Homelessness

So today I went to listen to Dr. Pete Gathje speak about homelessness in Memphis. After he went through and gave some statistics and the history of homelessness I then realized that this really is an issue in Memphis and everywhere else. I did not know that Tennessee are in the Top Ten States of Poverty. I usually thought of homelessness as people just living on the streets because they are just to lazy to get a job. Well, in reality some of them do try they just do not make the money they need to support them. Ill be honest whenever I see people on the street sometimes I will lend a hand but then sometimes I think to myself can they just not walk the nearest gas station and at least try to get a job! I know that is really bad on my part and my point of view has definitely changed after hearing some of the causes. Some of the causes include lack of affordable housing, lack of health care, substance abuse, mental illness and ect. Dr. Pete is apart of what is called he Manna House. This house is open three days a week from 8 am to 11 am. People can come in whenever they want and stay as long as they want. They get to drink coffee for free, get clothes and even take showers! I think this is such a nice thing to do. Although he also made it seem like there are no other organizations not helping the homeless when really there are. For example, around Christmas time when people go to the homeless shelter and bring food and toys. I am just so grateful that I am living a good life and do not have to worry about living out on the streets. (303)

Idol Gives Back

This is the second year for American Idol to host the Idol Gives Back Show. Idol Gives Back is for people to donate money to help out the less fortunate people all over the world. This night consisted of many celebrities and showed tapes of celebrities going over to Africa and other places around the world helping out people. I forgot how much money Ryan Seacrest said that was donated but I rememeber it was a big number! There was this one slide they showed I forgot where they went but it showed a little girl who was 8 months old. This little girl was born with malaria and was so infected that her brain was swelling bigger and bigger everyday and causing her to have seizures. When they traveled to Africa it showed Bono from U2 talking to this little boy who was infected with HIV. Idol Gives Back helped donate money to help and try to keep these kids in need to survive! It was a very inspiring night along with inspirational songs. The top 8 idol contestants sang Shout to the Lord and Seasons of Loveboth were very good. If any of you want to check this out you can go to americanidol.com and watch videos of Idol Gives Back. I think this is such a great thing for American Idol to do. (277)

MY OBSESSION!

Well what do you know, another blog on American Idol. This past week American idol was on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday night! I had to work Tuesday and Thursday night and had dance on Wednesday night so I was not able to watch it at the time it came on. So, I had to TVO, even though I always do! There is just something different to me about watching it live and then watching it after you taped it. Anways on Tuesday night the contestants performed inspirational songs. My all time favorite David Archuleta sang “Angels” and what an amazing job he did… the judges loved it! My second favorite Jason Castro sang “somewhere over the rainbow” which was amazing too! I am so glad my two favorites did good! The other contestants were not that good and its not that they did not sing well, it was the song choice they picked. Wednesday night was the Idol Gives Back night and that was a good show. Thursday night was the elimination night and last year they did not send anybody home instead they sent two people home the following week. Well, I was very shocked and so were the judges and other people about the bottom three. I was especially shocked about Michael Johns getting eliminated. He was one of the most talented contestants on this show…I guess it just goes to show you that at this point in the competition no one is safe! I am just waiting on Kristy Lee Cook to go home…she is the least talented on this show and yet somehow she is still on here! It bugs me so bad! Next week, Mariah Carey is the mentor so I definitely will be posting another blog about the competition! (295)

i STILL LOVE our tigers!

I am sure everyone along with me agrees that Monday night was not as exciting as we thought it would be in fact it was depressing. I was so upset the whole day just because I had to work Monday night and was not able to watch the game so I had people calling and texting me the results! I wish I could have been somewhere watching it instead of work where I only saw twelve people. I was so mad they would not let us close early. The refs I heard were making bad calls and didn’t call the foul at the end where Kansas made the three pointer! I was upset at first but then I got to thinking that atleast we made it to national championship even if we did not walk away as champions! We still deserved to be there and also no other team has the record we had this year! The Tigers had a great year. Hopefully, we can come back next year and win it and I have a strong faith in the tigers that we can. Oh, and maybe Derrick Rose and CDR will decide to come back one more year =) (200)

dance competition continued

Well, if any of you read my last blog about my dance competition and want to know what the results were feel free to read. Last Sunday I had to be at White Station High for Showstoppers. I had to wake up at nine o clock in the morning to put my hair in curls and get it ready for the number that we were performing later on in the afternoon. We had to put curls in our hair so it would flip out and be teased like the people in the hairspray movie. After, all this time spent on everyone’s hair we realized that next time we are purchasing a wig to wear! HAHA. Anyways, we all got to the school around 10:30 and we did not go on until about one. The reason we got there so early was because we had to go over the number and also make sure we were stretched out good. We did a production and in our division there were four other numbers. The awards were not until around 4 o clock so believe me it was a loonnngg day! Well, the good news is that in our division we got first place and then we also got overall production which with overall we were up against about 8 other numbers! They put you in different age divisions. So , we were all pretty excited about the outcome and ready to go home and get some sleep. I thought we would have a break for a little while and not have so many practices but I was wrong. We have a show on April 25th to get ready for!(277)

the BIG paper

So our big paper is finally coming to an end! I cannot explain how relieving that is. Although, I will admit we should be really thankful that Wendy is letting us do it in sections. If you think about some teachers would just make us do it all at once. So thank you, Wendy for letting us do it in sections! Also, in a way it kind of makes it easier and make me concentrate on the paper more. It makes me think about what I am writing about more so that my paper makes more sense. I think I like the peer editing for this paper as well because other people point stuff out that I probably would not catch. The reason for that is because when you read your paper, you are going to read what you thought you wrote. Also, it gives me help on the structuring of my sentences and paragraphs! I find this paper not to be easy, but easier than any other paper that we have had to write just because of the help and advice Wendy has given us. Especially like on ecourseware where we go to the contents and click on “part-four” or whatever part we are working out. She breaks it down easier for us so it is not that hard for us. Thanks again Wendy! Haha. So I started on my part four yesterday and almost done, since we need to have it Tuesday in class! I am trying not to procrastinate on this anymore! GOOD LUCK ON YOUR PAPERS EVERYONE! (263)

busy day

Okay, so I had to work tonight which I really did not want to because I have had a massive headache all day and have been lying in bed not being able to sleep because of the pain but no one would cover for me! So anyways, I get to work at two o’clock and the salon assistant does not come in until three. Well, the school next to the tanning place I work at gets out at two o’clock, so of course I am going to get a bunch of girls and boys coming in to tan. I thought to myself, I am going to have an easy day at work, today. Well I was completely wrong! I saw like fourteen people in ten minutes. So, I have to go clean the beds because the assistant as yet to make it to work until her scheduled time. I came back up to the front to see a line of people. I was freaking out! After a busy couple hours at work, I come to find out that my salon assistant has to leave here at six and we close at eight. She has to go to another store to close because supposedly that store is busier! Yea right! So I am going to be stuck here probably pass eight o’clock because I will not be able to do any closing duties because it has been so busy! I am surprised there are a lot of people tanning on a Friday! It is never that busy, ever! (255)

SHOWSTOPPERS

This Sunday I have a dance competition at White Station High School. I am excited for it and ready for it be over at the same time. The reason behind that is the fact that I love to compete in competitions because I love to dance but over the past few weeks it has been so tiring!! We will have dance twice a week or maybe even three days a week when it is normally just on Wednesday nights. The reason for practicing so much is because we are doing a production number and there are two other classes plus my class doing this number. We are dancing to You Can’t Stop The Beat from the Musical, Hairspray and it is a really cute dance, just a lot of work has to go into it. These weeks have been so tiring for me and hard to wake up and do everything because I have school work, dance, and having to go to work! My manager does not get the point. She always puts work before your education and other activities you have to do. So basically I am just really ready for this competition to get here and be over with! I hope we win though! That will be really exciting! (211)

MEMPHIS TIGERS

I don’t know about any of you but I am really excited for the game on Saturday against UCLA! It is going to be an intense game, but I believe that the Tigers can pull it off and win! You can tell they want to win the Championship. Also, if they play against UCLA like they played the past two games I think we will have a GREAT chance of winning. As much as I hate to say it, I am kind of glad they lost against Tennessee just so they have the pressure off their back of being an undefeated team. I don’t know if it is similar but when I cheered in high school, we would always get first at whatever competition we competed at and it seemed as if everyone was out to beat Germantown. So, I kind of know what the pressure of being undefeated feels like. Anyways, back to the tigers… I really hope that not having Andre with them in San Antonio doesn’t affect them. I do not suspect that it would. At least I hope it doesn’t hold them back. I will be watching the game with my family and we will be supporting the tigers and wearing our final four shirts! By the way I got my family final four shirts and it was $109… yea I was a little upset about that!! GOOO TIGERSSS!!! (232)

FAVORITE SHOW UPDATE:

It is that time of the week again to post another update! Feel free to read or feel free to skip this one! Last Tuesday’s theme on American Idol was Dolly Parton’s songs and Dolly was the mentor. I was a little worried about all of the contestants singing their songs, especially David, who was my favorite. When the show started, I was so anxious to see David and wondering when he was going to come on. When they showed him with Dolly Parton together, I thought it was neat. Dolly said she believes that he will become a great, great singer. David picked Smokey Mountain Memories to sing and as usual, it was amazing! I am being totally honest when I say this…in that David gave me the chills. His voice is just so pure. Overall, the contestants did pretty well with their songs. I was amazed because it just seems so hard to top her songs off since she is considered a legend in country music. Wednesday night was the result show and every night on this show, the group sings a song together. The song they sang was Nine to Five…I love that song of Dolly’s. Anyways, of course David was safe! That made me even more excited and Ramielle went home. Next week is the idol gives back week so the contestants are singing inspirational songs! I can’t wait to see the top eight perform!
P.s. I know I am OBSESSED with this show! (251)

sweet summertime

i don't know about anyone else but i am really excited that we get out of school in less than a month and then it is summer time for us! i can not wait for it to be summer. I love when it is summer so you can sleep in and not have to worry about school work or anything! One of the reasons why i can't wait for us to be out of school and summer to be here is so all my friends that do not go to memphis come home and we can all hang out again! There are going to some memories made this summer for sure! Another reason would have to be the days where it is so nice and sunny outside that you can lay by the pool and get a nice tan! I love being tan in the summer, for some reason being tan just makes me feel a lot better about myself. I also love going to the beach during the summer. I think a few of us from high school are going to try and get a house this summer like for the fourth of july so we can spend time together! if this plan falls through it will definitely be a time that will not be forgotten! SO basically school needs to hurry up and come to and end so summer can begin! (233)

WEEKEND!

I am really excited about this weekend. I do not have to work at all and not having to work is such a relief right now because it is beginning to be busy season where i work and trust me when i say busy i mean LINES out the door and so many people waiting on beds to be ready to tan in. When you stand on your feet all day at work, it is so uncomfortable. Since i do not have to work this weekend i am going to catch up on my exercise because i definitely need to catch up on working out. I guess you could say it is time to get in shape for the summer time! Man, i can not wait. This weekend is also exciting because it starts off with the TIGERS playing! Can't wait to watch the game tonight. I am also hanging out with my friend Liz. I'm excited because us hanging out has been wayyy over due like about 3 months overdue ! She just got a new puppy so we are going to take Lucy Claire to the park tomorrow along with Rocky (my brothers dog). I hope it is a pretty day for the park tomorrow! I just can not wait to have a relaxing and fun weekend! (226)

GO TIGERS GO!

We all should be very excited to go to a school with such a great basketball team. It was a good game against Mississippi State to get into the sweet sixteen, but man how nerve wrecking was that! Ahh! I was so scared. Anways, we play Michigan State tonight and I must say I’m pretty excited and I think we can make it to the elite eight once again! They just need to get their head in the game and when they get fouled actually make the free throws because in the end that may be what causes us to win or lose! If we are up like ten points and only a few minutes left in the game I’m sure the other team will start fouling us just because everyone thinks we can’t make free throws! Memphis needs to show them wrong! We have such a strong team so I believe we can pull this game off and go into the elite eight! Tonight is going to be an exciting game to watch! And I don’t know about any of you but I kind of wanted Tennessee to win last night just so maybe we could play them again and show them who really is the best!!! (208)

another AI update

It’s time for another update on I guess you could say, my OBSESSION! American Idol is so addicting. I like it soo much that I watch it and also TVO it so I can go back and watch it. Anyways, last Tuesday the contestants had to sing songs from the year they were born. They all did pretty good! David Archuleta (my favorite), sand “You’re the Voice” by John Farhamn. I have never heard this song before, and now I really really like it. Each week before he goes on stage I get so anxious to see how well he is going to do and what song he picks. All the other contestants are definitely improving along with Mr. Archuleta! Haha. Wednesday was the result show, and Chikieze was sent home. I liked Chikieze and I really wanted Kristy Lee Cook to go home, I am just not a fan of hers! Well, next week Dolly Parton is their mentor. Even though I am not a Dolly Parton fan I still think that would be cool to meet her since she is someone famous in the country music industry. So, instead of singing country songs I believe the contestants are going to have to sing Dolly Parton songs! This is going to be an interesting one. Especially to see what the contestants pick and how they may rearrange the songs! Can’t wait! (232)

Brothers Wedding

okay, so im going to vent in this one! so if you dont want to read it feel free not to because its nothing to important. anyways my brother is getting married august 9th. and the main reasoin for writing this blog is well, my sister and i are not in the wedding. in my opinion, i honestly think that is really disrespectful to the family. i was really upset about it and i honestly didnt think my sister would be upset about it, but she is! she said something to my mom and my mom said something to my brother. when my mom talked to my brother, my brother had no idea that you usually have your sister or sisters in the wedding! my brother is so laid back and doesn't care about anything. his fiance has the five girls in her wedding who are her best friends and she was in their wedding. i know she knows it's the right think to do to ask the sisters to be in the wedding. i mean don't get me wroing i love my brothers fiance to death but this bothers me so much ! the wedding is going to be different to. its going to be in arkansas which is where she is from. instead of being in a church its going to be in a ballroom and everyone is going to be seated at tables. the reception food is going to be mexican good. i mean what if everyone doesn't like mexican food. i dont know it just bothers me that she is going this all her way and not letting my brother decided anything. but then again my brother doesn not care and won't speak up since he is so laid back. she is this because she is the only child and no offense to being the only child. i mean there is differences in being the only child and being raised to not have everything your way and being raised by having everything your way! i dont know im just really upset about this issue and felt like venting. i mean would anybody else be upset about this or am i over exaggerating?

Easter Sunday

well, as we all know easter is this sunday! i love the holidays because its a time where my whole family can be together! i love spending quality time with my family. it is so much fun being around the people who care for you and love you more than anyone! we always have so much fun together. i don't know if it is the same for any of you but the easter bunny still comes to visit me or should i say my parents!haha! i love getting easter baskets! my youngset cousins are twelve and nine and me and my older cousin who is twenty two still easter egg hunt! well, me and my cousin don't but we hide the eggs for my little cousins to fin! some may find this weird that we do this at an older age but we do! we love to do it! it's just a tradition and i guess you can say we are still kids at heart! also, eveyr year we dye eggs the day before easter! i actually just dyed some today! it is just another way to spend quality time with the family! its going to be weird though this easter because my brother nor sister will be with the family because they will be working! they are both cops and they work the holidays! what a bummer that is! well anyways, i hope everyone has a happy and safe easter!

Memphis in May!

i dont know if any of you are excited about music fest this year but i know i am! the line up this year is so awesome! i know its like a month away but i cant wait! i really want to see colbie calliat, the john butler trio(sarah, remember the blue dots!..that was so scary ahah), O.A.R, Matisyahu, and of course more! i really hope it doesnt rain this year though because that would be awesome if it doesnt. hopefully, it's warm too! i hate when it rains and it gets cold by the river ! the rain and the cold definitely dont mix well! haha. i love being downtown at music fest with a group of people! its fun except it sucks when you lose people in your group and sometimes your phone doesnt have service! it's so frustrating. I like memphis in may to because sometimes you see people you havent seen in awhile! although im really excited for music fest this year, i think the best music fest ever would be for INCUBUS to be there! they are my favorite band. Memphis in May would be complete if they were included in the line up !

My Job

okay, so i work at a tanning salon but i'm not going to mention where i work because i don't to put a bad name out there for this company! i have been working at this place since august 2006 and it's not that i hate it but it's just beginning to get more and more ridiculous. it is fun to work with all the people here and the manager does work around your school schedule and extra activities but let me get to the main part of this. They have no taken away our unlimted tanning and we are only allowed to tan in levels one and two, and if we want to tan in higher levels, we have to pay ! i mean i don't tan that much anyways but i just think this is kind of ridiculous considering we do work for this company and we as employees are the ones who bring in money for company and to keep the business alive! Another thing is that i know this is a job and should be taken seriously but its beginning to become more than a job! i mean this is not my career, this is just a part time job while i am in school. Another thing is when we put in a request off sometimes the manager does not take it into considertation and schedules us and leaves it up to us to find someone to cover it! like for example, for my graduation from high school i asked off way ahead of time and she scheduled me ! i told her she messed and she said that i was the one who would have to find someone to cover it. i said okay, i will but if no one will cover for me i am not coming in! well, she got mad at me. i mean if you're the manager and you schedule somoene whey they are not allowed to work, you as a manager should cover it.. don't you think? i'm also tired of dealing with bitchy customers! they act like everything is our fault. the other day i was working and some lady started going off talking about how the air condition doesn't work and that's a problem and we will lose business because of this. i honestly wanted to say lady, i am not a machanic but i kept my patience and was very nbice to her! well i just really wanted to let this out. i could go on and on about this! im just glad i let some of this out! whewww!

AMERICAN IDOL UPDATE!!!

okay, so i am writing another blog on this topic just to keep any of you who are interested updated on american idol, which is my favorite show of course ! Last Tuesday the contestants had to sing songs again from the Beatles song book. Honestly in my opinion no one will be able to sing as good as the Beatles so of course this would be another hard wekk for the contestants. Any of you who read my last blog on this topic would know my favorite contestant this season is seventeen year old.. David Archuleta. He definitely stepped up his game this past Tuesday. He was amazing. I mean Simon called it a Master Class and said it was amazing =). So i knew Mr. Archuleta would make it to the top ten (the top ten are the ones who go on the idol tour). As for the other contestants, some were really good as well and some it was just not their week. The results night was Wednesday night and the bottom three was a suprise to me. One of the best singers in this competition was in the bottom three. I was shocked. Amanda was sent home, and even though i don't like her she should have been the one to go home. well i will keep everyone updated for next wekk. Be ready! haha

Semi-Pro

I went to go see Semi-Pro while i was in Knoxville for Spring Break. I love Will Ferrell movies so of course i had to go see this one. The previews looked to be really funny, so i was all excited to go see this movie. Well, unfortuantely this was not one of my favorite movies he has been in. To me, it didn't really seem like it was a good movie script. There were some really random parts in it. I mean it was funny at parts I will give it that, but if i had to give it stars i would more than likely give this movie two or three stars. It just really did not impress me with how i thought it would. I also went to go see this in the afternoon, which i'm glad i did because i don't think it woud have been worth paying like nine dollars for a movie. Which i must say is completely ridiculous. They keep on raising the price. It's a lot cheaper to just wait for the movie to come out on video and go rent it at blockbuster or even kroger for like one dollar. This is my thought on this movie, if any of you have seen this movie feel free to leave comments on what ya'll think about it. I wonder if people feel the same way i feel about it. It just seemed like this movie wasn't as much as a comedy for Will Ferrel to star in.