mother, my father, my brother, my team
My camp, my squad, my house, my car
My boat, my shoes, my pants, my shirt
My coke, my sugar, my cream, my butter
My toast, my all, my queen, my folks

[Chorus: Samuel Christian]
My baby!
Walk like six strings talk like she's my everything
My baby!
Loves me, hates me, leaves me, runs right right, that sexy...
Baby!
All I know, she shed's all my confusion, so...
My baby!
Will not run from anything, I swear, this goes

[Knoc-Turn'al talking]
Lord will lay me down to sleep
I pray the Lord my soul to keep
Cause if you die before I wake
I pray the Lord my soul to take

[Knoc-Turn'al]
She's thick, she's bad, so clean, she fine
She loves, she hates, she laughs, she cries
She hurts, she lies, she's Bonnie, I'm Clyde
She's ghetto, she's real, she sings, she rhymes

She comes, she goes, she lives, she dies
She sexy and bomb, she blows my mind
She stays in line, she's smart, she's funny
She's crafty and cunning, in the game she's running
Her lips, her back, her waist, her thighs
Her face, her skin, her hair, her eyes
Her voice, her shape, her hips, her mind
Her love, her smile, her touch, her time

[Chorus]

[Knoc-Turn'al]
I'm typsy, I'm through, I'm drunk, I'm blunted
My way, my day, my life - I love it
I move, I groove, I shake, I love it
My friends, my kins, I like, I love it
I show, I prove, I live, I learn
I show, I teach, I run these streets
My kin, my heart, my heat
My rhythm, my rap, my beat
My life, my head and my feet
My heart, my soul, my candy, my cake
My platinum, my gold, my land, my gate
My Benz, my lake
My keys, my money, my love, my hate
My clothes, my phone, my house, my home
My money, my comb
My sugar, my spice, my base, my chrome
My rhythm, my music, my home
My world, my girl, my life, my home, my...

Artist: Knoc-Turn'al
Song: Muzik

feat. Samuel Christian
http://www.stlyrics.com/lyrics/thetransporter/muzik.htm

from The Transporter Soundtrack

Copy this MATRIX: REVOLUTIONS review and more by Stephen Simon, the Mystical Messenger

http://www.themessenger.info/MarApril2004/StephenSimon.html

“Everything that has a beginning must have an end.” Or does it?

The groundbreaking MATRIX series (but not its impact) comes to a conclusion with MATRIX: REVOLUTIONS and I believe it will be remembered for decades to come as a seminal step forward in the potential of Spiritual Cinema to remind us of the complex beauty and paradox of our humanity. Regardless of what you have heard or what you may have felt about MATRIX: RELOADED, there is magic and mystery in this film that rivals and, in some ways such as its brilliant and paradoxical ending, surpasses the original MATRIX.

The visuals in MATRIX are dazzling and majestic, but it has always been the philosophical and metaphysical musings of the MATRIX trilogy that have made the series so extraordinary. REVOLUTIONS illuminates both the challenges and breathtaking opportunities of humanity on the brink of knowing the unknowable––on the brink of, but not yet ever quite complete. As is said in the film––”I didn’t know…but I did believe”––The human experiment, the “illusion” of life, the ephemeral nature of our notions of reality. Emotions and glimpses of the potential answers to our existence are tantalizing, yet never so obvious as to rob us of our individual right to create and interpret our own reality.

========

March/April 2004

It’s that time of the year again––Academy Awards. I do not consider these the “best” 5 films of the year because I don’t think you can quantify “best” when it comes to film. There are films we either like or don’t like. I know that some of you may be surprised and/or disappointed that some films are missing from this list (like SEABISCUIT, LOST IN AMERICA, and BIG FISH). I just need to reiterate that the films on the list below are the films that I liked the best in 2003 and are, I believe, films that fit the criteria of asking who we are and why we’re here––and ALSO have us leaving the theater feeling at least a little bit better about being a human being.

The descriptions below are greatly condensed. To review the complete discussions of these films go to www.movingmessagesmedia.com/current.htm
To join our email list go to www.movingmessagesmedia.com/emaillist.html.


WHALE RIDER

This was simply my favorite film of 2003. When an old paradigm dies, a void in time is created and that twilight space becomes a magical opportunity for all those who have been born into it. The new paradigm is still but a ray of sun on a distant horizon and it is that light that sustains us in the unknown of that suspended moment in time. Just as the power of paradox lies in the space in between solution and resolution, powerful transcendence awaits all those who feel their hearts pulled to the call of that “swing between worlds.”

Pai, the thirteen-year old heroine of WHALE RIDER, guides us through her own experience of that moment of transformation. She hears the call of ancient whales that draw her and us into a film that is haunting, prophetic, and groundbreaking.

As Spiritual Cinema, WHALE RIDER is a metaphor for the majesty of this epoch into which we have all chosen to be born. As the early days of this new millennium unfold, old traditions are changing and outdated belief systems are being challenged and dismantled. Entrenched ways of thinking and responding to each other and the world around us are being confronted by courageous souls such as Pai and, as a result, our world is evolving and reaching up its arms to the approaching dawn of that new paradigm whose light bathes our faces in the reflection of the wisdom of such films as WHALE RIDER.


LOVE, ACTUALLY

“The” Holidays…Family…Close friends…The end of one year and the beginning of a new one. A time when one’s heart may be at its most vulnerable––either fully open to the warmth of all the love that the season can imply, or, perhaps, fully susceptible to the loneliness that can seem almost unbearable in the longing for family, a significant other, health, or peace of mind.

Now, a new film has arisen which may, take its place as a classic Holiday film. LOVE, ACTUALLY begins with a sequence at Heathrow Airport in London where the joyful greetings of families and loved ones is observed with a wonderful voice-over that puts the film itself in early perspective. Even with all the anger and hate that is blared at us in our every day world, Writer/Director Richard Curtis poignantly observes that, “even after the planes hit the twin towers”, the messages from people who were on those planes were not those of hate or revenge but rather that “love is, actually, all round us.”

There have been so few films this year that you walk out of feeling happy and proud to simply be a human being that LOVE, ACTUALLY came along in this particular season as a welcome and refreshing reminder of the beauty of our humanity…that, above all the strife and challenges that confront us, we have this unique and endless capacity to consciously immerse ourselves in the experience of love––for one another, and for ourselves.


MATRIX: REVOLUTIONS

“Everything that has a beginning must have an end.” Or does it?

The groundbreaking MATRIX series (but not its impact) comes to a conclusion with MATRIX: REVOLUTIONS and I believe it will be remembered for decades to come as a seminal step forward in the potential of Spiritual Cinema to remind us of the complex beauty and paradox of our humanity. Regardless of what you have heard or what you may have felt about MATRIX: RELOADED, there is magic and mystery in this film that rivals and, in some ways such as its brilliant and paradoxical ending, surpasses the original MATRIX.

The visuals in MATRIX are dazzling and majestic, but it has always been the philosophical and metaphysical musings of the MATRIX trilogy that have made the series so extraordinary. REVOLUTIONS illuminates both the challenges and breathtaking opportunities of humanity on the brink of knowing the unknowable––on the brink of, but not yet ever quite complete. As is said in the film––”I didn’t know…but I did believe”––The human experiment, the “illusion” of life, the ephemeral nature of our notions of reality. Emotions and glimpses of the potential answers to our existence are tantalizing, yet never so obvious as to rob us of our individual right to create and interpret our own reality.


AMERICAN SPLENDOR

What a wonderful and enchanting surprise this film is! AMERICAN SPLENDOR traces the true-life story of Harvey Pekar who became an underground comic book hero in the 1980s. The comic books are very appropriately called AMERICAN SPLENDOR and they detail Harvey’s every day life––working as a file clerk in a Cleveland Hospital and generally feeling like the world was created to personally torment him.

The title of the film and comic books themselves is a wonderful commentary on the journey into the every day Cleveland life of its protagonists. These characters are people we meet all the time in our lives and, for me, are truly representative of the heart of America––hardworking people, who long for their place in the sun and for someone who they can love and who will love them. They are Survivors of countless encounters with the ordinary ups and downs of every day life; optimists, who strive every day to keep that optimism alive in the face of disappointment, even heartbreak. I heartily and wholeheartedly recommend AMERICAN SPLENDOR as a fascinating and original film in a time where this kind of innovation is rare and, when it does appear, is usually translated from a dark perspective.


UNDER THE TUSCAN SUN

Spiritual Cinema asks who we are and why we are here and illuminates our human condition in images, thoughts, and feelings that inspire us to strive for who we can be as a species, when we operate at our very best. When movies touch upon all those issues, they resonate deeply within us. Such was my response to UNDER THE TUSCAN SUN which revolves around a subject matter rarely even approached today in mainstream films: women over forty who divorce, are divorced (or widowed), or who simply have chosen to be alone until that time of their lives.

Feel familiar? It just might. Divorce has become an unfortunate fact of life in America and countless numbers of women have been faced with the dilemma of having defined their lives for themselves in one way (often through their spouses) and then being forced to confront a whole new set of challenges as their marriages dissolve. The movies have touched upon the subject matter, certainly, and there was even that apocryphal story referred to in SLEEPLESS IN SEATTLE comparing the chances of a woman over forty getting remarried to the chances of being attacked by a terrorist. Don’t worry…as it is with the most painful and wrenching passages of our lives, TUSCAN SUN ultimately becomes a poignant, inspiring, and empowering reminder of the resiliency and determination of the human soul.

STEPHEN SIMON has produced such films as Somewhere in Time and What Dreams May Come and has just produced and directed INDIGO www.Indgiothemovie.com. His book The Force is With You: Mystical Movie Messages That Inspire Our Lives, published by Walsh Books/Hampton Roads, is now available. As the Founder of the Institute for Spiritual Entertainment, Stephen has become a leading spokesperson for the recognition of Spiritual Cinema as a genre and leads seminars, telecourses, and inspirational Mystical Movie events. Please visit www.Movingmessagesmedia.com. Stephen welcomes your comments by email: Stephen @Movingmessagesmedia.com

READ his THE FORCE IS WITH YOU: Mystical Movie Messages That Inspire Our Lives
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1571743499/themessenger-20/103-3483631-5918265?creative=125581&camp=2321&link_code=as1

A taxing, tax day did you know fact, shamelessly [but credited] stolen.

From Get Published! Issue 72, April 15, 2004
Date: Thu, 15 Apr 2004 12:39:44 -0400
Penny C. Sansevieri, Editor, penny@booksbypen.com

Tax Day - Did You Know?

It might seem like the worst day of the year to many but be glad you didn`t live in Belgium during the middle ages. Why? Well a popular Belgian city is named after a taxing way the Flemish government once collected their dues. Antwerp comes from two words "hand" and "werp" which literally translated means "hand throw." If you lived in Belgium during the middle ages and couldn`t pay your taxes your right hand was chopped off and thrown in the Schelde river which runs through this bustling city. Don`t believe us? Check out the fine statue in the center of Antwerp dedicated to this, eh, painful tradition.

Tax extension anyone?

"But 'The Matrix Trilogy' didn't end the way I thought it would. 'Reloaded' sucked, and 'Revolutions' blew," quoth the Whiner.

So what, who cares. You suck, you blow. You were obviously wrong, dude. Crack a philosophy tome from Castaneda, Cayce, Lynn V Andrews, any shamanistic thing you can get into your boxed mind. There is no box. Oh, and "there is no spoon", which means there is no boxed you.

Or get a complete boxed set of the "Xena: Warrior Princess" series when available. You'll get all these concepts and the Matrix ones all in a pretty and violently fun package--who am I, how can I redeem myself, where do I fit in, love, friendship, culture versus anticulture, heaven, hell, gods, demons, good, bad, ugly, beautiful, and sacrifice. And more.

Simplest: you're used to the long, twenty minute, American film battle coming at the end of "Die Hard", "Terminator", and the like; but, the Wachowskis, Keanu Reeves, and the good rest gave it to us in the middle of "The Matrix: Reloaded", confusing you whiners terribly. Wait for it. In a week, a year, a decade you'll finally go, "Ah, I get it."

Simplest: you're used to the American, white, male hero kicking ass, wisecracking, being cocky and surviving to leave with the trophy girl of his convenience for implied celebration sex after the FADE OUT. Wrong. Neo's not so American, not so Anglo, nonwise-acre, uncocky [especially out of the Matrix], who doesn't leave with the girl ... unless you count meeting her again on the flipside. He's very male hero but in a softer, understanding, hesitant manner.

Simplest: whether turning the other cheek for Christ, loving your enemy as you would love yourself, or pulling a full Christlike, Taoist "Art of War" and welcoming your enemy to overrun you. And, of course, the greedy bastard will, and did. When Smith overtakes Neo, our hero is winning by accepting, conquering by attrition, as Old Testament and feminine as giving the appearance of being defenseless in order to accept and welcome your enemy into your tent to feed and succor him, and then putting a spike through his lulled and sleeping brain. [Yep, that's in your local "Holy Bible"]

That's the final battle, the final stroke of the Wachowski/Reeves/Neo genius, the scene so many think is anticlimactic, after the overwhelming shoot-em-up.

The machines / human war in Zion couldn't be the final conflict, because it was plainly always Custer dead at the Little Big Horn, the English out-warred at Roarke's Bluff in Zulu land.

Only a full connection and peace treaty between enemies to rid themselves of an outside aberational imbalance, Smith, that one connection and peace treaty made only by and controlled by Neo, the one Tank and other said is "a machine" HAS THE POWER AND CONTROL to end the war. Not thousands of dead men de-activated machines. Not you lose and we win. Morpheus didn't foresee it and neither do the whiners see it still. One person facing the ugliness he made and re-embracing it into himself, becoming it but being stronger than it. [Agent Smith had been already changing but Neo inadvertently made him into just Smith, who became out of control]

"But that's middle of the road talk!"

No, that is balance. To Walk In Beauty. The Tao. Yin. Yang. Female. Male. No. Yes. All. Walking upright and strong and seeing all around, from ground to sky, not crawling on your weak belly unable to see anything but mud and worms.

Oh, and never make the mistake as I've heard many say, that because since they don't get it then Mr. Keanu Reeves doesn't. The guy, who brought to life sweet Ted "Theodore", the enlightened Buddha, the willful devil's lawyer, insecure and violent Donnie Barksdale, the two-faced prince in Idaho, and so many more spiritual cinema heroes and villains gets it. He gets it big time. The question is what does KCR know that you don't, if you're supposedly more brilliant than he?

Thank your enemies.

Always thank your enemies. I had one at my day job at JPMorgan Chase; before she was fired during the last merger purge. My group had had a private office a floor up, it was decided to save rent and we were moved within sight and sound of said busybody woman, a passive aggressive aggressor. I hated it. we'd moved from seven rooms in a private suite to three offices for my guys and a very public cube for me, which PEOPLE KEPT WALKING THROUGH; close enough to be struck in the crotch if I stretched at an inopportune time.

No matter how much I hated it and I did like some of it, no matter what I did--remember I'd had extra storage in the suite, now all of which was being assimilated and stacked in one cubicle--she was displeased. She didn't want me in her sight. A suggestion by her was made. I said nothing, which is what you do to make the final sale, when things are surprisingly, actually going your way. So, to end story, to get me out of her view, I was given a private office next to my guys. Good, I write and publish erotica [okayed by my bosses] while tending to regular Middle Market business.

So, remember PIE: Perception Is Everything and thank your enemies. --Neale