Music types categorized by dancing cats . . . I LOVE IT! Techno cat, Stoner rock cat, Stevie Wonder Cat, Metal cats, house cat, hip-hop cat and iCat , can you tell which is which? Which cat are you . . .

 

 

 

 

The current exhibit, Painting under Pressure: A look at Graffiti which is being shown being shown at the Art Gallery of Calgary, located at 117 - 8 Ave. S.W., has succeeded in bringing the colorful street art of Graffiti indoors.

 

Local artist, Mandi Carter, is excited to see this kind of exhibit in a Calgary museum and says that legal wall space needs to be made available in the city for graffiti artists to practice and display their art.

 

“People need to express them selves freely and a creative mind can do so in many ways. As an artist I simply feel that if an area were available, a lot of positive aspects could come of it.” Said Carter.

 

The purpose of the exhibit, which consists of eight pieces created by some of Canada’s top graffiti artists, is to provide skilled and artistic pieces to the public for closer examination.

 

The primary goal is to educate people about the facts and history of graffiti as an artistic endeavor and form of expression as oppose to an illegal act.

 

Carter suggests that perhaps the problem of the illegal writing of graffiti on city and private property wouldn’t be such an issue if the city made some wall space available for local graffiti artists to practice and display their work.

 

Just as studios are made available for the practice of conventional art forms, the same space could be made available for graffiti artists to work.

 

“It would be good to just have a place to portray our, emotions and feelings -political or non-political opinions- either way you look at it, it’s expressions in an art form.” Said Carter.

 

After researching the possible availability of a program such as this in the city, the only program I found that offers legal wall space to aspiring artists is called Urban Youth Worx but there’s a catch . . . or two.

 

The first catch is in the name, Youth Urban Worx, the maximum age to join this program is 19, and this therefore excludes artists in their twenties and up.

 

The second catch, ironically enough, is that the Urban Youth Worx program was developed by the city as an anti-graffiti campaign.

 

This program was developed as an effort to appeal to young artists who, instead of writing graffiti illegally on private property, can practice their art in a “positive” way by joining this group and painting murals on pre-approved walls and buildings around Calgary.

 

City of Calgary graffiti management co-coordinator, Karen Hirl says that the Urban Youth Worx is the only alternative that will be made available to graffiti artists.

 

When asked about making free walls in the city available, Hirl dismissed the idea saying that if it starts with one wall it will only spread on to more walls when all the free wall space is full.

 

 

 

So basically, to sum it up, if graffiti artists want to express themselves legally- joining Youth Worx to paint on city property is the only way they’re going to be able to do it.

 

If graffiti artists are caught in the act painting on public property without permission, they will be fined a steep fee that can reach up to as high as $5000 dollars.

 

But I have to ask- what’s the big deal with having walls around the city to showcase raw talent and artistic skill anyway? 

According to the city of Calgary Website the problem is this “graffiti is vandalism, and therefore a crime.  Graffiti is not art; it is the defacing of property without consent from the property owner.”

In the minds of city officials, graffiti is simply vandalism and no form of art, but did they ever stop to think that the main form of “art” that they allow to be displayed on city streets, in the opinion of some, is another form of vandalism?

 

“Advertisements are all over the cities, in my opinion polluting our youth’s minds with ideologies, negative and or unhealthy images or unnecessary materials.” Says carter.

 

“They are consuming our streets and are only there to represent or promote something, which is often only a means to making money; what ever happen to having a city with Character? Or just plain old being different?” she asks.

 

Clearly a debate that is going to take some time to settle, the question is where does graffiti belong.

 

Under bridges or on city walls- is it an art form or just straight vandalism?  Only you can make the decision for your self.

 

The exhibit, Painting under Pressure is meant just for that- open since December 10, 2005 and on display until May 21, 2006, it is the perfect opportunity to get a look at good graffiti up close. 

 

Amongst the pieces, created in the Gallery especially for this show, are other artifacts and informational tools meant to help the average Joe better understand graffiti and decide where it has a place in Calgary.

 

But as Mandi Carter says “it is unfortunate that those of us who are true graffiti Muralists have to set our selves apart from those who don’t understand the meaning of freedom of expression and an opinion expressed as an art form.”

 

 

 Giving Hope - One Animal at a time
 By Sarah Woren

 

 Just seven to eight weeks old when they were picked up and saved from freezing to death in a rural area outside of Calgary, Shepherd Cross siblings Brando, Cash and their sister Diva are now three months old and doing great.

 With the loving care of their foster mother Jody Kardash, an experienced volunteer foster with the Animal Rescue Foundation, these three well-behaved puppies are growing into healthy, happy dogs.

Opening her home to foster dogs for over a year now and already on her twentieth litter of pups, Jody says “it’s hard work . . . but it’s worth it.”

 Brando, Cash and Diva are just three of the 2725 dogs that have been rescued so far by the Animal Rescue Foundation and given another chance at life.

The Animal Rescue Foundation (ARF) may be the smallest animal rescue organization here in Calgary but one thing’s for sure, it has the biggest heart.

The specific mission of the good people at ARF is to rescue stray and abandoned cats and dogs from Alberta’s rural areas and get them into loving homes.

A process that begins with the rescue of and rehabilitation of an animal - in most cases ends with a lucky pet living a happy life with a loving family,

The pending placement of an animal relies on its physical and mental condition upon its rescue, “Where they go depends on the state they’re when they’re picked up, some are in pretty bad shape” said Janyce Rideout, a member on the Board of Directors for ARF.

In the case of Crash, a puppy that found was severely injured and left for dead in a ditch, help came just in time.  Suffering a fractured skull, which has caused blindness in his right eye, deafness in is right ear and some brain damage, Crash now occasionally experiences seizures due to scarring on his brain and he will be on medication for the rest of his life.  However, despite the sad beginning to Crash’s life, he has been adopted and his owners say he has grown into a loving and happy dog that is doing very well.

An animal in need of emergency medical attention will be taken to a veterinarian where it will stay until it is ready to be moved to a foster home - where it will remain temporarily until it is adopted. 

Animals that are in good condition will be placed in a holding home, a short-term stop where animals are cleaned up and tested for any medical problems.

Once an animal is evaluated and receives a clean bill of health, it is assigned to a foster home where it receives its shots and is spayed or neutered while it is cared for as it awaits adoption.

Foster homes are the main reason for the success of ARF, unable to afford a main facility in which to house rescued cats and dogs, ARF completely relies on foster homes as havens to keep and care for the animals.

Unfortunately, the number of foster homes available for these animals is minimal; with only 25 homes reserved for dogs and 22 for cats Rideout said “there’s not enough, we definitely need more foster homes.”

Out of the small number of foster homes, the amount of homes active at one time ends up being even less because as Rideout said “we make foster homes take breaks between animals for family time and if they have other pets or else volunteers burn out.”

When the time for adoption comes, prospective adopters are required to take 24 hours to think about adopting after they have applied over the phone in a process that takes about half an hour.

The next step involves two visits with the pet, one at the foster home and one at the adopter’s home -with at least 24 hours separating each visit.

Taking into consideration the chemistry between animal and adopter as well as the required living conditions in the potential home, the foster then decides whether or not the adoption will take place.

“It’s a long process but it’s necessary to make sure the animals go to the right homes.” said Rideout.

The cost of adoption is $180.00 for dogs and $120.00 for cats, this cost pays for the animal’s first shots, spaying or neutering, and licensing for dogs; cats do not yet require licensing.

Started in July 1995 as a charitable organization, ARF today still remains a registered non-profit charity run completely by volunteers whose primary concern is the welfare of the animals.

ARF’s success heavily relies on charitable funding received from corporate and private donations as well as fundraising done throughout the year including annual calendar sales and other charitable events.

The annual budget for ARF is based on the amount of donations received yearly and fluctuates accordingly; last year’s budget alone was $35,000. 

Fortunately, the proceeds raised by the sale of ARF’s popular annual calendar contribute to the budget, last year’s sales brought in $3300 towards the cause.

All of the funds raised are used to pay for the costs of vet care as well as the cost of food and medical care incurred while the animals are cared for in foster homes.

ARF also welcomes donations of kennels/crates (particularly large ones), dog/cat beds, scratching posts, puppy pens, cat litter and boxes, dog and cat food treats, a digital camera, dog houses, blankets, towels; go to http://www.arf.ab.ca/  for more information on how to send in or drop of donations.
ARF is always looking for and is in serious need of people interested in opening their homes to fostering rescued animals.

If you would like to become a foster, the application process is not difficult; you can either call 403 243 1910 or check out fostering.dogs@arf.ab.ca or fostering.cats@arf.ab.ca for more information.

If you are interested in volunteering your time or any other services you can go to volunteering@arf.ab.ca to fill out an application; all that is required is a few references and a little spare time that, in the end will make a big difference.

 

 

Who is Xenu?

 

I’m going to tell you a story. Are you sitting comfortably? Right, then I’ll begin.

 

Once upon a time (75 million years ago to be more precise) there was an alien galactic ruler named Xenu. Xenu was in charge of all the planets in this part of the galaxy including our own planet Earth, except in those days it was called Teegeeack.

 

 

Xenu took over complete control with the help of renegades to defeat the good people and the Loyal Officers. Then with the help of psychiatrists he called in billions of people for income tax inspections where they were instead given injections of alcohol and glycol mixed to paralyse them. Then they were put into space planes that looked exactly like DC8s (except they had rocket motors instead of propellers).

 

These DC8 space planes then flew to planet Earth where the paralysed people were stacked around the bases of volcanoes in their hundreds of billions. When they had finished stacking them around then H-bombs were lowered into the volcanoes. Xenu then detonated all the H-bombs at the same time and everyone was killed.

 

The story doesn’t end there though. Since everyone has a soul (called a “thetan” in this story) then you have to trick souls into not coming back again. So while the hundreds of billions of souls were being blown around by the nuclear winds he had special electronic traps that caught all the souls in electronic beams (the electronic beams were sticky like fly-paper).

 

After he had captured all these souls he had them packed into boxes and taken to a few huge cinemas. There all the souls had to spend days watching special 3D motion pictures that told them what life should be like and many confusing things. In this film they were shown false pictures and told they were God, The Devil and Christ. In the story this process is called “implanting”.

 

When the films ended and the souls left the cinema these souls started to stick together because since they had all seen the same film they thought they were the same people. They clustered in groups of a few thousand. Now because there were only a few living bodies left they stayed as clusters and inhabited these bodies.

 

As for Xenu, the Loyal Officers finally overthrew him and they locked him away in a mountain on one of the planets. He is kept in by a force-field powered by an eternal battery and Xenu is still alive today.

 

That is the end of the story. And so today everyone is full of these clusters of souls called “body thetans”. And if we are to be a free soul then we have to remove all these “body thetans” and pay lots of money to do so. And the only reason people believe in God and Christ was because it was in the film their body thetans saw 75 million years ago.

 

Well what did you think of that story?

 

What? You thought it was a stupid story?

 

Well so do we. Unfortunately this stupid story is the core belief in the religion known as Scientology.* If people knew about this story then most people would never get involved in it. This story is told to you when you reach one of their secret levels called OT III. After that you are supposed to telepathically communicate with these body thetans to make them go away. You have to pay a lot of money to get to this level and do this (or you have to work very hard for the organisation on extremely low pay for many years).

 

We are telling you this story as a warning. If you become involved with Scientology then we would like you to do so with your eyes open and fully aware of the sort of material it contains.

 Most of the Scientologists that work in their Dianetics* centres and so called “Churches” of Scientology do not know this story since they are not allowed to hear it until they reach the secret “upper” levels of Scientology. It may take them many years before they reach this level if they ever do. The ones who do know it are forced to keep it a secret and not tell it to those people who are joining   Scientology.

 

Now you have read this you know their big secret. Don’t let us put you off joining though.

 

ISN'T THAT FUCKED UP?!  For my info on the craziness that is this religion and other interesting tid bits, visit www.xenu.net. 

 

 

After popular demand. . . here is the space to go to to find out how to add all the cool stuff to your space, including media player!  Go to this link  http://spaces.msn.com/members/d3vmax/PersonalSpace.aspx?_c=

This guy know everything about hacking your msn space!

 

Enjoy :)