Siri's January Blog

2011 Year in Review

1. The Arab Spring- Remember this? Protestors across northern Africa and the Middle East demonstrated against dictators. And guess what? It’s still happening (Google Syria). Make it the Arab Spring, Summer, Fall, and Winter.

2. Political Scandals- Think Representative Anthony Weiner and Representative Christopher Lee using Twitter for their own, um, purposes, and not for good.

3. Notable Deaths- From Elizabeth Taylor to Osama Bin Laden, the world lost some of its most recognizable people, including tech innovator Steve Jobs and fun-sized North Korean dictator Kim Jong Il.

4. High Profile Court Cases- 2011 saw its fair share of notable (and notorious) court cases. Think Dr. Conrad Murray (Michael Jackson’s personal physician), Dominque Strauss-Kahn (former head of the International Monetary Fund), and Casey Anthony, the woman accused of and found not guilty for the murder of her young daughter.

5. The World’s Newest Country- On July 9^th, South Sudan split from its northern counterpart for form its own, autonomous state, rendering all maps in the world at that time incorrect.

6. Natural Disasters- Mother Nature had no mercy on some regions of the world this year. From Pakistan and Thailand to Japan and the eastern coast of the United States, hurricanes, tsunamis, floods, and tornados swept across the planet.

7. The Wall-Street Protests- For months now, “We are the 99%” demonstrators in New York and various cities across the U.S. have staged protests against America’s growing income disparity.

8. A New Royal Couple- Though some were excited by the marriage of William and Kate in the United Kingdom, more were concerned with the austere measures taken at the time of the pricey royal wedding.

9. The End of the Iraq War- This December, the last of U.S. combat troops pulled out of Iraq in time for Christmas.

10. The Republican Presidential Nomination Race- Though Herman Cain no longer joins them, the rest of the Republican candidates will battle it out for the nomination to take on President Barack Obama next November in the general election.

By Siri McGuire

Leyli Beims Top Ten List

Top Ten Best Things About Having Older Brothers

1.     You have built in body guards.

2.     Their cute friends always come over.

3.     You learn what NOT to do from their mistakes.

4.     They scare away icky boys.

5.     You never get yelled at for your room being messy because theirs is 1,000 times worse.

6.     They understand how annoying your parents are.

7.     You have automatic respect.

8.     They get in trouble for everything.

9.     You always have a ride.

10.  You learn how to fight for what you want, because once the food is on the table, you have to do serious work if you want to eat.

by Leyli Beims

Suzanne's Taco John's Top Ten

Top Ten of the Dumbest Things People Do or Ask Me at Taco John’s.

1.     A customer asks very angrily, “Where are the napkins? I can’t find any!” For those of you that find yourself saying this, we have two napkin holders each over two of the three trashcans and one napkin holder next to the lids.   

2.     When you’re the cashier at the front counter and the customer owes $19.31 and the customer gives you a twenty dollar bill to pay for their meal. So the cashier takes the money. Then the customer ignores the cashier. So when the cashier is ready to give the customers change back to them they say. “Oh! Here’s fifty cents,” and then demand that you open the cash register to give them back a different amount of change.  Ugh!!!!!

3.     The Lobby person has to take out the trashes in lobby as part of their shift. But here’s what irks me. While changing the trashes at least one trashcan will not have a trash bag in it for a minute at most. At that moment it seems like at least two people need to throw their trash away, and they can only locate the one trashcan that the lobby person is changing. So they either throw their trash in the bin without a bag (so annoying) or stand there and stare at you until you put a trash bag in(which is awkward and creepy).

4.     When a customer walks in the door the cashier must ask whether the food is, “For here or to go”. The diligent customer answers the cashier right away. Others may say, “I don’t know what I want yet!!!!” and yell at the cashier because obviously they did not hear the cashier, or they may order because they though you asked them what they wanted. Then there are the customers who hear the cashier perfectly but ignore the cashier for several minutes and then they order like the cashier never said anything to them.  

5.     If the customer says that they want their food “to go” the cashier is still supposed to give them a table number so the lobby person knows exactly where to find the customer. Some customers act like you didn’t hear them say, “to go” and say even louder, “My order is to go.” Then when the cashier gives them the table number they look at the cashier like they’re deaf and dumb.

6.     The lobby worker is not your personal maid! If you leave the restaurant with trash on your table then they have to clean it up. Management puts four trashcans in the lobby so the customers can throw away their own trash.  Yes, sometimes if the lobby worker is nice they might ask elderly customers if they are finished and may throw their trash away. But unless the lobby worker asks to through your trash away, it would be very courteous if you would throw away your own trash.

7.     If a customer orders a burrito in drive-thru the first drive-thru person may not know if they want a grilled or non-grilled burrito or whether it is beef, grilled chicken or crunchy chicken.  Please specify exactly what you want when you order.

8.     When customers come to the counter and want another food item because they claim that the person who took their order did not get it correct. Yet the cashier knows that the customer complaining just wants another food item for free.

9.     When customers pee on/in something other than the toilet or urinal.

10. When a customer spills a drink, salsa or food on the floor and does not tell the lobby worker.

by Suzanne Carlgren

Kadin Zimmerman's Tech Top Ten

Top Ten Tech Stories

            While working in the tech room at CHS, there are many interesting people who come in with laptop problems, which brings me to the top 10 tech stories.

10.) I was sitting in the tech room waiting for something to do, when a student came into the room. She had a beaten-up laptop in her hands, and continued to tell me that her mom had accidently run it over. The first thing that ran through my mind was how it mistakenly found itself underneath the tire of a car?

9.) Numerous people come into the room saying they have computer problems. When they turn their computer on to show me what the problem is, it ends up working. Wouldn’t you think they should have the problem up when they come in?

8.)  A student came in saying he had a big problem. I asked him what the problem was, so he pulled his computer out to show me. “I just can’t keep the screen clean and I don’t know how to clean it. Should I come in here when it gets dirty or what can I do?” I told him to use a soft cloth. He asked if he could use his shirt, and I said sure…

7.) Last year a student came in saying their internet wouldn’t work at their house, but it would work at the school. I looked at it, and it was working fine, so I asked who their internet provider was. They said they didn’t pay for internet and that her brother said she should be able to get onto the internet. I told her to go knock on the neighbor’s door and tell them that she wasn’t able to steal their Wi-Fi anymore… 

6.)  A teacher said that their students couldn’t connect to the wireless internet in their room, and that they had to walk into the hallway just for it to connect. I walked up there to test it out, and it seemed to be working fine. I asked the teacher what the deal was, and they said, “Hmm well I guess it’s working now…”

5.) A former student came into the room on a daily basis, saying his laptop wouldn’t work. Multiple screws were missing as well as a few components. We took his laptop away and said he wasn’t qualified to take his computer apart, which was why it was always broken.

4.)  A staff member came in asking if he was able to send an email from his Yahoo! account to a USD333 school email address.

3.) Numerous teachers ask why they can’t get on facebook.com or espn.com.

2.) A teacher came in and asked if I could unblock an email address for them. When I looked at the email address they had written down, it was for fantasy football…

1.) Kids come in asking if I will put Windows 7 on their laptop, or if I will just give them the wireless internet password. It doesn’t work that way.   

by Kadin Zimmerman

Courtney's November Blog

The Top Ten Worst Things about Cross Country

By Courtney Monzon

            Cross country is great but I have a love/hate relationship with this crazy sport. Here are some of the worst things about cross country.

1.     Running.

2.     When people ask, “ARE YOU GUNNA GET FIRST?!?!”

3.     Meets where the grass is wet.

4.     Running up steep hills, or any hill for that matter.

5.     Going at a dead sprint near the end of a race.

6.     That awkward moment when fans are yelling at you to run faster, when they could never run that fast. 

7.     Getting side cramps.

8.     Having cotton mouth.

9.     Not having water when you need it.

10.  Getting a Charlie horse at the beginning or end of a race.

Trent Tholstrup's Top Ten List

Top 10 Most Hated Athletes

10. Ty Cobb- The original bad boy of baseball. Spiked players, attacked fans and whipped his son after he flunked out of Princeton. 

9. O.J. Simpson-Any athlete who thinks they have a right to steal their own memorabilia deserves to be hated.

8. Charles Barkley- Whether it was spitting on little kids or talking about hating white people, Barkley never was liked around the league. If you’re looking for a laugh, look up his golf swing on YouTube.

7. Terrell Owens- A man with an ego the size of San Francisco, Philadelphia, and Dallas combined. (Hm no wonder why he couldn’t fit on any of those teams). His mouth annoyed fans to maximum hatred levels.  

6. Kurt Busch/Kyle Busch- Two NASCAR brothers who have had various run-ins with the media, police, and fans. They also get the most boos at the track on Sunday.

5. Ron Artest (Metta World Peace) - Suspended 86 games in 2004 for running into the stands and starting a brawl. He then changed his name to Metta World Peace in 2011. Fighting with fans is a major no-no.

4. LeBron James- A one hour TV special to announce that your leaving the city of Cleveland in shambles…classy LeBron

3. Tiger Woods- Cheated on his wife and hasn’t been able to keep his game up since. Disappointed millions of people and left many fans searching for a new role model.

2. Brett Favre-Retiring, then unretiring, then retiring, then playing for the rival Minnesota Vikings can’t possibly make the fans happy. Sending pictures of your junk gets you bad reviews as well.

1. Barry Bonds- Committed the number one no-no of athletes: took steroids. He also broke the all-time homerun record while using steroids. Cheaters are hated. Bonds was a cheater who lied. Liars and cheaters go to the top of the list of the most hated athletes.  

By Trent Tholstrup

Cody Schmitz's Sophomore Top Ten

Top 10 Best Things about Being a Sophomore

Congratulations! You’ve survived the infamous Freshman Year! Now onto oblivion in the umbra that is sophomore year. You’re no longer special, so get used to it. But you do learn cool words like umbra. You won’t be special again until senior year, fourth nine weeks when everyone is crying over you’re departure, so get ready for a fun 36 weeks.

1.     No longer at the bottom of the food chain

2.     Allowed to coast for one more year before things get serious.

3.     No college crap yet (see number 4)

4.     No scholarship crap yet (see number 3)

5.     There’s a super-secret spelling of the word sophomore that most sophomores don’t even know. (We have a silent O!)

6.     You still have so much time left in high school!

7.     You have so little time left in high school!

8.     Legal. Driving.

9.     People don’t look down on you anymore!

10. People don’t look up to you yet!

So enjoy it; junior year will sneak up fast, and research papers and planning prom will make you want to crawl back in the dark, fun hole that is sophomore year.

by Cody Schmitz