February 5, 2002
The Lion’s Eye
Page 7
The dreaded Freshman 15
By KAREN KARSZKIEWICZ
Special to the Lion's Eye
Slices of cheesy pizza dripping with
grease and loaded with toppings.
Cheeseburgers covered in every condi-
ment known to man. Thick gooey oven-
baked cookies.
Getting hungry? Sure, all these foods
appeal to our senses.
But, what else do these delicious, fatten-
ing foods have in common, you ask?
They’re all part of a typical college fresh-
man’s unbalanced meal.
Eat these foods every day, and the fresh-
man 15 will hit you in half the time.
The notorious freshman 15 is something
that many of us have experienced. If
you’re not familiar with the term, it refers
to the average 15 pounds many students
gain during the course of their first year at
college.
While the term includes only freshmen,
it can happed to sophomores, juniors, and
seniors as well. I interviewed several on
campus, and I found that many people said
they’d gained as much — if not more
weight — during their sophomore year.
How does this phenomenon occur, you
may wonder? The concept is very simple.
Entering college evokes a new freedom for .
students. No longer does one have to sit
down to. well-balanced meals with family.
A few slices of pizza, a super-sized coke,
- and a Snickers bar work just as well.
Ah, the feeling of freedom.
While this freedom (and the resulting
pounds) are more common for students
who live on campus, it still affects com-
muter schools like our Penn State campus.
Freedom-is not the only factor that caus-
es the freshman fifteen. A bigger problem
is the lack of healthy foods and the abun-"
dance of Tnpning treats available on and .
Sa
around campus.
not motivate one to eat healthy.
Another dilemma is the fact healthy
foods are notoriously: pricey. This pricing
of food is typical, especially at fast food
_ places like McDonalds. Sure, you could
“spend $3 on the:McSalad Shaker, but who
would waste their money when they could
Vending machines filled
with potato chips and chocolate bars do
get a $.99 double cheeseburger.
While it may seem difficult to avoid the
freshman 15 (or lose it if you’ve already
gained it), it’s not impossible. There are
some healthier and reasonably priced
foods sold on campus. Yogurt, salads,
turkey sandwiches, and power bars are a
few of them.
You gan also save calories by drinking
water (bring in a bottle and fill it up at the
fountain) instead of soda.
However, the best way to lose those 15
pounds is to bag a healthy lunch. It may -
seem juvenile, but it is much healthier and
lest costly than eating out.
The freshman 15 is discouraging, but if
you follow these tips, you may be able to
lose it in half the time.
Movie RO BIN rr TE EE Sh tits yea eni nest Mel EES
Two thumbs up for two great n movies
By SHAWN PETTIT
Assistant Ediror
‘A Beautiful Mind’
A Beautiful Film
Dts fon ond hy Ando
13) has created another instant classic with
‘his latest project, A Beautiful Mind, which
tells the story of real-life mathematician
John Forbes Nash Jr., a Nobel Prize winner
who suffers from schizophrenia.
~- Russell Crowe plays John in one of his
best performances in his career. The story
begins in John’s days at Princeton when he
was searching for his. “original idea” (His
original idea, a revolutionary paper. on
game theory, is what won the real-life John
Nash the Nobel Prize in 1994), through his
days as a professor and code-breaker at
M.LT. and into his later years back at
Princeton as a professor of mathematics.
Unlike other films that deal with mental
illness, A Beautiful Mind does not portray
John as a complete” lunatic. Thanks to
Crowe’s, impressive performance,
Howard’s directing, and the brilliant cine-
matography done by Roger Deakins, John
is seen as a normal man that is thrown into
seemingly realistic situations that are only
real to him. He handles these situations as
a regular person would without realizing
that his problems (and many of the people
involved) aren’t even there.
With brilliant performances by Jennifer
Connelly as John’s wife, Alicia, Ed Harris
as. government agent Parcher, and Paul
Bettany as John’s high-spirited roommate
from Princeton, this movie definitely
deserved “it’s four Golden Globe Awards :
and is a must see for anyone.
‘Black Hawk Down’
A Perfect War Film
Director Ridley Scott (Gladiator) and pro-
ducer Jerry Bruckheimer have turned
Philadelphia Inquirer writer Mark
Bowden’s book about the U.S. raid on
Mogadishu, Somalia into one of the most
stunningly realistic war films of all time.
Black Hawk follows the U.S. Army *
Rangers and Delta Force soldiers that par-
ticipated in the raid from the day before
the bloodshed started up until the initial
escape of all the soldiers from the city.
The actual storyline is about a prisoner
extraction in a process to take Somali war-
lord Mohammed Fariq Adid out of power.
Adid was taking over food shipments sent
to the country through the capital,
Mogadishu, in an effort to take over the
country by means of power through
hunger. During his reign, 300,000 Somalis
died from starvation.
U.S. Army Rangers and Delta Force spe- |
cialists were sent in on Oct. 3, 1993 to
extract key members of the Somali rebel
organization, including Adid’s political
adviser and his top lieutenant, from a
meeting in the Bakara Market section of
thecity.
The’ Somali rebels caught wind of the
operation and decided to attack from all
sides, turning a simple extraction opera-
tion into an 18-hour siege in which 19
American soldiers and over 500 Somalis
were killed.
There are no real starring roles in this
movie because there’s not really time to
focus on one soldier. The cast includes
Josh Hartnett as veteran ranger Sgt.
Eversmann, Ewan McGregor as action-
hungry: Company Clerk Grimes, Tom
Sizemore as the no-nonsense Colonel
McKnight, and Sam Shepard as the com-
mander of the operation, Gen. William
Garrison.”
Out of the entire cast, the strongest per-
formances were given by Sizemore, who
goes back: into the city three times to help
rescue his‘ fellow soldiers, and Shepard,
who seems to. make a personal connection
with his men as they are under fire.
Another great performer in this movie was
Jason Issacs as Capt. Mike Steele, the
commander. of. the Rangers. Issacs seems
to also give a no-nonsense demeanor, but
in the end, he is touched by the effort his
men gave to save each other.
Overall, Black Hawk Down’ is a first
class war film and a must-see but be pre-
pared for a type of bloodshed that has
never been seen on the big screen before.