Can we come up with a new plot?

     In my American Studies class, this week, we talking about authors writing about their own lives. How did they chose what part went into the book? Why did they pick those selected parts? This week I was watching the TV show The Walking Dead and I started thinking about how writers come up with plot ideas that are non-fiction. However they create their idea, a lot of writer must think a lot alike because now-a-days there are a lot of shows, movies, and books about post-apocalyptic societies.
     On TV right now there are about ten shows about post-apocalyptic societies. I think that we can blame all of these shows on the Mayans prediction of our upcoming apocolypse. A lot of the plots especially focus on apocolypses with zombies. I wonder if these writers actually believe in what they are writing or if they are writing to entertain?
     I wonder how so many shows, books, and movies can have the same plot and can be so popular?

The Cuban Prisoner Crisis

     In my American Studies class we just turned in a paper about  civil liberties in perilous times. One of the historical examples I used in my paper had to do with prisoners at Guantanamo Bay during The War on Terror. The U.S. government was not giving prisoners the same rights as American citizens. In the news this week, I read an article about an American man who is being held in prison and needs the U.S. government's help to be released.
     Alan Gross, the prisoner, has not had any help from the U.S. government for the three years he has been there and is still waiting for some. The prisoner was arrested in Cuba for "smuggling sophisticated satellite and other telecommunications equipment into the country to give to the island's tiny Jewish community"(article). However, Gross claims he was trying "increase internet access" and he claims he was a pawn in a U.S. government program to change the Castro regime. I think that no matter what is true the U.S. should help Gross even to just get a trial because as an American citizen he should have to his constitutional rights. 
    Other than the fact that Gross just wants to come home, he also has a sick mother back in the U.S. who he wants to see before it is too late. Do you think the government should start helping Gross to be released? Do you feel that Alan Gross is guilty?

Do You Really Need College?

     This blog post was inspired by a post written by Sarah, a fellow American Studies classmate. Her post, "The Price of Quality Education" was about Harvard University's new plan to bring education to those who can't afford it. This post got me thinking about how expensive college is these days for students. Many students can't attend college because of the price and some others who do end up attending are left with a large amount of debt. With all these students worrying about money I was wondering, is college really worth it?
     I have heard about a couple of very successful people who didn't go to college, but I always thought those were very special cases. When researching for this blog post I came across an article written by a mom with three kids. Two of her children both went to college and graduated while her third child had dropped out. In her eyes, all of her kids had become successful in the path they had chosen. This was just an ordinary family. So, if a regular joe can be successful without a degree, do students need college to be successful? In my opinion, I think it depends on the student and how that student defines success. For some, looking out the window of their large office at a law firm means they have found success. And for some others, success is found in things like getting married or successfully climbing Mt. Everest. College is not necessary for everyone.

Bill Gates and Steve Jobs (two college drop-outs
 that have found a lot of success)

     What are your thoughts on not going to college? Who has to go to college in order to be successful? If you could be successful without a degree would you still go to college?

Do People Know That There Are Still 43 Days Till Christmas?

     While scanning the blogosphere i came across a fellow classmates post. Hannah W discussed her thoughts on Christmas advertising in her post "Christmas in October". I decided to write this post to show Hannah my thoughts on the subject. Christmas is without a doubt my favorite holiday. I love the food, the family, the christmas spirit and the sweaters. However, I am also a fan of Thanksgiving. This year, I have noticed how companies are already advertising for christmas even 43 days in advance. Because of this Christmas has been overshadowing Thanksgiving.
     ABC Family has started a countdown to there annual countdown called, "25 Days of Christmas" and the radio station 93.9 FM is now playing Christmas music around the clock. Personally I agree with Hannah that starting these yearly events before December even begins is annoying. If they start playing Christmas music and movies over a month in advance then by the end things get so repetitive that you have a personal vendetta on "The Jingle Bell Rock" and "How the Grinch Stole Christmas". However this may just be a problem for Hannah and I because the companies obviously have people ready for Christmas who are already watching and listening.
     I can see why stores would start advertising. They want people to start buying earlier and purchasing more. So the stores have all those extra commercials to get the idea into people's heads that Christmas is right around the corner when, in reality they still have months.
     Are you already in the Christmas spirit? Why do you think the music and movies are playing?

Hurricane Sandy Votes For Obama

     For the last two weeks Hurricane Sandy has been the star of a lot of news. For those who don't know, Hurricane Sandy was the largest Atlantic hurricane on record and effected 24 states in the U.S.. Particularly Sandy caused a lot of damage in New York and New Jersey. Anyways I bring up Sandy because I think that this hurricane contributed to Obama's win in the presidential election. I know what you're think "what? No!" but come on I'll show you. 

     Mitt Romney, who was running on the Republican ticket for president, may have shot himself in the foot when he mentioned he planned to eliminate FEMA (Federal Emergency Management Agency).  FEMA is a group from the government who responds to national diasters to help victims in the affected areas. So, when Sandy hit, thousands of affected people felt the relief efforts of FEMA. Since the victims had been through a situation where FEMA was of help, they probably started questioning Romney. People who really did not like Romney's idea of getting rid of FEMA, probably voted for Obama. In the map below you can see that Obama won a lot of the states that were mainly affected by the hurricane. This a link to an article talking about what I just discussed.

     

Election Map 2012 from politico.com

     Is it a coincidence that Obama won those affected states? Would the election have changed if Sandy hadn't happened? Do you think FEMA should be kept?

Obama and Romney Arn't the Only Candidates?

     Today my American Studies class talked about how nobody watched the third party debate last night. Just like most of the class, I didn't even know there was a debate. However, unlike most people I didn't know that there were four more candidates in addition to Romney and Obama.

Do you recognize any of these people,
 because they could be your next president?
(image found through Google)

     In class we also talked about how the third party candidates hardly get any publicity. I can now vouch for that statement. When trying to do a little research for this blog post I had a hard time even finding the names of the other candidates. For everyone's information though the third party candidates are Gary Johnson, Jill Stein, Virgil Good, and Rock Anderson (you can click on the names to be taken to each candidates website). The best information I could find was each candidate's website but I still can't even find Rock Anderson's website.
     People say that the competition is Obama vs. Romney, so why do these third party candidates run? Do you think the candidates have hope in becoming America's president?

   

The Naughty or Nice List

Found through Google 

     In class this week, we were talking about how our society still has some Puritan values. The Puritans used to believe that if they did enough good they would be rewarded by becoming a saint in the town. So, the idea was kind of genius because it was a way to keep the town in order. Most people wanted to become a saint so therefore they behaved and didn't "sin".
     An area where I see this same value in our society is with kids and Santa Clause's naughty or nice list. All around, parents tell their children to act nice because then Santa Clause will bring them presents. On the other hand, if the kid's act naughty then Santa will put coal in their stockings. Most kids would prefer presents over coal, so this a way to make sure children behave.
     Is this tradition of the naughty and nice list only in the U.S.? If not, how has it spread to other countries when the Puritans lived here? Also, are you on Santa's naughty or nice list this year?

Feeding The Hungry

     This post is in response to Mr. Bolos's post on the physical and mental heath of homeless people. The lack in physical health that Mr. Bolos describes sound like people are buying the cheap food that is high in sodium instead of the more expensive fruits and vegetables. I remember hearing about an old women living in a poor area of Chicago who had to walk over a mile to the closest grocery store if she needed something. Even when she had time to go to the store she didn't always have the money to pay for her expensive food. This makes me think that Chicago needs more stores where homeless or poor people can go to buy cheaper groceries. 

     There should also be more services like Meals on Wheels or the Night Ministry that travel to the places where there are high populations of poor and homeless people and give out free meals. These meals also need to be healthy though in order to make a change in the physical health. This situation would be ideal because this  way people could get healthy meals brought right to them. Also, on the Night Ministry bus there is also doctors that give free check-ups. Maybe if there were more doctors and volunteers willing to give free check-ups the homeless people who are mentally ill could be better taken care of.  I actually think that New Trier has a service like this as well. If I am not mistaken it is called Food Taxi. I love how even our high school is helping out with hunger problems. 

     Mr. Bolos also mentioned how he wanted to talk to the people he was serving. Sometimes, I volunteer with my church at a soup kitchen in Evanston. Like Mr. Bolos I find myself wanting to talk to the people I am serving. I bet they all have really interesting life stories, but all I and the rest of the volunteers will know them as the homeless people we served. How can we make better connections with the people we are helping? What are other ways to help the physical and mental health of homeless and poor people?

Isn't there ever an unhappy ending?

Kurt Vonnegut's good fortune chart found through Google

           I went to the movies the other day and saw "Pitch Perfect". It was a really good movie, but in the end it was predictable: (SPOILER ALERT) the guy gets the girl and the girl's team wins the big competition. The movie got me thinking what if the guy ended up alone? What if the team came in last place? Right now, I can't think of one movie that ends with only unhappy events.
           In class earlier we read a packet called "Here Is a Lesson in Creative Writing" by Kurt Vonnegut. It discussed different shapes of stories. The "good fortune" graph shows the stories that start off with good fortune, and then has some ill fortune in the middle, and they always end with good fortune. After discussing that shape we saw another graph for stories that start with ill fortune and just get worse from there. While talking about these tragic stories, one of my teachers said that these types of stories are not written by American authors. Why is it that Americans don't write these kinds of stories?
          I think it might be because the American public wouldn't respond to them well. Stories with happy endings have hope and stories with unhappy ending just make you sad. So, it makes sense that people would want to feel happy over feeling sad. However I don't understand why that characteristic isn't universal. What is so different about the American authors or the American public?

Choice vs. Destiny

    In class we have been discussing different peoples' lives. I have noticed that their is a vast difference between each person. Obviously everyone has their own unique life, but the difference between someone who lives a life working at a fast food restaurant everyday and another person who gives up all their possessions and moves away to a live with monks in the mountains is almost too different. Thinking of the differences in these lives made me ask the question do we really have a choice in our lives or is our life planned out from birth by something/someone else? Their are many books and movies where people living the first life, the one with the same job forever, dream about doing something more, like living with monks. However, if they really wanted to have that life, don't you think they would? This brings up the argument choice vs. destiny. Do you really have control of our lives? Are there some things we can control and others that we can't? For me I believe that that we don't have total control over our lives. The stuff in our lives we can't control I think is from the effects of the choices other people make. It would be really cool if we could know how our lives end up, but I don't believe that our lives are predestined. What are your thoughts?

Brad Schneider's Bold Move

     While watching TV the other night a commercial came on for Brad Schneider, who is running for Congress this year. In the commercial he promised to work with both Republicans and Democrats, "as long as they have a good idea". A week or two ago we talked about how careful politicians had to be about what they say in their speeches. Even though what Schneider says sounds like a good idea, I don't know if people who actually know about politics will agree with me. Brad could have just shot himself in the foot with this commercial. Although I think that Brad's idea sounds like it makes sense I can see why people who are very into politics would not like it. Brad lists himself as a democrat but what does it mean if he thinks the Republicans have good ideas too? If he is willing to work with both Democrats and Republicans does that mean that he does not fully believe in Democratic values? People want to fix our nations problems, but will they want a solution from someone with different political values than the ones they have? Do you think this will help or hurt Brad's campaign?

READ THIS POST AND GET FREE STUFF

     I was at a Northwestern University football game and at the end i was walking out and saw a huge group of people by the locker rooms. I asked what they were there for and found out that they were all waiting for the visiting football team to leave, because then they would get to go in the locker room and keep anything the team had left behind. Used socks, dirty football gloves, and sweaty towels, why would people want to keep these things. Then I thought about why so many people were waiting, FREE STUFF. People, I think especially Americans, are obsessed with getting free things. Think about it, at a business fair what is the most appealing booth? I know for me and others that I have seen we love the place giving out free pens or free candy. Even when we don't need a pen or the calories from the candy, we still pick one up.

Picture from Google 

    I think this highlights how Americans just want more stuff. We think subconsciously that the more possessions we have the happier we will be. When we don't have to pay to add to our collections its even better. Americans need to take a step back and stop focusing on material possessions and wanting more and more. Instead they should focus on what they have and how fortunate they are.
    By the way the free stuff you get from this post is some perspective and a chance to read my thoughts. You are welcome.

Is Reality Television Realistic?

        On a usual monday night, you can find me at the television watching the reality television series Bachelor Pad. Three nights later on thursday, you can find me watching Awkward, a scripted show on MTV about a girl in high school. Why is it that I find more in common with a scripted show compared to one that is supposed to be about the real lives of people? Now, I'm not saying this is true in every case but shows like Glee, Grey's Anatomy, Friends, Friday Night Lights, and How I Met Your Mother seem to be more like real life than reality television. Reality TV shows like Keeping Up With the Kardashians, The Bachelorette, The Real World, and Desperate house wives are very entertaining but are they for real? I think that if reality TV was more like our real lives it would be boring. Just imagine if a camera followed you around would people be entertained? So, this lead me to believe that reality television is somewhat staged to be more entertaining. After doing a little research I found that even the producer of a popular reality TV series had said that "seventy to eighty percent of reality TV is b.s." (For the article click here). When it comes down to it people just want to be entertained. Americans that watch reality television like the drama and the emotions no matter if it is real or not.

Red, White, and Blue is Cool, but Everyday at School?

American flag shorts via google and thefashionpolice.net

      The other day at school a girl in my spanish class was wearing a tank top with an american flag printed on it. The next day a different girl in my math class had jean shorts on with stars and stripes on them as well. I am all in for showing U.S.A. pride on the Fourth of july or during the olympics. However, for just an everyday look I am confused as to why girls were suddenly so excited to show there pride. When a lot of people are wearing a certain item of clothing it is called a fad. Some examples from the past couple of years are UGG boots, combat boots, and skinny jeans. Although I would have never thought that wearing our country's flag around could be considered as just another fad, American girls have proved me wrong. As americans, most of us like to follow the leader. By doing this we stay with the group and don't draw attention to ourselves. What some people call American flag couture was originally made famous by pop icons Ke$ha and Katy Perry. People buy into fads that celebrities start because then it makes the person feel like they somehow are a part of the celebrity life. Even though I buy into fads just like the next person, I think we as Americans should start marching to our own  drums of fashion and not make fads anymore.