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Show mion The College Times MONDAY, January 7, 2008 A resolute New Year? The path toward sainthood started January 1 Jared Magill Opinions editor Right about now, every Gold's Gym in the valley is packed with so many people there is a line three bodies deep at each apparatus. No doubt diet pills and nicotine gum are flying off Wal-Mart's shelves at a record pace, and local booksellers are grappling with a two-week backorderon all touchy-feely self-help guidebooks. In two weeks, or at best, a month from now, it will all go back to normal and those failed attempts will, once again, be saved for next year. Some people think New Year's resolutions are a bunch of honky horse pucky. Not me. As far as I'm concerned, the arbitrary passing of one year and beginning of the new is good enough reason to attempt a little positive change. To those who did not bother with any resolutions, maybe next year you should resolve to resolve. And for others, here is a list of possibilities to consider: Drive less If you live within reasonable distance, why not resolve to forget dealing with the campus-parking debacle? If you don't see parking as an issue, there are a multitude of other reasons to drive less. The fact that oil hit the $100 per barrel mark last week and most reports are predicting a continued increase in the price of crude might provoke you a little. When money isn't a compelling enough reason, then perhaps reducing the pollution in Utah Valley will motivate. According to a National Institute of Health study, the higher concentrations of particulate emissions that become trapped under a stagnant air mass during inversion episodes are roughly equivalent to smoking/ve cigarettes a day. This resolution allows you to kill three birds with one stone. You'll be able to save dough, get exercise, and adopt a greener lifestyle when you choose to ride a bike, push a skateboard, longboard, or scooter, ride public transit or just walk to campus. Volunteer Perhaps you have the will but don't know where to start. If so, the Center for Service and Learning located in SC 101 would be a good place to visit. The service center staff and its sixmember Student Service Council organize a range of service-oriented events throughout the school year. These include blood and food drives, hunger banquets, a Community Outreach Day, Habitat for Humanity buildings and a service-focused alternative spring break. If none of those events suit your fancy, the Center for Service and Learning can point you toward other opportunities. Or, if you know what to do and where to start but lack the will, then perhaps you should resolve to stop sucking. Be politically active That is. unless you are content with the status quo, in which case your resolution should be to lay off the sodium pentothal this year and join the game the next time around. The government belongs to us; why not take ownership of it? Register to vote if you haven't already. There are political clubs on campus, so find the one that represents your views and join. However, if you like to roll with the Neo-Cons, mingling religion and government, bear in mind that UVSC is a state school and therefore cannot officially sanction any pacts with the devil. The official rule is B.Y.O. pentagram. ^ # l f you know what to do but lack the will, then perhaps you should resolve to stop sucking These are just a few friendly suggestions, not stern mandates dictated by a judgmental authority figure. If we haven't provided enough stimulus, readers can send their New Year's resolution suggestions to The College Times at opinions@uvsc.edu Hollywood's seducing destruction By Eleanor Cleverly-Takahashi Editor in chief I've recently been experiencing a good dose of post-apocalyptic mayhem. It just seems as though I can't get enough of the stuff. I worked it into my Halloween celebrations with the rather raw and ominous 28 Days Later, along with its over Hollywood-ized sequel, 25 Weeks Later. Next I gave Thanksgiving a good shot in the arm with Cormac McCarthy's masterful work. The Road. And over the holiday break, I succumbed to the seducing appeal of / Am Legend. It's not that I am hyper-obsessed with armageddon or am a latent conspiracy theorist, but I have to admit there is genuine intrigue in watching individuals grapple with the magnitude of the most emotionally charged and physically grotesque situations written in literary (or screenplay) history. We're talking flesh-eating men and carnivorous children. A life lived in constant terror, waiting for those you love to not only mentally, but physically turn on you, forcing you to then turn to your only reasonable option: butcher them alive for your own safety. Tough stuff, I know. Luckily, as we drove away from the theater, I comforted myself with the realization that if biotech scientists morphed a deadly virus into a cancer treatment, which then morphed itself into an even more frightening disease, it would prove lethal. That's right. No bloodthirsty vampires once disguised as your neighbors. No legions of the undead charging down your street in search of their next victim. And yes, that means no translucent-skinned savages with the heart rate of 240 beats per minute and the ability to scale tall buildings. We would all just keel over dead, and probably much quicker than those populations confronting malaria and hepatitis daily. But then. that started worrying me even more than the thought of battling it out with a worldwide zombie epidemic. In real life, unlike the movies, there is never a hunky actor passing as a brilliant and dedicated scientist who refuses to 1 abandon the cause. In the movies we rarely have to face the reality of watching friends die slowly of an infectious disease or observe as parents try to cope with abandoning their children to quarantine zones. In the movies there is always a cure, a way to bring humanity back from the brink of complete destruction. This then led me over to the Center for Disease Control, which has a comprehensive list of bioterrorism agents currently threatening the world's population. The list totals out at 45 and not a single one of them claims to produce cannibalism or anything mirroring a zombie-like state. Unfortunately, they are "bioterrorism agents" for a reason and the only consolation I received is that, yes, I was right. We will ail die quickly ... but not pleasantly. I think that next time I have the option of watching another post-apocalyptic thriller, I might just head over to the United Nations Web site and see how the world's negotiated treaties are holding up. Maybe I will lend my support to diplomacy by switching on CSPAN or tuning into some peace talks (although I am not completely convinced they broadcast those sorts of things). Because, in the end, I am betting that postapocalyptic Earth is going to look a lot morelike McCarthy's stark remnants in The Road, ripe with baby-eating and rouge gangs, than / Am Legend's contemplative gaze toward the sunset. -.-!V.:>.<.-Y L - % " |