thanks for reading and live it up.

-Joshua Deese a.k.a. “stormbreaker”

First, people, please stop posting inappropriate things on my posts, it not only makes you look bad but also me.

Second, to all of you student ambassadors of Teen Ink, yesterday you saw that the newest November question came out. One of the questions was: Teenink.com is thinking of adding a new Blog Section. Which would you like to see.

A. Sports
B. TECHNOLOGY AND GADGETS
C. Do it yourself

Hooray! I’m not sure if any of you suggested, but I suggested in my first post to add a Tech Section. So if any of you student ambassadors haven’t voted yet, please go for the Tech one.

On to the reviews:

Super Smash Bros. Brawl: 8/10. This is a really good game, made by Nintendo for the Wii. In the game (the same as the first two Super Smash Bros. Game) You fight 1-3 other enemies, NPC’s or friends, or connect to the internet and fight people all over the world. What separates this from the previous games? One-player mode is made better by an actual story adventure. In this you can unlock a ton of characters, music, and stages throughout. Speaking of stages, in this game you can create your own using the stage-building tool(duh). The game boring in single player, however with friends it’s always fun.

Guitar Hero: World Tour: 7/10. You may think that Guitar Hero: WT is just copying Rock Band, but they are both made by the same company, so that’s not really true. The game on guitar is pretty much the same, except with different songs, but that doesn’t change how addictingly fun it is. The other instruments are cool, especially if you can get 3 friends to play with you. This isn’t necessarily the best game ever, but it is definitely worth playing.

WoW: 8/10: For those of you who don’t know what WoW is, it is World of Warcraft, the absolute largest MMORPG there is. Made by Blizzard, it is an incredibly addicting game. You first create your character, your race(by which I mean creature, yet it does include humans) and your character’s class, whether it be Paladin, Warrior, or Priest. Your story begins in a small town where you are forced to complete menial tasks for NPC’s until you begin to forage on your own, but can’t do anything until you become at least level 20. One problem with the game: it is expensive, first you pay for the CD, then a monthly fee, then expansion packs, etc.

So that sums it up for now. If you have any suggestions for what I review or talk about, post below! And remember, keep it clean.

For example, the basic preconceived notion that a woman is to be kept in a tiny, ironically ornate box. She is to keep the box pretty and try to grow some perfect plants in it, with facitious seeds…She is to nurture and care for them selflessly, yet still ensconced in her comfortable box…precariously comfortable…Yet the seeds, if they grow into healthy plants, with anthers and pollens, would step outside the box, to change the uncertain vacuum around it…

And as I come to an end of this strained, unwanted opinion, I realize, that it isn’t mine…Isn’t it unfair that my thoughts, though carefully sealed in an intricate mesh of nerves, veins and arteries were never mine…They were an input of borrowed ideas, and borrowed thoughts….

After reading Anna Karenina, I was shocked to find striking parallels between today’s society and Russian society in the 1800s. The wordless judgments passed on you whenever you walk into a room, are needless to say, painful. You feel like an anomalous alien to a world unknown to yourself, even though in reality you might be perfectly the same.

Then now when I’m reading Oscar Wilde’s “A Picture of Dorian Gray”, eying a person from head is visible once again. In this case, poor Dorian seems to be held in constant judgment. I’m sure he must be beautiful, and of course, exceptional beauty can sometimes arrest the eye for a moment, it’s only human. But scrutinizing Dorian’s every single feature is just cruel. And dissecting his every feature is not even enough. Lord Henry pretends to read him like an open book, excuse the cliché. Pretend might even be an understatement. It actually seems like the face bears the entire soul open, to mere strangers. Now that is just plain freaky. I’ve always liked to pretend like all my thoughts, and all my beliefs are dead bolted, locked up somewhere inaccessible. The thought of being a mystery to people is exciting, almost quixotic. But then I’ve always been the kind of girl who still holds on to fantasies, against my better judgment.

So if this is true, (I hope with all my heart that it’s not!) this could possibly mean that being all frank and candid in society is just pretending to acknowledge what’s already crystal clear. That everyone actually knows who you are and what you’re thinking and being reserved doesn’t really hide anything. It just gives you false hopes that you might actually hide what you so desperately want to hold on to. The idea of yourself.

The closet I’ve ever gotten to a smoking a ciggarette is when I walked to close to my dad as a kid and burt my self on the one he was holding in his hands as he talked to someone. The closest I’ve ever been to drugs was going inside of a house that drugs have most likely been in, and taking Advil and Aleeve and cough mediciine and other medications. The closest I’ve come to drinking or getting drunk is tasting one sip of my mom’s wine and deciding that it tasted gross.
The closest I’ve ever come to sex is kissing guys on the cheek and lips, and even a girl on the lips once.

So this past Friday I was sitting at lunch with some friends, and everyone was talking about their weekend plans and when it came to my turn I told them all that I was going to a soup kitchen with my youth group that night. Some of them laughed, some of them called me gay and then one of my best friends called me boring when I tried defending myself and saying that I was just the “good girl” and she said no, you’re just the “boring girl”.

Being considered the “good girl” has never bothered me before because honestly I’m not an angel, but I’m not some dare devil either and I’m fine with that. But this time I couldn’t help but think that none of them had the right to call me boring or “gay” because I was doing something good while that weekend all they were going to do was get high or drunk or just sit on their asses and do nothing.

I’ve done everything in my life with no regrets. I’ve stepped outside my comfort zone by twenty miles and I’ve sat in my personal space and lived a few days here and there doing nothing. Just because I don’t feel the need to get drunk or high or have sex with guys at my age doesn’t mean I’m boring, it means that I’m living my life the way I want to, and that’s exactly the way everyone else should be living theirs.

If you want to get drunk, then do it. If you don’t, then that’s great. Live your life the way you want to and if someone calls you boring or gay or some other stereotype, ignore them.

I’d rather be called boring, and living my life the way I want to; over being called something much worse while living a life that I want nothing to do with.

Peace and Love always,
Sheepskin

St Jude. My Grandma wore that necklace as long as I could remember. She never took it off, only to shower. I once got up the nerve to ax her about it. It wasn’t that I was scared she wouldn’t tell me, it was that when I axed her I wanted to be able to understand completely, for I know how special it was to her.
But the answer that I received was much less complex then I had anticipated.
She told me, in her soft manner of speaking and with the airs that made her the best Grandma ever, that St. Jude was the patron of hopeless causes, and since she was about just that she needed all the help she could get.
We both laughed and I agreed that I probably needed a St. Jude around my neck also, cuz I am a hopeless cause. We finished making cookies or playing cards, whichever we were doing like nothing big or life-changing had happened, but oh GrandmaMikek! the way you first started the wheels turning in my head….let’s just say they’ve only kept turning faster.
The reason for my sudden case of nostalgia is to get you to focus on hope. Now hope is a thing one does not need to take lightly.
If you know the story of Pandora you know she was a very curious girl who was told not to open a box. Of course, as the saying goes: curiosity killed the cat. What Pandora gave the world when she opened that box was almost every miserable thing you can think of! Violence, abuse, sexual harassment, AIDS, old age and many more. But after seeing these things fly into the world she, Pandora fell to her knees in despair and shame until one last thing came from the box. Which was hope. Hope, standing strong, telling the world not to give up. Hope, when everything’s over and you’re ready to give up telling us to hang on and believe.
Now the dictionary defines hope as: the feeling that what is wanted can be had or that events will turn out for the best. It’s pretty straightforward is it not?
Now how in an way would hope be bad? Oh, we’ve all heard it before….”I don’t wanna get my hopes up then not see those things I’m hoping for happen.” Now I will say straight up that that’s bologna. Hope is what keeps the world from falling into depression and strife.
I’ve found that when you hope for something and achieve it; the joy and feeling of accomplishment is so much more fulfilling then when you don’t hope at all.
Now I’m not saying my hopes don’t ever get down, because they do. I’m not saying that I’m the best person at being auspicious or optimistic, but the main thing I am trying to say is that having hope is not at all a bad thing. I think it is something more people need to do.
Now I know if I was Catholic my patron would probably match my Grandma’s. I thank God for putting her in my life I also thank God for giving us the one thing that doesn’t just let out world fall to pieces of chaos.

HAVING
OPTIMISTIC
PERSONAL
EXCITEMENT

So next time you feel like giving up; remember to HOPE.
over & out
ciao

Welcome to T and T, your not number one source for post-election coverage. Have you been living under a rock for the past week, then you need to know that Obama won! Yes, we now have a democratic president, though I would like to also say that McCain led a great campaign, kudos to him.

Obama won by alot, 364 (electoral votes) to 163. As known you need only 270 electoral votes. McCain lost in the popular vote by only 8,000,000. This was one of the MOST exciting elections in the past 4 years. But seriously folks, states that hadn’t voted for the democrats in over 40 years. For the first time in who knows how long the 10 most educated (based on people graduating from college) states all voted the same way(democratic).

The economy going down did not help either candidates. Since it happened so close to the election Obama and McCain had to quickly come up with a game plan.

News Coverage: this was done for about 2 years before the actual election. Some was good, some was bad, a lot of it was warped. Tip for the future: don’t believe everything you see on the news.

The Election Awards: These are awards for the best and worst things in the campaigns:

Most repetitive: John “The Maverick” McCain. Why? Because the word maverick was used more times in the past 3 months than ever in history.

Most Unnecessary news coverage: Sarah Palin, we heard a lot about her, a lot we didn’t need to know. Too many people saying she was a bad running mate. There were no bad running mates, they all tried to get the people’s vote.

Most below the radar: Joe Biden. I didn’t here much about him.

Most overused word: Change. Yes, we need change, but there are other words. Reforming for example.

Most important issue: economy.

Funniest coverage of election: Comedy Central’s Indecision 2008.

Most Serious coverage: CNN: Election Night.

On to our current president (Obama is president-elect until January 20) George W. Bush. He has grown a bad reputation, he made mistakes, he made some good things happen, now he gets to enjoy a position many people call the “lame duck”. Bush basically only needs to fill the slot until inauguration day. He doesn’t make any really important positions, he enjoys the perks of being the president.

I do not wish to say anyone did a bad job during this election season. I could never be able to last that long getting that much media attention. So that concludes my poor coverage of the past election.

Have any ideas for what I should do next week? Post below!