Archive for May, 2009


Ces't la vie

Filed Under: Psychology
May.29, 2009

Hi. Hello. My name is irrelevant. Some of you might know me from life. Greetings to you. Although it may seem as if I’m on some sort of narcotic, I’m not. Not. Not. Drugs are bad. Super bad. Anyway, the experience I wanted to share with you occurred while I was riding one of the results of the public education system. So there I was, sitting on the bus minding my own business and letting my thoughts drift to completely immaterial subjects and then those thoughts were rudely interrupted with the frivolousness (or so I thought) of two female bus passengers. These girls/philosophers were repeat offenders in polluting the universe with the drivel that spilled out of their mouths, but on that day I decided to listen a bit deeper to what they were saying. One of the girls was saying something about relationships and this is what she said, verbatim: “relationships are like, really weird. I mean, you like me? Love me? What the hell? ”. This statement totally embodies the thought process and mind setting of the younger generation. Everything is up in the air. Commitment is hesitation. Everything is a “what the hell.”

-C. Lo

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Perspective – A Collection of Musings on the Nature of Humans

Filed Under: Psychology, Sociology
May.01, 2009

I don’t know about any of you, but I often find myself thinking about the future and what it may look like. In a few short weeks, the school year will be over, and we’ll all be moving up a grade (may that be in high school, out of high school, or beyond). We’re not the same people we were when we started this great journey of life, and honesty, we’re not even getting warmed up yet. People change, that’s just in our nature, despite everything we do to try to stop it. This change comes at it’s own pace too, and this pace changes with who you talk to. No one is perfectly satisfied with their life, and they’ll tell you that. But time ultimately will come and wash all of these petty wishes away, leaving the ones that might actually have meaning.

This brings me to my first point: people ultimately want change. Even the happiest person on earth has something more they think might make them happy. This is just the way we are! There’s absolutely no use trying to hide it, deny it, or stop it. People living in poverty want riches, people living in riches wish they had a family. As much as they try to act like they don’t, do not be fooled. It’s perfectly okay to admit this. It’s a trait characteristic in every living organism – a desire to thrive. We don’t want to just live, we want to live comfortably (some more comfortably than others).

As we grow up, these desires and wishes are innocent and harmless. The new toy, to be able to play with siblings this very minute, so on, etc. When we get a bit older, however, and enter the dating scene, these desires may get a bit more scheming. Now we want him to be jealous that he left us, to get the grades that will allow us to go to the sparkling university of our dreams, avoid the overbearing eye of our parents. At each new stage, we realize the silly notions of the past level. We laugh them off without realizing that eventually the “cool”, new ideas we’re embracing now will soon become those we’re ridiculing of the past. For as long as high school seems, four years really aren’t long in the grand scheme of things, and the heartaches of the present will become the heartaches of the past.

People wonder why high school can be so hard. The truth of the matter is that this is the time where we’re discovering ourselves, our talents, our weaknesses, and our image of ourselves, and the only way to develop these ideas is to experience events that challenge our perception of our world. Like it or not, those events will sometimes hurt. How hard they hurt invariably depends on how you handle the situation. But I digress, how to handle painful situations is not the point of this article and shouldn’t be anyone other your decision.

Once we are adults and senior citizens, undoubtably we’ll look back and note these times with fondness, not remembering the pain and anxiety we once felt. Our desires will have changed to more reasonable goals. We hope to be able to pay bills, provide for families, and eventually not break our hips or need dentures. Even in age, humans tend to want something may it be material or otherwise. No matter how much of a conservative you are, there is still an amount of change that you wish to see take place in the world by the end of your lifetime.

So next time you feel upset about a particularly bad break-up, worried about your next job performance evaluation or AP European History exam that you really haven’t studied for just remember that eventually the waves of time will  caress the hurt of your heart and smooth out the pain, eventually eroding it to leave a peacefully blank space of sand for you to do whatever you wish with it.

-mmeyer

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Swine Flu… Is It Really Such A Big Deal?

Filed Under: Arizona News
May.01, 2009

Everyone I talk to is concerned over the new and improved Swine Flu.  I say new and improved because it originally was only contagious to pigs, or swine.  Just as a few years ago the Avian.. or bird flu… was only contagious well you can guess birds.  So why is everyone so afraid? Three words: IT’S A VIRUS.   Hopefully it is common knowledge that unlike bacteria, viruses mutate… meaning the is no “common cure”.

Initially the Swine Flu was only known to swine… though because it mutated, for an unknown reason, the H1N1 virus mutated.  It combined the Swine strand with common influenza {known to humans} and the Avian flu… yes the one everyone was fearful about just two years ago.

As of today, May First, there are 343 cases in Mexico, 1 lone case in Asia, 4 cases in New Zealand, 2 cases in Israel, 1 person in Austria, 4 in Germany, 1 in Denmark and 1 in The Netherlands, 1 in Switzerland, 10 in Great Britain, and 13 in Spain bringing Europe’s total to 31.  In Canada there are a known 35 cases and right here in America there are 146 people infected.  The numbers are overwhelming… though still somewhat small.

The United States has issued a preparedness alert, in which the pentagon and the country’s leader’s have told the country over and over that you can help prevent it.  The Swine Flu is spread like Influenza… the plain old flu.   The virus enters the humans respiratory system… usually though the nose, mouth or eyes.  The virus will then land on a cell’s membrane… and be engulfed into the cell where it then releases RNA… duplicate blueprints to it’s DNA….. allowing to create more.  It then must be released from the cell, this is where the “cure” we’ve all heard about would come in.

Tamiflu and Relenza are the antiviral medications of oseltamivir and zanamivir.  Both Tamiflu and Relenza refuse to allow the virus to leave the cell making it so the virus is unable to infect a different cell, which in turn allows the virus to be less dangerous.

Out of 50 states, 22 are holding large amounts of either Tamiflu or Relenza.  Nine of those 22 are already infected… California, Kansas, Missouri, Indiana, Ohio, Virgina, South Carolina, Delaware, and New York.   A total of 19 states have at least one positive case.  The federal government recommends that each state have enough of either Tamiflu or Releza to cover twenty-five percent of it’s population.

Only one person has died in the United States so far, a man from Texas.  A state that has yet to reach the federal government’s preparedness standards. Personally I find that the 19 states which have proven cases of the Swine Flu should be the first to receive and stockpile the “antidotes”. Hopefully then it could be quarantined.

It is human nature to fear for one’s life.  It’s also human nature to be stubborn, willful and a pain in teh butt at times. I personally am going to choose the second set.  Sure I’ll be carefull and travel back to kindergarten where I was taught to sing Twinkle-Twinkle Little Star or the ABCs when washing my hands.  I’ll make sure to cover my cough and no kiss anyone who’s recently been ill with anything.  However I will not live my life in fear. I refuse to be one of those crazy parents who wish to hide their children in a cave because one child caught the Swine flu at the school.  I am not going to drop everything to hide whenever someone coughs or sneezes.

Here’s how I see it… if the Swine Flu reaches pandemic level and everyone in the world catches it then we’re all doomed.. or most of us are.  If it reaches pandemic level I won’t cower in fear and wait for the Swine Flu to find me.. I’ll still go to school, I’ll still learn.. and overall I’ll still enjoy my life.  Now that doesn’t mean if I catch it that I’m going to go parading around town.  There has to be some limits.  The Federal Government is arguing.. if you get ill… including a common head cold, STAY AT HOME.

The Swine Flu can be deadly… but don’t run in fear. If you ran from everything that could be potentially dangerous, you be continuously running.  Everything, Chicken Pox, Mononucleaus, the common cold, and regular Influenza, can all be deadly if you don’t take precautions.  Stay home, drink liquids, rest… blah blah blah..  Everyone knows the routine.  The key point with any illness is don’t freak out. Breathe  and rest. Living in fear never did anyone any good.

~Dark Angel

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