A RARE CONFESSION
Yes, it's true that YOE missed the beginning on the meeting (never explain, I'm told). Thus I rely on the printed agenda supplied by Prexy STEVE, and hereby state that GENE PRINDLE was scheduled to lead the Pledge, which I assume he did. Next was the song, and while I arrived as it was going on, all I can be sure of was that the leader was PP STEVE DAY and accompanist Three-Finger JACK. DAVE MATSON gave an excellent Invocation - and is it just me, or do you also get the impression that he has done this sort of thing before? FLOYD DEWHIRST introduced our Visiting Rotarian, Gerald P. Smith, who, I think, hails from the China Town Club in New York. SUSAN ALLEN introduced another Scholar, . And of course GEORGE DEA had a Special Guest, Khin Vohn, Assistant VP of Union Bank. This apparently caused the bell to toll for him, Prexy STEVE leading him to admit to the purchase of a new car. We now learn that such significant events, if reported directly to the President, qualify for a lesser fine than if the good news is gleaned from second-hand sources. GEORGE, however, trying vainly to defend himself, claimed that the car was only a favor from PP STEVE SCHERER. This piteous plea enabled him to be nicked for just 75 clams - and someone at our table remarked that that wouldn't even cover his first maintenance service.

BITS AND PIECES
Prexy STEVE read a letter from DG Reka Shetty of Kerala State in India, thanking us for our support of their armless artist. MARK BLOCK was also warmly thanked for hosting the Board Meeting this past Tuesday evening - but no one seems to know how they clean - or even dust - the center of that wonderful marble table in the Board Room at MARK'S firm. ELLIOTT TURNER was called upon to speak in defense of his occupation, which is Mortgage Ban king. He has helped several of our members with their mortgages, and as he says, they are all pleased - so far, at least. RUDY ALVAREZ reminded us to get our reports on Committee Activity in to him for the Awards Book, plus noting that his International Service Committee will meet next week at 11:15 - that's Feb 22nd.

HARLAN LEWIS announced the upcoming Yearling Breakfast on March 6th, at the Holiday Inn at Sunset and the freeway - EVERY new member should plan on being there, please. JIM GREATHEAD reminded us that the next District Breakfast would be March 27th. And last, PETER MORE spoke about the District Conference, which will be held at the Newporter Hotel in Newport starting 26 April. PP DOUG DESCH has applications. And February birthdays were noted - ((Jan, this info will follow, as will the name of Susan Allen's guest, OK?))

OUR VALENTINES BRUNCH
While he was up there already, PETER MORE won applause for this fun event at Shanghai Red's this past Saturday. 74 attended, with the following members contributing to a most successful celebration. PDG AND ANDERSON suggested the place, and it was a real find. The centerpiece was Pat Anderson's idea, assisted by Shirley More. BOB YOUNKER noted it on our Web Page, plus supplying animation for the flyer. PP RALPH WOODWORTH was the on-scene Major Domo.

Hospitality was aided by GEORGE DEA, Prexy STEVE, PDG ANDY, and the aforementioned RALPH WOODWORTH. And as always, PP JIM DOWNIE'S music was the hit of the day. Two anniversaries - ROZ and DON NELSONS 50th, and DORIS GREATHEAD'S 90th birthday. A final kudo to PP JOHN SINGLETON, who started the whole thing eons ago.

ART HENRY'S -"CALL A COLLEAGUE"
This has been briefly mentioned before, but here is more information. ART has put together a small team of confidential counselors, who are available to assist members who may have a variety of personal problems. They will not only "lend an ear" but are trained to help with the kind of problems that sometimes come up. Remember, this is entirely confidential, and it all starts by calling ART at (310) 391-3594,

DICK LITTLESTONE is updating the convenient one-page members list, and if you have not already done so, please provide him with all your data - business and home phone, fax, & email address since this should be ready for publication by early March.

We had a lovely note from Marian Tseng, thanking us for our concern and support after the recent loss of her sister, Jean Davidson-Austen.

SAN ANTONIO CONVENTION
Check this - GEORGE DEA has gathered 24 members and friends for this event, starting on 24 June. Those going include (with some spouses), WALLY FISCHMANN, KEN KILPO, PETER MORE, HENRY TSENG, VICTOR HSIA, PP HOWARD SISKEL, HENRIETTA LIAN, NORA AQUINO, TED IHNEN, RO SHAW, RUDY ALVAREZ, BILL PIERCE and RON LYSTER - these last two by motorcycle! Most will be staying at the Westin Hotel. A minor problem here - Prexy STEVE will be out of town for what would otherwise be the last meeting of his term, on June 28th, and Prez Elect GEORGE won't be back in time to chair the meeting. The obvious candidate to 'get back into harness' is Senior PP JIM COLLINS - so JIM, are you available, please? Call PP DOUG DESCH, either way, OK?

VAL ZAVALA of KCET
was our Speaker and was introduced by PP RALPH WOODWORTH. After graduating from Yale in Latin American Studies, she got a Masters at American University in Washington D.C. in Journalism, and later received a fellowship to the John S. Knight School of Journalism at Stanford. Val is Vice President of News and Public Affairs at KCET, having joined them in 1987. She has received an Emmy and a Golden Mike Award, plus the coveted Imagine Award for excellence in her field.

With the wide variety of news that she covers, she felt it might be worthwhile to review the 12-hour period immediately following the close of the Polls on November 7th. It was a busy time, as we all recall. Voters News Service (henceforth referred to as VNS) is designed to collect poll results, and then supply that information to the various TV stations, all of which subscribe to this service. Starting at 1 p.m., with the first third of data in, they reported that Gore had lost Pennsylvania. At 2:47, they reported an Alert, and at 4:p.m., problems with statistics. Yet at 4:05, Dan Rather said their results "could be taken to the bank"! All news services want to be FIRST, of course, and when the polls in the east closed at 7 p.m., they had some data from 9 states.

By 7:40 VNS was ready to declare Gore the winner, with exit data from just 45 precincts out of a total of 58 THOUSAND precincts. CNN doubted this result, and of course the Bush people said, "Hey, wait a minute". By 8:15 they canceled this tally, but at 10 p.m. VNS still had Gore winning in Florida. At 10:13 they retracted that call, since they had not counted the absentee ballots. Rather was by then referring to this as "The Dance of Democracy". At 2 a.m. with 96% of the vote counted (in Florida) Bush was ahead by 24K, and 15 minutes later, ahead by 48K. At 2:30, Fox projects Bush as the winner, and the others followed. "Governor Bush will appear about 3:15" but apparently it was about this time that Gore withdrew his telephone concession, so of course Bush didn't appear. At 3:27 the difference was much narrower, and at 3:45 a recount was called for. Rather then pleads, "Don't Shoot the Piano Player" and at 4:10, he admitted, "we don't know what to do".

Part of the problem with all this 'Lets be FIRST' driven psychology is the time differential between the east and west coast - we will never know how many in the west gave up voting, once they 'learned' that Gore had already won. Of course this is all driven by the egos of the anchors - none of whom like egg on their face.

Q&A - Is the head of VNS still on the job? Unknown. What will Digital TV mean to all of us - it will be a much better picture, but note that it is probably a couple of years away from full implementation, with a lot of intermediate steps necessary. What programs do well during your fund-raising drives -Those with emotional content or needed information do best - Masterpiece Theatre, for instance, does NOT do well at this time. Public Service TV feels that their older viewers are philanthropically minded, while the 30 to 50 year olds donate because they enjoy a particular show. So, Thank You, Val - for your rapid-fire delivery of a most historic time for all of us.

Thought for the Day - "Nobody can make you feel inferior without your consent" Eleanor Roosevelt.

YOE, Ernie Wolfe

Note: The following was added by an e-mail from YOPrexy:

Contrary to what you just read in the emailed February 15 Wind Mill version... Prexy Steve Adler will chair the June 28th of WVRC.

YOE apparently also missed all the Rotarians gracing the head table at this past Thursday's WVRC luncheon inclusive of Ann Elkin, Susan Allen, Henrietta Lian, Athena Jackson, Sally Brant, Lenore Mulryan; KCET speaker Val Zavala; as well as Program Chair Ralph Woodworth and YOPrexy.

It should have been noted that Jim Sumner presented a most entertaining and informative speech on his war experiences with General George S. Patton, last Wednesday, at the Hawthorne Rotary Club.