Letter to a Senator

Senator Hatch:

I am a graduating senior at Brigham Young University and expecting my first child this October.  As I contemplate my future, I realize that media plays a large part in my life and will play a large part in the life of my child.  In gaining an education, I have learned a lot about the media and especially the confusing nature of our rating system.  I feel the need to work to clarify these issues in order to create a safer world for my growing baby.

Media ratings are extremely confusing.  There is a different system for every type of media.  This creates confusion and difficulty in understanding what it is that the viewer will actually see or hear when the media is viewed.  Because of this, it is extremely difficult for parents to monitor the media that their children view.  Due to the difficulty in deciphering media ratings, parents often will simply not monitor their children’s media intake because they don’t know where to start.  If we were able to clarify this, parents could be much more confident and effective in monitoring the media that their children view.

We need a universal rating system that can be used for all types of media.  We need a system that allows parents to read the rating and understand immediately what it is that they or their children are going to view.  It needs to be content based instead of letters and numbers that are hard to understand.  It should be widely publicized so that parents can easily find the information on the ratings and make more informed choices.  These changes can change the lives of parents and children in America.

As a U.S. Senator you are in a position to start the discussion and to lobby for a change in our rating system.  You can help make a clear and easy way for parents to protect their children from harmful media through creating a universal rating system. Any effort on your part to accomplish this would be much appreciated.

Sincerely,

Maddie Bills

Graduation is coming!!

Graduation is coming and I am so ready.  So when I found this, it made me really happy.

I am so ready for this feeling of no more essays ever! Yay for graduation!

Ultrasounds are the coolest things ever!!

So as some of you may know,  I'M PREGNANT!!!  Yayayayayayay!!!  This is my first baby so everything is new and super exciting and all sorts of emotions!  I had my first ultrasound yesterday and it was one of the coolest things that I have ever experienced.  They put this stick thing on your uterus and then a video of your little baby shows up on the screen.  It's so cool.  This was the first time I had seen my baby and I can't even describe how happy it made me to see it move around and wiggle in my belly.  It was so amazing.  I am just super grateful for the technology that makes this possible and that I could watch it on a television screen.

Because I am so excited I thought I'd share with you what the inside of my uterus looks like right now.

Zombie Apocalypse

So my husband has been super into zombie apocalypse stuff lately so when I found this, it made me laugh a bit.

http://blog.estately.com/2014/03/u-s-states-ranked-from-most-to-least-prepared-for-the-zombie-apocalypse/

It's a list of the states and it ranks them on how well they'd survive a zombie apocalypse.  Utah is #11 so we'd probably live! Yay!  The reasoning is pretty funny too so give it a look!

Arrow and Hamlet

So recently, my husband and I have been watching the TV show Arrow on Netflix.

For those of you who have never seen it, it is the story of a rich playboy millionaire named Oliver Queen that survived a shipwreck that killed his father and his girlfriend's sister and got marooned on an island.  While he was on the island, he learned some awesome bow and arrow skills.  He was rescued and now he's back in Starlight City and ridding it of corruption spurred on by the memory of his father.  Super cool superhero story.  It's pretty interesting actually.  Anyway, as I've been watching, I've noticed a lot of similarities to Shakespeare stories especially that of Hamlet.  For example, Oliver plays a Hamlet character who is trying to get justice and redemption for his dead father.  He even had hallucinations on the island of his father asking him to rid the city of corruption, which is very similar to Hamlet's chats with his ghostly father.  

Another example is that while Oliver was shipwrecked, his mother marries the CEO of his father's company.  This is all very Claudius and Gertrude esque.  Also, one of them may have had something to do with Oliver's father's death but I'm not far enough into the series to know which one yet.  

Another similarity is that Oliver has a friend named Digs who knows that he is the vigilante and helps him stay true to himself much like the character of Horatio in Hamlet.  

There is even an Ophelia character.  Luckily, she's not crazy but she does exhibit many Ophelia like characteristics.  The Ophelia is Oliver's old girlfriend Laurel.  When Laurel's sister is killed in the shipwreck, she goes crazy in the way that she throws herself into finding justice through becoming a lawyer who is unafraid to attack the corrupt rich in her city, much like that of Ophelia upon hearing of her father's death.  In addition, she has a father who counsels her not spend any time with Oliver like Polonius tells Ophelia of Hamlet.  

I found all these similarities fascinating and I hope to discover a lot more as the show continues!

Psych is Ending.

Psych has been a favorite TV show of mine for a while now.  I love watching Shawn and Gus figure out the case and solve the mystery every time.  I have loved watching Shawn and Juliet fall in love and become a couple.  Psych is ending very soon.  It has 2 more episodes.  And I really don't know how they're going to wrap everything up in just 2 more episodes.  I really hope they can do it.  I just am not ready to say goodbye to this show yet.  Psych is ending and I am really sad about it.

The Bachelor Finale: Es Okay

Warning: this contains spoilers so if you don't know what happened and don't want me to ruin it for you, don't read this post.

As I have previously mentioned, I watch The Bachelor as my guilty pleasure and this season has been quite a disappointment. Mostly, it has been super confusing.  I'm sure the finale made sense to Juan Pablo and maybe to the lucky lady he chose but to the audience, it was simply confusing.

Here's what happened.  Juan Pablo chose Nikki (that was exciting for me because despite all the hate hype, I was rooting for her) but he didn't get engaged to her or even tell her that he loved her.

While, I think it's awesome to not jump into marriage quicker than you are ready for it, to not even tell the girl who has just poured her heart out to you and told you that she loves you that you love her is just rude.  One of the basic rules of the show is that the bachelor/bachelorette can't tell the contestants how they truly feel about them (for example, say I love you) before the "final rose."  Usually the bachelor/bachelorette is dying to say it by the time we get there and they just get all excited that they can finally tell that one person their feelings.  It's a beautiful moment.  But we didn't get that this season.  

Also, maybe it's a culture thing but Juan Pablo's constant "es okay" was super irritating.  It was especially so because he said it in moments where he should have said something else.  

Overall, The Bachelor this season was a little disappointing but don't worry because as Juan Pablo says, "es okay." And his season is over so it truly is okay.  

Thick Hair Problems

I have really thick hair and it can be a problem.  So this buzzfeed article was especially enjoyable for me.  So my fellow thick haired friends, please enjoy!

http://www.buzzfeed.com/javim2/28-things-people-with-thick-hair-will-totally-unde-bw9q

Miss Representation and Pregnancy

I enjoyed the film we watched yesterday in class.  I thought it was very enlightening and interesting.  One of the things that stood out to me was how when Jessica Simpson had a tiny bit of a belly (which I couldn't even really see) they assumed she was pregnant and her publicist had to come out and say that she wasn't.  It made me think about how this is saying that you must be skinny unless you're pregnant.  But even then there is no peace for body watch.  Then the media covers how fast your baby bump grows.  I found this picture of Olivia Wilde after she announced that she was pregnant and the caption was can you find her baby bump?

The answer is no because she's still probably in the first trimester or very beginning of the second trimester and most people don't have a real baby bump then.  It's crazy how the expectations for women are to be skinny until pregnant and then they want to see a cute little baby bump immediately.  This, like all the expectations that women face, is highly unrealistic.  

Life Lessons from The Bachelor

The Bachelor is one of my guilty pleasures and I have to admit that every time I watch it I thank my lucky stars that I am not on the show.  And apparently I'm not the only one that has learned many life lessons from The Bachelor.  Thanks Buzzfeed!  Enjoy the life lessons!

http://www.buzzfeed.com/madisonlmedeiros/important-lessons-you-learned-from-the-bachelor

Ron Swanson is my favorite

Recently I have really been loving the show Parks and Recreation.  It's super fun and relatively clean.  The character of Ron Swanson is one of my very favorites.  So I thought I'd share some of his epic wisdom with you all.

I Always Knew Prince Eric Was Awesome

So I found this list on buzzfeed today and I thought I'd share.  It's all the reasons why Prince Eric from the Little Mermaid is the best and why it's okay to be attracted to him.  I knew there was a reason I liked him so much! Enjoy!

http://www.buzzfeed.com/lyapalater/prince-eric-was-the-best-disney-prince-and-its-ok-to-be-attr

Yet another Frozen video that's really cool.

So I know everyone is probably super tired of seeing Frozen videos and stuff but I stumbled across this one the other day and I just had to share.  It's truly fabulous.

I just don't know how little kids can sing like this.  I know I certainly didn't at her age.  Way to go, girl!

My Favorite Book

Dr. Coyne asked us to think about our favorite book last time in class and I thought I'd share.  My very favorite book is Ella Enchanted by Gail Carson Levine.

My mom read it to me when I was little and I have continued to read and re-read it over the years. It's the Cinderella story but with a lot more personality and no singing mice.  One of the reasons that I love it so much is that Ella is a girl who struggles with life and growing up but is able to overcome all the bad things in her life and get her happily ever after.  It's truly a beautiful story.  I would definitely recommend reading it, especially if you have only seen the movie.  (Between you and me, the movie was terrible and didn't do the book justice at all.  Like absolutely ZERO justice.) Because the movie wasn't the best, I decided to include this picture that I found on deviantart.com that captures more of the feeling of the book.  Read it and let me know if you love it!

My Favorite Commercial Ever!

There are some commercials that you just love.  This is my favorite commercial ever.  It came out over a year ago but I still look it up on youtube when I need a laugh.  Enjoy!

This is one way to make your morning commute more interesting

So I stumbled upon this gem today.

So apparently this person takes pictures of people like this during his/her morning commute.  Isn't that hilarious?  I think it's a fantastic use of a newspaper.

Here is an article with more of their pictures.  Although I have to say the queen one is my favorite.

http://twentytwowords.com/2013/04/09/the-head-of-a-newspaper-pic-and-the-body-of-a-fellow-commuter-20-pictures/#more-72026

Senioritis is here.

This is my last semester of college and boy do I feel that senioritis.  I found this on Pinterest today and it pretty much sums it up.

The Elsa Craze

So by now, I'm assuming that most of you have seen Disney's new movie Frozen.  It's spectacular and all the things that the reviews say it is but the reaction to it has really surprised me.  Everyone on facebook and all other types of media are super obsessed with the character of Elsa, who is voiced by Idina Menzel.  

Elsa is a strong female character that goes through an amazing character transformation and gives little girls a great role model to look up to.  However, it is her sister Anna, who is voiced by Kristen Bell, who I found the most interesting and who I identified most with.

The story told in Frozen is Anna's story.  Elsa may be the one with the special powers and most evident problems to deal with but the story belongs to Anna.  I thought it was brilliant storytelling on Disney's part. It was very interesting to see through Anna's eyes as she tries to help her sister figure out how to control her powers instead of simply telling the story through Elsa's eyes.  And not to mention, who knew Kristen Bell could sing like that?  She's fabulous!  I didn't get why people were so excited that Idina Menzel was so phenomenal (as usual) when there was such a surprise as Kristen Bell's rockin pipes!  

Anyway, if you went to Frozen and were preoccupied with Elsa's fabulousness, I urge you to watch it again and let Anna's story come through.

Sometimes the Internet Describes My Childhood Perfectly

I stumbled upon this and it sums up my childhood perfectly.

Every time I went to the store with my mom, we had this constant debate.  It's kind of funny to see my childhood feelings displayed on the internet.  This probably due to the fact that someone out there on the internet felt the same way that I did.  I think this is part of the magic of the internet.  It allows us to find a kinship with others that we don't even know.  And that's kind of nice.

Tights Are Not Pants Debate

So I keep seeing this on Pinterest today and I thought I'd share.  It made me laugh.

I think it's pretty funny that there is even a question of whether or not these tights could be pants.  I think that if they are tights, they should be worn as tights and if they're pants, they should be worn as pants.  I just know that my mom and dad would kill me if I ever stepped outside of the house in tights as pants (Regardless of the fact that I am grown and moved out of the house and married. They would still have something to say about my wardrobe.)

Ken Garff Billboards

My family and my husband's family live in Salt Lake City so we travel back and forth from Provo a lot.  Because of this, I pretty much have all the billboards along the way memorized.  For the past year or so Ken Garff has been pushing the "We hear you" slogan with billboards like these:

According to the Ken Garff google plus profile and their mission is this:

"The message we're trying to convey is that our customers should expect a very different car-buying experience when visiting a Ken Garff dealership...We've learned, through extensive research with customers, that in most car-buying experiences, sales people do too much talking and not enough listening to customers. We're committed to providing an experience for our customers where they will not only want to come back to Garff to buy their next car, but to tell their family and friends how we listened and really helped them find just the right car for them."  ( https://plus.google.com/104478314347265149108/about )

This sounds great but the message that I get is that they are putting others down in order to look like the better option.  Maybe it's just the fact that I used to be an el ed major but I cannot tolerate people putting others down.  It's one of the first things we teach our kids about kindness.  I feel like you should be able to advertise your product without putting everyone else down.  I understand that they didn't mean to have this effect (as shown in their statement above) but this is the message I am getting when I see these billboards.

Olympus High School's One Act Plays

This past weekend, my husband and I went to our old high school to see his sister in their one act plays.  These are a series of student written and student acted short plays.  They usually last about 10 minutes each.  Since they are student written and acted, it is always interesting to go watch them.  They usually deal with teen issues like having a crush and awkward situations.  This year, they had a few like that but there were also a large amount of drug abuse or death related one acts.  I come from a fairly affluent community in Salt Lake City.  Most of the school is LDS and live super normal and happy lives.  So it surprised me to see so many one acts on drugs and death.  I asked my sister-in-law if there was a drug problem at the school now and she was as baffled as I was.  She also talked about how the students who had written the drug one acts were happy and cheerful and didn't seem like they would write about drugs at all.

This is super interesting to me because had a stranger  judged my home community based solely on these one acts, they would think that there was a serious drug problem at my high school.  So sometimes media can reflect things that aren't totally true.  I think that, in the end, the students that wrote about drugs and death were just trying to be the most dramatic they could be and those were the topics that felt the most dramatic.  But it was a good example to me of how looking at just media can be misleading in trying to understand.