Over the Edge + January 13, 2010

Opinion 7

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THE UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA

How many times have you vowed. to

lose 10 pounds starting with the New
Year, or said that this was the year you
were going to cut back on your drinking
or quit smoking once and for all? After
celebrating on New Year's Eve and using
it as the last hurrah to overindulge, most
people set out on a stringent quest of
resolutions beginning the very next day.
‘Then, around the end of January, many
fail to live up to their stated resolutions,
give up, and go back to their former life-
style. New Year's Resolutions show the
right intentions.

Trying to make improvements, often
through changing a behavior, habit, or
goal is a good start. No matter how cyn-
ical you may be about the prospect of
writing down your promise for the next
year, it does show a desire for change. So
even with this potential desire to change
why are some of us set up for failure? I
am one of many who have stated to my-
self and friends, “I’m going to lose weight
and eat healthier,’ and “I'm going to quit
smoking,” So this said, why I am I still
eating Christmas treats for breakfast,
lunch, and supper? Oh, how typical. I’ve
got the goal, just not the process.

I suppose making improvements
needs to be a constant activity, not
something that goes with the seasons
or holidays. I think the reason why so
many people fail their New Year's reso-
lutions is because they turn their desire
for something (e.g., weight loss) into
something they have to do, They try to
fulfill resolutions for the sake of fulfill-
ing resolutions. There's no enthusiasm,
no motivation if you turn your desires

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into a chore. If you have a goal in mind,
you've got to want it, You've got to want
to lose weight. You've got to want to
quit smoking. You've got to want to jog
three miles every day. Feelings of desire
are a stronger motivator than feelings
of obligation.

Perhaps New Year's resolutions have
been turned into obligations. That's
no fun, who wants to do the things we
HAVE to get done... no one, really,
isn't this why we procrastinate and find
‘better things to do’ when we have things
that need to be done? Sounds like the
story of most students life.

I do, however, applaud the desire to
make improvements in one’s life and
give a hearty pat on the back by way
of moral support. The sad fact is that,
statistically speaking, you're almost
certainly doomed to failure before
you've even started. So I must get my
hand out of the cookie jar not as a New
Year's resolution, but by wanting to lose
weight no matter what time of year it
is. Don't go nuts though and become
obsessed with measuring every param-
eter in sight. You'll have good days and
you'll have bad days, that’s just how it
is and it’s the overall long-term trend
that is all that matters. You can make
the changes you want to make and
you can start to make them whenever
you're ready to do so, that much is not
in doubt. What is in doubt is whether
you'll bother to do so, or whether all
your great intentions end us as being
just that and this time next year we're
having the same conversation.

Sex and the City UNBC Edition

Kali Flick - Columnist/General Office Assistant

Happy Talk, Keep Talkin’ Happy Talk... Unless

ANDREW BAILEY
EDITOR IN CHIEF

According to a 2003
study conducted at the
University of Utah, talk-
ing on a cell phone while
driving is more dangerous
than driving while intoxi-
cated. This study was conducted with 41
test subjects being placed in a driving simu-
lator while intoxicated, and again while so-
ber but talking on a cell phone; the drinkers
won, they always do. Regardless of the fact
that 41 test subjects provides a miniscule
sample size, in fact the University should
be commended on finding that many will-
ing participants in the state of Utah given
Joseph Smith's attitude towards intoxicants,
this alarming conclusion has impacted local
governments across North America.

In a surprising move, Gordon Campbell
didn’t take the opportunity that this study
could have provided to legalize the drunk
driving he so loves to do. Instead, he waited
seven years before following the leaders of
other state and provincial governments all
over the Continent, focusing on the other
side of things and deeming cell phone use
while driving to be far too dangerous to be
legal. Therefore on January 1* 2010, the ban
on using hand-held communication devices
while driving took effect in Prince George
B.C. Fines will not be issued until February
1* in order to give cell-using drivers time to
adjust.

The penalty starting on February 1* will
be a $167 fine as well as three-penalty-
points against your license, This ban also
includes texting and emailing. Experienced
drivers (those of you who no longer have an
‘N license) will be permitted to use hands-
free communication devices such as blue
tooth,

So basically, what we've got ourselves here
is a situation that’s easier to read than Chris-
tina Hendricks body is to look at. Any driver
caught disobeying this law will be penalized
3 points against their license, and as we all
know, anyone who accumulates more than
3 points gets to pay a pretty sweet penalty-
points premium to the fabulous people at
ICBC. In today’s tough economic times a
guy like Campbell has to look out for the
financial wellbeing of his friends. Seriously,
Richard Henne could have masked this
reach around more effectively. You're wel-
come for keeping the balloon boy references
alive. But just for the sake of argument, let's
look at this ban as if it wasn't entirely based
on friendly benefits.

I am undoubtedly aware that cell phone

use can most definitely impede a driver's

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You're in a Car

ability to react quickly on the road, but do
British Columbians really believe that our
Liberal government has the right to make
this call for all of us? Many business folk and
salespeeps who rely on their blackberries and
such devices to conduct business, and do so
responsibly, during their daily commute are
going to be hit extremely hard by this. Perhaps
not to a large extent in Prince George where
the average commute is no longer than thirty
minutes, but what about the big shots in Van-
couver and other large cities where commutes
can last several hours?

Long commutes can currently be spent
productively as, thanks to cellular communi-
cation devices, negotiations can get done by
anyone not named J.P. Ricciardi, plans can be
made with colleagues, spouses, and friends,
and therefore time can be well spent and not
completely wasted. However, beginning on
February 1", this will change. On the bright
side, no phone to talk on means you can now
turn up your car radio, because that won't dis-
tract you at all.

Speaking of loud music, there are also other
fringe factors to put in play on this one, For
example, if Campbell's Liberals deem the
reading of text messages while driving to be
too dangerous, will they also illegalize reading
written directions, or glancing at maps? What
about smokers and coffee drinkers, are they
not distracted during their morning com-
mute? Should Jerry Maguire have been pulled
over for singing along with Tom Petty after
signing Cushman? He obviously wasn't giving
his entire attention to the road while belting
the lyrics of “Free Falling” and pumping his
fists with his eyes closed.

Where is the study being conducted on the
distraction level of parents who are currently
allowed to put other drivers on the road in
great peril while answering the repeated ques-
tion of “are we the yet?” Rather than threaten-
ing to turn the bus around and end their pre-
cious little field trip shouldnt Chris Farley's
character in Billy Madison have been pro-
hibited from driving a bus full of distractingly
loud children? You'd think the University of
Utah would have conducted such a study
given the amount of children, and spouses,
that drivers in that state could potentially be
distracted by.

Now I understand that Campbell is feel-
ing threatened by Harper's Federal govern-
ment which is currently chomping at the
bit to swoop into Vancouver and take full
credit for the Winter Olympics, but didn't the
RCMP just launch a major advertising cam-
paign aimed at recruiting more officers due
to exhausted resources? How exactly does
Campbell propose our police enforce the Lib-
eral's new desperate attempt for attention and

praise? It will be an impossible task to some-
how prove that a driver was texting while
driving, throw the cell phone on the passenger
seat and the police officer just wasted his time
pulling you over.

Introducing a new law that will be impos-
sible to enforce makes this new cell phone ban
about as useful to British Columbian taxpay-
ers as Campbell's brilliant implementation of
Anti-Bullying day on February 25%, which
will be held on April 14 this year so as not
to conflict with the Winter Olympics, don't
pretend to care or you'll pull a face muscle.
Should we also completely ignore the fact
that this ban has been proven to be ineffective
in many of the areas that have had the mis-
fortune of enforcing it? In fact, according to
the independent news source “Scoop,’ a study
by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety
showed that the percentage of teens observed
using cell phones in North Carolina actually
increased five months after a ban went into ef-
fect in that state (yeah an online news source
was just referenced in print media, see Inter-
net we can be allies not enemies so how ‘bout
you stop bankrupting us.)

If you just raised an eyebrow questioning
how exactly the Institute for Highway Safety
came to the conclusion that more teens were
using cell phones, I agree with you. It does
seem that it would take a science fiction type
process to conduct that kind of research,
which leads me to believe that it’s probably
baloney, which is most likely why online news
sources don’t get referenced much in my col-
umns. The Institute probably just released
that data in search of some attention, kind of
like when a Provincial government imposes a
ban on using cell phones while driving. I won-
der where the studies that the Liberals based
this ban on came from.

Like this one: Brian Brodie, the President
of the British Columbia Medical Association,
and staunch supporter of this new ban, told
the Victoria Times Colonist: “research shows
people who talk on a phone while driving are
four times more likely to crash and drivers
who text spend 400 per cent more time with
their eyes off the road than a normal motor-
ist.”

400 percent? The anti-second-hand-smoke
people don't even use fake stats as high as
those, Brodie might as well just say if you use
a cell phone while driving you have a 900%
chance of being kicked in the groin by Luis
Passaglia. In case you're wondering what that
feels like, it probably feels roughly the same
as having an attention seeking government
impose a useless law, based on unproven sta-
tistics, that inconveniences everybody and is
impossible to enforce. Wait, Luis Passaglia?
Am I even old enough to get that reference?

Stephanie McCullough - Columnist/Managing Editor

Welcome back to school ever faithful
readers! Here's a question to pose to your-
self; did you enjoy Christmas or New Years
more? Those that chose Christmas still live
with their parents, work at Save-On and
haven't declared their major yet; you people
keep on enjoying your lack of responsibil-
ity. As for the REST of you, Props to you
for growing the hell up. Give good presents
and enjoy the Big Ball Bash even more every
year. The New Years Eve Party I attended
- what a fun time! Props to the hosts for
having a theme, following said theme, and
dealing with my drunken shenanigans.
Now after that little rant, let me go into my
selfish ramblings.

1 — Stumble Upon. Now I know all of
you students out there think you have no
time to spend on pointless web browsing,
but seriously, get your head out of Facebook.
StumbleUpon is the coolest and easiest
add-on for Firefox on your home computer

yet. You can“ Like” stuff you find so that other
Stumblers will find it and you can “Stumble”
for sites that those same people want to share
with you. I have not yet been linked to the
ShamWow ordering site or anything purely
posted as advertising, so dont worry about
that. I learned about black holes this mor-
ning... Who can say that?

2 — Pressed shirts. If you actually IRON
your shirts, they, and in turn you, will look
awesome. Pressed shirts are hot, appropriate
and not that expensive. Pop one out every so
often and the added bonus, you have a pocket
for all the phone numbers you'll be receiving.

3 - BlackBerry App World. I’m sure I've
already established my addiction (in the
worst possible way) to my BlackBerry, BB
App World has given me the coolest apps and
I strongly encourage you all to get them. Dic-
tionary.com, WeatherEye, CBC Alert, Texts
From Last Night, Shazam, QuickPull Lite,
Color ID Lite, and ELLE Canada. I don't

think I need to give individual reasoning for
all of them as it’s is pretty easy to download
an app and see if it works for you.

4 — My new pair of shiny metallic silver
boots I bought while in Victoria. They aren't
a flattering cut, nor do they actually “go” with
anything I own, but they are awesome and
that is that,

5 — Dr. Dre's Chronic 2001 album. Yes, it’s
a little late for me to be saying this but this
album is for sure something to write home
about. “Xxplosive?” What a sick beat. I bust
this album out when I’m driving to Vancou-
ver. Cars pass me as my blonde self bobs my
head and yells out racial slurs in the privacy
of my own vehicle; it’s truly hilarious, I prom-
ise you. Also, “Ed-Ucation’ is the perform-
ance for every ho out there who I just can't
stand. I could pretty much go into detail for
every song on this album but, alas, this is not
a review, it is just me sharing what I like this
week,