Suze Orman Shows Us the Money

QVC financial guru, Suze Orman, is working with Queen Oprah to help out us little people in these tumultuous economic times.

You can download a copy of Suze Orman's latest book, Suze Orman's 2009 Action Plan, for free here.



Ok, so it's not a free car like Oprah used to give away, but times are tough, people!

I've always thought that Suze and the Q were an odd pairing. Aside from wanting couples to start out their married life out of debt by using Diamonique as an engagement ring, they don't have a whole heck of a lot in common. I just can't see Suze agreeing with the whole QVC "spend! spend! spend!" mentality--unless it's her stuff. That's different.

So You Wanna Decorate like a Billionaire???

Ok, so maybe you aren't a billionaire with your own number-one-rated talk show, but you can certainly pretend. Oprah's favorite interior designer is coming out with his line of furniture and home accessories on Monday, October 13th, on HSN.

Oprah has always been so generous to us plebs!



After looking at the collection HSN has already posted on their website, I came to the conclusion that Nate loves interesting combinations of texture and color--and is not afraid of a sequined throw pillow or two. And for the record, I love the idea of a sparkly throw pillow, but I'm terrified of what my little kitty-kitty would do to it!



If you want to see what Nate did with his own apartment, check out the pictures here. I get the feeling that he likes books.

And if you have a big Nate or Oprah fan that's on your Christmas list, you might want to get an autographed copy of his book, "Home Rules."

Grab Your Pitchfork! Rosie on HSN!

Wow!

I tried to defend Rosie here, and boy did I hear about it! I thought that what I had to say was rather even-handed. Apparently, I was mistaken.

I still stand by my words.

There are evil people in the world--people who ruthlessly prey on the weakest and most innocent among us--worthy of spite, anger, tar, feathers, and pitchforks, but Rosie simply isn't one of them.

She isn't evil.

She's an opinionated loudmouth comedian/talk show host.

Agree with her politics or not ... think she's funny or not ... think she should just shut the hell up or keep talking ... she's not the enemy.

All of the proceeds--all of them--from her Crafty U book are being donated to her children's charity, For All Kids. She chose to create her own charity organization instead of donating to another so that she could personally cover the administrative costs of running the organization so that anyone who donated would know that all their money was being used to help and not just to raise more money.

That isn't evil.

I'm not saying you should like her or watch her or even donate to her causes, but there are worse people in the world to use energy and resources fighting against.

I watched her on HSN (see the videos below) and didn't see or hear anything terrible. But don't take my word for it. Watch and judge for yourself ... or don't.


Rosie selling her book:




Rosie selling her DVD:

Rosie the Riviter!

According to Rosie's website, she will be the latest celebrity peddling her wares on HSN (aren't they all these days????)

Along with the Rosie O'Donnell Show Season One DVD, she'll be selling her latest book, Crafty U, a crafting book for kids that has gotten great reviews on Amazon. Rosie is an avid crafter--remember back during her old show when she was obsessed with decoupage? While she personally uses crafting as a way to relax, with the new book, she wants to inspire families to spend more time together crafting using mostly found objects and lots of creativity.

Ok, so here's the meat of the whole thing: some people hate Rosie with a fiery passion and therefor are absolutely horrified that HSN would dare let her on the air.

I don't agree.

Rosie is rather ... shall I say ... outspoken about many hot-button political issues, so I'm not saying that you need to agree with her opinions or even agree with the way she goes about expressing them (usually very loudly!!!)

From what I've seen of Rosie over the years, she is a basically kind-hearted person who feels passionately about protecting and helping children. She has admitted to fighting personal demons from childhood and has been in therapy for years to address her problems.

My point is that although she might go about things the wrong way, her heart is usually in the right place, which is more than I can say about many of the people she fights with. Besides, sometimes things just need to be shaken up a bit!

If nothing else, she'll probably make for some great entertainment. In all the fuss about her politics, people forget how funny she can be.

Although, I must admit, with the political firestorm going on right now, it'll be interesting to see how long she can bite her tongue (not one of her better talents!)

So all this talk of boycotting Rosie or HSN is completely stupid. Get over yourselves. No one is perfect and she would probably be the first one to admit that.

Check her out 9/21- HSN 12PM, 6PM, and 11PM EST.

You'll Never Believe What's in Bob's Cabinet!

Bob Bowersox is a man of many, many talents. I had no idea. This is an audition for The Interior, which claims to have conducted the world's first completely open, online casting call. I believe this was posted by Bob himself:




You can read Bob's comments about The Interior here.

If you want to watch more of Bob in various acting roles, go to his website here. He has clips posted of all his movie roles ... and he also talks dirty! Oh my. I never thought I'd hear words like that coming out of Bob's mouth. It's just a voice over for a book, but it's just so strange ... like hearing your mom say stuff like that.

You can also listen to him reading part of his book, 48 Hours to a Stronger Marriage: Reconnect with Your Spouse and Re-Energize Your Marriage, here. I know there's all sorts of divorce rumors floating around. And, no, I don't have any answers on that front. But he did write this book because he and his wife, Toni, did have struggles that they worked through.

Literary Crack: Sellavision

I just found out about this book, Sellevision, which is all about the behind-the-scenes drama at a fictitious home shopping channel--similar to ... oh, I dunno ... maybe QVC or HSN, perhaps??? It came out in 2000, and how I haven't heard about it until now is beyond me.

It starts off with a popular male host getting canned for accidentally exposing his bits and pieces during a robe segment. Ok, I'm hooked. There's all sorts of hairy earlobe drama, peddling of Princess Di memorabilia *cough*shopnbc*cough* and, of course, the Dazzling Diamonelle (Hah! Fake diamonds ... I love it!).

Sellevision is the first novel by Augusten Burroughs, famous for Running with Scissors. Anyway, I will be buying and reading Sellevision. It looks to be the perfect literary crack Summer beach read.

Paul & Judy ... Where Are They?

As we all know by now, power home shopping couple extraordinaire, Paul Deasy and Judy Crowell, are no longer at HSN or QVC. According to their new website, they just got back from a great trip to Italy and are working on a jewelry line and another book.

Here's what Paul had to say about both books and the new jewelry line:

The original quantities that were on HSN sold completely out. There will be a second printing, but for the moment I cannot sell it in the USA due to a non competition clause I still have with HSN. That will expire on November 30th. After that time, the original book and the second book will be available on this website and probably at another television shopping channel that I will choose to launch a new gemstone jewelry line.

I do have plans for silver and gold as part of my line. I would entertain gold over silver if I can find a factory that will do a minimum thickness of vermeil or better and guarantee their manufacturing process.

I am currently negotiating with a few shopping channels, but I have decided it will not be with HSN. When that decision is made, the gems would likely be offered on our website, but that depends on the shopping channel. Some do not like the same items being available for sale on the website as would be offered on their channel. I will keep you posted.

And to whether it was better to work at HSN or QVC:

That is a really difficult question. As you say, Judy and I have worked at both places and have many friends in both of them. That being said, I think that there are certain things about QVC that had a better interaction with the customer than did HSN. We also enjoyed the opportunities to do more remotes and live shows with QVC. We are not sure who we will be partnering with yet, but we hope to make a decision by this summer and we will let you know when we do.

I think that he like the Q better and I'm guessing that his new collection will end up on ShopNBC ... but you never know!

ETA: Click here to find out what Paul had to say about Technibond and the end of the lifetime warranty!