The Voice

I don’t watch very many television shows that are currently on air, due to my addiction to Netflix. But one show that I have recently started watching and really enjoy is The Voice. Some people might say that is just like American Idol, but I think it is much different and enjoy it much more. One reason for that is because they actually have good performers. On American Idol I feel like they pick some good singers and then some shitty ones just for some comedy relief. But on The Voice almost everyone that even tries out is pretty dang good.

          For those of you who have never seen The Voice I will explain what happens a little bit. So first, there are four coaches: Blake Shelton, Usher, Shakira, and Adam Levine. The first five episodes are just straight auditions. And they are blind auditions, which I think is pretty cool because that way the performer isn’t judged on their looks, only on their voice. And it also might help calm some nerves since the celebrities are not watching them the whole time. During these blind auditions the coaches each choose 12 singers to be on their team. Then the next few episodes are the battle rounds. These consist of two people from the same team singing a duet. One person is eliminated from each duet. But each coach also has two chances to steal someone that has been eliminated from another team; leaving each coach with eight people on their team. Next comes the knockout rounds. Same thing as battle rounds only they are singing different songs (one at a time) and steals are gone. This leaves four singers on each of the four coaches’ teams. And into live shows we go. Being as I have not seen any live shows at this point in my viewing history, I am not going to even pretend to act like I know what happens on those shows.

          Earlier I mentioned that I like The Voice better than American Idol because they, overall, have better singers. Another thing I think is cool about THE VOICE is that the competitors have coaches. I really like this because this way they are actually getting better and have people who do this for a living showing them what to do and giving them pointers on, not only singing, but stage presence and entertaining the crowd, too.

(405 words)

The Next Step

As junior year is coming to a quick close, I am starting to really think about senior year and college. Senior year is the easy part. That’s just another year of high school, another year of classes with the friends you’ve been with for the past four years. But then you have to throw in college. Thinking about college; that’s the hard/scary/nerve-wracking part. It’s the next step.

          College is a big decision. Most likely the biggest decision we will have made in our life so far. Because it is the next four years of your life, it is more than just another school. It is where you are going to live and spend all of your time. It is where you are going to earn a degree to earn a living for the rest of your life. It is where you are going to start the next chapter of your life.

          I have always wanted to go out of state for college. Mainly because I think that is a different experience and opportunity that a lot of people don’t take either because it is more expensive or they want to be closer to home. But not me. I want to go far away from home, preferably somewhere warm. Well, at least that’s what I thought. Until, I started thinking about what I wanted to major in instead of just location. And when I realized the best school for me in state was Iowa State, I will honestly say that I wasn’t completely thrilled by the idea of it. I grew up in a family of Hawkeye fans. But when visited Iowa State it was hard not to like it. I don’t know if I liked it so much just because it was the first college I visited or not. But I cannot tell a lie. It is a very nice campus. It is really pretty and feels inviting to everyone. Also because it is known for its design school, it has great academics and opportunities for what I want to do for the rest of my life. Basically the only thing that visit did for me was make the decision of whether I should go out of state or not much harder. I still want to visit more schools to see if I like them better but Iowa State is definitely a contender for where I want to go.

          It is scary to think that soon we will be filling out college applications. It seems like just yesterday we were just walking into Kennedy for the first day of freshman year. But nonetheless, the time is coming and it is definitely an exciting experience. And I am ready to see what is in the near future. I am ready to take the next step.

(469 words)

Hallway Couples

Walking down the hallways at Kennedy is hard to do sometimes because there are so many people. For me the last thing I want to see as I’m going down the hallway is PDA.

          PDA is a broad term. It could be from holding hands to making out. I don’t have a problem with couples holding hands as they walk down the hallway or hugging before class. It’s when they take it to a whole new level and stand in the middle of the hallway and make out before they have to go to class.

          When people do this it makes walking down the hallway uncomfortable for other students and teachers. I know that I don’t want to see it, so why would a teacher.

          I feel like if I were one of the people making out in the hallway I would feel uncomfortable with everyone watching. I wouldn’t want my teacher or Dr. W. to see me making out with my boyfriend.

          I don’t know how they even have that much time. We only have five minutes and depending on where your classes are there isn’t time for PDA.

          Not only is PDA a concern of others not wanting to see it, it takes up space in the hallway. When couples stand in front of lockers, they are in the way of others trying to get into them. How awkward would it be if you had to ask or be asked to stop making out so someone could get in their locker?

          Then there are people who stop in the middle of the hallway so no one can get around them. There are enough obstacles in the halls as it is with people coming and going in so many different directions. We don’t need to add anymore.

          I think that we should put an end to PDA because no one wants to see it and there is no room or time for it.

 (328 words)

Different Sports

I have played volleyball for 6 years. In comparison to a lot of other people, that’s not very long. But when you think about it, 6 years is close to a third of my life time. And playing both school and club has taken up the majority of my time since fifth grade and most of the memories of my middle school and high school years. I started playing volleyball because my cousin, Jacqui, played it when she was in high school and when I was in fifth grade I wanted to be just like her. So what better way than to play the sports she did? Jacqui also played tennis, so freshman year I played. Then sophomore year I was hurt and didn’t go out and finally, this year I am playing again.

          So far this year, we have had two tennis meets and one of them we didn’t really play to win, we just played for fun. It was like a practice. Then this week we had another one. Because I played freshman year, you’d think that I would know what to expect when it came to conducting a tennis meet. Well you’re wrong. I knew that I wasn’t going to be playing very much because tennis is a slower sport and there are only so many people and courts that can run at a time. I wasn’t playing singles so I knew I was going to have to wait for at least one round of matches to be over. Okay, no big deal. But wait, now I have to find a different partner because mine is playing with someone else. Okay, still not that horrible at least I get to do something now. Wait, now I have to wait longer because the person I am playing with needs a rest in between games. At this point I am so bored I contemplate whether or not I should have even come.

          A lot of people think that volleyball and tennis are similar. But really they are completely different. First off, with volleyball you have games and tournaments. But in tennis there are only meets. In school volleyball you only play one game on the weekday (during games) but at tournaments you usually play a minimum of 4 games. In tennis you play 1-2 matches a night, usually putting you at 2-3 hours of time you have to stay there consisting of a game that takes MAYBE half an hour to play. I do like to play tennis because it is different. But I hate going to meets and sitting around all night for nothing. I like volleyball so much better because you get to play more and you can get more excited. Tennis is a quiet sport.

(463 words)

POEM--The Blues of the Grey's

The Blues of the Grey’s

A waterfall of tears rush down my face.

Yet, it’s just another day at Seattle Grace.

Why Shonda Rhimes, why?

When ferry crashes,

Meredith Grey almost drowns.

Why Shonda Rhimes, why?

George enlists in the Army as a trauma surgeon.

Going to tell his mom, he gets hit by a bus.

Why Shonda Rhimes, why?

An angry widow attempts to kill Derek.

Ends up shooting at least 20 others.

Why Shonda Rhimes, why?

Team of doctors flies to separate twins.

Mark Sloan and Lexi Grey die.

Why Shonda Rhimes, why?

Christina Yang gets PTSD.

TWICE.

Why Shonda Rhimes, why?

Meredith announces she is pregnant.

Miscarriages in the same day.

Why Shonda Rhimes, why?

The main characters, with which we fall in love,

Are taken from us time and time again.

Why Shonda Rhimes, why?

Line 1: Metaphor: “A waterfall of tears…” is a metaphor because it is comparing tears to a waterfall. And instead of saying that the tears are like a waterfall, I am saying that they are a waterfall making it a metaphor instead of simile.

Line 2: Allusion: Referring to Seattle Grace Hospital in Grey’s Anatomy by using the names of all the characters. I am doing this to show how ironic the show and life can be at times.

Line 3: Apostrophe: “Why Shonda Rhimes, why?” I am asking Shonda Rhimes (the writer of Grey's Anatomy) why she is killing off all the good characters. I do this to show my concern and anger at her for all of my favorite characters leaving. By doing this it makes it seem as if I am really talking to Shonda.

Line 4-5: Irony: Meredith is a doctor going to help victims of a ferry crash, but instead she almost dies. Irony is really throughout the whole poem becuase that is what the show is like. For people who don't know the show they might think that these things are alluding to the irony in life. And while it is, I put in the irony because I wanted to show everyone what the show is really like and how frustrating it can be.

Line 6: Anaphora: the repeating of “Why Shonda Rhimes, why?” I did this because I wanted to emphasize my frustration and confusion as to why we fall in love with all the characters and then they are killed or go crazy.

Line 8: Visual imagery: instead of just saying that George dies, I gave imagery of him getting hit by a bus. I did this because it portrays the craziness of the show and adds comedy (out of context/for non viewers). When I think about this scene in my head all I can is just wait what? Is that a thing? Did that really just happen? And that's what I want the readers of the poem to think as well because it ties the whole poem together in really asking Shonda Rhimes why she does this to these characters.

Line 22: Inversion: I used the inversion here because the poem was coming to an end and I felt like it was my concluding thought and it added a softer, heartbreaking end to the poem. It also kind of alludes to how each episode ends because it is filled with people running around a hospital all day and then at the end they wrap it all together with Meredith's voice playing over the last scenes.

Get-togethers

Family reunions. You would think it would be a fun get together with family members that you have known your whole life. Wrong. Most of the time, you don’t know half the people. And the younger you are, the less people you know.

          According to urbandictionary.com the definition of family reunion is “The awkward get together your parents make you go to where you stand around for hours with random relatives, some of which you either despise or don't actually know.” This definition is how I feel whenever there is a family gathering.

          This past weekend I went to my grandpa’s 80^th birthday party. It was much how a family reunion would be like. My grandpa, obviously, knew everyone there. Then my parents and aunts and uncles knew most, if not all, of them. Then there are the grandkids. We all probably knew about 20 people – our closest relatives.

          If that situation doesn’t scream boring, then I don’t know what does. What I don’t get it is why our parents make us go to these events. My parents always use the excuse, “Because I said so.” But no. That’s not a good enough reason for me. If I wanted to go see a bunch of people I don’t know, then I could go to a mall. At least that way I wouldn’t be bored out of my mind and wouldn’t have to drive for hours.

          Some people think that it would be a good way to meet the rest of your family. But honestly, you aren’t going to walk up to someone you don’t know and have a conversation about your entire life. What really ends up happening is you hanging out with your closest family, then periodically having your parents call you over to talk to someone you haven’t seen in years or ever.

          I understand why my parents make me go to these events. But I still don’t like the fact that they are boring and I don’t know anyone. It is a part of all of our lives, though. I guess we should just get used to the fact that we have to go now.

(360 words)

Spring Sports

April showers bring May flowers. We have all heard this saying many times before. And the weather this April has definitely lived up to that saying. There has been rain in the forecast pretty much all month and there continues to be more in the forecast for next week—ALL week, as a matter of fact. Some people might like that it is raining a lot because it has been pretty dry lately. Others might hate the rain because it gets in the way of other outdoor activities that we are supposed to partake in. Yes, I’m referring to all the spring sports at school.

          It has only been two weeks into April and every sport at school has been cancelled at least once. I know for tennis, it has been postponed twice. The one on Thursday was moved to Friday. You might not think that is a very big deal. But if you remember what the weather was like on Friday, moving the meet didn’t have much better conditions. It was freeeezing. The JV meet lasted 30 minutes.

          The weather this year has been completely out of season. Saturday morning I woke up and there was snow on the roof of every house. Some people are still wearing Uggs. This is NOT normal for spring. The only reason that is still slightly acceptable is because it is around 30 degrees in the morning every single day. The only thing about the weather that is normal is the rain. And sometimes I wish that that would stop too. Let’s just hope for pretty May flowers and a warm summer.

(273 words)

Childhood Memories

My younger sister has always been my go to person when I get bored. In elementary school, we would come home and make up games to play all night long. One of our favorites was our wooden swing set. Our dad built it before we were born. Our backyard was lined with trees. It was very open and free to run or do whatever wacky game we came up with. The swing set had three swings -- two regular ones and one baby seat – and a yellow slide. Behind the swing set we had monkey bars. Everything was a competition between us at that age. It was always about Who can run the fastest? Who can do the monkey bars the fastest and how many bars can you skip? Who can swing the highest? Of course being the older sister, I always had to win. Our parents hated that everything was a competition. We always made them the judges, but as parents how do you pick a winner? There was always screaming and laughing that echoed through the openness of the yard.

          During the summer bike rides were a favorite choice of activity. Our driveway is unusually long. But we loved it! It was half paved and then half gravel as it went down farther. The house off to the side, more so on the paved half of the driveway. My sister and I would, once again, race down the driveway to see who could go the fastest. The wind blew in our faces as we got a breeze along our clothes.

          In middle school things changed a bit. My sister and I still played outside together a lot and our parents still joined most of the time; more so dad than mom. Fall was my favorite time to go outside. After we got our homework and while mom would be making dinner, me, my dad, and sister would go out in the cool weather and play either football or basketball. My sister, being more athletic, was much better at football. All I wanted to do was make up fake plays and get touchdowns. I could’ve cared less about defense. My sister went along with it most of the time, even though she always complained about me not trying.

          When mom would finally call us in for dinner we would always complain and ask for five more minutes. We just wanted to be out there hearing the rustling of the orange and red leaves as the wind blew. We eventually had to go in, though. And when we did, we came in with red noses and toasty hands – if we had remembered to wear gloves that day.

          Now that this is my third year in high school, I don’t spend too much time in my yard anymore. It’s not very often that I really get to hang out with my sister or dad and mess around like we are little kids again either. Obviously we have different interests and ways of entertaining ourselves now that we are older, but we don’t ever have nearly as much fun as we used to just messing around.

          Now, most of the time I spend in my yard is spent on bonfires with my friends. During the summer it’s mostly just to lay out and tan. I like spending time with my friends and my yard is a great open area to do it. But sometimes I miss just hanging out with my sister doing kid things. I miss making up random games because we had time to waste.

          I guess we all have to grow up sometime, though. Even though my sister and I have a lot of different interests now, I still like to spend time with her. We find different things to do. We still shoot hoops every once in a while and play in the snow in the winter, but it’s definitely not the same as it used to be. I will always treasure my childhood and always thank my sister for being a part of it and for being a great friend to go through it with.

(691 words)

Projects

As we reach the end of the school year, we are getting fewer and fewer worksheets and more long term projects. Teachers don’t want to grade simple little worksheets, quizzes, etc. anymore and we don’t want to do them (not that we ever did like doing them). So instead we are starting big projects that are mostly independent work in class and on our own time. I personally would rather do projects than worksheets for many reasons:

1.     You can be more creative with projects than with worksheets. All you do with a worksheet is write down the answers and turn it, but with projects you can make something different than everyone else in you class.

2.    Later due date means more time to work on it. Or in a lot of cases, more time to procrastinate.

3.    Groups! There is really no point to have a group do a worksheet together, but there are always groups when we have big projects. This way we can split up the work and not have to do very much.

But like everything in school, there are down sides. Some of the down sides of projects are the same as some of the good things. For example, they definitely are more work and also, as I stated before gives you more time to procrastinate. Leaving it off until the day or two before can cause tremendous amounts of stress.

     Whether or not you like projects, you have to do them year after year. And all we have to go to get through them is remember that it is the end of the year and it is almost summer!

(278 words)

Extreme Couponing

Today, like every Sunday, I was procrastinating writing these blogs by watching some TV. Because there was not a single good movie or TV show on I was forced to flip through the channels to find something—anything—to watch so I didn’t have to do my homework. So as I came across TLC I decided to stop and see if anything good was on. Though I was hoping for a wedding show, such as Four Weddings or Say Yes to the Dress, but instead it was Extreme Couponing. I had never seen it, but I had heard a lot about it and I was interested to find out what it was really all about.

          First I should say that I started watching in the middle of the show and didn’t get all the details. But anyway, as I started watching the lady was already at the checkout. The clerk started ringing up all of her items. After the items, came coupons. There were probably as many, if not more, coupons being scanned than items being bought. She also split up the items into three different transactions. As if she weren’t already taking long enough, in the middle of her last transaction, the computer froze up and wouldn’t let the clerk scan anymore coupons. The manager had to come over and call the head of the company to figure out what to do. The commentator of the show said that she spent 60 hours on this trip to the store. When she was finally all done, combining all three purchases without any coupons, she would have spent $1,077. After the coupons she spent $29 (not exact change).

          I don’t know about you, but I think this is absolutely crazy. First off who has that much time to cut so many coupons? I understand looking through advertisements you get in the mail and cutting out coupons when you think you might need something, but seriously do these people just spend all their time cutting coupons? And it’s not like they only but one or two of each thing. They buy like 10 sometimes. Why do they need so much? I feel like they probably only go to the grocery store once a month. Clearly, the savings are worth using all the coupons, but is it really worth all their time and energy?

(395 words)

Practical Jokes

Middle school is the prime time to show people how rebellious you truly are. This is mainly because we have nothing else better to do. One of the biggest pranks we pull on each other is teepeeing each other’s houses. And since we could not drive anywhere, we would do it to someone in our neighborhood; preferably to someone we knew and did not care for very much.

          Teepeeing is a great prank because everyone has toilet paper in their house and even if you don’t it is cheap to buy. Also it makes for a tough clean-up for the person you are pranking. The best (or worst depending on which side of the prank you are on) conditions are when it is rainy or windy. When it is windy, the toilet paper flies everywhere and it is hard to get all of it. And when it is rainy the toilet paper gets all mushy and sticks to everything it was put on which clearly sounds disgusting and horrible to pick up.

          As we get older we get bored with teepeeing and move on to egging. Never have I ever egged someone’s house, car, or any other personal property. I can honestly say that I probably never will. Egging is way more disgusting than the worst teepeeing conditions you can think of. Eggs are sticky. And they are not fun to get off of things when they dry. They also smell. When they are cooked they smell pretty good; especially when other things are put in with them. But when they are raw and soaking in the sunlight, they smell pretty gross. Both of these elements make for the worst time trying to clean it up.

          Now that I have a car, I have a much more respect for personal property. In middle school it was funny to pull these pranks on people and them hear them complain about how much work it was to clean it up. But now, if my car gets dirty or messed up in any way, shape, or form I have to clean it. It is my responsibility to make sure it still functions and I’m going to keep that responsibility because if I don’t then I will not have a car. So basically, I guess I’m realizing that the things we did in middle school were some of the dumbest choices we made.

(403 words)

Junioritis?

There are 7 weeks and 1 day left of school. At this point in the school year pretty much every student is using the term “senioritis” for their lack of caring about school. Now we are all thinking how can anyone actually say they have senioritis if they are not even a senior? And really I guess we can’t. But I don’t think it should be called senioritis for a couple of reasons.

          First off, during spring term everyone feels as if they do not care about school anymore for the year. This causes us to not want to do homework, not study as much for tests, stop dressing nicely (or stop pretending like you are going to), and even skip some classes. Every year these things get more and more extreme. Freshman year it was a lot of talk. We all pretended like we didn’t care, but still did all of our homework on time. Sophomore year there was a little more procrastination. And now as a junior I can say that as I sit here on this Sunday night, this is the first homework I have done all day (I don’t mean to sound like a hard ass). This year is almost over and as fast as it has gone, I feel like I have been doing homework forever. So now I am just really over making sure I do the absolute best on every single assignment we get.

          Kind of going along with the first reason, senioritis is not so much of what grade you are in, but more of what time of year it is. I would have to say that spring term is the laziest term of the year…for everyone. Now if you are in a sport during spring term this might be different because you have to keep your grades up to stay in the sport. And personally, when I’m in a sport I have a routine of when I do my homework because I know there times when I absolutely have no time to get it done. But like I said it is usually spring when most people’s procrastination and laziness really set in.

          The end of the year is almost here and senioritis or rather junioritis has set in. And now that the weather is finally getting nice, it is making it even harder to think about school and do homework on the weekends and during the week. But we can do it. Only 7 weeks and 1 day.

(420 words)

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