Coming of Age

Global Warming is one of the most hot button issues in American politics for as long as I remember.

If whether or not you believe in Global Warming, you can tell there is something irregular going on on our planet. Rising sea levels, warmer climates around the globe and odd weather patterns are a sign Mother Nature isn’t liking what is happening.

The common stance on it is that “It’s a myth!” or, “It’s the worst thing in the world!” and there really isn’t any middle ground that I’ve heard from people. In Nebraska, we’ve seen very irregular weather patterns since the Spring 2019 semester has started. Blizzards to 80 degree weather, back to blizzards and then thunder-snow to top it all off, it’s been a bizarre weather pattern for the past few months here.

This fantastic article from UNL perfectly describes what I am talking about.

As Dr, Ken Dewey said in this article, Nebraska kinda just gets the leftovers of what the states around us get in terms of weather. “We’re not the snow-belt, we’re not the sunbelt, we’re not a tropical climate, we’re not Florida, we’re not Hawaii, we’re not a coastal climate. We have to share whatever somebody’s going to send us,” Dewey said. “This is the only only place that can have 70-degree weather in January, then plunge to 20 below zero within hours.”

I think Nebraskans think about Global Warming differently that other states due to the location of Nebraska, but I think the blizzard and flooding we have experienced this year has changed a lot of minds of how we experience global warming as a state. In the national news we see coastal cities get washed out and bombarded by hurricanes or earthquakes that damage California, but for the longest time, we weren’t really getting hit by massive Mother Nature attacks until this season of flooding and blizzards.

It is weird seeing Wood River and familiar locales being covered on national nightly news for the horrific flooding that hit our state, but I think after the dust(flood water?) settles, Nebraskans will be more stronger than ever. From the people I’ve talked to since the flooding and fluctuating weather, mostly everyone thinks global warming is taking place in someway or another. I asked my Mom what she thought of the weather and she said “It’s been weird how once day we would have 60-70 degree sunny weather, and then the next day would be snowing and cold and intolerable to go outside. I’ve lived in Nebraska for my entire life and I have never experienced these kinds of weather changes so late into the year. I wonder what Mother Nature is doing up there.”

It is bizarre how fast and sudden the weather has changed over the past 4 months into 2019, but the weather we have experienced will unfortunately haunt us into the summer months.

In an article on KETV, Mosquito and tick populations will likely skyrocket this summer due to the amount of standing water in Nebraska, as well as the wetter weather we have experienced. So this summer bust out the bug spray and foggers as experts say this summer will have noticeable mosquito outbreaks.

South Florida Sun Sentinel

The specific story I will be analyzing from the South Florida Sun Sentinel is Unprepared and Overwhelmed.

The Marjory Stoneman Douglas high school shooting was one of the darkest events in US history and last year. I recall being on campus the day it happened and it was harrowing and disturbing to see the events unfold on TV.

One of the pieces that won a Pulitzer Prize was the SFSS article “Unprepared and Overwhelmed. This specific article analyzes the hour it took for police to capture the killer and end the chaos that was ensuing on the Parkland school campus.

This specific piece does a unique, dark and insightful look at the staff and local police response to the shooting and takes the shooting in to question, as why was there such a late response to the gunfire and alarms? In the article, it says that the schools resource officer was in hiding for 48 minutes, watching other officers enter the building, when the entire shooting took place for about an hour. The South Florida Sun Sentinel does a fantastic job of sifting through the horrific hour with eerie detail as the gunman works his way through the buildings and gives the reader an insight to the chaos at hand and a reflection on the issue.

The other article that won a Pulitzer from the same newspaper, was What Went Wrong On The Third Floor in Parkland School Shooting?

This article further emphasizes the schools broken and almost obsolete safety of the students and staff as it lays out key facts about the shooting that asks the question, was the school actually ready for a scenario like this?

For starters as we already found out, the school resource officer Scot Peterson, hid outside for the majority of the shooting, even though the reported in that there was an active shooter situation 3 times. 

Secondly, bathrooms were locked and weren’t available for students to take cover in. While I understand high schools can deface and destroy bathrooms, locking them up with seemingly no issues to keep them open seems like a big security and health hazard for students.

Finally, nobody was watching the school security cameras. This seems like the biggest blunder of them all. Why have security cameras when nobody is manning them at all? Perhaps the cowering resource officer was the one to blame here, but I can only make assumptions.

The best thing that the South Florida Sun Sentinel articles give to the reader is the play-by-play of the events that made a dark stained history on Florida for years to come. I can’t image what it was like making these articles and analysis on the shooting and the Sun Sentinel staff should be incredibly proud of what work they have done and absolutely deserve the Pulitzer Prize in Public Service.

The beginning of 2019 for me sucked. My Grandpa passed away and very shortly after, a sweet sweet Golden Retriever named JR died. Experiencing loss for the first time, back to back like that feels like someone ripped your heart out, stomped on it and had no remorse for your feelings.

The week or so that I was in Grand Island with my family was incredibly difficult. I would walk into my house after funeral planning for my Grandpa expecting a big floofer to meet me at the door.

He wasn’t there.

At our family dinner and visitations to see my Grandma.

My Grandpa wasn’t there.

Loss changes you. Loss consumes you. Loss can be impossible to move past. But thankfully, slowly but surely, I am moving past it.

I think the biggest thing that has helped me process, grieve and learn from it has been my friends by far. Sure there’s some dark days where you remember and that’s totally natural. Hell, even yesterday (April 12th), I thought of JR and my Grandpa and was bumming out hard for an hour or so just remembering but what was the biggest difference of remembering now than right when it happened was happy memories and thankful feelings that I was there with them in life and in death. Behind the sorrow and gloom was passionate love for a lost Grandpa and Father figure for my sister and I, as well as an energetic and love filled dog that will retain in my memories and social media as long as I remember.

I don’t really believe in any Higher Power or actively follow a religion, but I thank whoever brought my friends into my life. Thomas, Hannah, Amber, Charles, Emily, Will, Taylor, Shayson and more I can’t even list off have all been there for me in this trying time and you don’t realize how needed a friend group is until you need them. The day of each of their passings, I got a flood of texts, Snapchats and phone calls asking how I am doing and if I want to hangout with them to get my mind off of things.

Coming back to college life after being at home at one of the darkest places in my life was so so hard. My motivation was 0, my patience for classes was 0, going to work again sounded like a nightmare and everything seemed gray and not important to me anymore. The biggest thing that got me out of that funk was slowly and surely getting back into the workloads needed to succeed. Finishing assignments on time and setting aside time to work and keep my mind off of things helped immensely. Thankfully, all of my professors and employers were understanding and willing to work with me to catch-up and not feel like I was skipping out in spite, instead I needed to kick things back into gear in a slow and safe way.

So yeah, I do miss Grandpa Ken and JR. I forever will. But what is important is that you cant let things like loss consume and destroy you. It will take your mind into dark places that you start to blame yourself for things that are totally out of your power and well-being. I’m forever thankful for the camping trips and card games my Grandpa took me on and taught me, and I am forever thankful for the kindness, unabashed love and borks JR showed me.

Me and My Girls

This was easily one of my favorite articles that we have read in this class. I am from a family that has a past of alcohol issues and I have been through dozens of AA meetings and the stress of being around someone addicted is hard. Family is the best through perseverance of a hard time and Carr’s hardships through life gave him excellent insight as to how is life has been post his drug issue and leading up to his death.

The way Carr describes the intense details of shooting up drugs in a street or watching every way he can while he prepares himself for the night of debauchery is in exquisite detail and immense pressure.

One of my favorite lines in this article were,  “Everything good and true about my life,” Carr writes, “started on the day the twins became mine.”

Cowboy Bebop Cast List is Out

Live action anime is VERY hard to do. Every attempt so far has been laughable, meme content that doesn’t really hold any attention. Netflix’ Death Note or Dragonball Evolution both have cringe filled moments that try to act cool but totally fall flat.

Cowboy Bebop is a space western drama that has fantastic character development and awesome set pieces and action. I think a live action adaptation of Bebop will hopefully perform better than the two stated above purely to the fact that the universe of Bebop is way more doable in live action than Dragonball.

3,2,1 Lets Jam

Cowboy Bebop is quite possibly one of the best anime ever made, but is also one of the best TV shows ever made. I know that sounds like an incredibly bold statement but something about Shinichiro Watanabe’s space western drama makes it a legendary name in the entertainment business for people who don’t even watch anime at all.

(That and the intro to the show is infectiously catchy)

Now that the live action adaptation of the show just got its casting announced, I feel like now is a good time than ever to dive into why this show stands out and proves itself from other forms of media.

Cowboy Bebop is about the story of a group of misfits aboard the Bebop shop from all different walks of life and their experiences in 2071 life. Spike Spiegal, Jet Black, Faye Valentine, Edward and the sweet boy Corgi, Ein are what the show focuses on and each character has a deep and touching backstory that makes each character interaction between the main cast and villains, supporting cast and background characters seep with story bits and emotion.

I think the reason why this show has stuck with viewers since it’s original airing on American TV on Toonami in 2001 is it’s deep character progression, depressing themes and fantastic action scenes all intertwined into each other with ease.

My favorite example of this is the two-part episode “Jupiter Jazz”. In this set of episodes set on Callisto, the ice covered moon of Jupiter, we delve into Spike’s past as well as Spike’s rival Vicious. We also meet Gren, an old friend of Vicious from a distant war who eventually bumps into one of the Bebop’s crew, Faye Valentine. Throughout the first episode we learn what kind of tortured life Spike, Vicious and Gren all have had and will have as long as Spike and Vicious are kicking around.

Intertwined between all of the fantastic character moments and progression, the shows animation and music hold up against the dark and depressing overtones of the themes of the show as well as the set pieces laying throughout. The long monologues of Spike telling Vicious about how hurt he has been since Vicious took the darker path along with the growing friendship strain between all of the Bebop crew at this moment in the show makes this mid-series finale feel like a culmination of everything.

In the Summer of 2018, a friend and I watched this show as he had never seen it but heard of the immeasurable praise it has gotten. When we got to Jupiter Jazz, we were both on the edge of our seats even though I have seen this show at least twice prior to this viewing. By the end of the 2nd episode of Jupiter Jazz, we were both teary eyed and in awe. How the story of Gren begins and ends is heart-wrenching. The events that happen across these two episodes prove that even though that this is an anime and anime is for the most part still looked down upon in the overall entertainment world, it can have deep character moments and fantastic cinematography.

I think one of the main reasons why this show specifically stands out against the anime stigma is that the characters are set in an unknown reality in terms of location, but have human and relatable emotions that the viewer can relate to, instead of buff dudes throwing gigantic beams of light at each other and yelling for 10 episodes. Cowboy Bebop’s themes of depression, love, loss and friendship keep the characters and moments in your head for days after viewing it and along with a killer soundtrack, Cowboy Bebop will surely stand the test of time and will forever be a staple in my life, and many others lives as well.

 

See you Space Cowboy….

The Reality and Limits of Beto

I think the upcoming presidential race will be a proving ground of the ages. For the most part, the Democratic party has had very few total candidates compared to the Republican party. A good example of this is how the 2016 election cycle had a few dozen Republican candidates and just a few Democratic ones.

The article I chose to look at was E.J. Dionne’s analysis of a Beto O’Rourke rally and I really like the way Dionne tells a story to the reader of the overall atmosphere of the rally itself. A good example would be how Beto had to crawl through a sea of fans begging for selfies and praise.

Floods bring out the best in Nebraskans

Its no secret that the Bomb Cyclone and warm rains brought historic flooding to the Midwest. Seeing the local communities come together to support each other has been incredible. My family owns Ken’s Appliance in Grand Island and they recently did a donation drive and gathered tons of supplies and water for the surrounding communities and it has been awesome to see other business’ come together to support the surrounding areas.

This column by Dale Miller perfectly describes how kind Nebraskans are to each other and how in times of need we can come together.

I think I am going to review the fantastic series “Cowboy Bebop”

 

 

Cowboy Bebop is one of the best anime of all-time, as well as one of the best TV shows that I have ever seen. The characters, story, music, everything is near perfection and I can’t wait to dive into what makes this show so special.

If you write about horse slaughter, expect to hear an earful

While I liked the column itself as it clearly explains the culture around horse racing and its dark underbelly, the title to this column is clickbait if I’ve ever seen it. The way she sounds in the title alone makes it sound like she supports horse slaughter but in reality she is against it. Throughout the rest of the column she explains the whys and wheres, but thankfully she doesn’t support the slaughter of animals.