Do you remember the days when you didn’t know what the boy from your ninth grade biology class ate for lunch this afternoon?  Those were simpler times, I guess.

Facebook has changed our world in so many ways; I will find myself knowing things I never needed to know, filling my head to the brim with meaningless information, taking up space in my brain that probably could have been better used to store those acronyms and definitions while studying for finals…he had a tuna salad sandwich and Doritos, by the way.  That is totally going to help me with my finals.

Looking at my mini-feed, there are constantly status updates.  Maybe it is about the new video game you got, the number of pancakes you had this morning for breakfast, lyrics to your favorite song, or the way that you’re feeling at this exact moment in time. And now this exact moment.  How about now?  How do you feel right now? And we wonder why all of our homework isn’t done.  Sometimes I have fantasy sequences of people commenting what they really think about every pointless status update they see.

A. H. — could my life get anymore stressful!!!????? i totaly didnt need this to top off tests and finals!!

            A, I don’t know what you’re talking about, but I am assuming you are feeling a little bit stressed out.  Maybe you are even a tad bit overwhelmed?  Well, I have to say, just reading this status update makes me feel anxious and stressed out.  Thanks a lot for spreading this illness. P.S. I totally didn’t need this to top off tests and finals.

Z. H. — just took a 9 hour nap..

            Z, I’m sorry to hear that. I wish I could give you some of my sleep deprivation that I have tried so hard to achieve by only sleeping three hours in the last 48.  In the meantime I will shed the world’s tiniest tear for you.  Maybe you aren’t even complaining about the nap, but my lack of sleep has made me lack the ability to perceive things accurately.  Also, I officially hate you…it’s facebook official.

J. C. – weiners

            Really?  I cannot even make up a word for how …. I think you are right now.

A. S. –  so long, farewell facebook. I can no longer use you to delay my paper that needs to be written.

            A, you’ve got the right idea!  If only more people were as dedicated to homework as you are.  Just think of how beautiful the world would be if those constantly-changing-my-status-to-something-lamers would follow example and take a little break from facebook.  I am glad that I saw this on my news feed. Thank you for this breathe of fresh air.  I am going to do all of my homework right now.  What an inspiration!

“Dear life, please fast forward to Wednesday afternoon….Thanks!”  I wonder if this will really work…I am copying and pasting this to my status.  Maybe someone will see it, and it will happen. Wish me luck! TTYL.

It’s that time of year again!  No, not the Super Bowl.  I’m not talking about Christmas.  I am talking about the greatest shopping holiday-after-a-holiday ever: Black Friday. 

My family has never done Thanksgiving the way everyone else does.  The whole family doesn’t get together and have a big dinner or anything.  My family is never even in the same state for Thanksgiving.  You see, every year over Thanksgiving, my dad and brothers drive out to Montana to hunt with my grandpa and other men in my extended family.  They go hunting for elk and stay in a cabin in the mountains.  It’s a tradition.  This leaves my mother, my sister, and myself, alone at home for the holiday. 

Thanksgiving Day always changes for us.  One year my grandma might have us over for lunch, the next year we might be staying the night in Grand Forks, ND and having fettuccini alfredo for dinner instead of turkey at the Blue Moose. 

“Come, Lord Jesus. Be our guest. Let these gifts to us be blessed. Amen.”   We are forever thankful for our family, but when it cannot be together, we learn to start our own tradition:  Operation save money and be done with ALL Christmas shopping.  Challenge Accepted.

Thursday, November 25, 2010: 

8:00 pm  Happy Thanksgiving!  The earliest store opens tomorrow at 12:00 midnight, but our first stop will be opening at 3:00 am.  This means we had better be outside those doors by 2:00 am if we want to get to the good stuff.  We’re pretty hardcore, so we decide to stay up and map out our plan of attack.

Friday, November 26, 2010:

1:00 am  It is 1:00 am and we are on the road.  It will take exactly 47 minutes to get to Grand Forks, ND if the weather cooperates.

2:00 am  It is butt-freezing cold outside and stores don’t open for another hour.  We wait outside in line with at least fifty other people.  We are hard-core.

3:00 am  Kohl’s opens its doors.

3:30 am  We run into Target.

4:00 am  We hit Macy’s

4:15 am  Sear’s

4:30 am  J.C.P!

5:15 am  We go to Victoria’s Secret and then Bath and Body Works.  There are so many people.  Almost every store in the mall has big signs that say “50% of everything in store!”  But that isn’t a part of the plan. 

5:45 am  Cabela’s.

6:10 am  We hit the wall.  We sit at a booth in Perkins, trying to figure out what to eat for breakfast, or dinner, or whatever.  We are too exhausted to be hungry, but we need strength for the hour drive ahead to get back home.  We are no longer on a time schedule.  We just need to fix our messed up sleep schedule. Sitting there like zombies, we wonder why we put ourselves through it. 

The truth is, this is our tradition.  We’ll be back next year!

Growing up I had watched ABC’s Extreme Makeover: Home Edition with my family. My sister and I would always get super emotional, but we always loved how the show was geared to help people, and to remind viewers of their own blessings. When I heard that the show was coming to build in Moorhead, I was ecstatic! I immediately got online so I could register to be a volunteer.

I was rejected. Two organizations that I was a part of also tried to get spots for us to serve, but they too were turned down. Already, they had been bombarded with so many volunteers that they already had more than they could take at that time. On one hand, this is pretty cool. The fact that we have so many people in our community willing to sacrifice their time and energy to help another family, a family that they may not even know personally, just goes to show what amazing people we have living here. On the other hand though, this meant that I could not be a volunteer. Needless to say, I was majorly bummed.

Little did I know, my video production professor, Sarah McCurdy, worked her way in to get our entire class media access passes. We were only on our second assignment, and we got the opportunity to get footage from the same place the news stations did! We got to be there for an ultimate community event, and capture it LIVE!

Upon arrival, we were given our media pass lanyards and a bright blue hard hat. I will admit, I felt pretty cool, like a VIP or something. Only one day of shooting was required, but a classmate and I cam three days in a row. Seeing the progress of the house in just those three days was incredible. One day there would be a hole in the ground for the basement; the next day all of the framework was up. It was amazing to see a whole month’s worth of work be accomplished in 24 hours.

Something I had never thought of before was the whole Hollywood aspect of the show. Before the family even arrived, ABC needed shots of people cheering, people yelling “move that bus!”, different angles of Ty opening the limo door, and even the bus moving! I swear I must have seen Ty open and close that limo door more than twenty times with nobody in it. I guess they need those different things for the whole production part of the show. I was happy, though, that they did this before the Grommesh family got there, so that when they did, it would truly be about them.

Now, I didn’t know the Grommesh family personally, but when I saw them look at their home for the first time, my heart went out to them. I cried at how proud I was of our community and everyone involved, whether they were holding a hammer or cheering them on. The whole experience was absolutely phenomenal.