Monthly Archives: October 2012

Swimming Injuries?

Usually when you hear of sports injuries you assume that the person plays a contact sport like, hockey, lacrosse, football, or basketball, and not of a competitive swimmer getting hurt. People think that because competitive swimming is a non-contact sport you can’t get injured. Well those people are wrong. Although swimming may not be a contact sport you still are able to get injured in different ways.

Most swimming injuries are caused from  overuse or repetitive stress injuries. You hear complaints about how someone on your teams shoulders or knees are hurting. This is from swimming the stroke wrong or from a lot of long practices. Its the constant action of pulling with your shoulders that makes the problems. While you’re swimming your shoulders are pulling you along which is a lot of stress on the shoulder. Breaststroke is a cause of  knee injuries because of the awkward looking and uncomfortable kick you do can irritate your knees! Other kicks such as the kicks you do during butterfly and the flutter kick you do during backstroke and freestyle may irritate your knees too. Too many stressful and long  practices can result in these injuries.These injuries could potentially keep you out of the pool.

You would think that since your lighter in the pool, swimming would be easy. But swimmers put constant pressure on their shoulders and knees. Everything they do involves their shoulders and their knees. I know that swim practices are longer than the average sports practice, sometimes I have practice for 2 hours and 45 minutes! Thats a long time to be moving your body around. So as you can see there are swimming injuries even though swimming is not a contact sport!

-Julia Waldron

RED

Recently Taylor Swift came out with a new album “Red”. Each week until the album came out a new song would be released and reach the top of the charts on iTunes. Within one day Swift’s album reached #1 in every genre on iTunes and more than 4 million copies had been purchased. But the question is, is Taylor Swift still writing country? Ever since the first single, “We are Never Ever Getting Back Together,” came out fans had that question.

In my opinion, Taylor Swift has never been the biggest country singer. In iTunes her songs genre is country but she doesn’t seem much of a country singer. Her songs are more upbeat and catchy than much of the country style. Yes, Swift’s songs do seem a little bit different on this album but I don’t think she’s purposely trying to change her songs to pop music. Every artist always changes their tempo sometime and now it’s Swift’s turn.

~Jacqueline Allard

Think Before you Drink

2 million. The number of drunk drivers at any given time. Most people enjoy a little drink from time to time and there is nothing wrong with this. But, did you know that almost one in seven of all deaths on the road involve drivers who are over the current legal limit? The more you drink, the higher the risk to be involved in a road accident. Alcohol influences your driving even if it’s ingested in small quantities.  In fact, if you drink and drive (with a blood alcohol level over 80mg per 100ml) you are three times more likely to be involved in a crash than a sober driver. There are things people miss on the road because they are not paying full attention, there are stop signs missed causing accidents, and many drivers are unlikely to be able to act quickly in intense situations such as swerving to avoid a collision. Alcohol is also a depressant, which can cause drowsiness, leading to higher risk for accidents. If people want to avoid accidents, it looks like people have to choose: drinking or driving?!

MADD (Mothers Against Drunk Driving) is an association to raise awareness about drunk driving.  “The mission of Mothers Against Drunk Driving is to stop drunk driving, support the victims of this violent crime and prevent underage drinking.” They stress that people should always take caution when on the road because many lives can be risked. Many people help continue this organization by raising fundraisers and just spreading the word. My uncle was a victim of a drunk driver, making it even more of a reason that I should spread awareness.

~Saige Bingman

The Fall of the Town Pool

The town pool is a “waste of money” says a Cheshire citizen quoted in the Cheshire Herald.   Every year millions of dollars are spent on the Cheshire pool.  Does it have perks? Of course it does, it’s a pool. But does it also have a lot of bad things about it?   For example, this year we are spending 7 million dollars on a machine that will make it so the pool will not use as much energy.  A lifeguard who represented the pool at a town meeting stated that 500 kids were taught how to swim in 2011. The real question is whether 500 kids learning how to swim is more important than millions of dollars that could be going to other essential needs of the town.

In my opinion the Cheshire public pool is a HUGE waste of money. I think that millions of dollars of Cheshire’s money should be going to more important things like education or healthy eating. Yes, I do believe that it is attractive to have a town pool, but I do not think it looks good to the town if the roof covering it is falling down every single winter!   Did you know that 1.3 million dollars of the schools budget was cut so that there was more money to spend on the pool?  I doubt it. There is no way that we have this much money to just throw at the pool and hope that it survives the year.  Even if does survive then you just hope you won’t have too much trouble putting the bubble up and down. I have been a citizen of Cheshire ever since I was born and I think that I have been to the pool all of 3 times. There are way too many problems to worry about when dealing with the pool. I think that it should be closed for good.

~Adler Demac

Getting Enough Sleep is Very Important for Kids

Is sleep important for children? A new study says yes. A new study published this week in the journal Pediatrics shows that children who do not get enough sleep have less control over emotions and are less focused at school. The National Sleep Foundation recommend that children who are between 5 to 12 should get 10 to 11 hours of sleep. Getting enough sleep does not just wake you up in the drowsy morning.  If you get enough sleep, your behaviors and grades can get improved. Before the survey had began, students were asked to sleep the same amount of time as they normally would, and their teachers were asked to score down their behaviors and grades. After five nights of kids’ sleep change, the teachers were asked to do the same again. Compared to the original score, those who slept less had the worse behaviors, and those who had enough sleep were normal.

I think sleep is just so important, sometimes you can pass out if you’re way too tired. If you’re tired at school, you won’t be able to pay attention in the class. If you don’t pay attention, you won’t be able to do your homework at home, therefore you can get  bad grades. If sleep is that important, why don’t kids just go to bed earlier? Do they spend too much time on the screen? I know some kids do that, but also, I know most kids in my school do not spend a whole lot of time on the screen, and they couldn’t get enough sleep either. It’s because when kids get to high school and middle school, they get more homework than before. In addition, they have to wake up early in the morning. Especially in high school. So I strongly suggest that middle school and high school should delay the school time, if you want kids to pay their whole attention in the class, you need to let them wake up late. If kids want to go to bed early and be awake the next morning, and they have sports or activities after school, they will have too much pressure. In a long period of time, they will be stressed, and we definitely don’t want kids to get too stressed. So, if the schools want kids to get better grades, you have to delay the school time, then kids can get an amount of sleep they need.

~Oscar Cai

Uconn Denied for Big East Tournament

Many people are probably wondering what’s the deal with the the issues concerning Uconn’s eligibility in the Big East Tournament. This is why I read the article “UCONN MEN’S BASKETBALL: No Big East Tournament for Huskies if team not eligible for NCAA Tournament” By The Associated Press. In this article it states “our presidents conceptually agreed that any team in any sport that is ineligible for postseason NCAA competition that they would not compete in the conference tournament or championship.” I personally  don’t like the idea of that because I am a die  hard Uconn fan and always attend at least one Big East Tournament game.  It also says under rules approved in October, the Uconn Huskies would be academically ineligible in 2013, because the NCAA plans to use data from the 2009-10 and 2010-11 school years, when Connecticut’ scores were too low to meet the standards. I found this really interesting because I guarantee  a lot  of  NCAA  Mens Basketball teams are under the standard score limit.The last fact that I saw was Connecticut has been pursuing an appeal that could result in a waiver of the sanctions, arguing that it has made changes that have resulted in significant improvements in the program’s academic performance. After reading this part of the article I don’t get why they can’t just let Uconn work on their grades without being punished with such harsh punishments. This article was great and gave good information on my Huskies.

This really answered almost all of my question’s except one. This question is what if they get their grades up before the season starts? I want to know this because if they do why can’t they enter the tournament. I think this punishment is very harsh and out of order. They just don’t make sense, they should have a chance to redeem themselves. Maybe this ruling will change, I guess time will have to tell us.

~Mike Millea

Cheshire High School Threat

On October 1st, students at Cheshire High School discovered a note written on a boys bathroom wall that said “people will die on/in school on October 2nd according to the Mayans.” Soon after the note was found and reported, Mr. Solan (principle of CHS) sent an email to all parents, informing them that the town will be taking extreme precautions tomorrow (October 2nd) at the school. The next day on October 2nd, Cheshire police were stationed outside of the high school and were there the rest of the week. Located on the local town website, cheshirepatch.com, is a copy of the email that was sent to parents and a more indepth rendition of the story.

Now this whole note could have been either a prank or something very serious. Personally I am quite happy about how the town reacted to the threat. They took it into their own hands and kept the school and students safe. I would like to take this time to thank the Cheshire Police for protecting our school even it was just a joke, their help was very close to our hearts. I believe that every situation no matter how big or how small, our town should do everything in their power to do the right thing and keep us safe. When I first heard about this “note” my first thought was about why would someone do this? I had gotten a text from a CHS students telling me that there was a rumor about someone bringing a gun to school. After I had gotten the text and the minute I saw my parents later, my mom showed me the email that someone had gotten and later posted on Facebook. It all tied together, it wasn’t just a rumor, this was something very serious. I am happy to say that the students of Cheshire High School are safe and will stay safe thanks to the police.


-Molly Michaud

Froyo World is The New Cheshire “Hangout”

For years, Cheshire has been a very desolate area for fun and exciting places for teens to enjoy. The town recently welcomed an entirely new look at desserts… frozen yogurt! Froyo is a rapidly spreading area of business. There are multiple frozen yogurt franchises, but none can quite compare to Froyo World: Frozen Yogurt Lounge. With its numerous variety of flavors, many different kinds of toppings and extremely high-tech displays, it stands out amongst the others. Frozen yogurt is a healthier alternative to ice cream, which still satisfies your sweet pleasures.

One of middle school students favorite things to do is to walk on half-days of school. Before, there were not many places to walk to; the usual cafe which you had to be very quiet in, or the pizza parlors along the main roads. Froyo gives kids an extremely enjoyable area to hangout with friends in and have a great time. I love walking in and seeing the cute signature sign to represent Froyo World: Frozen Yogurt Lounge, and all of the bright colors. Its almost as if it puts me in a better mood just being around it. You almost always recognize somebody when you are in there and it has become a very social place around town. Even at times when it is very hectic, the wide variety of self-serve frozen yogurt machines spread out the customers a bit, leaving spacious areas to feel comfortable. Froyo World has been a fantastic addition to town because it gives residents an area to eat delicious desserts, while having a great time with friends.

~Alexis Yamin

The World’s Worst College

The latest NBC/Wall Street Journal presidential poll showed both candidates, Barack Obama and Mitt Romney, deadlocked at 47% of the votes each. As the race tightens up, it is very possible that we may see what has only happened 4 other times in American history. A candidate may get more votes than the other candidate but still lose the election. How is this possible? Well, the presidential election is not determined by popular vote, it’s based on the Electoral College. In the Electoral College, each state gets a certain amount of electoral votes, which are based on population. For each state a candidate wins, they get that state’s Electoral votes. A candidate wins the election by winning 270 electoral votes.

I think the electoral system is really dumb, because a candidate should be chosen by how many total votes he or she gets, not how many populated states they win. A lot of other American’s must feel the same way I do, because in a recent poll by Gallup, 62% percent of adults want to abolish the Electoral College. The Electoral College makes it seem like votes in California (55 electoral votes) count more than votes in North Dakota (3 electoral votes). The electoral system probably also dissuades some citizens to vote, because they don’t think their vote counts. If we want a real democracy, then we should abolish the Electoral College once and for all.

~Rayan Vatti

Lance Armstrong: Hero or Zero?

The UCI has just decided to erase world famous cyclist Lance Armstrong from the record books. That means the seven tour de France victories are to be forgotten, the plaques changed to blank and the years of cheering for a man in yellow left  forgotten. Not only that but, any chance that he had to get back into the record books is gone because the UCI made sure that he was also banned from the sport of cycling. Along with on Friday 10/26/12 the UCI will meet to discuss going after his 2000 Olympic Bronze medal. Tour de France director Christian Prudhomme wants Armstrong to also pay back the prize money he won in his seven Tour de France wins. To top it all off, Livestrong renounced its affiliation with Armstrong.

But, who will forget possibly the most famous man in cycling history?  I know, his fans will not forget him and any of the cyclists that raced with him sure won’t. Although the way they remember Lance Armstrong may not be the kindest. Some will remember him as an athlete, others for his story but, most will remember him for doping his way to victory and being erased from cycling history. A man who was onced a praised champion all over the world is now, nothing more than a soon to be forgotten legend.


~ Quentin Arai