Help Wanted: Spokesperson for 30-second commercials who can appeal to local audience, age range of 18 to mid-30s primarily. Must have outgoing personality, strong "Q Rating" among Hawaii residents (recognizable and respected). Ability to ad lib and be witty on demand is a plus. Pay open to negotiation. Contact Career Changers TV producer for details.

As yesterday's news about Augie T's involvement with a home security company that left customers in the dark demonstrates, both the advertiser and the paid spokesperson must do their due diligence before entering into a business relationship. In case you didn't see it, KGMB ran this story about Hawaii Alarm on April 9 in which Augie says he was a victim too. A few months ago, he originally planned to do an OC16 comedy/infomercial type show about himself becoming the VP for this new security company, Hawaii Alarm. Interesting idea, right? Blend the sell part of the story with humor to draw the audience in. There was just one problem: Oceanic Time Warner Cable sells a home security system, so Augie's show would be competing with OC16's parent corporation. On to Plan B.

I'm not sure if it ever aired, but I think Augie's "Funny Business" show was going to run on another channel that didn't conflict with OC16's relationship to Oceanic Time Warner. There was a link to the "Funny Business" video on the Hawaii Alarm site, but the video is no longer available. Since I don't know Augie personally, I have no idea what went down with the owner of that company or if Augie ever got paid for his work on behalf of them.

In any event, I have a well-established local advertising client who is looking for suggestions on a spokesperson -- someone like Augie, perhaps. Or maybe a young, upcoming musical artist/entertainer? It has to be someone who is affordable and looking for the extra exposure at this stage in his or her career. And the person needs to have some local street cred that will stop viewers from automatically switching channels when the commercial comes on TV.

If you have any recommendations, please post them in the Comments below (takes awhile for me to moderate and approve new comments) or send me an email to richfigel@gmail.com. Thanks!

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The new April episode of Career Changers TV features interesting stories about Pacific Biodiesel and Waimea Valley's business turnaround. Please visit www.CareerChangers.TV for daily viewing times, or go to the CCTV YouTube Channel to see the low res video versions of past and current segments.

Photographer Ann Thompson sent me the photo above and said in her email she came across this scene while hiking through a remote valley about three miles off the main Kalalau trail on Kauai. She claims to have seen "a very small man, approximately 3 feet tall" near the thatched hut. The "pygmy-like" tribesman ran into the forest after he saw her. Ann says she heard other voices and bird whistle sounds, but did not go closer because she thought the man may have had a bow and arrows slung across his back.

While I was skeptical about the photo and Ann's sighting of small natives, who sound like the mythical Menehune of Hawaiian legends, I felt compelled to contact the University of Hawaii anthropology department to see if they've ever heard similar stories from hikers or residents on Kauai. As it turns out, Ann isn't the first to report seeing little people in the Na Pali Coast area of Kauai. Curiously, when people have returned to the location where they believed they saw these tribesmen, the huts are gone and there is no sign anyone had been there... even though the hikers say they were able to find the same trees and rocks they used as markers.

What lends credibility to these incredible photos and tales is the fact that scientists discovered the skeletal remains of a race of three feet tall people in an Indonesian cave a few years ago. There had been debate as to whether they really were a "race" of people or merely deformed individuals. However, on those islands there were stories about little wild men who lived in the caves and the locals were afraid of these primitive people. Not quite like our image of the clever, industrious Menehune -- but could there be some connection?

If you Google "hobbit people," you will find links to many scientific articles about the discovery, including this piece in the National Geographic magazine. I took a particular interest in the find because I had written a fictional screenplay about a group of misfit kids and a cynical resort developer on Kauai who discover the Menehune actually exist and are responsible for big trouble at his hotel.

To this day, I still believe it would make a great family movie -- but I wonder if truth is stranger than fiction in this case, and my mythical little people may be a Lost Tribe, still surviving in hidden villages. Perhaps, they only come out at certain times... like April Fool's Day?

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The new April episode of Career Changers TV premieres Sat., April 6 at 8:30PM on OC16. It includes really interesting stories about Pacific Biodiesel... and we shot our intros at Waimea Valley, where the photo above was taken! For daily viewing times, please visit www.CareerChangers.TV or check out videos from past and current shows on the CCTV YouTube Channel.

Been really busy with shooting new segments for the December episode of Career Changers TV, which will premier next Saturday -- good stuff! I was also involved with human trafficking presentations the past two weeks. Our 808HALT.com project and coalition has expanded to include people from the East West Center, government agencies and non-profit groups who recognize that this issue affects us all directly or indirectly... the food you eat may be coming from farms that employ immigrant workers who can't read health warnings on pesticides they are told to use (which you then consume unknowingly)... young girls are being recruited by pimps in shopping malls with come-ons about "modeling" careers... we're hearing more reports about "domestic servants" being brought in from Micronesia, who are treated like modern day slaves... restaurants and construction companies may be exploiting immigrants, right under our noses. You can click here to see videos we've produced that have been translated into other languages as well.

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Did you see the nice three-page feature on Robin Lung's "Finding Kukan" documentary work in progress, which ran in the Sunday Star-Advertiser? Here's that link if you missed it. Followers of my Career Changers show and this blog may recall we did a two-parter on her story last December. She's come a long way since then, tracking down more leads and raising money to continue the project. In Part One (click here) Robin tells how she became interested in the fascinating life of Li Ling-Ai. Part Two shows Robin's first trailer/preview. The film has evolved since then as her search for details on Li Ling-Ai turned inward, and has become much more personal to Robin. Anyway, I'm happy to say my show was first to put Robin and "Kukan" on local television!

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As some of you know, my wife and I are old 'Bows fans. We had UH football season tickets for about 20 years, going back to 1988. At one point, we also had season tickets for men's basketball during the glory years of A.C. and Alika, NCAA tournament and NIT appearances; men's volleyball when Yuval and Sivan had fans dancing in the aisles; and women's volleyball, when the WAC tournament was played in Vegas (and we went)... so many great memories and experiences. Especially surrounding the football team. We'll always remember the big wins under Coach Wagner and Paul Johnson, and watching the 'Bows beat Illinois from the Big 10 at the Holiday Bowl in San Diego. We were at Aloha Stadium for great wins when June Jones was here too.

So it was sad for us when we went to the game against Boise State last Saturday and there were probably less than 20,000 fans in the stadium. A sizable chunk of that was wearing orange and blue to go with their bright red sunburns. I also noticed there were still a lot of old timers in the stands. Some -- like me -- still break out their faded Rainbows shirts and hats, because we take pride in what UH football and sports has stood for over the years. It seems like a lot of the younger "Warrior" fans are of the fair weather variety, who bail out when times get tough... You know, I thought June was a very good coach. But I never understood why he chose to alienate the true diehard fans, who wanted to keep the Rainbows logo and name alive. Look at every pro team and most major colleges, and you'll see they cultivate tradition -- and sell it! Retro team apparel is a revenue generator.

Yet when we walked around the stadium and stopped to look at UH "Warrior" merchandise, the only choices were: drab green and basic black. Sheesh, even the green they use in their uniforms these days is duller and boring compared to the bright shade of green the uniforms used to have. And don't get me started on those ridiculous butt stripes on the back of the current uniform pant legs. Who thought that was a good look for football players?

However, the latest UH Athletics email had a little bit of positive news for us older fans. They are now offering some retro 'Bows shirts again! They're calling them "Vintage" designs (click here).  I call them cool. Like the Miami Hurricanes, the UH Rainbows was a truly unique nickname... and I'll never forget hearing 40,000 people in Aloha Stadium, chanting "RRRAINNN..." on one side, followed by "BOWWWS" from the other half of the crowd. Those days are gone though, and I am over the Rainbows. Once you kill a tradition, it's pretty hard to bring it back.

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Have a great Thanksgiving weekend. For daily viewing times of my show, visit www.CareerChangers.TV -- you can also watch segments from past and current episodes on the CCTV YouTube Channel.

We interrupt my originally-scheduled blog on Vegas gambling lessons, to bring you this update on local folks who will be appearing on the Travel Channel and Cooking Channel this weekend -- people we just happened to have featured on my Career Changers TV show. More on that in a bit.

On Eden Eats, Cooking Channel 322/1322, you can catch her Honolulu episode in which they filmed Aye Aye Maw's Burmese Pop-up Dinner a few months ago. Although the premise of Eden's show is they visit different ethnic restaurants and eating experiences within a 24 hour period, they actually spend several hours  -- even days -- at each location to get the shots they want. In this case, it was the Pacific Gateway Center, and the filming crew was there for a very, very long time I was told. That episode also includes Agnes' Portugese Bake Shop in Kailua. (The owner, Non, and I go way back to my pre-rehab days when I used to frequent Jake's Hideaway on Bishop Street, where he was a bartender back around 1986-88.)

That episode airs today (10/5) at 4 pm and 8 pm, then again on 10/6 at 3 pm and 7 pm, but will probably be repeated throughout the month if you search for it. Our segment on PGC's pop-up dinners ran all last month on OC16 and can be seen on the CCTV YouTube Channel by clicking here. By contrast, our low budget run-and-gun shoot took only about 2 hours and was minimally invasive, which was greatly appreciated by the PGC staff and dinner guests.

Over on Travel Channel 325/1325 this weekend, Legends of Hawaii will feature paranormal investigator Preston Galera and Hawaiian historian/ghost tour guide Lopaka Kapanui. We just did new segments on them for our Halloween edition of Career Changers, premiering Saturday night on OC16 after high school football (around 9:30 pm). You can DVR it this weekend at 2:30 am on 10/7 or 9 am on Monday... or view them in small screen, lower res format by going to the Trick or Treat link on our website.

You'll also find a couple of Lopaka's ghost stories that we couldn't fit into the show, along with segments from past Halloween episodes on that page. Over the next couple of weeks, I'll have more to post about other interesting news related to those people and filming that show!

For daily viewing times and other useful links, please visit www.CareerChangers.tv and check out videos from past or current episodes on the CCTV YouTube Channel. Have a great weekend... and let's hope the Bows -- er, "Warriors" -- don't get blown out again in San Diego! BTW, Lopaka is related to Chad Kapanui, a former UH football player many old-time fans will remember.

On the current Career Changers TV episode, we have a segment about a Sea Life Park app for smart phones and tablets developed by a new local venture called Pass the Projects... which was started by David DeLuca, who is also the Director of Bess Press. If you have any books about Hawaii or local culture, chances are at least one of them was published by that company. I was given a copy of Pidgen To Da Max long before I moved here -- which brings up an interesting point that is often overlooked: books add to the allure of the islands and help market Hawaii to the world.

Sure, we often hear how TV shows like Lost or Hawaii Five-0 and movies shot in Hawaii can bump up tourism numbers. But what about all the non-fiction and children's books that are bought by visitors in local shops -- or online? Everything from Bruddah Iz to ukes and cute sea creatures have been exported to faraway places through print media. And now those traditional publishers are getting into digital adaptations, which could expand their markets even further.

Besides Bess Press's entry into digital (click here for our segment on that), there are some other CCTV "alumni" we've featured who are making the transition. Haleiwa publisher Kerry Germain recently announced that Island Paradise Publishing is making their award-winning children's picture books available on Kindle, iPad and other tablets. Those titles include her popular Kimo surfing series and Plenty Saimin, which was written by my friend Feng Feng Hutchins (met her in a playwriting workshop).  Got relatives on the Mainland with keiki? Send them an app as a gift! Here's the link to Kerry's website.

Another friend of mine, Ellie Crowe, is having her children's book -- Hoku the Stargazer -- made into an app with music by local publisher Island Heritage. I'm also collaborating with Ellie on adapting the Hoku book into an animated TV series for pre-schoolers. It's essentially a Polynesian "Dora the Explorer" with the same kind of franchise/merchandising potential. But to make it happen, we need local animators who are willing to work on spec. Email me if you know someone!

Ellie also has a new children's activity book coming out called Amazing Mazes Under the Sea in Hawaii. Her publisher sent this press release:

Did you know mazes help children gain pre-writing skills? They develop fine motor control, pencil grip, hand-eye coordination, and visual planning. With that in mind comes our newest children’s activity book of imaginative mazes aimed for preschoolers, kindergarteners, and early elementary grade kids.

Kids will love going on this underwater adventure in Hawaiian waters where they can wind their way around reefs and coral to learn more about its sea creatures—from ink-squirting octopus to soaring flying fish. Author Ellie Crow and illustrator Tammy Yee present twenty-one amazing mazes that introduce fascinating facts about various animals with detailed, textured illustrations that make you feel as if you’re diving deep under Hawai‘i’s sea.

Last but not least, friend of the show Charley Memminger, sent me word that his novel Aloha, Lady Blue will be published by St. Martins Press in January with a cover blurb by Pat Sajak, the Wheel of Fortune host and KHON anchor Joe Moore's pal. Here's part of Sajak's glowing recommendation:

“Hawaii just might be my favorite place on Earth. Every time I think I’ve seen it all, I find something else new and exotic. In his extraordinary first novel, Aloha, Lady Blue, longtime Island crime reporter and humorist, Charles Memminger, shows an odd and quirky side to his state that even frequent tourists such as me rarely get to see. The novel’s hero, Stryker McBride, provides a funny and engaging narration to a dark and compelling mystery. Aloha, Lady Blue is a great read for anyone who lives in Hawaii, visits Hawaii, or even dreams of going to Hawaii. Oh, what the heck, it’s for anyone who loves a crackling good story. Mahalo, Charles!"

Who knows? Maybe Charley's book will take on a different media makeover as well... Hollywood movie, perhaps?

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For daily viewing times and other useful links, please visit www.CareerChangers.TV. You can also check out video segments from past and current episodes on the CCTV YouTube Channel. Mahalo for watching!