Senior Charlie Rents is one of the students that favors Buckle jeans.

“I have around six pairs of Buckle jeans and I spend an average of $70 everytime I go”. With the cost of the jeans some people say it is worth the price you pay.

Many girls think boys look good in buckle jeans, as long as they aren’t more feminine than their jeans.

“I don’t mind if boys wear Buckle jeans as long as they don’t have more of a sparkle on their jeans then mine,” said Senior Amanda Letsinger.

A normal cost for a pair of boys’ Buckle jeans is $80 or more. Girls’ jeans cost around $90. With the price of Buckle jeans comes a good question, how many pairs of jeans do most people have?

Sophomore Sammy Johnson owns 18 pairs of Buckle jeans and spends around $100 every visit.

“I like when boys wear Buckle jeans,” Johnson said, “because it makes their butts look really cute.”

“I had a roommate in college that would kick up into a handstand and do her review work upside down,” says BHS English teacher Heather Eld.

“I go on my computer, I play Minecraft and make all the Calculus problems out of blocks, then blow them up with TNT,” says BHS sophomore Spencer Martin.

While some students go about studying in the traditional way of textbook skimming, flashcards and piles of notes, other students see it as a labor of educational torment, they find their own way to concentrate.

“In the immediate vicinity of where I study, I have to clean the room completely, it has to be clean,” says Senior Michael Swearingen.

The obsessive compulsive naturally brings itself out when its comes to hardcore studying, in an effort to be in the zone; students find themselves inventing unique study habits.

“After practice I have to shower, get clean clothes,  clean the room, and the right music, it has to be the right music (in order to study),” says Swearingen, a user of 8tracks.com’s read and write more playlist.

Music is great influence in the world of studying, helping students relax and let the their mind focus. Whether its loud or quiet, heavy metal or classical, or no music at all the choices are limitless.

“I listen to Pandora, quietly. My hair has to be up, away from my face, I listen to Frank Ticheli at the library because I get distracted anywhere else,” says Junior Annie Moore.

In the world of cramming piles of information, studying brings out the quirks and tricks to understanding the information presented. The quirks will last a lifetime, the habits we develop now will be with students for the rest of life ingrained in how we memorize and comprehend the world’s secrets.

By: Max Lemp and Anya Bluhm

“I was worried it was going to be chaotic” said Senior Sam Vanmuyden “But the jump ropes were brilliant and kept us all in the right shape.”

The yearbook class spent all block trying to perfect the number.  Many students helped in the preparation of taking and setting up the photo.

“I had to clean up the jump ropes,” said Senior Bucky Ogdahl. “ I had to untangle and rewrap them back up and put them in the bins. I mentor gym fourth block and I got stuck with that job, it sucked.”

Taken off guard that the picture was even happening that day, students piled through the doorways scrambling to find their groups of friends to stand next to in the big 13.

“I had no idea we were taking the picture that day” said Senior Mary Ogdahl, “We all just kinda tried to fit in the lines.”

Being put amongst 417 other student, many wanted to stand out and make themselves noticed.

“It was fun to be part of a school tradition” said Senior Ian Warpula. “I smiled my very best smile to really impact the picture. I’m going to put the picture in a golden frame and hang it in my house so I can always look back on it.”

Story by: Maddi Herzfeld & Bailey Hanson

Photos by:  Lunderby Photography

Photos by Ben Lepinski

If you fell in love with Nicholas Sparks movies, like The Notebook or The Last Song, then his newest movie of 2012, The Lucky One, is the one to see. This chick-flick isn’t too much of a tear jerker, but the romantic scenes and amazing actors Zac Efron and Taylor Schilling, will keep your eyes locked onto the screen.

Logan, a Marine serving in Iraq, finds a photo of a woman with “Keep Safe” written on the back. He experiences many situations that should have lead to his death, but he survives and believes that the only reason he did was because of the picture. He goes home on leave and goes on a search to find the woman in the picture. After finding her (Beth), he tries to tell her how he found her and why he was there, but the timing just never worked out. This problem in their relationship has led to the theme of the story.

“Start appreciating the memories you have and stop begrudging the ones you never got to make.” That quote was said by Ellie (Beth’s mom), and I believe that it sums up the moral of this love story. Beth’s struggle of dealing with her brother’s death makes her reluctant to accept her relationship with Logan. She could move on and make new memories, but she can’t overcome the sorrow of missing her brother. Her grief makes her push Logan away, and her bad decisions soon catch up with her.

Nicholas Sparks is an amazing author. The way he writes makes you realize that you can’t always dwell on the past and what happened; you have to move forward and make new memories. Even though Beth’s past is still surrounding her (Beth’s Ex Husband), she decides to move forward and have a relationship with Logan. This concept in the movie is very important because there are many scenes that her ex husband tries to convince her to go back with him. Her strong will keeps her from doing that, making The Lucky One very inspirational.

During the November elections there will be a vote on an amendment concerning same-sex marriage. By voting no future generations could change the laws about same-sex marriage. By voting yes it puts the amendment on the state constitution and makes it very difficult to change.

With younger people becoming more and more accepting of each other, this amendment will hurt how young people will be living in the future. 70% of people 20 years and younger are in support of same-sex marriage, that number is expected to climb over the next few years according to gallop poll. That shows that when younger people become leaders of our state and communities we are going to want to let people have the basic human right to marry the person they love. If this passes, people will not have that right.

This amendment will not only put people’s future at risk, but will even put the state of Minnesota at a huge disadvantage compared to other states. Six states allow same-sex marriage: Washington, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Iowa, Vermont and New Hampshire. In the next few years many others are expected to legalize same-sex marriage. If Minnesota wants to move forward and become a modern state we must stop this amendment. States, communities, countries are all moving toward human equality; but people in this state are holding us back.

People of faith say that the LGBT (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender) community is not an act of God’s and is very unreligious. I say that it is very much so an act of God’s. The torah, the bible, and other holy books say that we are images of our creator(s) and that we should not judge each other on who we are. There are religious bodies that have come out to support the LGBT community. The United Church of Christ (UCC) is a Christian church that has came out and open its doors in support of the LGBT community. It has done so by providing educational programs for LGBT people, teaching them that it is fine to be who they are and has ordained many openly gay ministers. Local rabbis have said that they do not support the marriage amendment and urge “all Minnesotans of conscience and faith” to vote against the amendment.

By voting no for this amendment, people are not changing anything. Currently there is a law in Minnesota called the Defense of Marriage Act, which prohibits same-sex marriage already. Voting no does not mean that same-sex marriage will be legal or that you even support it, but voting no will allow young people to make the changes necessary in our state as we take the reins and become leaders of Minnesota. Voting yes on the amendment will put it onto the constitution and will greatly hurt our future.

Supporters of the amendment say that it needs to be on the constitution because we need to maintain the traditional family in Minnesota. As we like to think that the traditional family is made up of a husband, a wife (who will stay together for ever) and two or three kids. The truth is that on average 40% of people will get divorce according to divorcerate.org. Unfortunately broken families are becoming more of an image traditional family. Yet people say that same-sex families will destroy the meaning of marriage and family. That is simply not the case. The divorce rate for same-sex marriages is tremendously lower. Also, overall families with same-sex parents make wiser decisions than families with heterosexual parents. 69% of homosexual parents have a college degree before they get married, according to gaymarriage.lifetips.com.

It is not easy for same-sex parents to have children. In order to adopt kids it takes a lot of work and they have to be truly devoted to raising a family. No matter what people say there has been no research found that kids with homosexual parents having any mental problems or are more likely to become gay themselves. If the people who say that gay marriage ruins the traditional marriage and they really want to get people living in the best families, supporting the amendment will not fix it.

This amendment must be defeated in November. If it does not it will leave Minnesota dragging behind other states and societies. People deserve equal rights and the constitution should not discriminate against human beings. I greatly urge voters to vote no so Minnesota can become a brighter place.

“I was really excited, and I wanted to see how proud Mr. Rabehl was because we had worked so hard to get where we were,” said senior band participant Kelsey Cox.

Along with all of their hard work the students also got the chance to enjoy the city. A few lucky students even got the chance to meet Corbin Bleu after watching him perform in the play “Godspell”. An overall favorite of the trip was visiting Chinatown where they got to experience a whole different lifestyle of Asian cuisine and culture.

“My favorite part of the trip,” said Junior Ian Warpula. “Was when we were in a shop in Chinatown and a woman grabbed my arm and said, ‘Oh you very big man, very strong, big arm!’ And all I said was thank you.”

Tired and exhausted, the students arrived in Buffalo at about 7 o’clock on Monday night after a 24 hour bus ride. Although there was tension in air on their final bus ride, everyone agreed this was a trip worth remembering.

The spaghetti dinner has been around for three years and this year was the biggest turnout yet. Usually, there is leftover food to be frozen, but this year there was barely enough. Besides the dinner there was also a silent auction and a live one where swimmer Jamie Green‘s grandfather was the auctioneer because he used to do it for a living. Businesses donated the items and the money from the top bidder of each item went to the team.

A ton of parent volunteers had to decorate, advertise and cook while the swimmers served. The boys provided entertainment, too. Dressed in black and white with red bandanna bow-ties, mustaches and even some berets, they loudly welcomed guests at the door.