Happy Birthday!

Say a very happy birthday to Bam Margera! He turns 29 today!

Twilight!!!!

I'm a big fan of Twilight by Stephenie Meyer. Here's the cast list and my opinions on them. 

Kristen Stewart- Bella Swan: 4.5/5 - She's a good actress. I always imagined Bella with lighter hair, though. 

Robert Pattinson- Edward Cullen: 0.5/5 – I really do not believe that Robert Pattinson is or ever will be Edward. I imagine Edward to be more filled out and heartbreakingly gorgeous, neither of which Robert is. Anna and I figured out why this is. Ask me sometime. He's a wonderful Cedric, that's it.

Taylor Lautner- Jacob Black: 4/5 – He's cute. We share a birthday. Jacob's supposed to have longer hair, though.

Billy Burke- Charlie Swan: 1.5/5 – I imagined Charlie older and chubbier. Not really dad-like.

Peter Facinelli- Carlisle Cullen: 3/5 – He has a really small mouth. That's weird, but he looks a little better blonde. Just not how I thought Carlisle should be.

Elizabeth Reaser- Esme Cullen: 4.5/5 – Truthfully, she's nice enough, and Esme isn't a big enough character for it to really matter.

Nikki Reed- Rosalie Cullen: 4/5 – I like her, she looks good as a blonde, and Rosalie's one of my favorite characters. I just can't get over the fact that she was in Thirteen.

Ashley Greene- Alice Cullen: 3.5/5 – She's alright. I don't really like her haircut, it looks kind of stupid.

Jackson Rathbone- Jasper Cullen: 2/5 – He was a good Jasper until they dyed his hair blonde. Really?

Kellan Lutz- Emmett Cullen: 4/5 – I imagined Emmett as freakishly large. But he's good. He's cute. I like him as a blonde.

Cam Gigandet- James: 4.5/5 – I don't completely have a preference for look of James, so I really like him. And boy, oh, boy, is he a GOD. I'll be rooting for James to win the fight at the ballet studio.

Edi Gathegi- Laurent: 0.5/5 – SUCH A COP-OUT. You don't need racial differences in characters if they are not supposed to have dark skin!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! There are olive-skinned vampires, but they have olive undertones of ashy white skin. Get it now, Twilight casters?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!

Rachelle Lefevre- Victoria: 4/5 – The only issue I have is that in some scenes she has straight hair, and she's supposed to have wild curly hair. And it's supposed to be more intensely red.

Anna Kendrick- Jessica Stanley: 3.5/5 – That's how I imagined Jessica, so it's okay. She's an annoying character and the girl looks a little like she would annoy me. She's not an über main character, so I don't have an issue.

Christian Serratos- Angela Weber: 3.5/5 – She was Susie Crabgrass on Ned's Declassified School Survival Guide. But she's alright, I guess.

Michael Welch- Mike Newton: 3/5 – EWWW. Mike.

Sarah Clarke- Renee: 5/5 – Only perfect casting.

Justin Chon- Eric Yorkie: 0.5/5 – Seriously? They made Eric asian?!

Sarah Palin and Hilary Clinton!

Jesse

Jesus's name was not Jesus. It was JESSE. 

And YES, he was just another Black boy with a white boy's name. 

Every time we went to market, somebody would inevitably shout out "Jesse!" and Jesus and 12 white Roman kids would turn around. 

I ought to know: His house was up the street from mine, 

and we spent most of our respective childhoods this way:

Jesse and me used to play Muslims and Indians when we were kids. 

I'd wrap a rag around my head and he'd starve himself for a month. 

We'd spend hours trying to knock down the old sandals hanging from the crosses in our neighborhood.

He would heal the Crips and convert the Blood. 

He always smelled like Jerusalem goat's meat pizza to me, 

but to Aaron he smelled like Dead Sea Salt Water Taffy

and to Martha he smelled like something she couldn't place at the time, 

but when we went out on our third anniversary, 

two years after Jesse'd moved on, 

I walked with her through the Garden of Gethsemane

and she stopped at a flower and said "Jesse used to smell like this"

and the "this" in question was white oleander. 

See, he smelled differently to everyone. 

Whatever you liked, even if you didn't know it, that's how he smelled. 

You expect a little bit of occasional magic when your best friend is

the Son of God. 

He was the best man at my wedding, 

gave a four word toast at the reception: "I love you guys."

And he danced with my bride, 

and we arm-wrestled into the night, 

and he kept the party goin', 

gracious one-touch bartender that he was. 

And I loved him--and love him--like a brother, 

back when being a man's brother meant something. 

And that book?

That book you can kill nations over?

That book you stood black men on to lynch?

That book you swing at the heads of gays on parade?

That book doesn't give you HALF the magic tricks he used to do. 

But to you, 

he's the rock star of the universe, he's God Bon Jovi

he's a gold necklace depicting his death, not his life. 

To me, he's larger than two lives stacked on top of one another, even

Gandhi's and Mother Theresa's

and I'm not here to debate with you about whether or not he was a great man--

you wouldn't know greatness in this day and age if the real Madonna came down

out of heaven and kissed Britney Sears dead in her mouth--

of COURSE he was a great man, 

but you didn't know him. 

No matter how strongly you believe

you will always, at best, just know the way, 

putting words in his quiet mouth, 

never resting your hat upon a friendly hook at the destination that is the truth. 

The truth is he smelled like Dead Sea Salt Water Taffy, 

The truth is he smelled like goat's meat pizza, 

The truth is Jesse smelled

like love. 

-------------------------Just wanted to share one of my favorite poems, I don't know the author, though. 

My Favorite Picture

Just thought I'd share one of my favorite pictures:

The artist Vincent Fantauzzo painted it a few weeks before Heath's death. 

Swimming...in the street.

The water went all the way up to the hotel. 

The truck making waves. 

A truck coming through to help. 

On the other side overflowing onto the sidewalk. 

Looking across the street. 

The pond closest to my house overflowing. 

My dog and all the water. 

A car stalled trying to get out. 

The water started going onto the sidewalk. 

That water was still there Sunday night. 

The current was pretty intense. 

A car trying to make its way through. 

Finally the police tried to block off the watery area. 

Some people tried to drive across the water, and their cars stalled from the water. 

The water at it's deepest was about knee-level. 

Looking across at the house we were sandbagging. 

Across the street, the "river" as we called it actually had a current. 

The pond closest to my house overflowing. 

So, as I was racking my brain to try to come up with a topic to write about, my mom yelled up the stairs for me to come downstairs. As you may know, we had a pretty big storm come through as a result of the hurricanes down south. My neighbor had called my mom and told her that at 8 am, the water was 12 feet from her back door, and at about 10 am, it had gotten to a little over a foot away. We went over to pick up her daughter, Chloe, and tried to drive there, but could only get to about 150 feet from the house before the water would have ruined the engine. I'm going to try to explain this the best I can, so to do that I took 5 minutes and put together a crude map of what's around my house with paint. 

The purple star is my house, and the orange star is the people who we were trying to help. The two blue ovals are the two ponds, which were what was filling up and overflowing towards the houses and streets. Our house is on a hill, and not near a lake, so it was safe. 

We had to call every hardware store we could think of, then finally we found a Home Depot about 10 minutes away that had bags of sand. To prevent the water from entering the house, we had to put sand into plastic garbage bags and line the outside of the house so it would create a barrier from the water. We drove all the way there, to find that the only bags they had were 50 pound bags. My mom and I had to take 15 of these, put them on a cart, push the cart out to the car, and load them into the car. 

After that, we drive back towards my house, to find that the main road (down the middle of the picture) has almost completely flooded, and even though we have a four wheel drive, we didn't want to chance it with the back of the car weighed down with the sand. We drove all the way around and got in, and we set up shop in my garage. Thus, craziness ensued. It started out as my mom, Chloe, and I making these bags, putting them in garbage cans, and dragging them through almost knee-deep water (that was freezing cold, might I add) to the house. As we were doing this, some neighbors took notice, and decided to help. Finally, we got into a groove of making these bags and hauling them across the street. Meanwhile, I was absolutely soaked. Finally, we got all of the sandbags made and the house safe. I went home and took a HOT shower, and we finally got back to our original plan for the day, sitting around doing absolutely nothing. 

That was an interesting Saturday....

First Day

My eyelids flutter open to the shrill sound of the alarm clock. 

Something old in a day of new. 

I feel as if I am in shock, 

In everything all I see are muted hues. 

I put on my new clothes, 

and grab my new backpack. 

As I hear the door behind me close, 

I wish I could take it back. 

Take back all of the wonderful new things, 

Take it all back and burrow under the covers, 

But I would never know what this new day brings. 

Against my will I enter the menacing doors to discover, 

A whole new world at my feet. 

Everything around me has come alive, 

I find my first class and take a seat, 

I hope that I am allowed to survive, 

This first day of high school.