Jasper Jones

One of the few places to get breakfast around here is Shoneys. There aren’t very many of them anymore - lots of them have shut down and the ones left are all owned by the same guy who just bought the whole company a year or two ago. He’s from Atlanta where he ran another chain of QSR’s - that Quick Service Restaurants, for those of you not in the biz.

I go to Shoney’s because they have a buffet and you can take what you want, whether it is breakfast stuff or fresh fruit or salad fixin’s, and you can eat all you want. Their lunch and dinner buffet is usually jut one or two meats, like fried chicken or meat loaf, but lots of good vegetables. Or you can order off the menu. But the buffet is the better deal as far as food for the dollar.

It’s ‘Flag Day’ and I’ve got my Rebel flag flying high!!!!!!!!

You know what gets me about that flag, what people think it stands for. The only thing it stands for is ‘Southern Heritage’ just like any other flag stands for the state or the country. It really ticks me off for someone to say it stands for ‘Hate’. Hate of what? I never owned any slaves and flew that flag to prove it and I honestly don’t think anyone else flew the Rebel Flag to symbolize they owned slaves.

Besides, it wasn’t the white man that captured the blacks and made them slaves. It was other Africans that captured them and sold them for slaves. I don’t agree with slavery at all but if you ask me, what our country did to the American Indians was far worse. We took their land, their way of life, and worst of all, we broke their spirit in the process.

Sure there were some slave owners that were really terrible to their slaves but think of this; If you bought a new tractor and paid a pretty good price for a good tractor, are you going to go out and beat the tractor with hammers and tear it down? Heck no, you’re going to take care of it so it can work good for you for a long time. Most slave owners treated their slaves the same way.

I know of a black man with a rebel flag on the front of his car and he understands that all it stands for is ‘Southern Heritage’. That’s someone who is a man not looking for an excuse to act this way or that way. He’s got it together and is his own man. I admire him for that.

  Kobe Bryant is without a doubt the best player in the NBA right now.  In his career he has won three championships, and is on track to be the NBA’s all time leading scorer.  Now, after twelve years of waiting, he can finally call himself the NBA MVP.  There are people that say Chris Paul is more deserving of that title this year, but the fact is, Kobe did everything that was needed of an MVP, and more.  Kobe finally became the league’s best team player this year.  He didn’t feel like he needed to carry his team.  Instead, he trusted them and they came through.  Kobe’s great team skills and excellent play lead the Lakers to the number one seed in the west.  Now they are in the second round of the playoffs and are predicted to be in the NBA finals, the exact thing the league MVP is expected to get his team to.

  Society has a fun way of making people feel good about themselves and bad about themselves at the same time.  There are so many commercials tell people that they are perfect just the way they are and that they will find their special someone without changing how they look.  Then there are all of these commercials that show weight loss pills and exercise programs.  They tell people that weight can cause stress and unhappiness.  We also see celebrities showing there bodies and tell how they have to look good to be famous.  This makes everyone want to look just like them and do the same things that that they do.  People think that they will be happy if they do all the things that these celebrities do, but few know what these means.  It means changing your daily schedules to work out twice a day on top of the running of two hours. It also mean changing your eating habits.  These celebrities pay thousands of dollars for people to design meals for them that are perfectly balanced.  Most people don’t have this type of money for this. This is putting mixed feeling and a lot of pressure on society.  People should do what makes them happy, whatever that is.  If they want to do what these celebrities do, that’s fine if that’s what makes them happy. But the main point is that if people are not happy with themselves the way they are now, then they will never be happy no matter what they look like.  It’s more about who you are than what you look like, or it should be.

  Many kids view entertainment as watching TV or playing video games for hours at a time.  I have found that there is a better way for kids to have fun and learn at the same time.  They won’t learn English or history, but they will learn life skills.  This type of learning comes in the form of a board game called, “Monopoly.”  Monopoly teaches kids to do math by counting money, but that is not all it teaches them. Kids will learn strategies such as money management and conservation.  These are skills that you must have to win the game.  They are also skills that can help these kids in life.  Saving money, learning only to spend for what you only need, and also critical thinking are things that kids can learn to help them in the game and also in life.