Well about two days ago was no exception. With a stuffed up nose, chills, a severe cough, and a soar scratchy throat— that hurt every time I coughed… nice, right? I was in no condition to go anywhere. To my dismay, it was not going to be an easy day. I woke up at 8:30 AM which not only meant that I couldn’t sleep off my sickness, but also and more importantly I had some major time to kill before the Jerry Springer power hour, Montel with guest star Sylvia Brown, Judge Hatchett AND True Life! The ultimate combo that will perk up any sick kid. Unfortunately all the good stuff begins at 11am. . I know what your thinking: What the hell can you possibly do to entertain yourself without those crazy yokels trying to kill each other with a turkey, on the Thanksgiving Springer Specacular!?

Well being the crafty kid that I am I have become savvy to the fact that these things will and do happen, therefore there were a number of things I could do. First I crawled up to the kitchen (blanket and all) and made myself some tea with Benadryl. However, not so much as to knock me out before my shows. After drinking my lemon zinger, I fell into my normal killing time while I’m sick pattern. I read about five pages in a billion different books and than got bored and chucked them on the floor. Played a round of fetch with my dog and a sock. And of course I did what I do best…doodled! As usual, I had managed to make my room a complete mess, while bed ridden. Yes that takes extreme skill. But unfortunately that only killed half an hour. So what is a girl like me to do in such a predicament? INTERNET!

Well, seeing as no one would be on myspace I decided to research some of the greater questions I had in life. But not before scaring the heebie jeebies out of myself looking at ghost photos and listening to EVP recordings. Yes I’m a science fiction nerd, and yes I’ll admit I looked up alien conspiracy sites…well back to the greater questions of life.

Do poodles really come in pink? – No the closest they can come is peach, you’ve gotta dye them pink.

How many smoking Jackets does Hugh Heffner have? A closet full of them!

And perhaps most importantly… Why is MC hammer poor? Oh jeez, haha this could be an article of its own. Lets just say solid gold Hammer Time Iron Gates for your 17 car garage mansion don’t come cheap. And yes I did actually google "why is MC Hammer poor?" Well, as I browsed, browsed and browsed some more. I laughed! I cried! I covered my eyes! And of course I wondered: Sweet Jesus! WHERE DO THEY FIND THESE PEOPLE?!

Finally I came upon something a little less comical and quite a bit more disturbing. I came upon an animal rights website with a specific section about the plight of animals caught in traps. Actually there were a bunch of horrific sections but this one hit me the hardest. Well for starters I learned what snare and other types of traps do. They are set out in the wild and when an animal walks by it (probably looking for food, or going back to its cubs) its leg gets clamped with sharp painful snares. I read on in horror. I was devastated as I read the terrible plight that these animals had to suffer. Among those caught in traps are raccoons, coyotes, foxes, wolves, bobcats, opossums, nutria, beavers, otters, and other fur-bearing animals. However snare traps are not just restricted to our wild friends, they can also catch domesticated critters like cats and dogs. After these animals get caught (the number being in the ten million range each year) they are left to suffer a terrible painful agonizing death. Some animals, become so desperate to escape the traps, usually to attend to left behind cubs, that they will try to chew they’re own leg off. Eventually, usually days after, the animal finally begins to suffer a slow death due to starvation, dehydration, freezing, or an array of other possibilities.

I have always loved animals and this is not right. No living thing should ever have to suffer such a death at the hands of people. Everyone knows animal abuse goes on in the world. You’ve seen it on animal cops. Maybe you know about the laboratories that test on rabbits and mice, maybe its the dogs and roosters that are forced to fight to the death for the sake of a "game." Maybe its the puppy that’s chained up in your neighbors yard with filthy water or no water, or maybe its the circus elephant that is beat brutally to learn unnatural tricks, just to be tied up in a filthy trailer that night. Whatever abuse you may know of, it cant just be ignored. Its hard, to stand up and say what’s not right. I know it is. Its a tough thing to do. But there are a lot of small things you can do that will make a huge impact. Maybe its getting your dog spayed or neutered, maybe its making an anonymous phone call to report abuse, maybe its just telling your friends and family the same story I have just told you. But I’m begging everyone who is reading this article to please take what I have said into consideration. These poor animals don’t deserve to live like this.

I know that I have been ignoring it and I am going to try and do whatever I can to make a difference. Starting with writing this article in the hope of reaching you, (the reader!) ignoring a problem wont make it go away, it will only make it worse. Well thank you for reading this article! Hopefully I didn’t bore you with my MC Hammer shenanigans. Oh! and I hope this article gave you a few ideas for if you ever get sick and need something to do!

In the end it was all the same. The plot was dull, setting—mediocre, and outcome typical. The movie starts off interestingly enough with a man who critiques haunted places and decides to investigate the notorious 1408 room in a run-down yet elegant hotel. After being warned numerous times not to go by the hotel’s manager, the skeptic chooses to… Surprise, surprise… being the smart bunch I believe we are, I think we can all guess what he chooses to do. His check-in is followed by a series of odd visions, and overly dramatic paranormal activity, ultimately leading to the story of his deceased daughter and failing marriage. I won’t spoil the rest for you in case you do choose to watch it for yourself. Furthermore, the movie turns very repetitive towards the end, leaving you to wonder what the heck is going on.

In conclusion 1408 is obviously not something that I recommend, it continues the drought of good horror/psychological thrillers, and keeps me wondering, "Where have all the scary movies gone?"

Well now that you know just how much this party (sleepover-to be exact) meant to me, I can continue to tell you what a pain it was to find a stylist. My mother told me of a salon she had heard of. It was a trendy little place in the Castro, that apparently left everyone quite satisfied. I decided to do a bit of research and came upon some very positive reviews, many of which went out to a particular stylist. I read all her reviews each one more spectacular than the last, and with them my confidence skyrocketed. I Had found my stylist! Of course I immediately called to make an appointment and as I did I felt tons of pre-party stress instantly leaving me.

I suppose it was somewhat ignorant of me to assume I had actually found the perfect hairstylist, as I proudly and giddily walked up the steps to the trendy loft-like salon clutching the clip outs of exactly what I wanted my hair to look like. As I waited patiently in the comfy reception area, I stroked and observed my soft jet black hair. It had taken me what seemed like forever to grow it past my shoulders; a length which I intended to keep, and this particularly dark shade which I had chosen about two months earlier looked striking against my fair complexion and blue eyes. Additionally it was a color that didn’t make me look like something out of Scream when I didn’t have the time to straighten it. In all honesty there wasn’t anything wrong with my hair, but perhaps one of my tragic flaws is my chronic boredom, a problem which constantly provoked me to change my hair color- and this was no exception. I should have known there was something wrong when the stylist asked me to blow dry my own hair before applying the color, but I felt so confident that I didn’t think twice about it.

Four hours had passed before the she spun me around, and happily said “Done!” I stared into the mirror, with total and utter disbelief. Within the course of four hours that woman had without warning, single handedly crafted my demise, or so it seemed in my eyes. I tried to stroke it…Straw. Accordingly, a damaged piece of hair fell out. It was as if someone had declared nuclear warfare on my head, and what remained were not the soft luscious strands I previously knew, but instead short brittle wisps. I gave the stylist a look of disbelief, half horrified and half delusional and hopeful that perhaps, maybe in some sort of crazy turn of events she was in fact, not done at all, and perhaps with her hands, shears, and some sort of miracle product, would continue to transform my hair into exactly what I had wanted, no maybe even better! But that hope lasted all but five seconds before it faded away and I came back to reality, realizing she was staring blankly back at me… My hopes were in vain.

The flow of tears accumulating in my eyes was inevitable, so I made a quick dash to the bathroom and in the typical teenage-crisis like manner started sobbing uncontrollably. How could this have happened to me? I had done everything; From cutting out the cutesy pictures, to my inability to stop searching until I found a stylist praised by reviews, and now the day before my party, all I had to show for it was a bang-cut worthy of its own horror production company. The woman was a madman with the scissors and I had been her unsuspecting victim.

I didn’t sleep much that night-I refused to, instead I cried, in my mind playing back the events that had taken place earlier. I played back the terror and disbelief, I played back the miserable ride home which was accompanied by my moms desperate attempts to console me but most of all I played events that had yet to happen, the struggle that I would have to face the very next day.

My mother woke me up early the next morning and as I groaned, part sleepiness and part remembrance of the events from the previous night, she ignored me though and would have none of it as she chirped optimistically about the party. I was too weak, and too depressed to care. Then my mother said something I would never have expected; she told me to get dressed, we were going to try fixing my hair. I stared blankly at her. I was about to tell her how that could never happen, how despite her obviously good intentions, my hair had been so damaged, so obscenely cut that even beginning to try to fix it would just be adding insult to an already hopeless injury. I didn’t though, I’m not sure exactly what my reasons were but I decided to humor her.

Although it was early, the hair salon my mother frequented was already filled. They did have time to squeeze me in though and for that I was thankful. I met my stylist, an optimistic woman who smiled sympathetically at me. After assessing the damage she quickly went to work. She did all she could: cutting off damaged pieces, trying to adjust my bangs and doing everything humanely possible to keep the little length I had left. Before I knew it she had transformed my hair from a massacre to what was in this case, a masterpiece! I was in shock to see just how much she had fixed it, and although I lost some length and my hair was nothing like I originally hoped. It was much better than before.

In case you were wondering, the party went fantastically and my girlfriends and I had an excellent time. It was everything I had hoped for and more. I got many fantastic gifts too! But perhaps one of the greater gifts was the wisdom my mother had installed in me that very day. She taught me that although things may seem impossibly bleak, there’s always something you can do, and although mourning may seem like a good solution the only true solution is to do damage control and try to fix things no matter how bad they are.

Well, I’ve done it! What seemed impossible has now become a reality. I am no longer an elementary school child, or heck, even a middle school preteen. I am officially a double digits teenager! Children of the world, please feel free to be envious. Well, I must say, those countless years of waiting, wishing, and hoping were well worth it. However, I have now stumbled upon a newer much greater problem: not wanting to become an adult. And by saying that, I mean not even wanting to turn eighteen. Indeed this is a much greater problem. Oh the irony, no longer do I wish to wake up one morning having magically gained a few years like it happens in the movies, but now I want my time snail to slow down and be on an extreme hangover.

I came across this problem a month or so ago, as I lay in bed late at night reflecting on my life as I sometimes do. This realization both stunned and panicked me. How had I never thought of this problem before? Where had all the time gone? Freshman year went by so unbelievably quick that I hardly had time to just stop and look around. But now, as an incoming sophomore and having had a few friends graduate, I truly have begun to realize this unfortunate and depressing dilemma.

But why don’t I want to grow up? What is so wrong with going away to college, getting my own apartment, and well, getting a real world job? Well, in most people’s eyes, absolutely nothing. But to me, everything is wrong. I can’t grow up. I can’t go to college. I can’t keep an apartment, and I most certainly cannot have a serious job. I guess to further understand why this is such a huge problem you should first know a little bit more about me.

Well, when the occasion rises I can be extremely mature, but that’s just not me. I still can’t make a bed without the careful assistance of my mother or father. I surely am not incapable if that is what you are thinking, but I guess you could say I am the irresponsible type. My room is a mess, I dress like a teen, I act like a teen, I behave like a teen, and I’m, well, a teen! A teen, who has absolutely no intention of having to grow up. I don’t want to dress seriously, and I don’t want to act seriously (Ha! Me acting seriously? That’s a joke!). I don’t want to listen to lame jams in the car with my children asking to put in their new hip CD which I cannot tolerate. I don’t want to have to pick up coffee for the office and then talk to "Jonathan" about the latest fax stock report. In fact, to be 100% honest, I don’t even know if what I just said makes any sense, let alone know what it means. No, I want to sit in the grass with my friends talking about everything, yet meaning absolutely nothing, I want to catch school football games, and go on trips to the mall knowing I will be doing absolutely nothing other than loitering with some pals. I want to sleep in till 3 in summer and weekends, I want to get caught by the hall monitor, and I want to use the most outrageous eye makeup and most trendy haircuts and colors—as I usually do. And I want to be able to ignore my faults without repercussion. In short I want to be able to keep my careless teenage lifestyle doing countless other things that we teenagers do.

I talked to a few of my friends about this problem. Most agreed with me and began to panic themselves. Oh boy, looks like this generation really isn’t ready to grow up. I did however speak to one friend who is ready to grow up, and well, isn’t as big a fan of the teenage years as I am. His answer to my problem? A simple, "Screw society, don’t grow up." The answer seemed good enough at first. It was just what I had wanted to hear. I was happy, for all but a second until I realized, I was living in a fool’s paradise. As appealing as the answer seemed, there was just no way I could do that. There is just absolutely no reason for a normal adult to not fall into and conform to society. Such behavior would be ridiculed, frowned upon, and just plain wrong. There would be no excuse for me to resist and think I am above the countless others who will have been forced to grow up. Everyone else can grow up, so why can’t I? What is so bad about just…Growing up and maturing? Something I know I am capable of, but just don’t want to do.

Well, I guess by this point you’re probably wondering what a teenager like me is to do in such a situation. I could try to find Peter Pan and his lost boys, or better yet, take a shorter trip to Neverland Ranch with everybody’s favorite pop star and just wish and hope with all my might that it will work. No, I am not going to hang out with Michael in a desperate attempt to retain my youth. I have realized the only thing to do is just enjoy these last few years as much as I can. Perhaps I will find a way to elude growing up and falling into line. It is highly doubtful, but still slightly possible. The truth in it all is that we all have to face our fears whatever they may be, and I guess I know deep down that I am capable of going and getting coffee for Jonathan and the team, making my own bed, and budgeting. In fact, I probably will. I guess this is the most magical thing about being a youth, you can still dream.