Crystal's Crazy Crazes

Today I was reading the National Geographic and I stumbled across a very interesting topic.  A very important insect is going extinct.  These flying insects produce more than 100 crops (fruits, nuts, vegetables) for humans each year and are responsible about 80 percent of America’s pollination services.  That’s about 15 billion dollars in the crop industry.  They buzz around pollinating delicacies such as apples, apricots, avocados, cherries, strawberries, raspberries, grapes, and blueberries, peaches, pears, pumpkins, squash, watermelons, plums, cranberries, cantaloupes, cucumbers, soybeans and almonds.  But a big problem today is that their population is rapidly declining.  They are slowly disappearing, and if they disappear, so do our food.  What important insect am I talking about?  I’ll give you one more hint: they also produce honey.  If you haven’t already guessed it, yes, I am talking about the honey bee!

Honey bees have been producing honey for at least 150 million years.  (That’s a lot of years.)  They are also the only insect that produces food for humans. In fact, they pollinate 1/3 of the food that we eat.  But a big sad and critical problem is that they are disappearing.  Scientists say they don’t have a definite reason why these buzzing creatures are disappearing, but I personally believe it is because people are scared of them.  I am back in my middle school PE class minding my own business when suddenly I hear someone screaming.  “A bee!”  Suddenly half the girls are jumping up and down and are running away.  Some of the guys stand up and decide it is time to act like a hero.  They zoom in on the threat and decide to put their feet up into the air and down on the poor bee.  The threat is gone and the girls swoon over their savior.  I look down at the broken body of a bee I never knew.  I silently make a memorial for it.  “I am sorry you never got to see your flower.”

Why are people afraid of a buzzing insect that is smaller than the size of their thumb?  Yes, they do sting, but it is only for protection.  If they sense that you are a threat, they will sting you.  It will hurt, but the pain will eventually go away.  Why take a life because you somehow aggravated it and it stung you?  These creatures have an important job to perform: feeding you.  It is ungrateful to kill them just because they made a tiny mistake and met your foot.

There are campaigns to help save the bees, and there is a website dedicated especially for raising money to fund research to find a solution to the bees’ disappearing act.  The website is listed below.  They have many fun activities, to making your own bee to email to your friends, to learning about these beautiful creatures and how to help save them.  If you are thinking, “Oh, I don’t trust the groups that raise money because they will take my money and run,” well, have no fear!  You can still help.  Here’s how:

You can buy a carton of Häagen-Dazs Honey Flavored Ice Cream!  Häagen-Dazs donates the money they earn to help fund research.  They use honey from the bees to make their delicious ice cream.  You can also plant bee friendly flowers in your garden.  This is not as hard as it may sound.  Here are some beautiful flowers that are bee-friendly:

The Rose    

Aster    

Daisy                          

Dandelions

Peony

Sunflower

And much much more.  (You can get the full list from the website by simply downloading a booklet.)  These flowers can grow beautifully in your garden and help bees thrive at the same time!  Also, bees need water, so providing them water may be as simple as leaving a dish filled with water out for them to drink.  Also, be aware of the harmful effects of pesticide in your garden.  They are detrimental to the bees.  If you really need to use pesticide, use insect specific pesticide.

Thanks for reading, and I hope you have beautiful gardens full of blooming flowers.  Spread the pollen!

Website: http://www.helpthehoneybees.com/

Ice cream flavors: http://www.helpthehoneybees.com/#helpingflavors

Pictures: http://library.thinkquest.org/07aug/02034/images/european%20honey%20bee.jpg

http://happyhomemaker88.files.wordpress.com/2007/11/honey-pot-print-c10069558.jpeg

http://aster.gforge.inria.fr/aster.jpg

http://media.dailyprogress.com/dailyprogress/images/snap/rose3sharp_medium.jpg

http://www.fosjp.org.uk/wildflowers/oxeye_daisy.jpg

http://img.allposters.com/6/LRG/8/842/ENKY000Z.jpg

http://www.bridgewatergardens.com/Peony%20Big%20Ben.JPG

http://originallamby.files.wordpress.com/2009/10/sunflower.jpg

In every teenager’s life, you feel like you want to get rid of the strings that attach you to your family.  They nag, bully, and sometimes it even feels as if they are from a whole different planet.  Yet, you share your most prominent memories and the worst of your disastrous fights with them. You scream and curse at them; you hate them… but then again, what would you do without them?

Everyone has some kind of problems with their families.  Some parents put far too much pressure on their children; they have high hopes and aspirations for them, but in that very process, they forget that their kids have their own hopes and dreams to achieve.  They do not want to admit that they were wrong to push their goals onto their kids, they only want the best.  However, when is there a line between wanting the best for your child and just driving them crazy and to the brink of insanity?  Sometimes the best action to take is to simply let the kids speak for themselves and make their own mistakes.  The key aspect in keeping a healthy relationship is communication, with a little bit of compromise.

The problem however, also lies in the generation gap, or the age difference between the parents, the siblings, and yourself.  At times, they just cannot relate.  You do not understand the position where your parents or older/ younger sibling are coming from, and vice versa.  Sometimes, in a frustrated moment to explain what you really mean, you end up screaming at them and then screaming even more because you cannot convey your true feelings. Then again, you may also just bottle up all your emotions inside until that fateful day when someone will shake the bottle and all your emotions will spill out like a gushing waterfall onto the carpet floor.  Different people find different ways to handle this tide of overwhelming emotion.  Many rebel, some talk to their friends, others find an escape in a hobby or music, while a select few turn to deadly substances.  I believe it is best to find a healthy outlet for these emotions; I find it in music and in writing.

Siblings are the worst.  They are extremely annoying.  Everything they do seem to be a nuisance.  Sometimes it’s just the fact that you see them day in and day out and the proximity is driving you nuts.  Other times, siblings are the best.  They are cute, adorable and there for the rainy days in life.  However, in my case, it is a rarity.  They nag, scream, kick, fight, and talk back.  Why were they ever invented?

I have mentioned all the problems with families, but what are the good things about them?  Right now, it seems like there are none, but only because as a teenager, I have that unwritten right to complain once in a while, if not often.  Despite that, families are great, really.  On those awful hazy days, you just have to look past the smoke of regret and see that families are your back brace and are always there to give you support and unconditional love.  They are there for the laughs, the bad times, and the sweet good times.  You go on picnics on the beach and they are the only ones that can ever understand where you are coming from, because you came from them.  You cannot survive without your family, no matter how awful they may seem at days.  I love my family, sometimes I may feel a tiny bit of hate, but it is not unnatural.  It is a love/ hate relationship, but with love always winning in the end.

Pic: http://or.ucr.edu/images/pictures/centers/FamilyStudies.jpg

Here are a couple of scenarios:

You wake up late one day and have to get ready in a hurry.  You grab the first t-shirt you can from your closet and brush your teeth at the same time.  You quickly run to the bathroom to rinse your mouth and rush back to grab a pair of jeans.  You are jumping into them and are about to zip it up when the zipper gets stuck.  You try in vain for several minutes to get them to zip up because all your other jeans are in the washer.  You finally decide to wear something else, but when you finally get going, you are late.

You come home from a long day and throw yourself heavily on the couch, ready to spend the rest of your afternoon watching some T.V. to relax.  You realize your family or friend has turned to a channel you absolutely despise.  You grab the remote and click the button to change the channel.  But it doesn’t switch channels.  You desperately try to switch the channel because the people on the T.V. are about to dance into song.  But it’s too late, they started singing those show tune music and you can’t switch the channel.  You get up in frustration and decide to just go to sleep.

You finished your written assignment late into the night and you have to print it for the next day.  You feel quite accomplished, actually, because you finished and it’s really good.  You connect the printer to your computer and click the print button.   You await your masterpiece to materialize into ink and paper.  You wait several minutes, but nothing comes out.  You check to see if the printer is on… it is.  You check to see if there is ink and paper… there are.  You desperately try to get it to print because the rooster would be yelling at any minute and you really need your beauty sleep.  As the bell chimes for every hour that has past, you continually grow frustrated.  You are ready to kill anything in sight.  Two hours later you decide to call it a night and you still don’t have your work.

What do all these scenarios have in common?  It is all about appliances NOT DOING THEIR WORK.  They came into this world to have one purpose and one purpose only.  A zipper is there to zip.  What else is it going to do, save the world??  A printer is supposed to print, and a remote control is supposed to work the T.V.  Why do you think they separate appliances for everything, to only have one job to do?  It’s because if they made a super appliance where it does everything, then there’s a greater chance of something to go wrong.  They already can’t do their one job correctly.

The same principle applies to humans and their work.  If you are going to be doing a job, do it correctly, and as best as you can.  Because really, no one wants to walk into a hair salon and only get half a head shaved off because the lady doesn’t know what she is doing.  And no one wants to go into a dentists’ office to have the wrong teeth pulled out because he fell asleep in an important lecture.  And you especially don’t want a surgeon to leave that beautiful metallic scissors in your abdomen after he has sewn you up.  So for everyone reading this, I hope you have appliances that work in your home, but I also hope you learned something invaluable… a job is important, no matter how big or how small, so learn how to do it correctly!

Here’s a funny blog about a job interview: http://www.djod.co.uk/2009/09/16/best-job-interview-ever/

Pictures: http://tkool.jp/products/rpgxp/eng/gameover.jpg

http://hostingbytes.us/images/2/7488212.jpg

Today, America is facing a great economic situation where most people are out of a job and many have lost their homes.  Many are out in the streets or in their cars and there is no food for their family.  The situation seems bad and many are calling it “worse than the Great Depression.”  It seems like a time most people would give up on life and just float along, waiting to see what will happen next.  Many have lost Eleanor Roosevelt’s favorite word: hope. But we cannot let go of life.  Hope is a big essence in life.  So what do you do when life brings you down?  You think: WWERD.  What would Eleanor Roosevelt do?

Eleanor Roosevelt is one of the greatest women in the 20^th century and has many great quotes.  She was born on October 11, 1884 in New York City.  In 1905, she married her fifth cousin, Franklin D. Roosevelt. When Franklin Roosevelt suffered a polio attack in 1921, a disease where you lose function of your legs, Eleanor Roosevelt stepped into the spotlight of politics.  She was not the typical first lady that fade into the background, oh no, she fought for the things she believed in.  Back then, women didn’t have the rights that we have now. They couldn’t vote, own property, or play sports.  She fought for those rights, along with the rights of racial equality and peace.  She was outspoken and she hated losing.  “Ultimately, ER morphed into a heavyweight champion of the oppressed, the poor, the underdog.  Her all time favorite word was hope.” (“33 things”,106)

Many people hated her for her words, because it was uncommon for women to speak or be so powerful.  But that didn’t stop her from fighting.  When her husband died in 1945, she took the podium and continued fighting for the things she believed in.  She charged through clouds of hardships and discrimination, and not only did she hang on, she prospered and changed America for the better.

While reading a book on women’s history, I stumbled upon some interesting facts, but this quote stood out the most:

“When you get to the end of your rope- tie a knot and hang on.” –Eleanor Roosevelt 1960

I thought it drew some parallel to today’s hard times.  The end of the rope stands for your tolerance level for things being thrown at your face.  Everyone has a certain tolerance level for bad things.  Some have more than others.  But when there is just too much, like losing your house, we have to do something about it.  Here, Eleanor Roosevelt said we should just tie a knot using the last bit of rope we have left and HANG ON.  What does hanging on mean?  It means to lever let go of that last bit of hope, to never give up on life, to keep moving forward.  When time times seem tough, just remember that the great Eleanor Roosevelt is here for you to share some of her wisdom.

Other great Eleanor Roosevelt quotes:

“No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.”

“I have never been bored.”

“It’s better to light a candle than to curse the darkness.”

“Do what you feel in your heart to be right- for you’ll be criticized anyway.  You’ll be damned if you do, and damned if you don’t.” (My mom says that al the time!!)

“If someone betrays you once, it’s their fault; if they betray you twice, it’s your fault.”

“It is not fair to ask of others what you are unwilling to do yourself.”

“Learn from the mistakes of others.  You can’t live long enough to make them all yourself.”

“People grow through experience if they meet life honestly and courageously.  This is how character is built.”

Eleanor Picture: http://z.about.com/d/history1900s/1/0/h/H/fdr149.gif

Hang on picture: http://lh5.ggpht.com/_OVpgGzy0wII/RqNud_PeJpI/AAAAAAAAAQ8/HzZfKlIfgic/Hold+On+Kitty.JPG

Website:  http://www.biography.com/articles/Eleanor-Roosevelt-9463366

Quotes page:  http://www.quotationspage.com/quotes/Eleanor_Roosevelt

Book: Bolden, Tonya.  33 Things every girl should know about women’s history. New York: Crown Publishers. 2002.