With all the recent (and well-deserved) hoopla surrounding the St. Louis Cardinals being named World Series champions this past Friday, Halloween has pretty much fallen by the wayside. A majority of the city’s weekend festivities for the holiday undoubtedly morphed into some conglomeration of costume-slash-World Series party.
Hundreds of thousands of fans packed the streets of downtown St. Louis yesterday for the celebratory World Series parade.
Even at the parade in downtown St. Louis yesterday, grown men dressed in Bert and Ernie costumes were seen mingling and taking pictures with fans decked out in Cardinals gear.
At 22 years old, today is the first Halloween I have never celebrated. This is especially upsetting to me, for not only is Halloween my favorite holiday, but it confirms the already lingering suspicion I had regarding my own adulthood. To put it short, I am officially OLD. This year, for the first time, there were no parties, no costumes, and, needless to say, no trick-or-treating.
Continue reading ‘Happy Halloween! Err…HalloWorldSeries!’
When it comes to student loans, I’ve been luckier than most. Federal financial aid and academic scholarships paid for almost all of my college education. Even so, a majority of students in America today will earn their Bachelor’s degrees and consequently face roughly $25,000 in debt. For those who decide to go to graduate or law schools, that amount is often tripled.
An Occupy Wall Street protestor shows his dissatisfaction with the current student loan program
This leaves young people with an unrealistic burden to carry. After all, it is next to impossible to find a job without a college degree. Higher education has become almost as crucial to social survival as elementary and high schools. Yet with today’s economic climate, jobs have never been harder to come by. Those who graduate with a degree often cannot find careers until several years after they have completed their schooling. Without a legitimate income, how can they pay back the thousands of dollars it took for them to get their education in the first place?
Continue reading ‘Victory for Students as Obama Unveils Loan Forgiveness Plan’
Netflix (NFLX), the largest online DVD rental service, has been making waves in the news lately for a variety of reasons. Most notably, the company announced in July that it would be discontinuing its most popular plan and splitting its streaming and DVD rental services.
Netflix Shipping Center
Rather than paying $9.99 a month for unlimited streaming and unlimited DVDs, customers were forced to choose between unlimited streaming (no DVDs) for $7.99 a month, unlimited DVDS (no streaming) for $7.99 a month, or both services for $15.98 a month. As an avid Netflix user, I was outraged, as many others were, by this absurd price increase. Many customers, myself included, predicted that this change foreshadowed Netflix’s eventual downfall and bankruptcy.
Continue reading ‘Netflix is Losing Money, and I Could Be Losing Roseanne…’
Yesterday around 1:40 P.M. local time, a 7.2-magnitude earthquake hit about 12 miles from the Turkish city of Van. Its effects and aftershocks left most of the eastern part of the country in utter destruction, with a total of 970 buildings having collapsed, including 25 apartment buildings and a student dormitory.
The Golcuk Mosque and Minaret stand unaffected amidst the destruction of Sunday's earthquake
So far, 264 people have died and 1,300 are injured. Unfortunately, however, these numbers are expected to rise astronomically, as more extensive rescue efforts are underway today. The main obstacle to clean-up efforts now is the near-freezing temperatures, forcing rescuers and survivors alike to test their own physical limitations. Despite this frigid atmosphere, a good number of residents refuse to return to their homes and are instead sleeping on the streets, either because their residences have been destroyed or simply because they are scared.
Continue reading ‘Earthquake in Turkey Reminds Midwesterners of the Fears Lurking in Their Own Backyard’
When Muammar al-Gaddafi seized control of Libya in 1969, his dictatorship changed the landscape of the country forever. Not only did he abolish the country’s Constitution, instituting his own form of aggressive and destructive government of which he was the sole participant, but he funded militants, terror groups and guerilla armies.
Libyans celebrate Gaddafi's death in Martyr's Square
He caused destruction not only in the country over which he ruled, but in the world at large. His regime was held responsible for several terror attacks, including the 1988 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie,
Scotland, that of a French passenger jet in Africa in 1989 and the 1986 bombing of a German dance club.
Continue reading ‘Gaddafi is Dead! …Gaddafi Who?’
An almost unprecedented tragedy unraveled this week in a rural town in Ohio when sheriff’s deputies were forced to shoot and kill almost 50 exotic animals. Terry Thompson, 62, owner of Muskingum County Animal Farm, flung open his animals’ cages late last Tuesday before committing suicide. Schools were closed and residents of Zanesville were warned to stay in their homes until Wednesday afternoon, when officers with high-powered rifles and orders to shoot-to-kill had managed to hunt down the 56 animals
Motorists in Ohio were warned to be on the lookout for animals and to stay in their vehicles
that had been turned loose from the farm. Among the animals killed were 18 endangered Bengal tigers, six black bears, three mountain lions, two grizzly bears, a wolf and a baboon. Six animals were saved and taken to the nearby
Columbus zoo.
Continue reading ‘Endangered Animals Slaughtered After Owner’s Suicide’
If there’s one thing I’ve noticed growing up in St. Louis, it’s that we have some of the most diehard sports fans in the country. I’ve seen tricked-out Hummers with custom Blues paint jobs, more Cardinals tattoos than I can count (yes, the permanent kind) and enough Rams merchandise to keep me from forgetting that we still have a football team. But our dedication really is somewhat ironic, when you think about it. For a good seven years, we didn’t even have a football team; the Cardinals moved to Arizona in ’88, and it wasn’t until ’95 that we acquired the Rams from L.A.
Saint Louis Cardinals players celebrate after clinching a birth to the world series.
Since then, they’ve made it to the Super Bowl twice, winning the first against Tennessee in 2000 and losing the second to New England in 2002. The St. Louis Blues, my favorite team, have never, ever, EVER won a Stanley Cup in franchise history (much to my chagrin). The Cardinals, our one saving grace, have played in the World Series a total of 17 times. Of those 17, they have won ten and lost only seven.
Continue reading ‘The World Series Returns to Saint Louis for the Third Time in Seven Years’
Has it been 24 months already!?
‘Till death do us part…unless of course two years down the road we decide to call it quits.’ That could very well be the attitude of citizens in Mexico who are talking marriage if the proposed legislation passes that will allow married couples the option to sign a marriage contract that is only valid for two years. With almost 50% of couples in Mexico City ending in divorce, and a large majority of these divorces happening within the first 24 months, this seems like a fairly logical solution. Why continue to put money in the pockets of divorce lawyers who feed off of the failed marriages of others? But on the flip side, with divorce rates so high, why would a country want to almost encourage the idea that marriage is no longer a lifelong commitment and divorce truly is the norm.
Call me crazy, but I was raised to believe that marriage was a sacred union between two people who planned on spending the rest of their lives together. Now, I understand that times have changed and that the US divorce rate is frequently reported at around 50%, yet I still cannot fathom a law being passed that gives people a cop out after just two years. True, this contract would almost wipe out the ‘messy’ parts of a divorce. Predetermining who gets the kids, the house, the car, etc. would take out a lot of the heartache and unnecessary fighting that so often comes with splitting up, but that still doesn’t make it right.
Thankfully, this legislation is only being discussed in Mexico, but the United States isn’t one shy away from adopting a law from another country that seems to be working. So, that leaves us with this question – if this legislation was being proposed in America, would we pass it?
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