Gossamer

    "Sick to the bone on the steps to my home. The moon shined through the drapery of leaves to her, to ignore everyone on my own, my true love, just to feel some made up breeze." These deep lyrics are from Cry Like a Ghost, from Passion Pit's second album, Gossamer, which was released July 24, 2012.
    The album is a huge hit and has even been said to be "the most dynamic and interesting, and downright manic pop albums in recent memory," according to NBC News. Gossamer is doing much better than anticipated, with an expected number of 10,000 albums to sell within the first week, it has sold over 295,000 copies in the first three days alone.
    Though the lyrics are upbeat and will make anyone who listens to it happy, if you listen close enough, you will notice the lyrics relate to depression, alcoholism, and even bipolar disorder, which frontman Michael Angelakos has been dealing with since the age of eighteen.
    "I'll be alright," Angelakos vocalizes in the second track. He says it with such hope, it makes you sympathetic and you want to believe him.
  The sound of Gossamer as a whole is very similar to the caffeine buzz you receive from listening to Passion Pit's debut album, Manners, but the lyrics have changed. As opposed to hearing "You'll always smile upon me when the seasons bad, You'll always make me feel best even when I'm blue.You'll always smile upon me and I'll smile upon you too," like you hear in their first album, you hear more depressing lyrics, such as "Well I've made so many messes and this love has grown so restless. You would like enough but just I won't let you go the mess.”

Overall, the album is a lyrical masterpiece. The poppy melody will remain in your head for long after you listen to Gossamer, which is definitely someone you won't mind.

Take a listen: http://youtu.be/dZX6Q-Bj_xg

(500) Days of Summer Film Review

The year is 2006. The place is Los Angeles, California and you're sitting in the greeting card office in which you work. A  petite brunette with gorgeous sky blue eyes struts in to talk to your boss. Her name is Summer Finn and she just got a receptionist job here. Immediately, you fall in love with her. This is just what happened to Tom Hansen.
(500) Days of Summer is a romantic comedy, with a twist. What do you do when the girl you're in love with doesn't believe in love?
Tom copes with this dilemma by seeing Summer, without strings, and hopes things will change. When they take a turn for the worse and Summer becomes engaged. Tom knows he has to move forward with life.
This film is about following your dreams and realizing that life does, in fact, move on.

Sunny

What it Feels like to be Named after a Dead Relative

Sunny Massa may be thought to have been named after happy things, like the sun, but truth be told, there is a much deeper meaning behind her name.
“In the 1940’s, my aunt, who was then six, was at a neighbor’s house. My grandpa went and picked her up,” Sunny said. “They were driving on this long dirt road and for some reason, she opened the door and fell out.”
The doctors said she would be fine when she first arrived to the hospital, but later that night her grandparents received a call saying she had passed away.
“My mother wanted to name me after the sister she had never gotten the chance to meet,” she said, “and her name was Sunny.”
Compiled by Alli Huppert

Kyle

Meet Kyle Buckingham. An alumni of Blair High School, Kyle will be a returning sophomore to UNL. Prior to his college years, Kyle was a lean, tall teenager. He lifted seriously everyday, and was a star basketball player. Kyle Buckingham was the picture of health.

One look at the high-school Kyle immediately tells you that he is incredibly fit. His tall body type seeming to have not an ounce of fat on it. The liveliness in his boyish, round eyes resembles someone of good health and a healthy lifestyle. Energetic and easy-going, high-school Kyle has all the characteristics of a happy, healthy person. Entering college, Kyle felt on top of the world. But by second semester of his freshman year at UNL, Kyle had gained twenty pounds.

Not quite a year later, the physical change is minor. His arms slightly less toned, shirt gripping his midsection a bit tighter. Still, when he reveals the extent of his weight gain, it comes as a shock. The twenty pounds he put on while away at school, is a substantial amount, but with a height of 6’4”, most of the change can only be seen in his sluggish mannerisms as compared to his previous happy-go-lucky attitude.

College students have long had the idea of gaining the “freshman fifteen” in the back of their minds. Most colleges, specifically the University of Nebraska in Lincoln, create numerous programs and facilities  and opportunities to help prevent the scale from going up. In fact, the majority of its students walk to and from their classes each day. So the question is, how exactly are college students putting on the extra weight?

A college student’s time can be their most valuable asset. Spaced out between classes, school work, maintaining a job, and extracurriculars, most college students don’t have the time to eat a healthy meal or exercise regularly. Kyle found these issues to be true while he stayed on campus. His old habit of lifting and exercising daily became nearly impossible to uphold.

Living on a strict budget can limit a person’s access to healthy choices as well. Kyle, like the majority of college undergrads, was a frequent customer of his dorm cafeteria. Although UNL’s cafeterias do offer a number of healthy food options, they also have their fair share of fatty foods. Another temptation facing the students is the fact that it is an all you can eat buffet. It becomes fairly easy to forget about portions and calories.

Food in the dorm is previously paid for, and makes it convenient to eat and go without the hassle of preparing it. This same problem is reflected in the massive amount of fast food advertising around campus.

Pizza corporations, for UNL it is Lil’ Caesars and Papa John’s, locate themselves just minutes away from dorms and offer delivery services to increase sales. When your time is limited and fast, greasy food is just around the corner, convenience may take the place of nutrition.

high-school Kyle enjoyed the ability to eat practically anything without the worry of weight gain, but college Kyle didn’t have the same leisure. Between eating pizza and burgers nearly everyday, the weight slowly started growing on him and with the stress of college, he barely noticed how drastically his body had changed. He became aware of his declining health when his father said he saw his “gut jiggle” over summer break; it was time to change, he decided.

At UNL, they offer many choices to help their students remain fit. “Our recreational center controls the Cook Pavilion, Sapp Recreational Center, Mabel Lee Hall, the Coliseum, and all of the outdoor tennis and basketball courts,” the Recreational Center Director, Tony Hernbloom said. “We also have aquatic classes and the rec center funds trips for hiking, rock climbing, canoeing, and so on. Sport clubs are another big, rec-funded activity here on campus. Students who maybe played a sport in high school that would like to continue on in it, but not at the collegiate level, can get groups of people together and form a ‘club’. These teams are non-varsity, but the clubs have the opportunity to compete nationally each year”.

The recreational center offers bike rentals, gym facilities and sport courts, fitness classes, and a variety of other options. For students, it costs $10-$15 to rent a bike for a day, depending on which speed you choose. “Students tuition covers the membership fee to the gym, which averages out to about $30 dollars a month,” Hernbloom said. A registered dietitian is also available on site to counsel about health and run programs/presentations to share with all of the 25,000+ students of UNL.”About once a month or so, the dietician tries to organize a presentation for the students in the dorm lobbies,” Said Hernbloom. Other places on campus have chipped in to the health movement as well. Better-choice companies like Red Mango, Juice Stop, and Panera give students the same convenience as a fast food joint, but with real health benefits. To compare the real difference between these companies and fast food chains, here are some typical examples from each facility: Vanilla ice-cream- Wendy’s (280 calories), Red Mango (190 calories); Turkey sandwich- Arby’s (700 calories), Panera (420 calories). By making small pushes towards healthier lifestyles, the faculty of UNL hopes to teach their students how to maintain a comfortable weight.

Kyle had to relearn how to be healthy. He started eating sandwiches as opposed to pizza and put down the Xbox controller so he would have more time for the gym. Slowly but surely, the weight started disappearing, and come fall of the new school year, he had succeeded. Now Kyle is back to his normal weight and has even gained more muscle tone.

Feature

This is Colton Stone. Colton may appear to be your typical, run of the mill, teenage jock, but under his baseball t-shirt and his athletic shorts, there is a whole other side of him that you must reveal to have the pleasure of meeting.

The first thing that strikes you, no pun intended, about Colton is his love of sports. If his sporty attire and tall stance don’t spell it out, nothing will. Colton plays baseball, which holds the number one spot in his heart, as well as basketball, which is enjoyable for him too. The athlete played football until an injury took him out of the game, causing him to just watch the dangerous sport off of the field.

This is a story about a man’s love of two things. Sports and writing.

“I enjoy writing and I love sports, whether it’s playing or just watching them. That’s what interested me in broadcast journalism,” the sophomore, explained about his passion. “I job shadowed Matt Schick, who is a broadcaster for 1620 the zone, which was fun. I’m looking forward to more job shadows of sports writers.”

Who is Colton Stone? Colton is a 15 year old boy, who happens to be looking forward to his first year on the newspaper staff at Millard North. Colton is a boy with a dream. A dream to be the sports editor on his staff, and even have a sports talk show of his own someday, where he can commentate on recreational activities in the area.

It is the year of 2012, where just about everything has turned electronic, from books to even newspapers, but Colton believes that idea isn’t the best solution. “There are still many old fashioned people who like to sit down on a Sunday morning with a cup of coffee and read the newspaper,” he said. “But when so many newspapers are becoming paperless, fewer people get to enjoy the writing.”

Of course what is interesting about Colton is his motivation for reaching his hopes and dreams, which will come true as a result of his hard work and dedication.

I learned quite a bit about interviewing today. It was an educational day and it was fun, as well. It makes me look forward to what knowledge I'll learn tomorrow.

I'm interested in furthering my interviewing skills. The staff I'm on does often struggle with coming up with ideas and what not. I wish to specialize in arts or entertainment. Last year was my first year on the staff and I'm the editor this upcoming year. I hope to expand our coverage and modernize the paper a bit.