Monday, June 30, 2008

Gator For A Week

What's this? I posted in a different font!?

I had big plans for this post. You see, I've been in Gainesville since Tuesday of last week and will be here until tomorrow. So my sisters and I made all these plans of what we could do while we're here. But then it rained. And by rained I mean thunderstormed. I was sure that Sapphire's, my sister's, apartment would detach from the rest of the building. So I'll my plans for the week and this blog post were washed away by hours of rain.


So mostly I've been watching movies. I think I watched like 10. That's 2o hours of movies. I spent nearly a day of my seven days here watching movies! But it's cool. I got to hang out with Sapphire, which is a rarity. And today will finally get to go see the butterfly garden if it doesn't rain. I've been waiting for that all week.

So I still have nothing to write about. I guess I'll tell you about Star Trek. I saw it for the first time on Thursday, with Sapphire's friends. We watched two movies. And if I wasn't enough of a nerd already, I LOVED THEM. A lot of the stuff in the movies are really weird and often blow my mind, but the humor is great. It's that old style humor that you only see in shows that are black and white.

The best part of both movies, I must say, was in Star Trek IV. The crew goes back in time to the present (which is like the 1980's I believe) and try to capture some whales to bring back to the future. It's great because one of the crew members has a serious Russian accent. I mean serious, he pronounced his "V"s as "W"s. And this just happens to be the guy they send looking for nuclear fuel sources. He is captured in the military base and is of course questioned as a spy (this the 1980's remember). The whole time I was watching this movie, I couldn't help but wonder how the absolute worst person was chosen for this job. There were like 9 other people, but he was chosen. Then I thought...wait why are there Russian people in the future, when Earth became a unified planet. Then I thought..wait I'm watching Star Trek, shouldn't I question everything that is happening.

That was probably one of the highlights of my week, the mini movie marathon of Star Trek. One downside though, was everyone there was incredible smart. They kept making jokes that the calculations in the movie were wrong, and I felt quite idiotic. At least I wasn't Amanda. She asked why we were all laughing at the Russian part. Sapphire explained that there were post-Cold War tensions. Amanda was still confused.

So sorry this post was boring, but I had to post now because I wouldn't get a chance later. So I had to write what I had.

I just want to thank all you guys for posting about yourselves. They were quite excellent, and I think gave a perfect understanding of each of us. Well not really...but that sounded good didn't it?

DFTBA!

-Brianna

Sunday, June 29, 2008

Otters and Rednecks


Hello, blue powerblogger here, back from a two week vacation!! First of all, I'd like to thank my fill-ins, Erica and Blair, who gave up their time to make sure the powerbloggers didn't miss a day of the week. Thanks a million!!!

That being said, here's a little information about myself. I am 5'1, and that's pretty much going to be my maximum height. I'm really hyper most of the time, I love to sing and dance and be crazy, and I am a Mario Kart master. I can be pretty skeptical, I am a control freak, a perfectionist, and I'm fairly certain that I suffer from some form of OCD.

So these past few weeks, I have been in Blairsville, Georgia. Its a small town with absolutely nothing to do and its filled with rednecks. And on top of all that, there aren't any good restaurants because its a dry county (no alcohol allowed). My grandparents live on a little mountain, and my grandpa bought part of the mountain "across the street" and deeded land to each of his seven children to build mountain homes on. My house is located in the middle, with two tiny cottages below it and two mega-log cabins above, all belonging to my aunts and uncles.

This week, my cousins went to Washington D.C, so my family is the only one on the mountain. Yesterday, my parents planned a little picnic at Vogel State Park. Unfortunately, when we arrived, it started raining. Since both putt-putt golf and paddleboating are dangerous to do during a thunderstorm, we ate our lunch under a covered picnic area and then decided to wait out the storm. During our wait, we went to the little store in the park. My sister and I were looking around and I spotted the most hilarious looking stuffed animals peeking out from a shelf. They were otters, and they were only $2.75!!!! My sister and I HAD to buy them, OBVIOUSLY. We got two, one for each of us, and named them Frito and Dorito. We are thinking about going back and rescuing their four brothers and sisters, but we couldn't come up with enough rhyming names. Right now we have Cheeto and Neato. Feel free to make suggestions for more names.

Once we purchased our otters, the rain had let up and we went paddle boating. Doing that worked up a sweat, so my sister and I went swimming in the lake. It was during this time that we witnessed some very redneck things. Everyone had twangy accents, one lady had a mullet, and some girl yelled out to the entire park, basically, "I'm gonna go POOP!" It made me appreciate the fact that I am not actually from Georgia, and that I only vacation there. My sister and I were certainly the most proper people there.

I can't wait to go back to an actual city, with all my non-redneck friends!

Saturday, June 28, 2008

Stand in the Rain

Hello strangers. I'm the green power blogger and I would like to ask you how did you find this blog? You must have been pretty bored or plain random to read a blog like this. Either that or you knew that THIS IS THE COOLEST BLOG EVUR!!!!!!!(YEAH WITH A "U"). Since everyone is introducing themselves this week, I'll save that for last. So I was doing a bunch of 'back and forths' this week. "I'm going to post this. Nah I'm going to post this. No I'm definitely posting this..." and so on and so forth. In the end, I came up with this.

I'm currently training for tennis 5 days a week but I play tennis 6 days a week. The schedule includes a forest trail run to begin with and then one and a half hours of tennis. The trail run was 2 miles but my dad graciously extended it to four miles (two laps instead of one). I can handle two miles but 4 miles is a little much for me. So for a while my 4 mile time was around 40-45 minutes.

One day, it was a little cloudy and it was dripping a little rain but my dad thought we could at least run the trail. I was absolutely thrilled because everyone wants to run in the rain right? >.> Well anyway the first two miles were fine because it only dripped. But then these ominous dark clouds started rolling my way towards me. I thought I was going to be fine for the next lap... boy was I wrong. It started raining and I was half-way done with the second lap so it didn't matter if I turned back or not. So there I was, miserable and still running, trying to get out of the rain. I'm getting soaked more and more by the minute and I still had a mile to go. I'm thinking," Man, why did he have to extend it to four miles... I wouldn't have to go through this if it was just two...*grumble grumble grumble*..." Near the end of the mile, my dad is standing there waiting for me and he joins me. He's a little ahead and decides to provoke me to race him. I, with all my fury, sprint the rest of the lap and I finish first. I'm panting and I'm thinking,"Hah! Take that dad. I just beat--"
"35:40."
"What?" I asked.
"35:40." my dad repeated. "Your time."
"Seriously!?!?!?" I jolted.
This was a revelation for me because I just knocked off 5-10 minutes off my usual time. I couldn't celebrate it though because that little fury sprint knocked off any energy I had left.
"So next time you don't have and excuse. You know what you can do now. By the way, it's not raining hard enough to soak the clay courts so we will have some more practice today," my dad casually added.
That killed all the joy in me.

Onwards to me. I'm June and even though it's commonly a girl's name, I'm a guy. I've heard every single tease and nickname related to my name so good luck trying to find something original. I'm really into tennis though I personally don't think I'm all that great at it. I'm also teaching myself how to play guitar and I play for my church's praise band. My personality is pretty much lazy or indifferent if nothing of particular interest is going on but people tell me I'm nice,
mean, annoying, polite, creative, dull and a range of other contradicting adjectives. Maybe I'm just bipolar o.O That's all that I'm giving about myself so stay tuned for the blue power blogger's post because she's awesome.

Friday, June 27, 2008

And I always reread to check for errors.

First of all, I am quite thankful that Brianna has already provided us with a topic to discuss this week. It's probably quite obvious by now that the seven of us are very different people.
Before I begin my autobiography, I would like to offer a little something regarding each of my fellow bloggers.
Brianna was assigned to be my BFF during lunch, and luckily, the title(s) stuck. I admire the positive attitude she shows towards her life and the eagerness with which she emphasizes her religion.
Lacey is so level-headed about the craziest things, and sometimes it feels like we have whole emotional conversations just looking at each other during class because of the interesting months that have passed by.
Viv is one of those people I saw one day and automatically knew that she was and is highly intelligent, no matter what she rambles about. Not to say the rest of you aren't smart.
Jonathan is the French man, and to picture this in your mind, think about lol. The l's are the arms sticking up in surrender, and the o is the head. (Courtesy of a creative Korean person.) He gets so excited about the ideas with which he comes up that I can't help but smile at his joy.
June is my big brother, old school tennis player in an experienced way, and one of those guys who more than a couple of my friends have admired, or currently admire romantically.
Caroline turned around in Precalc, smiling at me every other day. She always seems to be concentrated on something, whether it is the latest math assignment or that guy in her history class.

I was born in China, moved to England, Wisconsin, and finally settled down here. I met these amazing writers, and quite a few other special people. I spend much of my time not wanting to do any work these days. One of the most important things in my life is making sure that my friends are happy, but unfortunately, it hasn't been that way for many of us for various reasons. My man spends hours with computer-aided design, makes me smile without trying, and I think he's smarter me. Piano has been my hobby since I was four and a half years old, and I have an hour-long lesson this evening. Chopin is my favorite dead European guy. I don't have any pets, and didn't have quite a good time with Jonathan's father's tiny puppy. It's disappointing when my brother lies about small things, but I have two other brothers who don't live with me, and aren't exactly Chinese. My sister keeps claiming to know the racial ratio of my future child(ren). I have more close friends than ever, and they are all astonishingly good people. This paragraph is absolutely scrambled. I go biking around the neighborhood when it's sunny outside. My hair is kind of long. Really, this could go on for hours. If you ever want to know anything else, then please feel free to contact me, and if you don't leave enough information for me to get back to you, then I will track you down.

Jonathan and Viv wanted us to add labels to our posts. So, here goes.

-Kejing

Thursday, June 26, 2008

If You Want Something Done, You've Got To DO IT YOURSELF

Today marks this blog's first month! Happy 1st Month, the Power Bloggers!


So, that being said, let me go ahead and get my little introduction out of the way here so that we may have a more uninterrupted post.


I'm Jonathan. I'm pretty stable, have a rarely benevolent tyrant for a father and a mother everyone loves. I have one amazing cat, Artemis, and one resilient turtle, Tonks. I'm an Eagle Scout. I cook and bake better than you do. I play the piano, violin, and guitar. I make things, more specifically, I make DIY (Do It Yourself) things. I love renewable energies like solar and wind power because I love the idea of making my projects self sustaining and not tethered to a power cord. I regularly watch TV shows I'm not proud to say I watch due to their immaturity. But above all, I cannot stand uncooked baby/cherry tomatoes.


That being said, I want to introduce my latest DIY project that some of you may be already familiar with- a treehouse. See, a lot of us in the area have decided that, this summer, we're going to build ourselves what out parents had long put off and denied us. We're not going to wait any longer. This is going to be built and it's going to be amazing, because we'll have built it! Visit the link for more information or join our FaceBook group.


Many people have asked me why I've suddenly been sucked into the world of doing it yourself, and I have to say I can't pin the answer down completely. It seems as if the most appealing thing about it is that you learn far more by building your object that purchasing it. You're also far more qualified to fix it should it break as so many gadgets and contraptions tend to do. Plus, often overlooked, is the fact that you can customize whatever you're building to your exact needs. Try doing that with many of the things you buy prefabricated. However, what could be the most alluring facet of DIY projects is that when it's done- when your project is complete, you have something to be proud of. This is yours. You made it. It works and you know why. And, of course, you can get your ego stroked a little when people exclaim things like, "You made that? HOW?!" or "That is such a clever idea!". But who's in for it for the pride anyway?


It's a sense of accomplishment. Don't you want it? I do.


- Jonathan

Wednesday, June 25, 2008

No Problem

Alright, first the introduction, then story time.

I’m Viv. I spend far too much time thinking about hair, TV shows, and my ipod which has become a fifth limb. Most say I’m sarcastic, but I don’t really know where they get that from, perhaps from my generally elitist air. I enjoy clothes and “pretty” things in general. Not surprisingly, I have an addictive personality that makes me do crazy and irrational things like watching two seasons of Digimon within a couple weeks in a pathetic attempt to relive my childhood. I have a dog named Olive, and she IS the cutest dog in the world, no contest.

The Nine Mile Tour in Jamaica started with our tour guide introducing himself as “Captain Crazy”. For those who don’t know, the Nine Mile Tour is a Bob Marley tour, and even includes a visit to his grave (I don’t know why it’s named that, but I’m pretty sure that’s because I wasn’t paying attention). Captain Crazy has dreads about two feet long and is constantly laughing, issuing a sound that is slightly reminiscent of a donkey’s bray.

So Captain Crazy leads us to Marley’s birthplace, and we actually get to take a picture next to his bed (which was actually really cool). We then take a “break” were everyone who is so inclined has the opportunity to receives free pot. I tell my mom to go get us some, but she just laughs. Our deranged captain, on the other hand, takes full advantage of the joint intermission before heading off into the church where Marley’s grave is contained.

When we enter the church, our guide offers to field some of our questions. My mother asks about the basic beliefs of the Rastafarian movement and after a while I realize that not only is our guide not staying on topic, but that he has not stopped talking for several minuets. I’m now listening to the story of a poor girl who was overcharged for a patty that I’m sure would’ve been touching if I could have fully understood it. He tells us that Marley was murdered, contradicting the account of him dying due to cancer he’d told us minuets earlier.

He starts to become somewhat bitter as he talks about the new manager, saying that he’s worked here over twenty-five years while the manager’s only been here six. He tells us in muddled sentences that he too could fix his hair up nice and where a clean white shirt and greet the guests just like the manager does (here he gives us an extensive sample of the greeting) but tells us that “they” just don’t hire local people.

Here I stand torn between trying to keep myself from laughing at the ganja-induced stupor and feeling sorry for this man and the things he’ll never be. I even wonder what’s going to happen to Jamaica, as the laid back culture and "one lane two-way roads" give way to modernization and the fast-paced progress they’ll need to survive. But on the way out I feel a sudden sense of relief and contentment. Captain Crazy is smiling once again, and he lets out a solid bray.

-Viv

Tuesday, June 24, 2008

Moving. . . but not really

I'm not sure if you all are aware but this Thursday will be one whole month of blogging for the Power Bloggers. Yay.

I got my first ever driving ticket today. I got it for going 40 mph. I thought the speed limit was 35 so I was totally confused until I found out it's 30. Lame. Cops have nothing better to do than pull me over for going 10 miles over the speed limit? I saw a car cut into a lane that I was in and nearly cause a 3 car pileup today. I saw a car going at least 50 in a 30 mph zone. But did anyone pull them over? No. Our system is magorly flawed.

And I don't know how to spell magorly.

My mom says we need to pack because were going to move into our new house soon. . . . Our new house that hasn't even been started. I have things in boxes that I"m sure I'm going to need sometime before we move in. . . who knows when. I knew I'd be 18 by the time we moved into the new house and I was right. My parents should listen to me more. I am not psychic but I've seen this coming for YEARS.

I got blood work done yesterday. My younger sister and I both did. When we were at the counter signing in I asked if it was just going to be one container of blood and they said, "No, were doing a lot of tests on you. It's going to be a lot." I immediately burst into tears. Then the nurse came out. "Ms. Booth, we're ready for you." I asked if it was me or my sister and when they said Annie I shoved her forward, glad to have a few more minutes to prepare. When I finally got called back I was still in tears. They sat me down in the seat and I was like " I can't do this." I got to go to the special seat where the patient can lay down during it. Clutching my lamb stuffed animal I continued to cry. The nurse then decided that I needed the baby needle. It was tinier but as she began to draw the blood I realized that it also takes a lot longer. I asked "Are we almost done?" and the reply was "Ummmmm. . . we're almost half way?" It was horrible. I almost died. I couldn't move my arm for hours. Blood work should be outlawed.

I guess to introduce myself I would have to say. . . I'm random. I like gumby and Spiderman kissed me twice and I love him. I have a sister who is one of my best friends. I have a boyfriend who I will tell you about sometime when I am running out of topics for my posts. I run. I guess I don't really know. . . anyone who has anything else to add should comment on this post and then anyone who is reading this post should read the comments and then you can get a better idea. Pretty smart, eh?

-Lacey

Monday, June 23, 2008

Nerdfighter Like Me

You know what amazes me? People are reading this blog who we aren't even friends with. Which is really cool. To the person who commented on Lacey's post last week, I thought it was really cool what you said. The fact that you care and you don't even know Lacey was awesome. So I was thinking, we should probably introduce ourselves to those readers who don't know us personally. Nothing long, just a paragraph in your next post.

So I'm Brianna. I play the viola. I love superheroes, my favorite being Superman. I know pretty much everything you could ever know and more about the Power Rangers. I love chocolate milkshakes more than anything. I have three sisters and two parakeets. I work at a soccer complex, where I referee games for younger children. And that pretty much sums me up in a couple of sentences.

So you guys know that I came up with this whole idea after watching the video blogs (vlogs) of fiveawesomeguys. I also watched fiveawesomegirls, and the vlog that inspired it all, Brotherhood 2.0. Now I'm not suggesting you watch these, because there are lots of entries, you'd want to start at the beginning to understand all the jokes. But their pretty awesome, and if you have no life like me, I totally recommend starting from the beginning of each. But my point is that all these people (fiveawesomegirls, fiveawesomeguys, Brotherhood 2.0) are nerdfighters. Some of you have heard me say that in the past and I thought you might want to understand where I got the term from. I mean if you watch the video I'm pretty sure that all The Power Bloggers will realize that they are nerdfighters too.



Oh and here is another video that is from one of the fiveawesomegirls that I love. It has some jokes from the Brotherhood 2.0 project, but it's still pretty cool to listen to, even if you don't know the jokes.



Yeah, so here's the nerdfighters site too, http://nerdfighters.ning.com/. So on those vlogs they also do punishments whenever someone breaks a rule. Now, that's a lot more difficult considering we're not on camera, but I think we can still pull something off. I mean there's lots of stuff you can do on the computer. So, on punishments, I must say June didn't post on Saturday. And I thought since we saw his talent in paint the first week of The Power Bloggers, his punishment should be designing some sort of logo or banner for The Power Bloggers on paint. Yeah, I think that's reasonable. So good luck with that, June.

So last Monday I was very ill, and thus my post was pretty lame. I even forgot to mention our views from around the world. I apologize. To the four viewers from Costa Rica, salutations. As for the Pokemon Challenge, I finished up Pokemon: Yellow and I moved onto Pokemon: Gold. So yeah.

I think my post is starting to get a bit lengthy so I'll end it here.

EDIT: It's still Monday and since Erica said the Costa Rica views were probably from her hello to the UK.

-Brianna

P.S. DFTBA (Don't forget to be awesome)

Sunday, June 22, 2008

Ranting on Rudeness, sorry

Hey guys! This is Blair filling in for Caroline. I've been trying to think about what to write, and what I came up with was about how rude people can be. I went to New York last week, where I met more rude people than I've ever met! It was mind-boggling how they didn't realize they were driving people freakin crazy!!! I'll just detail my trip and add my rant in the middle haha.

So Saturday and Sunday I had to hang out with my stepdad's family. It wasn't too bad but I was bored out of mind because there's seven granddaughters all around twelve years old that are all practically best friends and I have no interest in hanging out with them. Mostly I just hung out by the pool or went down to the basement to play Guitar Hero. And I saw a deer! It was awesome. I got like within 20 feet of it before it ran away. Then Monday we drove into Manhattan. I had so much fun that day! Sightseeing and shopping, what your supposed to do in New York! Then that night I had the best dinner of my life and went to see Phantom of the Opera! It was amazing and I'll never forget it. But here is where my rant begins. At the play, they said multiple times "NO FLASH PHOTOGRAPHY PLEASE!" Then they had people coming around with flashlights telling all the people who still had them out to put them away. Well, this lady two rows in front of me just couldn't get the hint. Throughout the show, she pulled out her camera and took pictures, just without the flash. The person with the flashlight came like five times but she still took pictures. She put her hand over the screen when they came by, that's how she got away with it. But I wanted to reach down there and yank the camera out of her hand, and so did the person right behind her by the looks of it. She had to have realized people wanted to slap her! I even saw her looking at the pictures during intermission. But the rant doesn't stop there! The guy behind me wouldn't stop coughing and yawning, loud yawns too, not those quiet ones that you just see. And his wife was singing along to the songs!! The most ironic thing about them was that during intermission, I heard the wife telling her parents or someone that HE was driving her crazy, but she couldn't get the hint that SHE was driving everyone crazy too!! Also, the guy in front of me was coughing constantly. Now I'm not mad at the guy in front of me, but I'm still totally pissed at the guy who was behind me because that yawning could've been controlled!! I heard his wife also tell those people that he had like 12 sleeping pills! He was a druggy who I wanted to strangle!!!! ugh

There's more to the rant. Sorry. The next day, we had to leave the amazing city to go to crappy Brooklyn and see my stepdad's crappy family. More specifically, his sister and mother. One is bad enough, but the two of them together makes me want to shoot myself. That's how miserable it is! So we get there, and everything's fine, no huge headaches yet. Then his niece and her four year old daughter Brianna show up. Oh my freakin god, now I didn't want to just shoot myself, I wanted to shoot Brianna too! She is THE most spoiled child I have ever met (2 whole rooms in her small house to herself) and she wouldn't leave me the crap alone for 8 straight hours. She asked me to play when she got there, and I said sure at first. We played for like an hour with a stupid ball rolling it back and forth. Then I got up because I wanted to eat dinner with adults. So during dinner, after she finished, she asked me to play again and I was like in a little bit, I want to talk to the adults. She just asked again 2 minutes later. And this cycle lasted the whole 8 hours. That's not the rude part though. I know little kids don't really know better but you'd think she would get the hint after 5 times. But she was trying to tell someone a story while one of the adults was already telling this person something. So naturally, the listened to the adult. Brianna, being annoying!!, decided not to wait but to say the same line over and over, getting louder and louder each time until she was shouting. Finally, she would stop when someone was like "Brianna, wait a second and let them talk!" I just wanted to slap her or something to make her shut up and leave me alone. At one point she actually got mad at me for not playing with her, even though she's four and I'm way older. Tehn right after, she was like "You're my favorite cousin!" and I just had to be like "...yay" It was one of the worst days of my life, no exaggeration.

So, to sum it up, I hate New Yorkern people and how rude they are. The worst part is they don't realize it. Which is why I love my friends so much, because they are so considerate and awesome!! Trying to end this on a happy note :)

-Blair

P.S. I hope this blog doesn't totally suck and ruin the Power Bloggers.

Just an Extremely Late Post

Hey green power blogger here and I would like to start out by saying this... I REALLY HOPE THIS POST IS ON BEFORE THE BLUE POWER BLOGGER'S BECAUSE THAT WOULD REALLY SUCK! Anyways I would like to apologize for not posting on Saturday because I was busy at church getting my volunteer hours. Well let's not waste anymore time because I have to tell you guys about North Carolina's Chimney Rock and let me tell you, it is awesome. Though I can't show you guys pictures of me (thinking about the random viewers we don't know), I took pictures of the place without me just so I could post it on here. I also had to change the batteries to my camera so the date is messed up. So here they are =)


Wow the dates on these are correct. Yay.



After that, we went to the Biltmore house. I don't recommend it because it was just a house for rich people and all you do is walk. But if you like seeing stuff like that then go ahead and check it out.




The last thing I want to mention is the volunteer work at church. It was fun for a while. The high schoolers looked after kids in their Vacation Bible Study and we inflated a giant pool (which we later tipped over as a group and made a huge tital wave plus a lake). But let me tell you, those kids are SO violent when they are hyped up on sugar. They were like little monkeys in the pool... or leeches... whichever you prefer. They wouldn't stop tackling, half-choking, scratching, wrestling, etc. And little kids tend to......you know..... uh... not hold it in when they are in the pool.
Overall, it was an enjoyable experience because there were 4 other "over ten year olds" with me to make it all better. Well that's all I have for you guys today and again, sorry for the late post.

- June

*After post comment: HAHA! YES! I MADE IT! Whew, I was really worried I wouldn't make it.

Friday, June 20, 2008

Girls want in on it too.

So Erica, Shuyao and I were having a short conversation on a Facebook message. It was short because it just began. Actually, we should probably have been discussing practices as the title still indicates. Well, the title isn't changing, and neither is the cold, hard truth. Maybe Blair, Erica and Lacey's (I put first names in alphabetical order when listing, by the way, so please don't feel bad if you're not first or last) red velvet mole cake won because of the incredible gender ratio. Now, yes. It was a beautiful cake. The mole was adorable. The cookie foundation was extravagant. We don't wonder why.
About Jack, June and Yige's cake: I'm sorry, I think June was in that group. Sorry June, if I'm wrong. Or the true third person if he wasn't June. -feels really bad now- Anyhow, Shuyao brought her amazing cooking skills to the Summerbrooke estate (by the way, I miss your sushi), and the cake was marvelous because of it. Many people would agree with that.

But however much guys are jerks, or can't cook, or want us to give them our English vocabularies, or keep asking us weird things that they should know like what "shrew" means, and to please translate this, or expect us to pick out a baseball wallpaper (which we did beautifully, by the way), take absolutely forever to ask one question, or tell our best friends that everything is perfectly okay even though his girlfriend isn't communicating with us in any way, or call us when we need to be getting to bed and want to ramble about how much they hate our good friend, or they act like they love training and battling with Pokemon more than you, or put one arm around your neck while you're trying to just frickin' walk, or when they have "mantalks" and don't let the girls know who or what they were discussing, or when they won't get up from bed until after 11am... they can still sort of make us smile when we're at our worst, just rambling about how Nadal has a weird grip on his tennis racket sometimes, and that James is sort of copying Federer's style by going up to the fence when he can. So thank you for all the times you guys weren't jerks. Which were a bunch.

-Kejing

P.S. You girls are amazing. ;)

Thursday, June 19, 2008

The Chicken or the Egg?

Ah.. one of life's most puzzling questions. To many the answer is simple, unfortunately we don't all agree. Personally, I'm for the egg. My choice was based upon my logical conjectures that I came up with through careful thinking. While I have no doubt that my opponents in thinking have too given this debate great thought, I can't help but notice a trend.


It seems as if, (and I want to be explicitly clear here that I in no way condemn or look down upon any facet of religion or science- they are all different answers that we can neither disprove nor prove) that Creationists believe that the chicken came first and that Evolutionists believe the egg was the first to make it on the scene.


Creationists first:

Good news Creationists, you have more on your side than previously imagined. Aristotle, the famous Greek philosopher thought that while it is a very confusing debate, you simply cannot have an egg without a first chicken. Frederic Cohen also agrees and furthermore points out that without a chicken, the lone egg would have had nothing to warm it and keep it alive.


Genesis 1 states:

19 And there was evening and there was morning, a fourth day. 20 And God said, Let the waters swarm with swarms of living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth in the open firmament of heaven. 21 And God created the great sea-monsters, and every living creature that moveth, wherewith the waters swarmed, after their kind, and every winged bird after its kind: and God saw that it was good. 22 And God blessed them, saying, Be fruitful, and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let birds multiply on the earth.



Good news, Creationists, it seems that The Bible (and I assume of course that you realize which half of the Bible this is coming form and how applicable it is to other modern day religions) gives you a clear cut answer. Chickens ruled before eggs.


But not so fast.


Evolutionists have their turn too:

While it may not be one of my beliefs, Evolutionary Creationists (those who believe God created and sanctioned everything but then let it evolve into present state- most religious that accept some bit of evolution as a truth into their religion are Evolutionary Creationists, even if they don't know it yet) provide a sort of compromise between modern technological science and religious science but yet choose the egg as first. Why? They say that "God created birds through the means of eggs. Well. That's pretty much a compromise, no? By this argument, God could have created chickens through evolution, and could have created them as eggs. This of course is assuming you believe in some bits of evolution. Meanwhile, for those of us who do not believe in creationism and follow a more Darwinian approach, the chicken was all but a happy accident. Somehow, life starts as a lowly amoeba. Fast forward a few million years and poof, you have a species very very similar to chickens, yet not quite enough to call them "chickens". As with most birds, they mate, and have an egg. However, this time, in this mating process, by God's will (if you're an evolutionary creationist) or the random idiosyncrasy of mutation, the egg is slightly different than it's parents. It's a mutant. Lo and Behold.. it's a chicken egg.


To reiterate what, honestly, shouldn't have to be but will be for the comfort of others, "I want to be explicitly clear here that I in no way condemn or look down upon any facet of religion or science- they are all different answers that we can neither disprove nor prove."


Capiche?


Good. Now that we have an eggplicit understanding, I hope your feathers aren't too riffled and you can mull over my postulations for a while before rushing to the hen houses to comment your little hearts out.


Eggcellent.


- Jonathan

Wednesday, June 18, 2008

No Logic to Human Behavior

I was watching the Colbert Report last week, when I saw a guy talking about vertical farming. It turns out this is one of the coolest things I’ve ever seen. Yes, it might be impractical, but it’s just so awesome! Plants are actually built inside of buildings within city limits using hydroponics (nutrient solutions instead of soil).

Yeah, maybe I’m not sure how this will actually produce enough food to make a significant impact, and it might consume a lot of energy to provide enough light for the plants, and I’m sure there are hundreds of other logistical problems I haven’t even thought about, but it’s so pretty, gorgeous in fact. Something that was previously so untamed and unruly will become sleek and modern. Some people see things like this and complain, wondering what the world’s coming to. I hope it’s just the beginning.
Look at it, isn't it beautiful?
Here's the website - http://www.verticalfarm.com/


On a completely unrelated topic, I started watching Bjork videos again this week and I had completely forgotten what I was missing. Even if you’re not a fan of Bjork, these videos are very entertaining. There’s a video to match every mood too: angry Bjork, happy Bjork, sad Bjork, dreaming Bjork, pensive Bjork, even naked Bjork. So I’ve decided to recommend some of them.

Violently Happy- Do NOT watch this video, it’s bad, really bad. A waste of your time and you probably won’t watch the rest of them. I know this technically isn’t a recommendation, I just wanted to warn you.

Human Behavior- I love this one, it’s so cute! I think this was her first video as a solo artist, and it basically describes what Bjork’s like in a nutshell.

Oceania- This song is great. It’s about evolution from the point of view of the ocean, and in the video Bjork personifies the water. There’s not really a plot or anything to the video, but it’s beautiful.

Wanderlust- Her latest video, but still utterly Bjork. It reminds me of The Neverending Story, or The Dark Crystal with extremely updated equipment (June, you should probably skip this one, there’s…. awkward moments).

Pagan Poetry- I probably shouldn’t even mention this one as there’s a strong chance none of you will like it (actually there’s a strong chance you won’t like any of them) but it’s so beautiful I had to include it. It’s about a bride preparing herself for her wedding day. You also might want to skip this one if you don’t like piercings.

And Bri, I was in the airport on Monday, and I saw a little girl wearing a superman cape and I thought of you. Just thought I’d let you know

-Viv

Tuesday, June 17, 2008

decisions, decisions

I am so sorry about todays post. I should warn you now. And now I have.

I am so tired I feel like I'm going to die. My mom is yelling at me for something I didn't do and I have a huge decision to make.

What is worse?

Having a drawn out time where everything is only alright.

OR

Having a little while where your heart is so crushed that you don't remember that it's even there and then things could get better.

Right now I'm not sure. I had decided but now I am doubting. I hate feeling like this. I hate that my mom is making me think this. I hate that it's somewhat true. I hate that it's my decision.

Geez as I'm typing this it seems like none of you will understand it or care. I don't blame you. It's cool. I will love you anyways. But as I sit here writing my post, there really isn't any other option for me. I am overcome with this feeling and it's all I can think. If you have complaints about the post I think that they should go to this feeling and not me. Personally I am a little caught up in having my heart broken and I don't know if I would notice that much.

I am sick too.

I can't tell which feelings are mine and which I was told to feel. I just hope that I don't mess this up because it's the best thing that has ever happened to me.

-Lacey

Sunday, June 15, 2008

Gotta Catch Them All

So to help Caroline with her color changing problems, I've put a picture below. Just click on it and you can see how to change the color in a post. I found it funny that yesterday Erica changed all the font settings to make sure her post was blue. Yeah, that wasn't what you were supposed to do, but it humored me.










Yesterday I decided to take on the Pokemon Challenge. What is this challenge? Well it's playing and beating every Pokemon game for the handheld system. This means I must complete Pokemon: red, blue, yellow, gold, silver, crystal, ruby, sapphire, leafgreen, firered, emerald, diamond, and pearl. Then there's Pokemon Ranger, Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: blue rescue team, red rescue team, explorers of time, and explorers of darkness. So that doesn't include the lame games like Pokemon Pinball and crap. Ok, ok, I made up the Pokemon Challenge, but I still think it's going to be a noble quest. If anyone wants to join me in the Pokemon challenge, I'm currently trying to locate games that can be borrowed. And I have Yellow if anyone wants to borrow it.

I saw Kung-fu Panda today, and don't worry I'm not going to talk about the content of the movie, but I was really annoyed. We watched it in one of those theaters on the end that have only a few row of chairs and doesn't slant up enough. This is ok for the vertically inclined of the world, but for everyone else, if anyone sits within three rows in front of you can't see the screen. It's ridiculous! And to make this theater even worse, there was this sticking stuff on the ground which made me constantly shift my feet, so I wouldn't permanently be stuck in it. I was REALLY annoyed with that since it was the first movie of the day and someone SHOULD have long cleaned it up.

Ok, I had some more stuff I wanted to say, but I don't feel well right now. So I'll save that for next week. Anyway, I'll be leaving town Wednesday at noon, so I'll won't get to read any posts (except Tuesday of course) until Saturday. I'm kinda down about that, but it gives me something to look forward to. Um...yeah...so I'm done.

-Brianna Rosier

Murder

Hey everyone! This is Erica, filling in for the blue power blogger. This is actually my first time blogging, and the past few days I've been thinking a lot about what to write. I thought maybe I could write about my trip that I'm on right now, but then I thought, no, that's not that interesting. So I thought and thought. And since the internet here is not that great, I was so worried that the internet would flake out and I would be the first one to ruin the power bloggers streak, but here I am, writing it! Hooray!

Although you don't know this, I have been sitting here for quite some time thinking about what to write. At first I thought I'd write about tatooes, then I thought it wasn't that great of a topic, or it might stir up some discussion. In order to stop discussions or arguments, I thought I'd write about something funny and entertaining, but I don't have a funny story really. I keep glancing up at the TV trying to find some inspiration, but everything is in Spanish. Little did I know, I have been getting inspiration just by looking at the tv. Although this topic has been discussed, and possibly overused, it is the only thing on my mind right now. Television.

Last night, I was watching this show called Dexter. I had no idea what was going on, so I did a quick search on good old Wikipedia. What the article said slightly scared me. "Set and produced in Miami, the series centers on Dexter Morgan, a serial killer who works for the Miami Metro Police Department as a blood spatter analyst." Interesting, right? Well, apparently his adoptive father taught him to channel his desire to kill by killing people who deserve it. Perfectly normal.

It kind of reminded me of the book our book circle in English read, And Then There Were None. *Spoiler Alert* The killer gathered up 9 other people to come to this secluded island and, following a poem title Ten Little Indians, he kills them all. This is the poem:
Ten little Indian boys went out to dine; One choked his little self and then there were nine.
Nine little Indian boys sat up very late; One overslept himself and then there were eight.
Eight little Indian boys traveling in Devon; One said he'd stay there and then there were seven.
Seven little Indian boys chopping up sticks; One chopped himself in halves and then there were six.
Six little Indian boys playing with a hive; A bumblebee stung one and then there were five.
Five little Indian boys going in for law; One got into Chancery and then there were four.
Four little Indian boys going out to sea; A red herring swallowed one and then there were three.
Three little Indian boys walking in the zoo; A big bear hugged one and then there were two.
Two Little Indian boys sitting in the sun; One got frizzled up and then there was one.
One little Indian boy left all alone; He went out and hanged himself and then there were none.

For example, for the first one, the man who dies is drinking some drink, scotch maybe, and suddenly starts choking. Turns out he was poisoned with cyanide. And the reason this connects with Dexter is the murderer killed all these people because they also were murderers, but there was no proof they had done anything wrong. For example, one couple were caretakers for an elderly sick woman and they were supposed to give her pills everyday, and one day, they didn't! Hence, the woman died, but they couldn't arrest her.

Ok, I think that's it for now. But before I leave, I'd like to say one thing, murder is wrong. Don't do it, even if you have the need to kill. Goodbye everyone and thanks for letting me write!

Saturday, June 14, 2008

Books and Movies

Hey guys. I didn't know that my topic last week would influence so many other posts. I feel so special =D. Well anyway, I want to talk about the book choices that our AP Lang teachers chose for us. These books include Catalyst, Ellen Foster, Unwind, The Color of Water, Kite Runner, and The Astonishing Life of Octavian. I've read some of Kite Runner before when I was younger and I did NOT like some of the stuff in the book. So here are some minor spoilers for people who do not know what any of these books include:


1. Catalyst: Typical smart girl spazzing over college choice. Traumatizing event happens and it ruins someone's life.

2.Ellen Foster: Girl sexually abused by her alcoholic father. Enough said.

3.Unwind: Parents condemn their child to death. An intended rape is foiled.

4.The Color of Water: Book about the struggles of prejudice.

5. Kite Runner: Book describing the situation in Afghanistan and the Taliban.

Now I would like to ask the teachers why choose these kinds of books? I'm not saying these books are bad because Kite Runner and Catalyst are really good books but what are the teachers trying to tell us? Maybe they cut out all the kids' books and are telling us," Hey you guys are old enough now. Let's show you what the world really looks like." Still, I think these are some very weird choices and I wish to know why Mrs. Jordan (AP Lang teacher) chose these books.

Now onwards to the movies! The most recent movies that came out are The Happening and The Incredible Hulk. Based on two radio stations and the site rottentomatoes.com, these movies aren't the best ones that came out. For you squeamish people, both of these movies have a large body count so go see Horton Hears a Who for a better experience. Starting with The Happening, this movie got a 20% on the site and many of the people say it was a huge let down. "Unintentionally hilarious... there is a difference between plain nasty and plain ridiculous... gives the Wayan brothers a reason to make Scary Movie 5..." The Incredible Hulk got a better rating of 64%. "The Marvel people got so excited about Iron Man that they left out some of the finer details of The Hulk.... incredible action...." Yeah pretty much. Is it just me or are the movies getting worse and worse? Well that's all I got for you guys today so stay tuned for the blue power blogger's post. Though I won't be here to read it because I'm going to North Carolina for 3 days. Well have a good rest of the day/night/week/month/year/life!

Friday, June 13, 2008

Our Smiles are Genuine

The elementary and middle schools were connected by a breezeway. Every morning, various middle schoolers would walk down to the eastern, elementary school end, to Strings class. Ms. Lesh was away for an extended period of time, so the current teacher was never permanent. In fact, one of our long-term substitute teachers moved to Florida after he got his Master's Degree. One such teacher was slightly new to the music field. He tried his best, relayed his honesty to us, and we all had a lot to learn.
One day, he stopped the class early, took a seat on the teacher's stool, and smiled at us. No, not in a creepy way, as you may have suspected. I mean, he didn't give us shoulder massages or anything. He began a short story. One day after school, a boy came into the room to pick up his instrument. This teacher said, "have a good weekend," and the boy replied, "you too." This two-word reply meant the world to our teacher. He said that he had previously gone to a school where the students would never reply to a simple "have a good afternoon," but ignore him as though they hadn't heard a thing. He told us, "thank you." Even though it may seem like a small thing, it brought the motivation he had previously lacked, to get up from bed at 6:40am in the morning to go to a school, where students held some respect, even just a little, towards him and his instruction.
Guys don't cry, we know. And he didn't, but it seemed as if a good moment had come.

This is not related, but someone told me something a couple of days ago that really struck me down. He said that people were telling him that I was being especially kind to people before MAO elections to get their votes. And the thing is, I know I was in a really good mood in April. But truly, the elections had nothing to do with it. I had a personal reason to smile at everything and everyone who I saw for quite a few weeks, and I still do.
So please, to anyone out there who is reading this: Whether your heart is set out on helping a club, or you put forth all your effort towards something for which you have been striving endlessly, step back before it wraps around you, lovingly or not. Really, step back from it and look at the world around you. It's a big one.

-Kejing

Thursday, June 12, 2008

Repurpose That Green Currency, Would-ya?

You may or have not noticed, but I’m a green freak. This, however, is not solely connect to lime green as my favorite color; nay- I am a strong proponent of living green. And here’s why you should be too..


Economics-

Believe it or not, in many ways, it’s cheaper to buy green! Buying EnergyStar appliances will save you hundreds on annual electricity and gas bills (what did you think the water heater and refrigerator ran off of?). Being stingier with your water use will save you substantial amounts of money too- you’d honestly be surprised. Now am I suggesting you shower less often (well to a certain extent yes, to those of you who do it more than once a day) but mostly this means simply turning off the water while you brush your teeth (however TERRIBLY inconvenient it is!) or taking showers instead of baths.


Ecologically-

It’s simple. Even if you don’t believe in Global Warming (though you’d have to have had your head in the sand for a couple of decades now not to believe it by now) there is no denying that we are doing terrible things to our atmosphere. Skin cancer is on the rise (www.skincancer.org) and that’s only a small part of our problems. Smog is causing millions of people upper respiratory problems and forcing some out of their cities.

Now you are armed with a few of the basic facts, go champion your own reasons for being green. I have my own, and honestly, they’re less ecologically minded than economically minded.


I believe in sustainability.

Sustainability is idea that you remove yourself from the grid. You no long rely on the city to provide you your water, electricity, gas, you name it. In fact- any excess energy you generate, you can sell back to the city and make a little money! But back to sustainability- The Earthships Biotecture program has a creative solution to the sustainability problem (www.earthship.net) . They incorporate my favorite recycling technique into building their houses- Repurposing/Reusing. I <3 Repurposing.


Back to sustainability- I believe less in the ecological standpoint that it’ll “save the planet- yadda yadda”. The planet is on its way down. People are taking notice. Will people do anything about it? No. Not unless it’s convenient for them. That’s where I stand. I see the ecologic strong points to sustainability and think- “that’s nice.. but will it cost me less in the long run?” And the answer is (when used properly) yes. Solar Panels are a favorite of mine. They’re becoming cheaper and cheaper every month and reaching new efficiency levels everyday. Another fascinating alternative are wind turbines. These fickle energy producers are quite reliable actually and produce a surprising amount of energy just from the wind.

You might still wonder why you should go green. Here- let me spell out what I’ve been avoiding. O-I-L. It’s big, it’s dirty, and above all- it’s running out. No, no, I’m no dooms-day theorist, I’m merely pointing out that all of the oil pumps are working at full stomp and yet we’re not putting anymore oil into the ground- something’s got to give. If the world continues this love affair with hydrocarbons we will soon find ourselves paying through the nose for those last few drops in a few years. Why not forgo the ordeal altogether? If we transition (slowly) we can put money into the renewable energy market and help invest in more efficient technology in that field a few years earlier. You’ll see..

So what should you take away from this post for the week?

Reduce. Reuse. Recycle.

Honestly- they should consider adding “Repurpose.” to that list- it’s not enough fun without it!

Have a great green week!

- Jonathan

Wednesday, June 11, 2008

The Immoralist Speaks

Since I’ve only complained so far in my posts, I decided today that I was going to share something fun, exciting, jolly, etc. Unfortunately I can’t think of anything to share, so it looks like it’s time for a random rant.

Last week the good old hot-button topic of sex and violence in entertainment was brought up. As many of you know, I didn’t have cable growing up (and upsettingly enough still don’t have it now, but that’s for another day), but this didn’t stop me from watching TV shows on the basic channels that weren’t made for kids. I mostly watched Friends, the Simpsons, and Seinfeld, all of which at least some people would have problems showing to their children. I’ve also been watching R rated movies since I was pretty young. But I don’t think this has made me into an immoralist, or somehow turned me into a blood-lustful pervert. Ultimately I think that just by living in modern society kids are exposed to a lot of things, and further censorship of cartoons isn’t going to change that. When TV shows are adapted from other countries to the United States, a lot of people complain that they censor a lot of things out. A lot of people consider Americans to generally be prudes.

And in Adult Swim’s defense, I’d just like to point out that not only kids like cartoons, and seeing that there are a very limited number of networks that show cartoons, it makes sense that Cartoon Network would have adult oriented cartoons on later at night. I’m not saying that kids wont watch it because it’s on late, but for that matter, why would they be less likely to watch it if it was just on a different channel?

The point is, a lot of the time, kids really aren’t as innocent as they seem, and they understand a lot more than what people think.

For me, the biggest problem about shows like Tila Tequila is that they are such a waste of time and money that could’ve gone towards producing something so much better. Yes, many of these shows are stupid, pointless, and sometimes just disgusting, but I’m not exactly in favor of censorship either. In the end it comes down to what it always comes down to in a capitalist society: profit. So if you don’t like it, don’t watch it (and possibly don’t let your kids watch it either). If there are enough people who feel the same way as you, the show won’t make it to second season. If there aren’t enough… well then that’s just the beauty of free speech.

-Viv

Tuesday, June 10, 2008

chocolate shakes and puppies

I discovered an awesome recipe for the easiest chocolate shake ever. It's not intensely chocolate but I think its really good. You get an empty bottle of water and pour in a cup of milk and 2 teaspoons of instant pudding mix and shake it. Delicious.

So I don't get along that well with my family. Right now it's my mother. She blames me for her being so mean. I can't even post the actual quote because. . . its that bad.

Today she informed my father that the hamburgers that he cooked for dinner were dry and overdone. She informed me that I was a slob and on the border of disgusting. And when my father said to her, "Wow, you're kind of cruel tonight. . ." she replied, "no, I'm just being honest."

Just being honest. If I look back on everything she's said to me. . . I guess maybe in her own way she was just being honest. Sometimes, I think that she should think how it affects other people because I am sure that I am psychologically damaged.

I wish that I could just be honest with her. That'd show her how it feels.

About two months ago my sister came to me and asked for me to drive her in the morning to Driver's Education the first two weeks of summer. I, of course, said yes.
[In case you don't know, I drive her basically everywhere. She gets whatever she wants and thats fine, whatever. But when I was on my first date with this guy who I'd been crazy about for about 7 ish years and I get a call telling me that I need to go pick her up from hanging out with her friends. . . that is taking it a little too far.]
But anyways, I said yes. Here we are two months later and it turns out that it's extremely hard for me to do that with my schedule. I accomplished it everyday last week and this week I only asked for one thing. Can someone please take her on Wednesday? My mom told me NO Tuesday she could take her and that was it. So she took her Tuesday and then said she wanted to take her Wednesday later. I was thrilled until I got a lecture later on how I should think about things before I commit to them. For instance, if I was going to not be able to take my sister two days in a row I should have said no.

Does anyone see the irony here? If you don't tell me and I'll explain it further. It should be smacking you in the face. I'm sorry about that part.

I think that I'm meaner this week than usual. I have a few things going on and I'm sick feeling and my boyfriend is out of town and has been FOREVER. (Actually since Friday.) I guess I didn't know I'd miss him this much. I feel pathetic.

I met some of his family when they came to pick him up. They said I was sweet and very beautiful (? haha), and adorable. Adorable? Apparently I am. Just like a puppy or a teddy bear.

I got my legs waxed today. And the deal was that this girl at the school would wax my legs and then I'd wax hers. She was laughing at me for wincing and just ripping away. I, on the other hand, was very careful and tried so hard not to hurt her. Turns out that I was tougher than she was and she had to stop halfway. Thats right, smooth in the front and hairy in the back.


I have my first test tomorrow. I'm not worried though. In the review today our instructor used the test to quiz us. . .

I finished Unwind which is on our reading list for the summer. It was great. I recommend it. I started The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing and all I can say is, good luck.

Does it get randomer than this? Just wait until next Tuesday.

-Lacey

Monday, June 9, 2008

Wholesome/Invisibility

Speaking of television, the most wholesome show ever is The Power Rangers. I mean they promote such good values in kids, and the violence doesn't even look real. Last week I watched around 30 episodes of The Power Rangers. And, well I think I've figured it out. So here it is, the list you've all been waiting for....

How To Be A Power Ranger
  1. Wear your color at all times.
  2. Go to the same hang-out everyday (youth center, music store, etc.).
  3. Your only jokes must be in the form of puns.
  4. If something unexpected happens you must let each member of the team add their input no matter how useless ("no way!", "I don't believe it!")
  5. The only friends you can have outside the Power Rangers are goofy characters that make fools of themselves more often than not.
  6. Learn a skill that could help you when fighting (karate, gymnastics, dancing).
  7. Having a special ability is not required, but if you can do something like duplicate yourself it looks pretty good.
  8. Never have homework, or if you do never actually do it.
  9. Walk everywhere you go.
  10. Have some sort of mentor. Some of the past are: Zordon(I don't really know what he is), the hamster guy, the robot bird, and the alien dog.

So there you go. I'd also like to speak about the super power I've seemed to develop. I went the FAMU BRITE Invention camp for my first time today. It turns out they give out prizes like crazy. We watched this movie that half of the kids fell asleep in, but not I. Then they proceeded to ask questions about the movie. Every person who got a right answer received five dollars. Of course I knew all the questions, and I'm pretty sure my hand was always first in the air, but I never got to answer. I was annoyed because earlier they also had not been calling on me when my hand was raised. So I've come to this conclusion. I can turn invisible. That's right. It's obviously not under my control yet, but I'll work to focus this power.

Viv asked me if I would mention other countries we've been getting views from. So, hello to the two viewers we had from Spain.

So, let week three begin!

-Brianna

Sunday, June 8, 2008

TV continued...

TV continued...
Hey guys! Blue powerblogger here...again!
So I read the green powerblogger's post yesterday, and it really stirred up a lot of feelings in me towards television programs today. It seems like there is way to much violence, sexual content, and inappropriate material on tv today for people of all ages. A lot of the shows are just trash-like Tila Tequila, Flavor of Love, Living Lohan, and other reality shows that revolve around has-beens and people who are just famous for being stupid and having a lot of myspace friends. Take Tila Tequila for instance. Whereas I won't comment on Tila's sexual preferences, I think the show is very inappropriate and, quite frankly, disgusting for even MTV. The whole show is just a bunch of skanks and players all over each other. Every time I see it, I throw up in my mouth a little. Then there's shows like Flavor of Love, Rock of Love, etc. that are supposedly all about "finding true love". Well, its taken three seasons for both the guys in these two shows, and still neither of them have found "true love". Love isn't something that you audition for and then compete for in a silly reality show! These people are just going to break a lot of hearts and cause plenty of headaches with the stupid games that the contestants must play in order to get attention. And take Denise Richards: It's complicated (or as Joel McHale from the Soup would say, "Denise Richard's colon is complicated) and Living Lohan from E!. These are just washed up stars that are trying to get their fame back by having their entire lives exposed for the world to see. Ali Lohan needs to realize that she will never be anything like her sister (hopefully, for her sake) and Denise Richards is just harming her children by pushing them into the spotlight on her show.
And I'm sorry Hunter, if you are reading this, but I HATE Cartoon Network. In fact, I am boycotting it all together. I have never seen more inappropriate shows for children in my entire life. They contain what my dad refers to as "crass": those "bad words" from back in the day when we were in elementary school that really shouldn't be used in children's television. The whole "Adult Swim" on Cartoon Network really angers me, too. Why, WHY would you broadcast shows labeled M for Mature content on a network that was made primarily for children. Don't give me some sorry excuse like, "its on late, so kids can't watch it anyways". I don't buy into that crap. Its completely unacceptable.

So there's my little rant on television today. It makes me realize how much I miss the good ol' days with the Rugrats, Lizzie McGuire, and Scooby Doo.

Until next week,
-Caroline

P.S.: There isn't a little icon that allows me to change the font color. So I don't know what you're talking about, Bri.
Oh, and I won't be here next week, so if you are interested in being a fill-in, let me know. I think Erica might fill in for me though. But here are some really neat pictures of holes. The first three are of a huge hole that is used to drain water from a dam. In the third picture, the hole can be seen in the top left hand corner of the photo. Some lady tried to swim in the hole and come out the other side of the dam, but she didn't live to tell her tale. The last two are of this hole in the ocean thats thousands of feet deep. They're just really cool looking.




Saturday, June 7, 2008

Entertainment These Days

Hey guys I'm back and it's a miracle that my internet is lasting long enough for this post. So while I still have time, I would like to address an episode of Spongebob Squarepants. Now I want to address this because I have never seen a more graphic, children inappropriate episode in my life. The episode was called "The Splinter". I'm going to give you the short version.

So Spongebob is at the Krusty Krab when he suddenly gets his spatula stuck in the ceiling. He balances on boxes and jars but apparently he thought it was smart to put glass jars at the bottom of the pile of heavy boxes. So he gets the spatula out and stumbles and the boxes' contents spill out. And do you know what was in those boxes? SWORDS! I'm telling you that's a law suit just waiting to happen. Well anyways, he falls but misses all the swords. Then he slips on tar tar sauce and gets a splinter. Did they show him falling off screen, showing a splinter as he gets up? No. They show the splinter entering his finger in slow-mo. This didn't bother me as much until Patrick tried to help. He NAILS the splinter in further with a wooden mallet and then puts trash compost on it to stop the swelling, which causes the finger to swell even more, turn blue, and ooze pus. No censorship. Now we can handle this type of stuff but seriously! Kids of all ages are watching this show and do you think parents want their 3 year olds to see this stuff? Well the episode ends with Squidward trying to commit suicide by beating himself up with a cash register and then he asks Mr.Krabs for worker's compensation (paying the worker when he/she gets injured at work). Is this the message we have for children these days? Hey kids! Injure yourself as much as possible so you can get worker's compensation in school!

The last thing I want to talk about is the movie, "Don't Mess With The Zohan". Now due to a friend with excellent taste in movies, I had to sit through this torture. Is it a movie about an unstoppable Israeli soldier wanting to be a barber? Like 1/10 of the movie is about that. The rest was all racist and perverted jokes that kept repeating itself like a broken record. It had its moments but they are very few. Also it was very disturbing to see Adam Sandler butt-naked on a beach, sticking a fish in between his butt cheeks. That's not even the half of it. Ugh I don't want to tell you the most perverted parts so if you were going to see a movie, go see Kungfu Panda because it is NOT worth the money... Unless you like extremely perverted, sexual, racist movies. Well, no pretty pictures this week and this is the only exciting thing that happened to me so if you want more excitement, go watch a movie. That or stay tuned for the blue power blogger's post because she's awesome like that =)

Friday, June 6, 2008

Never Just One Topic

It's 11:11am. Sometimes I wonder what all of you are asking for at this moment. Other times, it occurs to me that 11:11pm is actually 23:11, so it isn't quite the same thing, but people wish at that time, too. Well, a few months ago, I wished at 11:11pm two or three times, and to my surprise, they came true within a week. Even though I don't believe in wishes.

xkcd has amused us yet again.

Journal 5
'Pick you up at eight?' 'Nine. I've got to re-mine the driveway.'

Yesterday, I thought it was interesting that sometimes, the smartest people do some not-so-smart things. If you are not mentioned in this paragraph, it does not mean you are not smart. A while ago, Gaku bought film for a disposable camera. More recently, during Biology, runiteking1 was offered 1 USD to sniff salt into his nose. He did it. He also expressed desires to become a mammogram technician. So Mrs. Traylor reminded him that he would have a lot of very old patients. Yesterday, Linda decided to bike, and went straight into a tree. She also went downhill with the 1st gear, and uphill with the 7th.

Gaku & Marshall's cousin, Linda's boss

Thursday, June 5, 2008

A Teacup of Shame

As some of you may know, I have a relatively new pet. By I, I mean my father. It's his and only his, and despite his multiple attempts to convince me that I should help him with it because it's ours, I still don't believe him.

That being said- I guess I should tell you what it is..

A Rat

Yes. It's small, hairy, has a tail, and gets into everything that you set within its tiny reach.

Okay. Okay. It's not a rat, per se. It's more of a Teacup Yorkshire Terrier and I think I want to shoot it.

This rodent/canine abomination is not only ugly, it's annoying as hell too. "Bacca" (short for Chewbacca, the Star Wars sidekick with all the hair in his face- which is what this dog will look like once her hair grows out) has the annoying tendency to steal shoes and do unmentionable things to them. Haha- I bet you were imagining something awful. Nah- she just steals, hides, and chews on them. Sometimes I'll find her play toys in them too.. I wonder if this is an instinct on her canine side to bury/hide things. Or it could be from her rodent tendency to hoard things. Either way it's a pain in the rear and I hate it.

She's also pathetic. No? Don't believe me? Well how about when my dad leaves her on the couch? Well, for some reason only known to the gods, she will not take the two and a half foot jump. She barks and whines until somebody pushes her off. Then she has no problem jumping. Damn co-dependent user.

What is her very worst quality? She poops. Not a little. No- that'd be manageable. No she poops a disproportionately large amount for her size. Honestly. I'm beginning to wonder if I shouldn't measure the amount per day because it almost seems as if this two pound dog is pooping her weight everyday and yet still alive. She's either a living miracle or debauched horror; jury is still out for the decision between the two.

So what do I do about it? I clap. I yell. I whistle. I hiss. I chase. (I really like the second and last verbs actually) It's gotten so good that it's at the point where I can one sudden movement in her direction and she flinches. Now that is power.

- Jonathan

Photographic evidence of said monstrosity:




(PS- No animals were harming in the production of this blog post)

Wednesday, June 4, 2008

Hitchcock in Real Life

Lacey, I just wanted to let you know that you are crazy, and for some reason I'm oddly excited that your going to cosmetology school. I also love that you have to watch a movie on AIDS before you can give someone a professional facial.

About a couple months ago, a bird started pecking on the door to our porch. Every morning around seven he would come back and start knocking again. Now, this door is made of plexiglass, so just imagine a small hammer tapping on your window every single morning and that’s about how freaking annoying this bird is. This had been driving me and my mother crazy for a couple of weeks when we decided to actually do something about it. So we opened the door.

Normally when someone knocks incessantly on your door for hours at a time over the course of two weeks, it means they want to come in. Apparently this bird doesn’t know how to communicate properly because after the door was finally, graciously opened for him, he just sat there. He sat there looking at us and then flew away. He could’ve at least given us some explanation for his actions but no, he just took off.

So we thought that that might be the end of the terribly rude little bird but we were sadly mistaken. He was back within a couple of days, and this time with a friend. Now he would tap relentlessly while his wife sat by watching. If I was her, I’d recognize him for the creep he is and leave. I mean, he’s obviously unemployed, and spends most of his time heckling good, innocent people without reason. Shouldn’t he be busy providing for his family? What about the little chicks at home? This guy obviously doesn’t have his priorities straight if his favorite pastime is running headfirst into glass barricades.

So why am I bringing this up now, after months of harassment? Well that is because my mother informed me that as of a few days ago there is now a THIRD bird. I fear that the house will soon be infiltrated and just in case, Bri, you might want to start looking for my backup. I know, I know, I’ve only been here two weeks. And don’t worry it seems that these birds are very slowly building their numbers, so this is likely to be a long drawn out process. But you should still be prepared.

I’m now waiting for the day when the head bird suddenly gives the go-ahead and the forty friends he so carefully gathered strike, piercing through the plexiglass and invading our home. Maybe I’m getting ahead of myself, maybe all they want is to live in peace and harmony with us. But if they did, would he have flown away when we opened the door? I think not. This bird was giving us our fair warning, at a time when it was too early for us to tell what lay ahead.

But don’t worry; we won’t go down without a fight. After all, they are mere birds, and we are humans, those who were born to rule the earth. This will not be the last you here from me.

-Viv

Tuesday, June 3, 2008

Death and Pokemon

What up home skillets?

I ALMOST DIED THIS WEEKEND. I was going to the beach with my boyfriend and we decided to run on the beach. Barefoot. My feet felt like they were being sliced open. It hurt so bad. I got blood blisters on my feet and their all purpley. I am lucky to be alive.

So not too many of you have heard about my summer plans.

I am taking AP Art History, Personal Fitness, and SAT Prep online. I am taking a class to become licensed as a personal trainer. I am also going to cosmetology school from 9-5 Tuesday-Saturday, except Thursdays when I am there 9-9. Ridiculous? I think yes. Why am I doing all of this? Well I can't quite remember right now, but I'll get back to you. . .

Anyways today was my first day of Cosmetology School. It consisted of the usual introduction/orientation material. You know. . . rules and dress code and regulations and supplies and textbooks. But we also had to watch an hour long video on HIV/AIDs. . . and then take a test. . . that had none of that information on it. So that was fun. Then we had to take an hour long class on bacteria. And take a test. (which I got 100% on by the way (only person in the class.)) And I have to read three chapters for homework. I am getting licensed in skin care right now meaning that if any of you want to have facials or waxing done you should come visit me. You still have to pay though. Just kidding. . . but not really, it's in the rules.

It's so hard to think because I had to wake up really early to take Annie to Driver's Ed. The same class I took over the summer last year. Yuck. What a waste of time. First of all, we did nothing all day. Second of all, it was hot and we were outside almost all day. And then, when we were inside the teacher, in his infinite wisdom, turned on R rated films. I am allowed to watch them, but at that point in time I don't think anyone in that class was 17 and there was no type of parent permission or notification or anything. Which just doesn't seem right to me.

The next thing is kind of pathetic. My boyfriend Ross likes to play video games. He plays them kind of a lot. Not as much as he used to, because he spends a lot of his time with me but still a lot. Right now the game that he wants to buy is Pokemon. He has played it on my sister's boyfriend's Gameboy DS recently when I was around and it was like I wasn't even there. He will always deny it but I know the truth. He loves Pokemon more than me.

Okay so I thought that the first week of our blog was great. I thought everyone's blog was awesome and I realized how perfect of a mix our personalities are for this blog. I truly feel like we did an amazing job, or at least everyone else did. And hi person from Egypt.

-Lacey

PS-I know that this is orange but no color of yellow works with the background. Sorry if someone else has orange. I'll work out this small technical difficulty. Also if anyone knows how to change the text background. . . that could help too.

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