I Guess It's Times Like These.

Merry Christmas, Everyone!

Haven't had the chance to blog in a very long while, due to the death of my computer. I had no other desire to post whilst i awaited a new one, due to a new job at Best Buy! Hiphiphooray. But enough of the update, lets get down to our topic today:: Obama's awesome speech about the recent terrorist attacks on airplanes.

On Christmas Day, a flight to Detroit was interrupted by a person who decided it would be a fantastic idea to try and blow up the airplane. Smart guy, right? Not the bomber, Obama. According to Aol.com, he said that "the failed Christmas Day plot to blow up a Detroit-bound airliner was 'a serious reminder' of the need to continually adapt security measures against changing terrorist threats." Nooo way, really? Because last time I checked, security has been going down since 9/11. Sure, they check shoes and offer a machine that does an x-ray of your clothes to determine whether you're hiding anything or not. But, unfortunately, some are often stereotyped and selected for "random screening" at TSA's request. Well, TSA does miss a bunch of stuff. Like how all liquids are supposed to be in bags? I have left mine in my carry-on on accident multiple times and have not had it brought up by any security. Also, why is Obama so late in deciding that our national security actually involves OUR NATION'S AIRPORTS?! We should be less concerned with Iran at the moment, and more concerned with what's going on inside our borders. President Washington was probably a smart guy when he advised everyone to stay out of foreign affairs. Too bad nobody actually listened to him.

Anyhoo, now, someone finally decides our security measures need to be looked over. I certainly recall this being an issue a little over 8 years ago...don't you think we could have stepped it up a little then, and avoided this issue now? And would this guy have gotten on a plane if TSA had been decent enough to do thorough searching? If you actually paid attention to what you were scanning, you could have found something.

Suck on that, Obama-admin. Let me help you review the security and the staff involved.

Happiness. & our NEW TEAMMATE!

Before we get into the major blog stuff, I'd like to welcome Kris. We've been friends as long as he has been with my brother, Tanner. And recently, we've discovered that together, we get some great writing and great points out into the world. So, he will join, and post after my postings, so on & so forth. So, without further ado, our topic for today.


Happiness. Webster defines this as a state of well-being and contentment. We have all had experiences that agree with Webster on this. Our first drive, our first love, our first date, our first art show, our first concert, etc. But what is the price to keep this happiness alive? We tend to crash, get our hearts broken, spill the water, break the canvas, and show up late to our most favorite passions in life. So why, I may ask, can this happiness not be contained?

My fifth grade teacher, Mrs. Speers, had a poster hung above the door that always read "Happiness is Contagious." and I would always glance at it during class. I loved that saying, and tried so many times to prove it to myself that it was true. I would be nice to my brother for once when I arrived home, just to be short-changed and ignored in return. I would give up a cookie at lunch, still left to feel like an outsider. Even now-a-days, I try and hold onto friendships and the happy memories that were shared, just to get argued with and replaced. Why can we not just hold simply onto the good, and not focus as much on the bad? Why must we feel to raise an argument we can not win? Life has other plans. For some, it makes it extremely hard to feel happiness, if at all.

How can happiness be obtained by someone that Life has decided to outcast? Easy. Put yourself around people who smile constantly. Smiles, much like yawns, are contagious as well. Smile at a stranger on the subway, smile to your barista at the local Starbucks. Even step out on a limb and smile at the boss you just cannot stand. Because even if Life is getting you down, you could always try and make someone else's day. Step outside the selfish box, take a look around. Sure, you may not be happy that day, that week, that decade, but even a smile a day can take you one step closer to even being remotely stable, and maybe pick up another stranger who is having an equally tough time, feel a little better because now that you have passed on a smile, so will they. It's a chain reaction, whether it be scientific or not.

Smile. Be Happy. You only get this Life once. Show it you're in charge, and you will make orange juice with the lemons you've been handed.

Golf, The Beach, And The Sand In-Between

I am currently vacationing in the beautiful Corolla, North Carolina. While I have been here, I have been taking notice of the variety of golfers coming through the course that our three-story get-a-way overlooks. I have seen guys, hitting balls [no pun intended] and having a great time, to an older couple just looking to relax, or a young guy, around my age, frustrated that his ball almost rolled onto the bike trail [and hit me...] Since my dad has yet to teach me to golf, I have easily become very jealous of the bond golf seems to help strengthen. Everything about vacation is about bonding, correct? Whether it be with friends or family or your fiance, you are ultimately striving to find out some new and interesting things about the other, and just having a stress-free enjoyable time.

Now for the beach! The first and second days we were here, the beach was red-flagged because of a tropical storm 700 miles off of the coast. Dern, the rip current was strong. But it's always good to know your lifeguards are light-hearted and encompass a personality full of smiles and tans. They joked about law-enforcement and neglected to take action to giving tickets to the brave who swam despite the undertow of the angry ocean. Although the sand-bars were high and the waves small, it could have been potentially dangerous. But thank-you to the guards for giving us a good laugh, and keeping watch on us when the flags were lifted.

And last but not least, the sand. I seem to have forgotten how much it is alike everything else in life, more importantly family. I neglect to include friends here, because of some interesting events I had come across me this past evening. However, significant others can be included if you so choose. At any rate, you seem to find sand in your hair, your clothes, under your nails, in your bag, and most irritably in your ears. Funny how family can be in your hair, stealing your clothes, breaking your nails, shoving random things in your bag, and shout constantly in your ear. All in jest, family is always around, and part of this trip was to bring a bond between a brother and a sister, their significant others, and the children, respectively. Which, I believe has done a bunch of good, seeing as my magical babysitting touch calmed the sibling rivalry for about 5 or 6 hours. I really deserve a pat on the back for this one, seeing as yelling is not an easy thing to calm. However, I am thankful for this trip and the opportunity I have to catch up with my dad, who is busy constantly, making it hard for any father-daughter bonding time. I also enjoy the smell of the ocean breeze, the feel of the wind, the warmth of the sun.

I know I ramble on about bonding, but relationships are extremely important in the hike of life. If you don't have anyone to catch the food, how will you eat?

A Common Thread in Teenagehood.

How about "love"? Most teenagers go and see movies like "The Notebook", "A Walk to Remember", and multiple other romance movies, and start imagining a romance so sweet and true as those. I believe it creates a falsehood in the minds of us teens that all relationships are really not that hard, and can be fixed with the slightest flick of a wand...wrong! Relationships are like a job you enjoy. Yes, you love working hard for the benefits, but you're still sacrificing a lot of things for this "job."

So many teenagers feel like searching for a companion as perfect as the movies make men seem. HA! Funny how the chances of that happening are one in about twenty thousand...odds comparable to being murdered...no joke. So we read magazines, watch movies, and look for similar things or quirks about someone else that you just love. You reach high school, and everything is about so&so dating someone else every two weeks. Or you have those who last from freshman year to senior year, and you think, "how the hell did this happen to them, and not me?"

Easy...you have the same chance of being murdered in high school than you do in finding love. I'm not saying it isn't possible, because I consider to have found some myself, although as Jason Mraz said, "And it takes no time to fall in love, but it takes years to know what the love is." Those are very wise words, seeing as in high school you typically base your opinions off of those of your peers, as well as the media. Movies, TV Shows, even music influences the minds of young generations across the nations.

So, who do we blame for wanting love so badly so young? The media? Ourselves? Men who are incompetent? No, simply, we just don't point fingers. It isn't polite, besides.

:)

So basically, sarcasm.

Sarcasm. Webster defines it as "a sharp and often satirical or iron utterance designed to cut or give pain." How true is this statement made up by some really really bored English guys? Sarcasm is usually the tone you give a significant other when saying that everything is fine when it isn't, or taking a statement and throwing it back at them with some extremity to make them feel lesser of themselves. I think this gives pain, wouldn't you? Or in familial ties, where your family jokes about your recent job or love-life, and you hate being reminded of such casualties.

I guess this leads to the intonation of how things are said. If you say things like "yeah, whatever" as either flirty or legit angry, then you obviously have two moods that can be based off of one phrase. This is the problem I have with electronic communication, i.e. texting, e-mailing, even twittering. You cannot hear the tone of some one's voice via these ways, but still accuse people of "saying" something they never actually verbalized. Then you have court cases which says that it was verbalized, but electronically. Then they send you to jail or juvie, whichever you prefer, and you're basically screwed for just joking around. Or using politically incorrect phrases. Cause we all know, heaven forbid, that someone use "gay" or "retarded" in a blog. Or on myspace, twitter, facebook, you name it.

Now, there are many phrases in the world that can be taken two or more ways. Things like "cool" "great" "yeah, awesome" "i love you" "i hate you" can all be taken differently depending on the intonation. Cool can be nonchalant or caring, great could be praise or apathetic, and i hate you could always mean that you love them, just you're refusing to admit to it. If only we could hear President Obama use one of these, which I'm sure he has and I haven't heard him say them. How i wish i could record every single mess-up he caused. I'd have a really good blogging topic then, wouldn't ya think? ;)

The Freedom of Speech...or so we thought.

Our Constitution helped to create the government we've come to know, well, up until this past election. And with that Constitution came the first amendment, which includes the freedom of speech and many other freedoms that come with it.

First, let's go with phrases that are not politically correct. Things like "retarded", "gay", "special", etc. Now, my generation has grown up using these phrases constantly, as phrases of expression to something stupid or hard. Now, these phrases get people into lot of trouble, especially journalists. If you say any of these in an article, soon you're ass is being ridiculed by MSNBC and CNN for "not being politically correct and expressing views that are biased and wrong." So, therefore, what happened to expression? Sure, these things are written and can be taken in many different tones, but if we get down to it, they're just words. Everyone, and i mean EVERYONE, is entitled to an opinion. So why strip us of said opinion so we can ball it up, and transform it to shape the spectrum of political correctness? It doesn't seem fair. If you get offended by a bunch of printed words, that especially aren't directed to just you as a person, you need a therapist.

Second, cuss words. You grow up all your life being told that cussing is wrong, bad, unladylike/ungentlemanly. But all in all, aren't these just more words that are being used as synonyms? Sure, they have negative connotations, but so do the words that aren't politically correct. So, maybe you're one of the few and brave and truly inspiring writer's that doesn't really give a shit, and cusses to your heart's content and uses all these phrases that the media claims as "horrible" and "rude", yet, you get amazing reviews on your book! CNN and MSNBC rave about you for weeks, about you're approach and how much it makes sense. So then, if a book is only using one of those words or phrases, they get ridicule fired at them like bullets. So, make up your mind! Choose one or the other, don't leave people getting praised for excessive cussing, or getting blamed for minor cussing. They're all just synonyms anyways.

Lastly, how about all these political people who are publishing raving books about Obama, that are only praised for their content, and not the style of writing? Surely, this is unfair to all the rest of us who are struggling just to put pen to paper, when all these loons are out there writing about Obama and all the lovliness he brings to our world...

Loving this nation, and my first Amendment.

Guns within Youth

So as i was sitting here, drumming my fingers on the keyboard and pondering what i should make my first official blog about, i decided to search current events, and came upon CNN's website, which of course is featuring first and foremost the Iranian government. I however bypassed this and came upon a shooting in an Iowa weight room at a local high school.

Just recently, i watched an episode of the very popular show that comes on The-N called Degrassi. Now, this show demonstrates a whole bunch of teen issues, from pregnancy to bullying, etc. There are two episodes dealing with violence. One, a kid comes to school with a gun and is threatening to shoot several people who had bullied him in the past. He ends up shooting a guy, paralyzing him for life, and shooting himself as a heroic student attempts to grab the gun from him. The other episode, two drunk kids from another school are urinating on a character's car, he intervenes, and then one of the guys stabs the character.

Now, as a teenager myself, who has been in a school with fights and bomb threats, i wonder why violence is so prominent in youth. What do we have to prove, so that we are killing or wounding or being sentenced to Juvie until the day we turn 18? What territory as a minor do we have to defend or protect? Guns, really? You are stealing weapons from your parents so that you can defend the territory that you don't possess to prove the power that you'll never gain from a gun and a killing. Or a knife, whichever weapon of minor destruction you may possess.

So, back to this whole "territorial aggression" subject. Let's say a 13-year-old in Middle School gets into a fight with a classmate over something simple, like stealing a soda or whatnot. He claims that he's going to fight said kid the next day. Nobody takes this puny newly-aged teenager seriously. Next thing you know, a kid ends up dead, one locked in Juvenile Detention, and a whole group of people wondering what could have been done to stop this or prevent it or whatnot. So they hire a whole bunch of 'crisis counselors' to come in and talk with kids who have seen it or were friends with the victim, so they can talk and ask a million questions, none of which probably had answers.

Anger is a dangerous thing, so lets take more precautions. Parents, lock away your weapons from where your kids can find them. And talk to them about gun safety and safe ways to prevent violence. Let's not add to the violence in the world around us, with protesting governments and killing innocent bystanders that are simply there to witness history. Let's make a difference, one household at a time, and stop our younger generations from destroying each other.