Category Archives: Columns

Blake Dykes, Columns, Forum

Columnist provides advice for incoming freshmen

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By Blake Dykes
Coming into freshman year I was very nervous and did not know what to expect. That is typical, starting at a new school with new teachers and new friends. Now that freshman year is almost over, I realize I have matured a lot throughout this year. The most significant ways that I have learned are from my mistakes.

These mistakes and other things that I have learned throughout the year has provided me a sense of direction.

1. Don’t get serious too fast. Relationships grow as people get older, but it is important to remember you still have your whole life ahead of you. High school is a time to date and figure out what you are looking for in a boy or girlfriend.

2. Don’t do anything you don’t want to. I hear about stories all of the time, about teenagers going out and partying and getting busted or even injured. Stay loyal to your values and avoid the situations where you may get pressured to do something  you do not want to. People will learn to respect you for this quality.

3. Try new activities. I was not supposed to be in journalism this year. I had a schedule issue and accidently got put into the class. Since I was already in the class I decided to try it out and see how I liked it, because it would have been difficult to change my entire schedule for one class. Now I love journalism and am continuing on with it next year. The point is, I would not have considered  journalism, and now it is the period  I look forward to every day.

4. Don’t block the hallways. If anything makes me mad, it is when people crowd around in the halls. If you want to have a conversation with someone, go to the side by the lockers. People are trying to get to classes and it is hard enough without the extra people standing in the middle of the hall.

5. Be nice to everyone. I know it sounds cliche, but you never know when you are  going to have to interact with someone, whether it be in a sport, project, club, or even a class you have with them. Besides, everyone likes to be liked. By treating other people with respect you will gain their trust and friendship.

I have made mistakes as I am sure the incoming freshmen will; these are just a couple things I have managed to take away from this year.

Claire DeFrancisci, Columns, Forum

Dangers of tanning beds ignored

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By Claire DeFrancisci

Being tan makes people look good. It will make the colors in their clothes pop, brings out their hair and eye color, and it is even said that to make people look thinner. But is it worth it?

Going to a tanning bed, even once in a while, increases one’s chances of developing melanoma by 75 percent. Melanoma is one of the deadliest skin cancers and can have a low survival rate. I am sure most tanning bed-goers have heard this many times, yet many continue to go and can develop a habit of it. What they usually fail to do is actually research what they are doing to their bodies.

It is hard to ignore when I see people on Facebook or Twitter that post things like “Addicted to tanning :),” in the middle of winter. If it is January, it is not natural to come to school looking like you just got back from a month long trip to the Bahamas. Most people are significantly paler in the winter; it is not necessary to bake yourself in a tube in order to look tanner than everybody else.

While tanning beds give you a “healthy” glow, they also mutate the DNA and lower the power of the immune system, making someone extremely prone to cancer. Unfortunately, tanning beds are usually associated with melanoma, the deadliest of all skin cancers.

People do not worry about getting melanoma because they think that they are not in danger of it until they get older are wrong.  However, melanoma usually strikes between the ages of 15-29.  If the cancer is not diagnosed immediately, people have less than 10 percent chance of survival.

Tanning is not something to overlook, and most definitely not something you want to form into a habit. If being tan is seriously important to someone, artificial tanning is a healthier option. Spray tanning is often looked down upon because people usually come out of it looking more orange than tan, but choosing it over tanning beds can be a more important decision than you think.

Columns, Forum, Sports

Local colleges look to exceed expectations

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By Luke Geraghty

The 2011-2012 college basketball season was a great year for the local teams. Louisville and Kentucky each went to the Final Four with UK winning the championship. Indiana also had a nice run in the tournament by making it to the Sweet 16. Watching these teams make a run in the tournament seemed very unconventional. But with many polls having these teams in their preseason top five, people may start to grow accustomed to seeing these teams at the top of the polls.

For IU, they go into next year with practically the same team and then some. Point guard Yogi Ferrell and forwards Jeremy Hollowell and Hanner Perea will be a big contribution for the Hoosiers as freshmen next year. The Hoosiers also will get a boost from sophomore Cody Zeller, who decided to to return to school rather than entering the NBA draft. Zeller led the team in scoring and rebounding as a freshman. Joining Zeller will be seniors Christian Watford and Jordan Hulls as well as junior Victor Oladipo. The Hoosiers roster will have plenty of talent and depth. If they can stay healthy and get a boost from some of their younger players, a Final Four berth is possible.

U of L enters the next season with plenty of experience. The Cardinals will miss Kyle Kuric and Chris Smith, but everyone else returns, including some players who missed last year due to injuries. Rakeem Buckles, Mike Marra, and Stephan Van Treese all missed games due to injuries last year and they are expected to give big minutes off the bench next year. Senior point guard Peyton Siva may be the Preseason Big East Player of the Year and they will probably go as far as Siva takes them. Siva’s partner-in-crime, Russ Smith isn’t afraid to shoot and/or drive to the basket. Both Smith and Siva’s stealing ability will cause chaos for their opponents when they bring the ball up the floor. Sophomores Wayne Blackshear and Chane Behanan and junior Gorgui Dieng look to round out the starting line up while freshman Terry Rozier also looks to gain big minutes off the bench. If U of L can stay healthy, then they will certainly be a tough out in the NCAA tournament.

Coming off a national championship, UK will come into the next season with plenty of talent. Centers Nerlens Noel and Willie Cauley, forward Alex Poythress, and guard Archie Goodwin are apart of another top notch recruiting class for the Wildcats. UK’s strong recruiting class will make them a very talented team, but it is hard to pinpoint how good UK will be. UK’s top six scorers from last year’s team are gone. Freshmen Anthony Davis, Michael Kidd-Gilchrist, and Marquis Teague, as well as sophomores Doron Lamb and Terrence Jones, declared for the NBA draft, while Darius Miller graduated. Kyle Wiltjer will be team’s best returning player, averaging 5 points per game last year. With the majority of the team from last year gone and a lot of new faces coming in, it appears UK may have a rebuilding year for their standards. UK’s weaknesses will be the lack of experience and also the lack of a true legit player at the point guard position. If UK can withstand these weaknesses, another deep run may be in sight for the defending champs.

IU, UK and UL have always had passionate fan bases, but they have each had hardships pretty recently. Kelvin Sampson turned a winning IU program to a Big Ten bottom-dweller. While UK faced an unheard of NIT berth just four years ago. While U of L faced distractions from their head coach Rick Pitino’s off-the-court problems as well as back-to-back first round exits in 2010 and 2011. However, each of them have bounced back to the peak of their game, making Kentuckiana the best place to be for the college basketball season next year and maybe for years to come.

Columns, Forum

Popular book fails to transition to big screen

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By Meghan Poff

*long pause and sigh*

Yet another well written novel ruined by Hollywood and marketing hype.

I hate to have to be the Debbie Downer since everyone else I know loved the movie, but then again most of those people didn’t even read the book and if they did, they read on such a surface level that they didn’t even comprehend the theme of it.

Let me start by pointing out that we know we have seen a truly disappointing movie when we leave the theater with the only plus side being the attractiveness of the actors. On that note, I feel an excellent job was done casting Liam Hemsworth as Gale.  But as I said, this is not the point.

I feel the greatest fault of The Hunger Games was Hollywood’s need to make money from it, which is not surprising but a setback nonetheless. I know violence was not a major theme of the film, but it was important to show because that is the reality of the story. The movie could have easily obtained an R-rating, but that wouldn’t have drawn as many target audience viewers to theaters so therefore, we get a watered-down, 10-year-old appropriate version of the story. Which, excuse my adjective use, was incredibly lame.

I don’t know about anyone else, but I certainly didn’t pay nine dollars for a movie ticket to see 20 minutes of Katniss sleeping in various trees.

Another fault of the filmmakers was using the tired camera style of shaking the camera around and switching back and forth between different cameras quickly to make the scene look action packed. The reality is the only thing I got from the spectacle was a headache, and had completely missed the scene because I had to avert my eyes.  Shout out to director Gary Ross for making that call.

Despite everything else, I must give credit where credit is due. An excellent job was done with the scenery and costuming. Whenever I read a book, I always get an image in my head of what I think the setting and characters should look like, and the movie literally took the pictures out of my mind and put them on the screen. So at least that was adequate.

But probably the main reason I stayed in the theater the full two and a half hours, a ridiculous amount of time even for a good movie, was the fact that I had already paid for the ticket. And only because I’m cheap.

In all my hypocrisy though, I probably will go see the other two movies when they come out in theaters just because I am already committed to the series.  Nothing else.

So really, what I’m trying to say is that you will love The Hunger Games if you also love the Twilight series and/or the Justin Bieber movie.

What more needs to be said?

Blake Dykes, Columns, Forum

Natural ways to alter hair color

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By Blake Dykes
When it comes to beauty and appearance, my philosophy is natural. Why put harmful chemicals on your body when there are more organic, beneficial ways to alter your image?  To obtain beauty there are more secrets than most are aware of. Starting off with one of the most expensive beauty products, hair dye. I watch people dye their hair once a month and see how their hair loses all of its beauty and becomes fried.  I understand people want to change things up. Different is fun, right?  But why take something beautiful and destroy it instead of spicing up the color giving it a more natural effect?With summer well on its way, lighter hair color is usually wanted. Here are some ways to lighten hair chemically free:

1. Take a cup of lemon juice and mix with ¼ cup of warm water. Mix well in a spray bottle, and spray all over hair. Use your fingers to really smooth the mixture through hair well. Then sit out  in the sun for an hour.

This trick will make blonde hair blonder and lighten dark hair, bringing out hidden highlights.
Hint: The longer you leave the lemon juice in the hair the lighter hair will become.
I have light brown hair, and after using this mixture my hair got several shades lighter, bringing out the blond.

2. Another way to get the sun bleached color many people look for is by using Chamomile tea or the flower itself. Either item works effectively for this process. First, boil approximately two cups of water. Next, add in a cup of flowers or five tea bags. Then, let the mixture cool completely (you do not want to put a boiling liquid on your head). Once cooled, get hair damp and scrub liquid into hair. Then sit out in the sun and allow hair to dry completely. This is the same as the lemon juice in the aspect that the longer the mix is in the hair the lighter the hair will become.

Although lighter hair is typically wanted, dark hair is becoming more popular this season.

1.  Take ½ to ¾ cups of brewed coffee that is completely cooled and rinse over whole head. You can also take the coffee grinds and rub into hair. Once hair is saturated, cover with a shower cap and leave for an hour. Repeat process three times a week to get the darkest color possible.

2. Mix two tablespoons of unsweetened cocoa powder with a palm full of shampoo and rub together in your hands. Scrub into hair and leave for five minutes. Then rinse thoroughly.
Tip: This routine can be repeated every day if desired and is more of a gradual change.

The final tint is red. Even though not as many people are dying their hair red, many people are getting red highlights and red undertones.

1. Take ¾ cups of beet juice and ½ cups of carrot juice and combine together in bowl. Rinse ingredients through hair and let air dry while sitting in the sun.

2. This process involves directions similar to the cocoa powder. Put two tablespoons of cinnamon and stir two tablespoons of conditioner with it. Next, shampoo hair as normal, and then apply cinnamon mixture. Massage through head and wrap in a towel. Let air dry in sun then rinse hair. These steps can also be repeated on a daily basis.

Caution: Be sure to be careful with cinnamon because it can easily create a mess.

Extra: Besides bringing out the red/auburn tint in your hair, this treatment will also soften hair and leave it smelling great.

This also works better on lighter hair such as light blonde because it is able to dictate the color better rather than darker hair, which is harder to stain.

Hint: The more times these routines are performed the more effective the results will be.