... Girl Scouts will be learning how to sing, dance and perform so that they can create and star in their own music videos. For a whole afternoon they get the best equipment, the best stage, the best lighting, to make their dreams of being the next Avril Lavigne or Hillary Duff come true. Oh, and by the way, besides all that, they earn a merit badge. A merit badge for starring in your own rock video? Apparently the 21st century Girl Scouts organization recognizes that being able to cast oneself as a celebrity ...
... seriously, to be considered worth our recognition, it must be extreme in some way or another--exceptionally wonderful, supremely dreadful, or as FedEx puts it, extremely urgent. Nothing mediocre, nothing in the middle will do. How does the Canadian teenager singer Avril Lavigne put it in her hit song? "Anything but Ordinary." Jesus' 1st century admonition to take it to the edge is actually more in keeping with 21st century currents than with 20th century thinking. The world organizes itself, we've been ...
... skilled artisans of the Tiffany Studios that created that unmistakable glassware with the distinctive markings. Today we're all too aware of the hold brand-names have on this culture. Although there are signs of a shift away from brands, especially among tweeners (witness the Avril Lavigne phenomenon), ask anyone with a trend-conscious member of their family and they will be able to tell you just how much more it costs to wear a hot name-brand than it does to get the imitation or knockoff. The maker's mark ...
... waving flag" But then in the midst of that dream, reality breaks in. The next three lines are “and then it goes back, and then it goes back, and then it goes back.” In March of 2010, some Canadian artists like Justin Bieber and Drake, Avril Lavigne, Fefe Dobson, Kardinal Offishall, Nelly Furtado, and more, got together and recorded this song as a relief effort for Haiti. It is the Canadian version of the Michael Jackson “We are the World,” though it is becoming a global anthem that is inspiring our ...
