Weekly Blog 4: Guess Who Got Sued

So today I just happened to be scanning the news on Yahoo when they had informed me that some poor 6 year old girl is being sued in New York. Here is the story, the New York Supreme Court Justice Paul Wooten has decided this 6 yr old is old enough to be sued for something she was accused of when she was 4! When this little girl was 4 she was riding on the street in her dangerous vehicle (a training bike) looking for trouble. She was out for blood when she ran into a elderly women (who was 87). I am sad to say that the elderly women did have to have hip surgery and died soon after, but to sue this girl for a random accident would be just as sad. She is just a innocent little girl and couldn't have possibly planned to run into this lady. There was no intention, no motive, no reason for her to want to cause harm to anyone. After all she is four and no toddler I know is trying to hurt anyone like that. It was all just a horrible accident that got out of control due to the elderly lady's medical conditions and age. I am so appalled to see that this 6 year old's life is going to be tarnished by such a ridiculous ruling. How could you ruin someones life over this, where is the line on who you can or cannot get into a courtroom now-a-days. Maybe since we find it easy to sue this little girl we should just throw her in jail for murder. Come on now people... 

Weekly Blog 3: Pandas

There is now two new additions to the Panda reserve in Sichuan province! Last week Yo Yo gave birth to twin cute baby Pandas. Bringing this years total number of new baby Pandas to 19, surpassing last year by one little baby. There are roughly around 1,600 Pandas live in the wild today and about 300 that are kept in captivity. Pandas are on the endangered species list because of  loss of habitat, poaching, and their low birth rate. This information is from Yahoo.com.

I think it is great what they are doing with the Pandas. They use artificial insemination to try and raise the birth rate of these beautiful animals and keep them on our planet. I love Pandas they are my favorite kind of bear if I had to choose one. On another note this article kind of made me sick because it brought the thought of poaching to my mind. I'm not one for any kind of hunting, but to kill a animal on the endangered species list just to make money really gets to me. I think it is disgusting people can do that. We all need to do our part in this world to keep it nice for generations to come, and to keep all the wild life we can. So stop having so many babies so we can have room for the creatures, they are more enjoyable anyways. Well most of the time. 

Weekly Blog 2: Trashed

Naples Italy is experiencing one of the dirtiest and stinkiest problems ever. After the city proposed the creation of a new dump, people went postal. Sanitation workers went on strike and the city protesters started compiling their trash in the streets. 2,400 tons of garbage is now piling up in the streets in Naples, and the European Union is threatening to fine Italy if it doesn't clean it up soon. All this information is according to Mike Krumboltz at Yahoo.com.

This kind of has me wondering, we have so many things and people we take for granted in our lives. Sanitation workers who come pick up garbage everyday have a disgusting and thankless job. But without them our daily lives would be thwarted. We couldn't do the simplest of tasks like drive to work without garbage being in our way. Don't even get me started on the smell. We all take a lot of things and people for granted, I think we should take time in our day to reflect on the little things. So we can start to realize how many things make our lives the best they can be from day to day.

Weekly Blog 1: Proposition 19

 Proposition 19 is the new thing on voters minds in California, it is all about if they should legalize marijuana this November. The law states that anyone who is an adult (21 or older) can legally buy and use marijuana. Now everyone knows that doing drugs is extremely bad for your health so I'm going to give you a little more insight on why it is a bad idea to legalize it. But also give you some in sight into why it could possibly be a good idea too. We will start off with the negatives, first off it is damaging to people's health and making it legal would lure people to do it more therefore making it physically harmful to people in the long run. The president of Mexico calls the law "absurd" and thinks it is going to have a back pedal effect to trying to keep the Mexican drug cartels as less violent as possible. Saying that if marijuana is legalized there will be more violence then ever for American citizens. Some who agree with Prop 19 say that it will create more jobs in the state and diminish crime because violent criminals could no longer profit off the illegal trading of the drug. Legalizing this drug could become the economic boost/stimulant California needs. It's going to be a hard decision for the voters in Cali next month, a recent poll from the New York times says that Proposition 19 in the end will be legalized with a vote close to 52%. The rankings change every week so no one can be sure. All I know is that it could be a very new and most likely hectic beginning for the coast.

Tinkering School

Well I will start off by giving you my opinion on Gever Tulley video. I thought his idea of teaching these children how to work like this is great, he is letting them make their own mistakes on the projects and teaching them problem solving skills. He doesn't tell the kids how to do things so when they finish a project they can feel well accomplished on what they achieved. These children get to decide on what they want to make and how they want to make it, which is very different than the schooling system now-a-days. In schools now the teachers give you projects and you have to follow strict rules on how to make it. That in my opinion is stifling creativity in the younger kids today. Anther thing I felt was great about his approach at teaching was that when the kids got stuck on a problem he let them take a break and decorate the unfinished project, allowing them to take a step back and relax made it easier for them to clear their minds and figure out a solution to the problem. This my also help them to never give up, most times if you get stuck on a problem and you stress about it you just give up to make it easy on yourself. But this way they learn that solutions will just come and not to just drop the thing all together.

I would love to go to a school with this approach, I think I learn better through examples and working things out visually so this seems to be right up my ally. I think all kids should be able to do something like this. Kids today are to sheltered because parents are to scared bad things will happen to them or they will get hurt sometimes. What they don't know that sheltering your kids like that is keeping them from having a lot of fun. And it also keeps them from learning valuable skills that would actually help them in the long run when they are adults.

Weird but fun..

Costumes, role playing, and adult like comedy skits these are only some of the things the Renaissance fair had to offer over the Labor Day weekend. Sounds pretty weird right? Well I am with you on that, I was one of those people about a week ago. I never thought I would go to anything like that, since I don't really get into role playing and all that good stuff. When I went home for the weekend my family surprised me about this little outing. I wasn't to happy with it at first, but it was actually a super great time. Of course the first thing I noticed about it was how many people were there. I would have never expected that many, we could barely find a place to park. Then the second which is the most noticeable was the costumes. My family and I had a lot of fun looking at all the men in tights and women in huge dresses, everyone talking like they just came out of a time portal. Two of my favorite things about this place were; the food and the comedy skits that played every half hour. I am completely addicted to chocolate so I was going to that stand every ten minutes, I must of eaten my body weight in chocolate that day. The skits were supposedly PG-13 but I wouldn't recommend any kids to go see  them, if you know what I mean. So really if your ever looking for something new and out of your comfort zone to try, go there it's surprisingly a good time.

A Little About Me

To start off my name is Angela O'Brien, but most people call me Angie. I was born and raised in Hastings, MN. This is the first time I am moving away from home so I am pretty excited. I have a off campus apartment with one of my friends, it's a really nice place right on the river. My birthday is August 15th which means I pretty much just turned 18. I was always the youngest person in my grade. Right now I am here at Western for the nursing program, but I'm kind of debating on that right now so I don't know what I will be doing after I get my generals done with. My favorite thing to do in my spare time is listen to music and go to concerts, I like a really wide variety of music so I will listen to like anything. My favorite bands to listen to are A Day to Remember and Mayday Parade, which I got to see both of them in concert and they were amazing! Back home in Hastings is my family and my dog, his name is Rusty and he is a brittney spaniel. Before I moved out I lived with my mom, my sister and my nephew. My family is really close so I have to make trips home at least once a month to see them. I am a summer baby so I hate winter and I refuse to go out if it's cold. In the summer I spend most of my time at the beach or at my family's summer cabin. I just lay around, swim, wake boarding, knee boarding, and a lot of boating.:)