Bad Weather at AUM.

Along with Brandon, I was stuck in Goodwyn Hall's Basement for what felt like forever but I think it was only like 2 hours. As soon as I walked in class I sat down and somebody came in and said "TORNADO WARNING GO TO THE BASEMENT." So everybody packed in the basement halls like sardines. Someone came over the intercom every so often only to tell us that they have extended the tornado warning for a later time. Around 12:20 people started leaving so I of course left. I didn't have a lick of service down in the basement so as soon as I got service my phone was blowing up with text messages. AUM sent be 5 or 6 weather alerts my brother sent me a few texts telling me to call him and of course my mom sent me half a million texts asking if I was okay and all that nonsense. After I called everybody I needed to I was finally able to call my brother. He told me that Adam's Motor Sports roof was torn off and was in front of the building where he works, which is right behind Adam's Motor Sports, so I'm glad he didn't hurt. On my way home I saw a ton of police cars, ambulances, fire trucks, and the trucks that work on power lines. I was so ready to get home. At least I got out of Biology class, and we weren't given the homework that we were supposed to get for the break. But knowing my luck, my teacher will probably post in on BlackBoard for us to print out the notes and the homework to do. But at least there is no school next week, hallelujah.

Thankfulness

I have so much to be thankful for. I'm obviously thankful for my wonderful family, and friends. I'm thankful to have a job, which I love. I'm thankful to be able to go to the college that I wanted to go to where my parents could pay for it. I'm also thankful that I have a roof over my head and clothes on my back. I'm thankful for being able to live in a country where you can worship freely. I'm very thankful for all of my animals who I love. I'm thankful for Starbucks, because they have the greatest double chocolate chip frappucinos.  I'm very very thankful to have spent the last year with my awesome boyfriend who has been supportive of everything I do since day one. I'm thankful to have my 2007 Toyota Corolla, Bella, who has stayed so very faithful to me even though I put her through a lot. I'm thankful to have food put in front of me every night when I get home from work or school, by my awesome mom. I'm also thankful to have good health and not be sick all the time. I'm thankful to be in Alabama, because it is just so much better than the rest. I have so much more that I am thankful for, but I would be here all day long, so here is just a few of them.

Christmas!

Besides my birthday, Christmas is my all time favorite holiday. With Christmas just a little over a month away, decorations are already beginning to flood the stores. All the Christmas movies are even starting to come on TV. I love Christmas time because everybody seems so happy this time of year. I also enjoy seeing all the decorations, eating all the good foods, and of course seeing my awesome family. Even though most people seem happy for the holidays, there are some who are very emotional during this time of year. About 3 years ago, I went to WalMart with my mom to get groceries I'm sure. As we went to leave I noticed a man standing by the road. He was an older scraggly looking man holding bags of homemade cotton candy, like something you would get at the fair. I asked mom to stop to see what he was doing. He said he was trying to do everything he could to make a little money to buy Christmas gifts. My heart immediately broke into a million pieces. I really felt bad for this man who obviously was doing anything he could to make a few extra bucks to buy for Christmas, even if it meant freezing in the cold. I decided to take all the money in my pocket, which wasn't much but I took that and gave it to him for the 2 or 3 bags of cotton candy he had left in his hands. As we said goodbye he thanked me and we drove away. Seeing people like that during the Christmas time makes me so sad. I hope the little I gave him helped him out. This year, I think I'm going to do more to help the people who really don't have a lot of money to buy for the children and family.

Thanksgiving Food.

Thanksgiving is one of my favorite holidays of the whole year, only because it is one of the few holidays of the year that I got to see my family. Even though they live in Millbrook, with everybodys busy schedule it is hard to make time to go see them. Each year we go to one of my dads sister's houses for lunch. Instead of just one person cooking, everybody brings whatever they would like to. That way we have a little bit of everything to choose from. There is always plenty of food and desserts to have. Not all of my family on that side goes to this every year because they have other places to go to, but they are always there for Christmas. My brother and his wife went to our Thanksgiving last year, so this year they will be traveling to Birmingham for her family's Thanksgiving. I will be going to Millbrook with my family for just a little bit then I will be headed to Eclectic for Hunter's Thanksgiving at his Granny's. After that we get to go back to Millbrook for Thanksgiving dinner at his uncles house for Hunter's other side of the family. Needless to say I have a busy day but I am so very excited to see mine & Hunter's family. The other good thing about Thanksgiving besides all the food is not being in school. It seemed like next week would never come but in 3 more days I will finally have a week off from school, which is extremely relieving. I'm sure that in between houses on Thanksgiving I will be needing a serious nap, because all of that food is going to make me so tired. But I'm so very excited about Thanksgiving break!

CQ Researcher: Preventing Teen Drug Use

Over the past few decades the use of drugs among teenagers has steadily increased and decreased over the years. Many schools have gotten help from different programs such as D.A.R.E (Drug Abuse Resistance Education) or S.A.D.D ( Students Against Destructive Decisions). These programs teach all different ages about what drugs can make you do, what you look like and also teaching the kids to say no. In a survey in 1992, it showed that 54 percent of all American children will have used an illegal drug by the time they graduate from high school, studies show. More than 80 percent will have used alcohol, and nearly half — 49 percent — will have smoked marijuana. Here we are 19 years later, I'm sure the survey would be quite different. I think most of what high school kids are using now is mainly alcohol and weed, not from personal experience but just from hearing things. Most all teenagers who start using drugs are influenced by their friends, which is sad. When it comes to hardcore drugs like "ecstasy", meth, cocaine, heroin, weed, or the "date-rape" drug those are anything but good, especially when someone gets addicted to them and can't get off of them. Drugs can make people do things they normally wouldn't do and drive a person crazy, especially when they have withdrawals and begin to get sick over it. I think the drug-free programs work for some people, like myself, but others it probably goes in one ear and out the other. It's very sad seeing someone addicted to a drug that has just lost all sense of control over themselves. Their appearance, personality, and everything else is so different from when they weren't on drugs. Some schools are even going as far as doing random drug-testing and suspending the ones that fail, which I completely agree with. When a teenager gets addicted to a drug they are most likely going to end up doing something they regret and end up in prison if not dead. It can also cause abuse in relationships and families. The drug prevention programs are definitely better than nothing. Even though it doesn't work in everybody, at least people will be aware of what drugs can do to you. Not all popular drugs are illegal. Some teens are getting legal substances to get high off of substances available at a drug store, including inhalants, non-prescription antihistamines and prescription pain killers. Some teens inhale the fumes of strong-smelling fumes such as finger nail polish removal, butane, glue and other such chemicals. Any drugs than someone can get addicted to can never be good. I think that more programs should be shown in school, public and private. I also think drug tests should be given randomly and anything else that can prevent teens from getting on drugs should be used. Drugs used by teens can and will most of the time result in prison, crime, getting someone else addicted or even death.

Wildlife Federation

For hundreds of years, many different types of animals have been hunted all throughout the year. Animals can be hunted for their meat, their skin, or just to have a good looking mount hanging on the wall. Some say killing animals for a sport is inhumane, which I agree up to a certain extent. Domestic animals are a completely different story and I agree that killing or fighting animals such as dogs, cats, horses or any other "family pet" is inhumane. But killing animals such as deer, elk, turkeys, and any other type of animal like that is anything but inhumane. Hunter's have a certain season for each animal every year in which they can hunt for that particular animal. That way the whole population does not go extinct. Now if we were told that we couldn't go hunting anymore, wouldn't we be overpopulated by all these animals? Every hunt, I think it's either one or 2 deer that can be killed. If your caught with more than that, your in a whole lot of trouble because those game wardens do NOT play. Each year hunter's renew their hunting license and that money goes to the wildlife conservation effort. The land that is hunted on is payed for and is definitely not cheap and is also hard to keep up. When the anti-hunting groups start rambling on about killing endangered species, I agree that's not good but where I'm from we don't do that. We hunt only in deer, rabbit, dove, and turkey season and ONLY those animals. I'm almost positive that there are people out there that virtually annihilate predators by poising them such as wolves from killing there precious deer, caribou, moose and whatever else. I agree poisoning is a bit harsh. But shooting and getting it over with is a lot better, at least I think. But like I said where I'm from we don't kill those types of animals. We mainly focus on deer, rabbits, turkey, hogs and some types of birds. The anti-hunters need to quit whining about ALL the hunters because we're not all the same. Hunting animals that multiply very quickly is by no means wrong, we don't want to be over populated by things such as deer. Don't people complain when deer run out in the middle of the road and plow their cars? I agree that the bigger animals that are small in numbers shouldn't be hunted as often. But cutting off hunting completely would be a big mistake.  I think hunting is not inhumane if its used in the right way for the right animals.

6 word memoir

Life without my bestfriends would suck.

Face your problems, don't Facebook them.

Life would suck without fried pickles.