I could use this column to tell you how much I love Gainesville and the surrounding areas — places where you can swim in a cave at Devil’s Den, join the drunken zoo that is Midtown or watch thousands of bats fly into the sunset at UF’s Bat Barn and Bat House.
The health of our unborn children is at stake — if they are born in Florida, that is. Everyone should run for the hills, aka somewhere that isn’t flatland Florida. What with the sudden lightning storms that can crop up at any minute, the 14 cases of Zika infections found in the Wynwood area of Miami-Dade, the alligator attacks, the vicious road rage due to our standstill traffic and a host of other dangerous occurrences that happen daily in our “sunshine” state, nowhere is safe. Even the people here have been lumped together as the crazed “Florida Man.” National headlines read, “Florida Man accidentally shoots himself during job interview at elementary school” and “Florida Man attempts to smoke crack in ICU, almost burns down hospital.” It’s no wonder the people here are close to self-immolating.
It’s the last week of classes, and you’re diligently studying for finals in a library, coffee shop or “Pokegym” of preference. At least, that’s what you tell your people back home. Of course, like any college student in 2016, you’re in awe at the debacle that is our presidential election, dying for a conclusion to the endless media cycles of the “what-he-said-versus-what-she-said” between the two main candidates.
In the opening scene of the adored Disney classic “High School Musical,” an eclectic set of multi-dimensional and well-intended teenagers burst out of a classroom in song, vividly expressing the excitement of the summer vacation to come. For those of you whose teenage blunder years were also not nearly as animated as this scene, there was one student made for us. In the back of the classroom, for the entirety of what is really just this obnoxious flashmob, an adolescent young man lays head-in-arms on his desk.
Smaller pieces create what we consider life. Therefore, understanding the building blocks of existence makes us not researchers, but rather seekers of understanding. These were the welcoming words of Dr. Juan Manuel Lopez-Alcorocho, the director of quality control of Amplicel, on the first day of my internship.
Summer ’16: Here we are, dear readers — the end of an era. It’s been long, hot, sweaty, rainy, long, hot — did we mention hot? It’s crazy how time flies. Five weeks ago, so many of us returned to classes, while many others stepped on campus for the very first time: so young, fresh, innocent. Now, we’re all stuck between the misery of finals and the perilous hopes of a longer summer, watching what feels like a reprisal of “The Twilight Zone” on the news.
Throughout high school, I spent my weekday mornings watching “The Daily Show” and “The Colbert Report” before having to catch the bus for school. As the complexity of classes increased, so did the need for a working knowledge for the world around me. But traditional news shows were too biased or analysis on economic policy was followed by the latest fashion trends. So, like many teens, I felt the best way to catch up on current events was to watch satirized segments to truly understand what was going on.
For the past seven weeks I have been engaged in an intensive language program, studying Yoruba for eight hours a day. I have studied and speak six other languages, including Swahili and Arabic, and I can say with complete certainty Yoruba is by far the most challenging and difficult of them all.
Who doesn’t love a good conspiracy film? A lone fighter struggling against a governmental authority responsible for controversial, covert schemes and robbing our fighter of his identity? Matt Damon as Jason Bourne has satisfied such spy inklings for years and will now return. First, there was “The Bourne Identity.” Then, “The Bourne Supremacy” and “The Bourne Ultimatum.”
My roommate, a modest conservative, had to endure the sight of me last week going full-fetal on our sofa, hugging a pillow, while I watched Fox News coverage of the Republican National Convention. “Why are you even watching this?” he asked, knowing full well my left-of-center views. “It’s like a train wreck,” I replied. “You just can’t look away.”
On July 15 in Istanbul, Turkey, soldiers closed the two bridges across the Bosphorus, the first indication that elements of the army were planning to remove the government of President Recip Tayyip Erdogan. In Ankara, the national capital, other soldiers took control of television stations and shelled the parliament building. President Erdogan had to use social media to rally his supporters. But by morning it was all over with Erdogan in full control.
First, it’s a way you can change the world. We need to produce more food over the course of your working lives than we have in the past 10,000 years. We’re not going to get there if people like you don’t come up with the scientific advances.
It’s been a crazy week, dear readers. Between that nonsensical WWE “Whose-nominee-is-this-guy-anyway?” deathmatch in Cleveland, Ohio, and Summer classes, it’s no wonder some of you might feel a bit overwhelmed. In times like these, kicking back and listening to some tunes might be all you need. Might we recommend to you some hot summer ’16 releases like “Dark Necessities” by the Melania Trump Chili Peppers or perhaps “Bored to Death” by Melania-182?
The lights were hot on a stage that could barely fit the ringleader’s ego. Inside the tent, a frenzied audience, crying out with ayes and nays, hollered when the silhouette of a man awkwardly moseyed on stage. With a flourish of hand gestures, albeit tiny ones made with tiny fingers, he grandly introduced his prized lioness: Melania Trump. And so went the first night of the “Republican National Circus.” On the second night, dozens of entertainers, a UFC president and a pro golfer among them, paraded to the stage to excite an audience thirsty for Democratic blood and a Republican victory. Meanwhile, spectators at home and commentators on TV marveled at their performances, a series of acts that would make the Ringling Bros. proud.
Pokemon will celebrate its 20th birthday this year. Since 1996, 721 pocket monsters have come into creation, 73 different video games can possibly be played and 21.5 billion trading cards have shipped globally. Nintendo released “Pokemon Go” two weeks ago, and the free game has added $7.5 billion to Nintendo’s market value. The game has already surpassed Facebook and Twitter in daily active users. Nintendo’s newest creation satisfies the yearning for the nostalgic days wasted on Game Boys. However, as the new game can no longer be played sitting in the corner, walking around with a phone glued to one’s face yields some danger.
The past few weeks have been troublesome for our country. Rather than add my voice to the chorus (read: cacophony) of those opinionating, I chose to listen, weighing the implications of cyber grief and outrage.
Over the next week and a half, the political elite of both major parties will evolve themselves from the primaries to the general election. Afterward, the candidates will ready themselves for battle in the gym we call America, and the two political parties will find themselves, according to The New York Times, $150 million in debt to the private entities (gym leaders) that will write checks for the conventions this year — all the more reason for our representatives to prioritize donors over constituents.
“The manner in which burning is executed is as follows: He who had been thus condemned was lowered into dung up to his armpits, then a hard cloth was placed within a soft one, wound round his neck, and the two loose ends pulled in opposite directions, forcing him to open his mouth. A wick was then lit, and thrown into his mouth, so that it descended into his body and burnt his bowels.”
Avoiding the financial summertime blues
Solutions by The State News
