Amanda

Do Not Sent Out Resume During Family Crisis!

2006-05-01T15:37:00.000-07:00

I just realized how I've been neglecting the blogging portion of this class. I will admit that in part I have senioritis. I graduate in 13 days! But I do have to play the blame-game a little. I have been really busy trying to keep up with my coursework and taking care of this family at the same time. It seems that everything is sort of coming to head at once. I have several assignments due at the end of this week and I'm still trying to find a job which means that every night I sit in front of the computer for several hours creating resumes and cover letters and making phone calls. Of course this wouldn't be such a big deal if I wasn't doing it with a three year old swallowing my wedding ring in the background. Oh yes, my diamond wedding band has been through Gen's entire digestive system before it's ever been on my finger. (No worries. . it came out the next day and I personally made her father go fishing for it.) And when it seemed that it couldn't get much more hectic around her my dad called and told me my mom had a heart attack. So after racing home for a day to find her doing much better I raced back to finish all my work. She's doing much better which has helped me to relax a little but I learned a great lesson from trying to work while dealing with my emotions. I created a resume and cover letter and had Daniel fax it while I was out of town and then when I returned and reread my cover letter I found 3 mistakes. Yes, I actually sent out a cover letter with mistakes in it. Oye! So now I am totally embarrassed to have to call this guy back Friday like I indicated. He probably thinks I'm a moron. . .rightfully so.
Lesson of the day:
Do Not Send Out Resume During Family Crisis!

I just can't wait til it's over!
I think I'll take a really long nap!
I promise my next blog with actually contain something intelligent. . . okay no promises but I'm working on it.

Portfolio Preview

2006-04-27T05:29:00.000-07:00

I don't know what the expectations for this portfolio assignment are but I figure we will have to create a homepage with links to our assignments all semester. I will be working on revising those assignments this weekend so that the revised copies go on the website. I wonder if we will have to include all of our work this semester or if we will use selected pieces. I really liked my brochure but I think that would be a little more difficult to create on a webpage and get the same appeal. I have looked at a couple of portfolios online and I really think adding a picture to the homepage looks nice. I found most people use pictures of themselves but I don't know how comfortable I am with that. I am not sure yet what type of image I would like to include. I am assuming we will also have to include an introduction. I think it would be beneficial to not only include a main introduction but also short introductions to the assignments, otherwise outsiders may be confused as to why the particular topic or audience was chosen. I don't think this will be too difficult. I guess it's hard to say what I plan on including in my portfolio until I find out what the assignment requires.

Bumps, Mumps, and the Plague

2006-04-20T19:17:00.000-07:00

I've have somewhat been keeping up on the mumps issue in the news. Apparently this is a pretty hot issue. When I mean keeping up with I mean that I read the headlines and maybe catch the first paragraph of an article or two. Okay. . .so that's borderline 'keeping up' but it's about all I can offer with my schedule. I guess my main concern with this outbreak is why. I haven't really found anything that has clearly stated why all these people that should have had mandatory vaccinations when they were kids are now contracting the mumps. Maybe I haven't looked hard enough for the answer. My concern is Geneivie. She is exposed to tons of kids all day long and then, lucky us, she is kind enough to come home and share all of those wonderful little germs with us. Have you seen kids in day-care lately. Snotty noses, dirty hands, sticky fingers, and most of them in their mouth. It's really gross. From what I read on CNN.com the real threat has been to college students living in close quarters. . . ie . . the dorms. So you can probably see my concern here. Being around a bunch of dorm living students daily and then coming home to a germ-infested 3 yr old is just breeding ground for trouble . . . or I guess something like the mumps. I just read on CNN.com that this mumps outbreak is the worst in 20 years and if you haven't heard it's in spreading rapidly in Iowa . . . oh the joys of the state just to the immediate North of us. (I actually found that picture when I image googled 'mumps,' haha)

So the other concern I have is that the bubonic plague was discovered in someone in LA. Okay now I'm not exactly up on my diseases but I really thought that was some ancient disease from way back when. And, people contracted it from fleas because they had lots of rats in the street and lived like pigs (actually . . . little know fact. . . pigs are actually very clean). So you can imagine my surprise to find that it was in some woman in LA. As I read further I discovered that this is really not that uncommon, that in fact there are about 10-20 people that contract the plague each year, mainly living in rural areas. So the decision. . . die of smog or die of bubonic plague? (actually the bubonic plague is not lethal but if left untreated can become pneumonic plague with can be lethal) Either way I'm not found of either idea. I think I'll just live under a rock for the rest of my life. Although I'm sure that in the next 20 yrs they will be telling me that living under a rock causes cancer. So, either way I'm screwed!

Job Search

2006-04-16T18:42:00.000-07:00

So I haven't exactly picked out my job for this assignment. I did pick out a couple of jobs that I sent off resumes to on Saturday but since I am really on a job hunt I thought it would be more beneficial to me to pick another job that I will actually apply for to do this assignment. So. . the search continues, and might I add it is a long, hard search. It seems that every employer is looking for experience. . . "1-2 years experience required" . . . ."5 years experience" . . . . blah blah blah! How am I suppose to get experience if everyone wants experience?
I did find a couple prospects. One was for a Shelter Relations Coordinator for the Humane Society. The position would be for fundraising and PR stuff. I applied because I have actual experience in this area from a shelter I worked at years ago. Surprise, surprise something I have experience in. My question in this is whether they will pay me what I want. The other job I applied for was Legal Assistant with the State Public defender office. I think the chance of me even getting an interview for this job is a long shot but hey at least I'm making an effort, right? I have no legal experience other than my intention of applying to law school in the fall. Other than that. . .zero . . zip. . .zilch. . . so yeah. . . a long. . very long . .shot.
For this assignment I found two ads so far. I found them both on the Columbia Tribune website. They are both for legal secretary/assistant. I will likely choose one of them to write my resume over. I have not picked which yet though. One is with the 13th Circuit Court Family Court- Juvenile Division the other with some guy named Ed Orr. Seriously this add reads, "fax resume to Ed Orr" and gives a phone number. There is no company attracted no address nothing just Ed. I will probably scan for more jobs on Monday to see if I find anything else interesting. My fiance directed me to another job search site he used called Great Hires. I thought is one worked better than Monster or Career Builder.
Currently my resume is just a bunch of information sitting on a page. I had to reformat it for the two jobs I applied for so I just have a bunch of information sitting there waiting for the next opportunity for me to dig for skills I think I could halfway convince someone I possessed. I found for the Humane Society job that it was easiest to highlight my skills because I felt I really had what they were looking in skills. I chose a variation of the functional resume highlighting my skills first, then my education, then related work experience. Previously I have preferred the chronological resume but I found the functional fit better. I think I will continue to use some variation of the functional resume because I lack that all important experience. On the resumes I sent out I did a border on the page but no other frills I guess you could say. I did a border on the resume and references page but not on the cover letter and afterwards I was wondering if I should have. I hope to learn more about that type of thing with this assignment. I went ahead an included references with these resumes. For the legal assistant job it was requested but for the Humane Society job I did this because I thought it would really help. Since I have worked at a shelter before and did a lot of event coordinating I thought adding a reference of the Executive Director of that shelter would be really impressive. And since I contacted her about it and she was willing to give me a good reference I thought that could really win me points. I just didn't know if it was standard to send references in with a resume or wait until you are called in for an interview. Oh well! So yeah. . . it's Gen's bedtime and since it's Easter . . aka. . . lots of sugar day . . . I have to go struggle to put her in bed.

If you can't beat 'em join 'em

2006-04-12T19:18:00.000-07:00

Since everyone is posting about their stress levels I thought I would join the crowd. . . what's that saying if you can't beat 'em join 'em? So after having a horrible day with trying to get my proposal to show up correctly on my webpage (only to be saved by Marcia graciously helping me) I come home to my fiance who is on the phone with San Bernadino County CA. Why might you ask is he doing this? That was my first question too. Apparently he got some papers from them saying that they will be taking him to court for child support.
So, here's the background information. . . . he has two daughters one of which is 3 and lives with us, the other is 1 1/2 and lives with her mom in CA. When they chose this custody arrangement my fiance went to his attorney and drew up documents that they both signed stating the arrangement. In this included the statement that since each of them had one child neither would have to pay child support and that each parent will provide medical insurance through their employer. Well, the girls' mother doesn't have a job so my fiance sends her what he can. . . about $200 a month to cover his daughters basic needs. Apparently she decided that she needed Welfare as well. And we all know governments, they certainly aren't going to pay for this, they will suck that money out of whoever they can, it just so happens my fiance is the only parent of these girls with a job. So they found this loophole in this document because it is based on both of them having jobs and are choosing to take the document to court in CA and "modify" it, as they like to say, so that Daniel has to carry both daughters on his insurance and pay 1/4 his income to the state so that they can provide Welfare to a woman who is too lazy to get a job. Don't you love this country? And on top of it all when he calls San Bernadino county they treat him like he's some deadbeat dad that refuses to pay child support on his kid. Hello . . . she's not paying us a dime for Gen and he's paying her $200 a month. Does this seem crooked to anyone but me? In the end it's all about money for the state. So our next step is thinking about trying to get custody of his other daughter because obviously her mother can't take care of her.
Oh and a really funny this is that Daniel, in arguing with San Bernadino county, says, "well what if I quit my job. . . are you gonna make her get a job then?" Their response, "no we'll just get the money from the state of MO." Haha so he could quite his job and then two states would battle it out. Of course he'd never do this but it was interesting to hear what their solution would be. It just kills me that instead of making a capable woman get a job they will force her ex to give the state 1/4 of his income so that she can be on Welfare. What a great country we live in!
So I recently went to the doctor because of this twitch in my eye. . . apparently it's stress related. . . hmm. . . wonder why that would be. There's no stress in my life. . no. . . never!
Okay I'm done.

Proposal

2006-04-10T19:15:00.000-07:00

Here is a link to a homepage that contains all my work for my proposal.

New Show

2006-04-07T16:59:00.000-07:00

I just tuned in to the WB and apparently there is this relatively new reality (surprise, surprise!) show (or else just new to me). Survival of the Richest is what it is called. This show combines people from poor backgrounds and rich backgrounds in one house. The people are paired off and have to complete manual labor tasks each week. From what I gathered during the intro the pair that works together the hardest ends up winning money. They also do the voting off thing. Okay so I really don't know much about this show yet.
It's funny, I think these reality shows get more and more outrageous every year. As pointless as this show seems though, I have to say it made me laugh a little. Just a few minutes ago three of the people went grocery shopping. Two of the people were from wealthy backgrounds. One of them made a comment, "If you put cheap food in my stomach I get sick." Oh yeah I can see you all laughing now. It gave me a good laugh too.

Assignment #4

2006-03-19T19:12:00.000-08:00

Honestly, I haven't thought much about this assignment since we discussed it in class on Thursday. I have been packing and moving since Thursday night and haven't thought about classes whatsoever (which I might mention is really NOT GOOD since I have a reproductive physiology exam Tuesday). Thankfully we are essentially finished now; other than unpacking a few boxes of stuff that we have no idea where to put the move it complete. Now I will try to focus on classes.
So, in light of recent events I have few ideas about this project. I am thinking I will try to find evidence to support several courses versus just one because I think that would be more beneficial. I feel like we are trying to put a lot of information into this course over a short period of time and are therefore aren't getting out of it what we could. The assignment go pretty fast leaving little time for learning how to write professionally in the computer based world we live in. I think more courses would offer more time to explore what kind of projects/documents can be created using various programs. That's about the only idea I have for now; I just need to find some evidence to back it up.
I'm a little nervous about creating a web page for this project. I have never done this before and it seems a little overwhelming to do this with as little time as we have. I also feel like since I am a beginner my project won't be as good as it could be if I had more time to get familiar with web pages. Hence, my idea for supporting several courses. This could be a course all on its own, creating different professional documents on web pages.
I guess the only real question I have is how to do this project. If I heard correctly that is what we will be going over in class, web page layouts.

Visual Exercises Assignment

2006-03-15T16:19:00.000-08:00

These are the main points I found from the CD:
Exercise 1: It is important to understand the purpose for your text.
Exercise 2: Elements and context will influence how your audience reacts and understands your message.
Exercise 3: Consider the needs and desires of your audience.
Exercise 4: Color and contrast can add to the attractiveness and overall effect of your document.
Exercise 5: Use emphasis and framing to make important concepts stand out.
Exercise 6: Alignement controls how your reader is able to read your document.
Exercise 7: It is important to consider the proximity of other objects when placing additional objects on a document.
Exercise 8: Organization should be logical and appealing on a document.
Exercise 9: The sequence should be logical for the type of document you are creating.

I don't really have many questions because I felt the information was pretty self explanitory.

The Little I Know About Cars

2006-03-05T19:05:00.000-08:00

I ran across this article several days ago and thought it was sort of ironic. Consumer Reports listed the top picks in cars for the year. I found it ironic that according to an article March 2, 2006 on CNN.com, "no American or European nameplate are represented on this year's list." Here we are in America and we won't even buy the vehicles made in our country. What does this say about us? Of course I will give the U.S. this, four of the five Honda's on the list are manufactured in the U.S. too according to the same article. But there are still no American nameplates that made the list. Does anyone else find this ironic or is it just me? I've never found much interest in cars but when my fiance's car pooped out in January and we had to go car shopping I developed a quick interest. Every search I have done on safety and overall consumer satisfaction has led to most foreign made vehicles. Now, I will not claim to have any true knowelge about cars but I can say the only Dodge I ever owned had an oil leak, transmission leak, the gear selector thing was off (when I was in drive it appeared I was in neutral), and the gas guage would get stuck on occasion and leave me stranded with no gas. The Oldsmobile I currently own only because we can't afford to pay two car payments is another story. Just as a breif overview, the radio doesn't work, the windows barely roll down, the power locks don't work, I can't turn my twilights on any more because they will not turn off, the trunk leaks, and my favorite quark is that if you leave the horn plugged in it will randomly start going off continuously and will not stop until you unplug it. This is by far the most fun because when I have to get it inspected and plug the horn in I end up having to drive the car with the horn blarring continuously. . . oh great fun, and apparently the only way to fix this problem is to replace the entire steering column (Ha!). Not that I want to insult American made vehicles but the experiences I have had have not been good. One thing I recently learned is that a car manufactured here can have many foreign parts as well as American parts. In my mind there's something really odd about building a car with parts made in different countries. I guess it's perfectly acceptable since it's been done for so long but I was actually surprised to learn this. What made me think of this article about Consumer Reports top picks was that I briefly heard on the radio that there is a bill in Congress or something that would wave the sales tax of any American vehicle. I don't exactly know the truth to this statement or if I even heard it right. But that would be an interesting way to get people to buy American made vehicles. Maybe someone has the scoop on this topic.

Flyer Plan (Or Lack Thereof)

2006-03-02T15:48:00.000-08:00

As my title may suggest I have no plan for this assignment. I didn't think about it much Tuesday night or Wednesday assuming I would get more information today to be able to start thinking about it tonight. Well, that plan changed when I got a call from Kindercare that Gen was sick and I had to go pick her up. So, since I missed class I missed generating ideas with people. I did read over the blogs and that helped. I know that I will want to do a fun activity that gets people moving. I feel like people that sit in an office all day will likely not want to sit and listen to a lecture no matter how interesting the topic. I also think team building activities are a good idea. I know I want to do the project solo because, like so many other people, my schedule is pretty tight. I also agree that the time frame we have to complete these assignments does make it difficult to get together outside of class. It's not like when you work in an office when you probably have similar schedules as your co-workers. We all have different classes and different jobs with different schedules which makes working in groups difficult. So, I guess this weekend I will have to come up with the activity I want to do and then begin putting it together. Fun times!

Hobbies and Interests

2006-02-25T15:57:00.000-08:00

Marvina: One of my favorite cats at ODAS (animal sanctuary I used to work at). Although she has cataracts and occasionally pees on a bed she's still really loveable and has yet to find a home.

According to the schedule we are suppose to blog about our hobbies and interests. I see that no one has done this yet and I don't know if it's because we are all being procrastinators or this assignment was meant to be done for the next project which won't be introduced until Tuesday so everyone is waiting until then. But I figure, what the hell, I'll just do now while I have a few minutes of peace. Gen seems to be distracted with the toys in her room at the moment. This usually never lasts more than 10 minutes so let's see if I can list my hobbies and interests before she informs me it's time to get out the play-do.
Hobbies:
Sleeping: Although this may not be a hobby for most I have found that it can become a favorite hobby when you lack normal amounts of it.
(Gen: Amanda, I'm hungry! of course this is in an incredibly whinny oh so abused voice . . . . I feed her all day long, where is she putting it all?)
Entertaining Geneivie: I hate to call her a hobby but in some ways she is. After all hobbies are activities we enjoy doing in our spare time and I do enjoy taking her to the park, reading to her, drawing with her, and many other activities three year olds find entertaining. It's really awesome to watch her grow and learn (and then scream at you because she was punished for learning to say "shit".
Movies: I love going to movies, although this doesn't happen very often anymore. If you've ever tried taking a 3 yr old to a movie you'll understand. I still rent movies a lot, the most recent being Christmas with the Kranks. We didn't rent it during Christmas and really shouldn't have rented it after. For all that have not seen it: horrible movie. . . just horrible.
Concerts: Over the years I have been to several concerts in Columbia and this still remains one of my favorite things to do. Yes, I attended the Rascal Flatts concert and absolutely loved it. I tried to get tickets for the Kenney Chesney concert in May but I wasn't willing to pay unless they were great seats. Well, not only were the great seats taken but the okay-could-possibly-move-closer-after-the-first-song seats were also gone. I did do an online seach and apparently all the great and okay seats were taken by things like ticketsnow.com and are being sold for $350. I like concerts but not that much!
Reading: I pretty much only get to read textbooks anymore but, I used to love to sit and read anything from magazines to novels.
Walking: I enjoy a good nature walk with a nice view once in a while but usually it's a tread mill and the nice view is the buff shirtless (if I'm lucky) guy on the bicycle in front of me.
Swimming: There's something I find really relaxing about swimming laps in a pool, maybe it's all that chlorine.
Traveling: I'm too broke to get to do too much of it, but on the rare occasion my parents pay I enjoy exploring new places.
I'm sure I can come up with many many more hobbies but I think that's a pretty good list.
Interests:
Well I have many interests. Animals are a huge part of my interests. I enjoy going to the zoo and seeing animals as well as sitting around and petting my cat. I used to work at an animal sanctuary before college and I still enjoy working the adoption fairs and helping to rescue animals with no homes. I am interested in learning. I enjoy learning new things, my fiance and I will sit and watch the discovery channel all day. Of course he watches some things that I find really boring and would never watch so I guess my interest in learning is limited to my interests. I've gotten more and more interested in cooking. I don't think a 3 yr old should live on mac and cheese, frozen pizza, and sandwhiches so I vowed I would learn to cook. So far I have found it pretty fun. That brings me to another big interest I have, kids. Ever since I took on this new motherly role I have gained a great interest in children. I try and read about parenting whenever I can. It's a learning process for me and since I don't have the benefit of the last 3 yrs of her life to perfect it I have a lot of catching up to do. I have a great and relatively new interest in wines. Ever since I visited the Les Bourgeois Winery in Rocheport I've developed and interest in good wines. I'm sure I have more interests I just can't think of them right now.

Frey is Dropped

2006-02-23T18:34:00.000-08:00

I wrote a blog about the book A Million Little Pieces by James Frey a while back. Well it turns out that his publisher dropped him. In my opinion it serves him right. According to the article on CNN.com he also wrote another book title My Friend Leonard and was signed to write two more books. However with the events reported by The Smoking Gun turned that deal upside down. As I expected the sales on A Million Little pieces continued to soar even after the lies were exposed. Surprisingly his second book was 5th on the hard cover non-fiction list.
Overall this incident has, "rocked the U.S. publishing industry, stirring debate about the nature of memoirs and the importance of accuracy" as stated by CNN. I think that's an important lesson to be learned from the whole ordeal. Maybe it will teache writers they cannot turn fiction into fact at their own discretion simply to sell a book.

Rascal Flatts Concert

2006-02-20T13:07:00.000-08:00

On a completely different note I went to the Rascal Flatts concert last night. They were spectacualar! As a special treat the lead singer of Chicago appeared. I have been to several concerts in Columbia and this was by far the best overall experience. Yes it was cold but our parking spot wasn't bad, the line went fast to get in, the concert was great, we had good seats, and it didn't take us long to get out of the parking lot. . . oh and no one puked near us (always a plus). These factors all made for a favorable experience. I remember the Kenney Chesney concert last year. Our parking was horrilbe, we had to walk up a huge grass hill to get to the arena, I had the beginings of a kideny infection, we had horrible seats so far up watching the screen was better than watching the stage (I could do this at home), and the young man to our left drank a little too much and puked all over the poor lady to his left. Overall not a good experience. This however turned out much different and I was very pleased. The only thing I can say I regret is not taking my digital camera at the concert. My fiance who thinks he's the next closest thing to God and knows all there is to know, told me I wouldn't get any good pictures. Well, lots of people had their cameras and were getting great shots, shows how much he knows. They also announced at the concert, but we already knew via Ticketmaster emails, that Kenney Chesney will once again be coming to MU May 8th. Tickets go on sale Friday and I will be sitting online waiting! Concerts are sort of my oasis from raising a 3 yr old and dealing with Mr. Know-it-All. Everyone has their thing, this is mine!
P.S. Since I didn't have any pictures of the concert I included one from before the concert. This picture is my friend Courtney and I at Tequila.

What would you do with $365 million?

2006-02-20T12:54:00.000-08:00

So it came to my attention as I was surfing CNN.com once again that the lottery winner this past Saturday was from Nebraska. This person won $365 million and has yet to claim it. My fiance and I were discussing this Saturday as we were driving to his sister's house and he informed me we were going to win the lottery. . . yeah right Daniel! We obviously didn't or I'd have something far more interesting to talk about. I couldn't believe $365 million. That is a lot of money, as if ya'll didn't already know that. But seriously, what would someone do with $365 million? Does anyone realize how many hungry people we could feed for $365 million, how many cancer patients would could help save, or how much medical research could be funded to save people. Instead one person will get $365 million (if they ever claim it) which is more money than they will need in their lifetime. I just found out my fiance spends $10 every couple of weeks on lottery tickets. If Americans would spend on charities what they spend on lottery tickets every month we might actually be able to save lives.
I wouldn't even know what to do with $365 million. What would you do?

Columbia News

2006-02-16T19:28:00.000-08:00

Some time ago I posted a blog about online predators and was reminded of it once again when I was cruising the Columbia Tribune website. In addition to checking out CNN daily I like to tune in to some local news as well. Today I found an article about a man who was convicted in solicitation of a minor online. This man was from Warrensburg and traveled to Columbia to meet a supposed 14 year old girl he met in a Yahoo chat roomfor sex. Luckily this innocent girl was actually a well trained police officer conducting an online sting for predators like this man. I found this interesting since it wasn't long ago I was watching this happen on Dateline. This just proves that these incidences do not just happen in big cities they can happen here too. It's disturbing to know that one day I will let a child out into the world with these types of people prowling the streets. I guess one thing that can be learned from this story is to not to allow her to prowel the internet unsupervised.
Another article I ran across that I had heard about is this semi traveling on I-70 yesterday that caught fire. According to news release from the Columbia Tribune a mattress flew off a truck and wedged itself between the rear wheels of the semi and then caught fire. Apparently no one was hurt but considerable damage was done to the semi. It would have been a terrible site to be driving down I-70 and see a semi on fire. Did anyone see this? Wow!

Brochure Adventure

2006-02-13T18:29:00.000-08:00

I don't know about the rest of you but I felt a little odd going in
hotels asking for brochures. I am sure the brochures were meant for the guests of the hotels so it almost felt like I was stealing them. I know that sounds peculiar but I was just a little uneasy taking up the time of the receptionist just to fulfill an assignment for class. Well, once I got over that uneasy feeling, or didn't and just sent my fiance in to do my dirty work, I found several brochures. The only thing was that I didn't find any hotels that had brochures for places that were not in Missouri. Which meant that half of the brochures I found were for places I had already been. My fiance suggested I visit a travel agency. But, being the procrastinator that I am, there was no time for this. Thus I have my brochures. Among my picks were, Meramec Caverns, Swiss Meat and Sausage Company in Hermann, Missouri (yeah I don't know either), Isle of Capri Casino in Booneville, MO, Isle of Capri Casino in Kansas City, MO, Fast Lane Classic Cars Inc., St. Louis Zoo, Hallmark Visitors Center (didn't know that existed), and Stone Hill Winery and restaraunt. So, those were my finds tonight. I think I would have enjoyed having some brochures from somewhere exotic but I guess Missouri will do. Oh, and I also got a brochure like Katy got with the attractions in Columbia but I don't have that in front of me right now. It did come in handy earlier when, after doing our brochure adventure, we could not find my fiance's wallet (he has a habit of misplacing it) and thinking he may have left it at the ARC when we were there I used the handy-dandy brochure and my cell phone and gave the ARC a call. (By the way. . . . It was not there, he found it in the console in the car where he had forgotten he put it. . . Men . . since you can't see my face right now I'll just let you know I rolled my eyes at that last part). See everyone, and their brochures, in class tomorrow, I hope someone found something more exciting than I did.

How young is too young to explain weather?

2006-02-12T10:50:00.000-08:00

My past two days.
Geneivie: Can we go to the park?
Me: No Gen, it's too cold.
Gen: Why?
Me: Because it's winter and winter is cold.
Gen: Why?
Me: Because that is how it works.
Gen: Can we go to the park?
Should I have been more scientific about why it is too cold to go to the park?
Why, you might as is this important? It's not, I tried to find something intelligent and critical to write about and it's just not happening. Too much Barney?

Why?

2006-02-08T17:28:00.000-08:00

You would think that reading disturbing news online and seeing it on T.V. daily would pretty much make me numb to any outrageous news. However, I am once again baffled. I was reading an article online about physical abuse in teen relationships. What kind of world are we living in? What on earth are teenage boys and girls doing abusing their girlfriends/boyfriends. This particular article talked about a program called TEAR that young women formerly abused set up in order to educate and help other young women being abused by boyfriends. I was astounded that this actually happens as frequently as it does. CNN.com stated, "one in five high school girls will become the victim of dating violence, according to a 2001 study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association." That is outrageous!! Why are these women tolerating this abuse? And where are their parents? When I was in high school there was no way I could have hidden bruises from my parents, I would swear they gave me the once over at least once a day. (Of course they were probably looking more for tattoos or piercings more than they were looking for signs of abuse, but either way they would have seen.) But should parents be looking for signs of abuse? According to this article they should.
I can remember being in high school and having a friend whose boyfriend physically and mentally abused her. For me, staying in this type of relationship is almost unimaginable. However, I remember that she did stay in the relationship for almost 4 yrs. I found her parents particularly naive especially since I actually told her mother that this boyfriend was abusing her daughter and she refused to believe me. I thought the fact that her parents didn't pick up on the abuse was because they were simply naive and in denial. From reading this article it sounds like a lot of parents are missing out on the signs their children are being abused. Is it just because parents don't pay as much attention anymore? Are they too busy with everything else going on in life? Or are these women just really good at hiding it.? But why hide it? I mean do these women really think there is no way out. They are in high school, they don't have kids making them feel obligated to the relationship or money holding them stranded. What is it? It's high school, high school should be fun and care-free.
This article on CNN.com stated that, "the girls say the relationships were so intense, they thought 'this must be love'." Is this really possible, do high school girls really feel this way, like this is actually love? As hard as I try I will likely never understand how any one person can mistake hitting for love. What concerns me is that young women are seeing this as love. What does that say about our society or the way these woman are being raised? I know some people blame T.V. for the violence in the world but I find that a little hard to accept. But if it's not that what is it? Something in society is allowing young girls to be abused and feel that this is what love is. I feel sorry for these women for thinking that treatment like that is a form of love. It just makes me question the world that these women are being raised in where they think it acceptable to be abused by significant other.
Then there is the other side, the boys. What possess these boys to do this type of thing? How were these young men raised and how did they learn this type of behavior? Again, what does this say about our society? It's a scary thought to think that these young boys are learning that this behavior is acceptable. Is there a some truth in the fact that kids are seeing too much violence on T.V. that brings them to this type of behavior? Or is there something else? Is it their parents, peers, or something else? There must be something causing this. Children are not born to hit, it is learned.

Our Tax Dollars in Action

2006-02-02T16:14:00.000-08:00

It's a daily ritual of mine to check two web sites. First I check CNN then I check KOMU. On CNN's website I get my daily update of the events going on around the world. Most of the time this site just leaves me a little perplexed and sometimes rather disturbed. Then I move on to KOMU's website to check out the weather. Recently this website has been putting a smile on my face. Imagine going out to a beef farm and palpating a cow in -10 degree weather. Well, I guess at least one limb would be warm. :) Well, I guess I check three sites. It seems this semester blogger.com has made my list.

So, today, as usual, I cruised through CNN's website and I found an interesting link. The Anderson Cooper Blog 360 (I can't make a degree symbol on here) discusses the Ethics Committee. Apparently the ethics committee has little to say regarding the latest indictments and investigations going on in Congress. So this blog posted by Tom Foreman asks for feedback regarding whether or not this committee should just be abolished. Foreman asks, "Will anyone notice if they do?" Most responses indicated that nobody would really notice. I found that particularly interesting since our tax dollars are funding these people working on a committee that apparently wouldn't be missed if it were abolished.
On a slightly different angle, an interesting comparison Foreman makes in this blog is, "Now we're hearing all this talk in Washington, D.C., about lobbying reform. I have no particular affection for lobbyists, but it seems to me that this is like saying, 'We have a problem with policemen taking bribes, but we're not going to hold the officers accountable. We'll just come up with new laws for criminals'." Haha! When you think about it that comment makes a lot of sense. In truth in most situations, I won't go as far as to say all, officer's are punished for taking bribes. Why don't we hold politicians to the same standard? Some of the comments to this blog were really interesting, some even a little humorous.

Oh the joys of our government and good ole' CNN.

Profile Writing

2006-02-01T17:45:00.000-08:00

Well, I finally decided to crack down and write this profile. I've been sitting here weeding through sources and my MLA book in order to write this paper for the past 2 1/2 hours. Okay, so I may have been watching American Idol off and on for the past hour. It's like type a little, watch a little, answer "Yes, Gen," type a little, watch a little then laugh a bunch, answer "No, Gen," and back to laughing again. If anyone watches these auditions of Idol they are, by far, the best part of the show all season. Well, because of my abnormal obsession with American Idol auditions I have failed to cook dinner tonight. Thus, in my spare few minutes before Gen's father gets home and I inform him that he can either eat a sandwich or starve tonight, I thought I would blog about my profile assignment. Of course, there's really not much to say about it. I researched, then I wrote. I think the hardest part was trying to remember what I read in Writing in a Visual Age and apply it all. I also had to continually reference Designing Writing because I forget how to do the formatting stuff on Microsoft Word. I think in my entire 4 years I have never typed a paper to turn in that consisted of columns or any font other than Times New Roman. It also took me a few mintues to figure out the header/footer thing since I have also never used that. Maybe we're deprived over in the Animal Science department but this was definitely a new experience for me. I still do not have an illustration but, since we do not need that for this draft I will find that later. I keep feeling like I'm forgetting something in this paper. I guess it's a good thing it's only draft one.

Okay, now everyone knows I have no life

2006-01-27T17:35:00.000-08:00

Here it is Friday night and I'm probably the only one in the class posting a second blog for the day. This is proof enough that I have absolutely no social life. As it happens, I am finding ways to entertain myself this fine Friday night since I am sitting at home with a very sick 3 yr old. Even better, I'm doing it alone. Her father is working this evening and thus here I sit typing, running to the bathroom to aid the sick child, typing, running to the bathroom to aid the sick child, typing . . . you get the picture. In the midst of this glorious excitement, I am so sure you all are terribly sad you missed out on, I checked out a link to dooce.com recommended by Marcia. A link on this blog reminded me of an interesting Dateline story I thought I would share. Those of you that spend any time in chat rooms may be interested in this.

I'm sure everyone has heard of Dateline. Well one ongoing segment they do is on sexual predators. They call this To Catch a Predator. Dateline goes into chat rooms, chat rooms most of us have likely been in, AOL, Yahoo, etc. They pretend to be a teen/pre-teen usually a boy, sometimes a girl and solicit men for sex. They then convince these men to come to a home to meet them for sex. When the men arrive they are greeted by Dateline's Chris Hansen. I was astonished at the number of men that showed up to meet this alleged young boy for sex. It was sickening. These were not men you would normally think of as sexual predators. They were men that could easily be lurking in any community. I remember there was an ER doctor, a special education teacher, and even a rabbi! It was really disturbing. Even though I hear about things like this happening it still really shocked me. This was only one of several episodes of To Catch a Predator.

There is another episode of this airing February 3rd. I'd encourage people to watch it. I realize most of you don't have kids but one day many will and it's important to know what's out there. I thought I knew until I saw one episode. I believe Dateline is doing an amazing thing. Even if I didn't have a child I would think this is important stuff. There is no greater power than being aware.

Exposed

2006-01-27T13:55:00.000-08:00

So today my boss and I were updating each other on our wonderfully exciting lives and she mentioned an interesting new story she'd run across. Apparently, there is this book by a man named James Frey that has become very popular. This man wrote a "memoir" called A Million Little Pieces back in 2003. The book is suppose to be a "memoir" of his drug and alcohol addicted life and how he overcame these obstacles. I'll admit I was immediately intrigued to read this book. Well, so were many other people. The book gained popularity and Oprah included it in her Book Club (which I highly recommend I have read several books given her Book Club approval and I have enjoyed all of them). Well, The Smoking Gun did a little investigating into the truths of this book. They revealed later that many of the facts from his book were not truths. According to The Smoking Gun he falsified several of the events in the book. Oprah gave it her book club approval because of the hope it had given many people living such lives as Frey claimed to have lived through. Finding out that many of these stories were actually fictitious Oprah backed Frey claiming that it didn't matter if the stories were fictitious if they helped others to overcome thier addictions. Then on a surprising episode yesterday she invited Frey back to the show and not only confronted him with the credibility of his novel but also apologized to the public saying, "I left the impression that the truth doesn't matter, and for that I am deeply sorry."

So, there are no laws that I know of that prohibit people from creating a fictional piece of work and calling it a "memoir." But the ethics behind it are questionable. I wonder if this will change anything about the publishing of books? My boss said she read somewhere that books my have to be published with the words "based on a true story" if they are not in fact completely factual. I have no idea of the credibility of that last statement or where she found that information but I think it will be interesting to see what develops from this incident.

I have yet to look into this more thoroughly but I probably will do some reading on it this weekened. For the time being I'm going out to dinner with a friend. Hope everyone has a good weekend.

Interesting Blogs (A personal Opinion)

2006-01-25T17:46:00.000-08:00

One of the most exciting new ideas in my life is being a parent. Since I will soon be a parent myself I find reading about children and families intriguing. Mommy blogs really interest me. One i found in particular is called Mommy Rumination. This woman has a wit that I find very humerous and enjoyed reading.

When I read blogs what keeps me most interested is humor. This particular individual named Ryan explores many areas of humor. He has some interesting links on his blog and happens to be from St. Louis, which is where I am originally from. For me that connection only increases the interest I already have in his blogs. It doesn't really appear that he has anything worthwhile to say but rather just does some rambling that has a bit of sarcasm attached.

Another blogger I found I liked the first blog I read was about the American Idol auditions from tonight's episode. I was immediately hooked because I happend to watch this same episode only minutes before. I felt as though I could really share in her sarcastic remarks and observations. As I read on I found that this woman, Althouse, was very interesting to read and her interests were very similar to mine. As before I find the wit and quarkiness intriguing and this woman certainly had it.

Favorite Authors

2006-01-21T12:30:00.000-08:00

My three favorite authors are (in no particular order):

John Grisham
Dr. Seuss
Dave Pelzer

John Grisham is one of my favorite authors. His books center around law. Grisham himself graduated from law school and practiced law before becoming a full-time writer. His books include The Client, The Firm, A Time to Kill, The Last Juror and many more.
I like John Grisham because he always has me in suspense. I enjoy that his books are usually about topics that are of interest to me. I have also never been disappointed from a movie based on one of his books. Although this has little to do with him, it still enhances my interest in his books.

Dr. Seuss is most famous for his children's books such as Green Eggs and Ham and The Cat in the Hat. He uses rhyme and few words to create children's books.
Though these books are very simple I believe he is a great author for the creativity he puts into such simple words. I also found it interesting how he came to write many of his children's books. (That information can be found on the link I provided.)

Dave Pelzer is an outstanding man to me. Reading his first book, A Child Called It made me cry like no other book before or since. I have a great amount of respect for what Dave Pelzer has overcome in his life. I enjoyed each of his books not only for his courage to write them, but for his writing style which I found extremely emotional and captivating. Dave Pelzer's ability to make this audience feel as if they are truly inside the character's body, feeling everything he feels and seeing everything he sees, is truly remarkable.

Profile

2006-01-19T09:50:00.000-08:00

I am 21 years old and attending the University of Missouri-Columbia. This is my last semester as an undergraduate. . . hooray for me! After taking a year off to recoop, I am planning on applying for law school school. This of course means another three years strapped to a barely working vehicle, no money, and little sleep. But in the meantime my brain will surely enjoy the year away from studies. No matter how difficult it may get it never seems to be too terrible as long as I can go home to the sanctuary of my family. I am speaking of the man that leaves a smile on my face and the child that keeps me on my toes. These two very important people in my life are a daily reminder of the things that are important in life. And of course, there is no better person than my grandma. She is the woman that keeps me grounded in life and reminds me what the love of a parent is capable of.