by Tanis Fowler
the Carillon

I recently had the pleasure of seeing my first live Telemiracle. I used to see it as an interruption to my regularly scheduled programming. Once in awhile, somebody I knew would sing. So I would tune in for five minutes, then flip to Much Music. But when you see it live, it gives you a whole new perspective. Believe me, it's a whole lot louder in the stands at the Center of the Arts.

A side note about teenagers - I can't wait until I turn twenty so that I can do more valid complaining about you people. I can understand enthusiasm, but constant ear piercing shrieks and yells for country singer Julian Austin to "Take off his shirt - now!" can get a little annoying. Then there was the guy I, laughably, called a security guard.

I'm sure he was only trying to do his job by telling my friend and I that we could not eat or drink anything in our seats. We put the small bag of popcorn away and capped our drinks. But then, a man and his wife brought in open glasses of pop with no lids, while a toddler wandered the row of seats dumping popcorn everywhere. An elderly fellow carried a hamburger right past the guard and he didn't say a word. My friend and I looked at each other, took our popcorn out and drank our pop. I noticed that the guard later told another young girl that she couldn't eat or drink anything.

I guess the rule about no food only applies to young women who don't look like they would question the rules. It's not like we were throwing the food at each other or anything. I'm 19, my friend is 21. Maybe we look younger, more impressionable and more susceptible to the pressures of big burly men than we are. Damn us delinquents!

Actually, I did feel a little delinquent later on when the girls sitting beside us had screaming fits every few seconds so that we couldn't hear a word the performers and MC's were saying. One woman kept turning around and giving us dirty looks. I felt like saying 'Don't look at us! We're civilized college students supporting a great charity!' But of course I held myself back.

Everytime the swing camera panned over the crowd, the group of teenagers sitting near us would wave, jump up and down, and scream excitedly. Maybe when they were done being idiots, they went home and told their proud parents how it only took a few strained vocal cords for them to get on tv. If that's not the purpose of Telemiracle, then I don't know what is.

I enjoyed seeing good ole' Bob McGrath. When he sang Ernie's song "I'd Like To Live on the Moon", I got goosebumps remembering the fun I used to have with Big Bird, Ernie, Oscar, and Grover. Not Elmo. That furry little fellow freaked me out. Still does.

Tom Jackson and Alvin Law were great hosts, and the entertainment was top notch, as usual.

With talent like country singer Julian Austin, the country trio Lace, and up and comers like Bluesway Express performing, it's no wonder that Saskatchewan keeps finding that extra bit of change that somehow adds up to $2,683,424. I find this amount incredible. That we can find the money to donate to a good cause when we're in the middle of a farm crisis shows that the people of Saskatchewan truly have big hearts, and are always willing to lend a helping hand.