Black Friday

I went out on Black Friday. Yes, I went out in the chaos despite having read dozens of articles about people being trampled or killed. I didn't have anything I needed to buy at discount prices, I just like being a part of crazy things. My best friend, Shaylee and I waited for one hour in the Toys R Us in Layton line at 9 pm yesterday just for fun.

The line to get in went across Toys R Us, Old Navy and Barnes and Noble and then around the side of the building. We started at the very end of that line. As we were waiting, there was a person selling hot chocolate for one dollar. About ten minutes later there was another person selling different hot chocolate for 75 cents. 

Finally, after waiting for an hour, we reached the front of the line. We were at the front of the line for ten minutes because the employees would only let fifty people in at a time. While there, a car was driving past, filming the line of people. So somewhere, there is a video of me and Shaylee standing in front of the giant line. 

The greatest part of the entire night. Photo by: Shaylee Simmons

I have to admit, waiting in line during Black Friday was pretty fun. It was more fun then actually shopping in Toys R Us. Especially when we were too broke to actually buy anything cool. 

Pictured: Broke college student

We stayed in Toys R Us for about an hour just so we stayed as long as we waited in line. We did leave empty handed but we decided that Black Friday should become a tradition.

Comedy Charity Night

On Saturday, there was a Comedy Charity night at the Davis campus. I went to cover it for the Signpost. It cost five dollars to get in and all money went to the food bank. The evening had four improv groups and two stand up comedians. 

Connie Beaty started off the show with her stand-up. "From personal experience," Beaty told me about where she gets her material from. "Most of the stuff comes from really bad dating experiences." Part of her stand-up she talked about asking guys to go to the grocery store to get Naked. Naked just happens to be the brand name of her favorite juice. 

There were also improv acts that were pretty funny. I won't talk about them all because I mention them in my article that I posted a link to below. 

The Antics were one of the groups that performed. Photo by: Amanda Lewark

One of my favorites were the Off the Wall Improv from Ogden. They did one game called Murder Mystery where the audience called out a murder victim, a murder weapon, and a location. The audience ended up picking Popeye as the victim, the Black Pearl as the weapon, and the forest where Edward reveals his sparkliness or the 'glittery forest' as one improv member called it, as the scene of the crime. 

Two of the improv members didn't know what those three were. Another guy had to get the others to guess those three items while only speaking in gibberish. Yes, they actually did guess all three of those correctly. 

For the story that was actually published in the Signpost go here: http://www.wsusignpost.com/2011/11/19/comedy-charity-event/

Just as an extra, here is the complete Disney Princess Survivor video we did for my ASL class. It wasn't finished when I did the post originally. It's pretty easy to understand even if you don't know American Sign Language. If you don't want to watch whole the video, the bloopers at the end are pretty entertaining. 

Disney Princess Survivor

For some reason, this semester has been full of group projects. One particularly challenging one is for my American Sign Language class. We have to create a 'fractured fairy tale' and film it completely in sign.

I am only in my first semester of ASL, making this assignment rather difficult. Luckily, my group recruited a guy who went on an ASL mission and is getting ready to take his interpreter's test to help us with the words we haven't learned.

My group contained three people, me, Lisa and Crystal. We decided that our fairy tale should be Disney Princess Survivor. My part in the movie was the host of the show, while Lisa and Crystal played Belle and Pocahontas. Crystal's roommate helped us out and was Sleeping Beauty.

From left: Lisa, Brynn (roommate), Crystal, David (language guy), and Lex (cameraman/Lisa's husband)

Each of the 'contestants' in our Survivor episode had t-shirts that Crystal made with the face of their character on them. I'm pretty sure this was mostly just so they wouldn't have to keep signing their characters' names.

Lisa = Belle

Brynn = Sleeping Beauty

We ended up doing six challenges for the princesses to face, that way they could each win two. The running and weight lifting was won by Pocahontas. Putting on makeup and reading a book while walking was won by Belle. Sleeping Beauty won sitting still and the scavenger hunt (there aren't many winning options for the one who falls asleep during the competition). I recorded the book race just because it was entertaining to watch. 

I just realized that this is the first post that is not about a charity event. So I am just going to remind you to donate to Race for Grace, the fundraiser for the nine-year-old girl in a coma. Just as a reminder, for updates on Gracie Hinds, go here: http://www.facebook.com/groups/195426767190204/. 

The Nearly Naked Mile

This blog is an assignment I'm doing for my Media Writing class. So, when my teacher said that my blog was full of heart warming stories, I just had to laugh because I knew I was going to be covering this story next. The Nearly Naked Mile, not quite as heartwarming as Make a Difference Day or Gracie Hinds Fundraiser.

This seemed like a weird thing for Weber to be doing because, let's face it, this is Utah and half naked people running around is typically frowned upon. Yet, there it was and I was assigned to cover it for the Signpost.

Over 200 people showed up to the Nearly Naked Mile, and yes, they were mostly in their underwear. The goal of the fundraiser was to get people to donate clothes. Many people just stripped off their clothes as the race started and left them on the ground.

The clothes that were donated at the starting line

They ran a mile from the Swenson Gym to the Alumni Building. It was particularly crowed in the Alumni Building because they expected 80 people like last year, when over 200 people showed up.  

People running. Photo by: Crystal Charriere

It was kind of awkward interviewing people that were not wearing shirts or pants. Despite that, all the people I interviewed were extremely confident the entire time I was talking to them. Two people even told me that they came to the run just because they like being naked. But, I guess you would have to be pretty confident to run around in freezing temperatures in nothing but your underwear. 

For the full story go here: http://www.wsusignpost.com/2011/11/12/running-nearly-naked/

The Race for Grace Fundraiser

Yesterday was the fundraiser for Gracie Hinds that I wrote about last week. I appreciate everyone who said they were willing to donate. My group and I got to school early to make posters for the raffle.

This is my group Caitlin, Spencer, and Aubrey clearly all working extremely hard on the posters. 

Here is one of our awesome posters. 

We then went to the fundraiser where we sold raffle tickets and bracelets. With that money plus the money from the entrance fee, about 1100 dollars was raised. The raffle had prizes such as gift cards, stuffed animals, and tons of other things.

The highlight of the evening was the hypnotist, Shawn Paulsen. He successfully hypnotized six people for his show and had them do some pretty ridiculous things. Hypnotists have always kind of freaked me out, which is why I was not one of the people who volunteered. During one part he had them act like they were four years old and then brought in a Santa so they could tell him what he wanted for Christmas. Paulsen also made one of the people, Jeff act like a rapper who only rapped in gibberish, which you can watch below. Spencer took the video with his phone, that's his laugh you can hear in the background.

 
All in all, it was a fairly successful fundraiser. My group decided not to any other events because we fulfilled the service hour requirements for our class assignment. If you want to continue hearing about how Gracie is doing or learn about other fundraisers happening, join the group Race for Grace on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/groups/195426767190204/

Raising Money for Gracie

Okay people, I am going to do a little advertising today. Before you stop reading to move onto something less commercial like, let me first inform you that it is for a little girl in a coma. More specifically, a little girl named Gracie Hinds.

Gracie is a nine year old girl who has been in a drug induced coma since August 25. She started having seizures for unexplained reasons and as a result, doctors were forced to put her in the coma to stop them. She is still in the coma because the doctors do not know what is causing the seizures. Fundraisers are being held to help the parents pay for the medical bills.

For my Interpersonal and Small Group Communications class, we were told to do some kind of service project. One member of my group of four knows the Hinds family and suggested that this should be our project. Today we got together to make donation jars that we could give out to some businesses. If you feel generous and want to donate, the jars are located in the following Ogden stores: Pita Pit, Ligori's, Grounds for Coffee, Roxberry Frozen Yogurt, Smith's (at the customer service desk), Beto's, Little Caesar's, and Jake's Over the Top. There is also one at the customer service desk at the Layton Smith's.

Why wouldn't you want to put money in these?

Also, on November 3, there will be a fundraiser for Gracie. There will be a hypnotist and a raffle. The raffle will be run by my group. The event starts at 7:00 and ends at 9:00 pm. The tickets are ten dollars to get in and one dollar per raffle ticket. The fundraiser will be held at the Wiseguys Comedy Club at 269 25th Street in Ogden. All of the proceeds will go to Gracie's family. You should all come. 

My group will possibly be having another event later on in the month to raise more money. I will let you know.

Behind the Scenes of My Make a Difference Day Article

Yesterday was national Make a Difference Day. To celebrate that fact, Weber State University had a day where students went to different organizations to volunteer. I went there to cover the event for the school newspaper The Signpost.

I volunteered for Habitat for Humanity to help build a sprinkler system for a house in Ogden. The job was to basically dig trenches where the schematics said to using pickaxes and shovels. We were each assigned a team of a few people. I was in team pink with two girls named Amanda and Olivia. We were pretty much given the plans for the sprinklers and told to go dig.

If you look closely, that's me on the right in the white shirt. Photo by: Amanda Lewark

It seemed kind of weird to me that inexperienced people were allowed to just work on someone else's house like that. It makes me wonder how well this sprinkler system will actually work once it is finished. We weren't given any kind of training, we were pretty much just told to have at it.

Our team had a bit of a slow start trying to figure out exactly what we were doing but we eventually figured it out. We spray painted out the lines where we were meant to dig, which led to me accidentally getting some on my fingernail which has yet to come off. I think it may be permanently pink.

After the ground was sprayed we continued by digging with pickaxes which are deceptively heavy. As I type this, my arms are ridiculously sore, proving how little muscle I have. It took three hours just to dig out the trenches for the piping.

While taking a break, I interviewed both Amanda and Olivia for my article. We had just been digging together for the past three hours so it was easy to start a conversation. They were both there to get service hours for their dental hygiene scholarships. They were trying to find cheesy yet profound things to say, Amanda was particularly proud of her quote, "We aren't just building sprinkler systems, we're building dreams."

All in all, it was an exhausting day of digging, let's just hope we didn't screw up that sprinkler system too badly.

For the full Signpost article without the personal commentary, click here: http://www.wsusignpost.com/2011/10/22/making-a-difference-through-digging-holes/