CHRISTMAS EDITION - DECEMBER 9, 2010

Happy Holidays Bobcats! Christmas is almost here! Pretty crazy to think about, right? Well this December, we have some pretty cool things planned for everyone!

December 6th-10th: Toy Drive and Change for

Change This is where you can bring in new toys or loose change that goes towards giving gifts for Toys for Tots. The toys must be new but any kind of pocket change is good. Your home-rooms should have a collection container or envelope or you can put your change in the bot-tles at the cafeteria cash regis-ters. This is a chance for us to let kids who wouldn't normally get any gifts and are sad to have smiles on their faces at Christ-mas time!

December 13th-17th: Christmas Week

These days are designed with little fun activities for to enjoy and get excited for the holiday season!

Monday: Don't Forget the Lyrics Carol Edition (Cafeteria at lunch)

Come to the Cafeteria at lunch time and get in teams. We will play the carol out loud and all you have to do is give us the next five words in that given Christmas carol. Just put the right answers in. Who knows, maybe you will win a small prize! Tuesday: Slingshot Monkey

Elf Fest (Cafeteria at lunch)

Shoot monkeys that are designed as slingshots at the executives of student council who are walking/skipping/rolling across the stage! Hit one of us, and you get a candy cane!

Pretty simple folks! Wednesday: Ugly Christmas

Sweater (All day)

This one is pretty self-explanatory. Wear an ugly Christmas sweater or holiday themed sweater. The uglier, the better! Thursday: Bring Your Own

Mug Hot Chocolate (Lobby at lunch)

Bring your own mug to school that day and student council will give you a free mug of hot chocolate. If you forget your mug, you can pay $0.50 for a cup. If anyone wants marsh-mallows, that will be an extra $0.25, no matter if you have your own mug or not!

Friday: Door Decorating Judging

(During homeroom) Throughout the whole week, we will let you decorate your homeroom door in a festive way. During homeroom, executives will be coming around judging the doors. There will be awards given out so make sure your door is the best! Also on Friday, December 17th, to finish off our Christmas week, we are having our Winter Formal Dance. This is going to be a semi-formal event. Sign-ins are in effect and tickets will be on sale during the Christmas week in the Blue Store for $7.00. The Winter Formal Dance theme this year is New York New Years. So think sparkly and New York. Come one, come all! We want to see all you Bobcats there as this is the last Bluefield dance in 2010! Student Council would like to just thank everyone for their spirit and smiles during the run of 2010! Enjoy your winter breaks and rest up. Happy Holidays and drive safely Bobcats! See you all in the New Year!

STUDENT COUNCIL UPDATE By Haley Myatt

Blueprint Editors

Rhyanne Beatty, Lucas Olscamp

& Emily Cornish

Comics Editor

Lauren Adams

Teacher Advisor

Nancy MacIntosh

Book:

The Hunger Games Author:

Suzanne Collins

The Hunger Games is set in a futuristic location called Panem. Panem is what’s left of North Amer-ica. Katniss, the main character, is from Dis-trict 12; one of the many districts in Panem. Katniss is sixteen years old and has been head of the house since her father died. Once a year, The Capital gets all the dis-tricts to send two people between the ages of twelve and eighteen, one boy and one girl, to compete in the Hunger Games. Katniss steps up to take her sisters place in the games and never suspected she would change Panem forever. Follow Kat-niss’ story of challenge, love, hard-ship and friendship. I give this book a five star rating.

By Julia Wilkie

BOOK TALK

Protection. Understanding. Re-spect. Peace. Love. Equality. That’s the motto of Bluefield’s newest com-mittee. The P.U.R.P.L.E. Committee is a group of dedicated students who want to help make difference in their community and their school. Project facilitator Chris Doiron and co-chairs Amy MacQuarrie and Timothy O’Brien started this com-mittee with one goal in mind: equal-ity for everyone. The Committee stems from the Purple Spirit Day we had back in October to raise aware-ness and show support for the ho-mophobic bullying crisis. The P.U.R.P.L.E. Committee is a safe place to come, talk and learn. With guest speakers, presentations and event days in mind, you can expect a lot from them. Recently, the com-mittee sold tickets for AIDS P.E.I.’s “12 Days of Give-A-Ways” and as a result, AIDS P.E.I. donated 25% of the profits from the P.U.R.P.L.E. sales back to the committee! Mrs. Coffin and Ms. Hastelow serve as teacher advisors, with Ms. Hastelow graciously donating her classroom for the meetings. Meetings are bi-weekly at 12:00 in the Drama Room (Rm. 123) and anyone is welcome! If you’re interested, stop by at their next meeting on December 21st! Come hang out! Bring your lunch and a friend! Lots of things are planned for the New Year. Talk to Mrs. Coffin, Ms. Hastelow or Chris Doiron for more information.

So, while watching 101 Dal-matians, I realized that my newspaper article was due. And then I realized that this is most likely our last edition before the Christmas break. I just love Christmas, don’t you? If you don’t, please don’t rain on my parade. So, back to my calling: informing people of the clubs that they were unable to attend. Note to Drama Club members:

SEEING P.U.R.P.L.E. By Timothy O’Brien

By Agent Blue

please come to all meet-ings, or at least most of them. It’s really hard to

have a rehearsal with only five people, the director, and super-visors. Other than that, the play is excellent. I’m not quite sure how Writing Club went, as I was unable to attend and was also unable to get information on the matter. I’m sure it was fabulous. SAGL is planning on entering the Battle of the Book Clubs, and will at some point prepare a presentation. And while win-ning isn’t everything, any ath-lete will tell you, it’s the only thing! So do well SAGL, or I will write a strongly worded letter… just kidding. As far as my sources tell me, Art Club is still as popular as it was, and I’m sure it will remain so. Chess Club has started up for anyone wishing to better their intellect. Just repeat that last sentence and you’ll feel smarter and smarter. Agent Blue is taking a break from the prowl to get fat on Christmas candy. See ya!

IN THE HALLWAYS

THANKS By the Students

Bluefield has been grateful for all the help from the many UPEI student teachers that have come to our school to learn more about in-the-class teaching. These student teach-ers have given us Bobcats the highest respect and gratitude for their chance to work with us. Many of the student teach-ers have also gone out of their way to continue their help be-yond class time with extracur-ricular activities. They are hardworking and dedicated individuals and we wish them all the best in their future teaching careers. Thanks for everything! Happy holidays!

Dear Ryan Murphy Claus, I’ve been moderately good throughout the year, with only a few insults flung at a few friends here and there. Sure, I kicked that hobo in the teeth, but come on. He was trying to steal my falafel. I know I may not be fully deserving, but think of all the other kind, intelligent gleeks out there, with only one wish for this Christmas: A sane, cohesive second half of Glee season two. Maybe some world peace along with it, but mostly Glee. To make this wish easier for you to grant, I’ve rounded up some tiny suggestions for you: - Stop introducing new char-acters. Sure, the addition of Blaine and Sam was... impor-tant? But really, the show’s overflowing with fresh faces. Everyone’s being jostled around like Oprah in a Belly Burner, only appearing every couple

episodes. We’re losing touch with characters we previously adored. Make plots a little more attainable. We’ve been feeling

a bit detached lately, with all that non-sensible storyline thrown on the screen. Sure, everyone on

Glee is m e a n t to be a little bit o v e r -t h e -top, but y o u c a n ’ t j u s t t h r o w b a s i c charac-t e r t r a i t s

out the window for the sake of a laugh. - Axe the Autotune. Seriously, we’ll listen to the original pop songs if we want to hear a tweaked and processed voice screech the lyrics at us. With all that Broadway talent, Glee

should be able to mix up some nifty new takes on our top 40 hits. - Quit the drama. We get it. The world has issues. Homo-phobia, bullying, obesity, blah, blah, blah. Glee used to be good at keeping these issues light-hearted. Now we’re stuck with less glee and more glum. - Make us like the characters again. We can’t like Kurt when he’s being a creepy attention-seeker, and we can’t like Will when he’s acting like a whiny and hormone-ravaged 13-year-old. We want to root for our protagonists, not criticize them. Sure, we gleeks could just leave a show that we have so many qualms with. We should-n’t have to clamour for the bet-terment of entertainment. But it’s Glee. It has promise. We can’t abandon a show when it teases us so. Listen to our cries, Ryan Murphy Claus! See our tears! We wail for justice! Ugh, just make the show all better and stuff, OK?

THE LAZY MAKER By Sean Young

Getting into the Christmas spirit means drinking eggnog, going caroling, baking cookies, and of course, attending some local holiday performances! This year the Confederation Center is putting on the Christ-mas Blaze – A Celtic Kitchen Party, and I was privileged last week to join my drama class in

attending the matinée version of the show which was half the length but with just as much spice! The show features Stephanie Cadman and Celtic Blaze along with Shawn Silver’s Talamh an Éisc Traditional Irish Dancers, and PEI favour-ites, Catherine O’Brien, Joey Kitson and Wade Lynch. The special component to this local

show is one of our own Blue-field Bobcats, Cameron Fran-cis. Cameron is a grade twelve

student who has been dancing since a very young age and has worked professionally with the Confederation Center and High-land Storm. He is also a student in my drama class and has ex-pressed his love for performing in dancing through our class cof-fee houses and in acting in our many creative activities. Cam-eron is the sole male dancer in Christmas Blaze and steals the show with a spellbinding solo. His step dancing entwines tradi-tional Celtic moves along with modern and unique approaches to music. With every dance num-ber Cameron performed he was graced with roaring cheers and after his solo, a thunder of clap-ping and a standing ovation. With fluid movements and catchy beats, Cameron’s dancing is a show of its own. If you are interesting in attending a won-derful, heartwarming festive show, then check out the Christ-mas Blaze – A Celtic Kitchen Party at the Confederation Cen-ter. Tickets are on sale at the Confederation Center box office and are starting at $20. A Christmas feast of incredi-ble traditional dance, stories, and song with an unexpected kitchen party mix of holiday music, pop, jazz and blues, and original com-edy. Support our talented Bobcat Cameron Francis and check out the show!

BLAZING DANCER By Lucas Olscamp

Have you ever watched some-one write? Have you ever identified those born calligraphers, with their long liquid strokes, hold-ing the pen like a delicate ca-nary bone, creating art with every waltzing dance of their wrist? How about those who are destined writers, with their fe-vered devotion to the words spilling onto the page, with no care to the formation of individ-ual letters, just an energy and tempo so intent? Have you ever watched those who never learned the fluent language that wrists share with fingers, which translate to the foreign language of the pen? They bend over the paper, fists clenched about the pen, with their mouths agape as they clumsily transfer their thoughts doggedly and with much effort. Strong hands, soft palms, an-gled wrists, fingers bent just-so. Writing might be one of the characteristics of advanced soci-ety, but it would be nothing were it not for the thick, thin, strong, weak wrists which faith-fully translate thoughts shallow and profound. These are beauti-ful things.

TO WRITE By Abby Sawyer

SENTIMENTAL CHRISTMAS By Patrick Jeffrey

The Best Things Ever Right Now:

The Wish Book. A He-Man Christmas. Sleeping over at Gram and Poppi's on the couch next to the tree like old times. The smell of spruce sap. Shovel-ing snow off the trampoline year after year after year and never, ever learning your les-son. Drinking a carton of egg-nog while decorating the Christ-mas tree. Having eggnog in-duced nightmares. Contemplat-ing opening presents sneakily with an Exacto knife, then chickening out at the last sec-ond. Clementines. Black and white films. Never removing your hat. Generic holiday Google Doodles. Gremlins, an inexplicable holiday classic.

Over-watering the tree and fran-tically drying presents. Saying "Hey! We should go caroling" every year. Never going caroling for some reason. Singing louder than anyone at the Women's In-stitute Christmas tree lighting. Collapsing in a snow bank as you walk home from said Christmas

tree lighting. The Food and Warmth Show. CBC Holiday Magic. Getting the truck stuck while hauling the tree out of the woods; walking a kilometer to get help. Arranging and rear-ranging presents under the tree.

Loving the vegetarian life as you cram extra stuffing into your maw. Walking the dog in the Christmas Eve rain. That one year mom and dad read the Night Before Christmas to us while tipsy. Hilarious. Sleigh Rides on Christmas Eve. Cran-berry juice. Waking up in the

morning, seeing a centimeter of snow that wasn't there last night, getting excited, then for-getting about it for the rest of the day. A forever repeating Colin James Christmas CD that never actually gets old. Freaky masks. Icy Squares. Sipping cider from Styrofoam cups. Pretending you're an alcoholic with shot glass after shot glass

of sweet, nourishing eggnog. NORAD's Santa Tracker. The punch bowl. Throwing snowballs at the mailbox. Staying up all night with your sister, sneaking downstairs at 5am. Finally, Christmas socks.

Reid, Gael MacEachern and less intensely Elizabeth Rankin. Nationally, Wikileaks, a web-site which makes classified gov-ernment information freely available to the public, has sur-v iv ed cy b er-attacks, threats, and the dropping of its web server by its service pro-vider in the wake of recent revela-tions causing dip-lomatic mayhem and prompting a senior Canadian political advi-sor to insinuate that Wikileaks' founder should be assassinated. Newfoundland and Labrador have sworn in their first female premier, Kathy Dunderdale, less

Locally, UPEI is starting a new class aimed at prospective students in West Prince, a hy-brid of in-class and online learn-ing slated to begin in 2011. The class, called University 103W, will attempt to give potential students an idea of what the uni-versity experience is like. In other educational news, the Eastern School District's govern-ing body, its board of trustees, is extremely dysfunctional, a state of affairs which was blamed on three specific board members in a confidential mediator's report. The named trustees were Edna

NEWS By Bill MacGregor

Hey Bobcats, I can't believe it’s this time of year, its Christ-mas! And for this Christmas I want to get your opinions on what Christmas really means! It’s a question I've seemed to be asked lately from friends and family. To me, Christmas means spending as much time with my family from away as possible, and celebrating the “true mean-ing of Christmas.” But what does the “true meaning of Christmas” really mean to Bluefield? I went around and asked a few of our fellow Bobcats what Christmas really means to them and here is what they said. "Christmas is a time to spend

than a century after women gained the right to vote in their region. Internationally, Ai Weiwei wanted to accept the award as proxy for the first Chinese Nobel

Peace Prize laureate in history, but was prevented by the Chinese govern-ment from leaving the country only a week before the ceremony. Many

Chinese activists and lawyers have had restrictions placed upon their movements recently to prevent them from attending the Nobel Peace Prize ceremony in Oslo. Liu Xiaobo, the actual laureate, is currently in jail.

with my family around me. Tra-ditions are the excitement of my year! Reading “Old Saint Nicho-las”, drinking a glass of eggnog, and opening one present Christ-mas Eve. Christmas means a time of love and joy. Presents are a bonus on top of that. So turn on that radio of yours, and start eating your chocolate calendar. The countdown begins!"- Grade 11 "Christmas is a joyous time of year where you spend time with family, sit by the fire and are grateful for everything God brings!" -Grade 12 "The best part of Christmas is pigging out on turkey and dress-ing." -Grade 12 "Christmas means giving, family and spending time with friends!" -Grade 11 "Christmas is a time for hap-

piness and reflection and getting together with family." -Grade 10 "Christmas means you can finally turn up the heat and deco-rate exactly how you want!" -Grade 10 "Christmas time is the most wonderful time of year, putting up the Christmas tree and deco-rating. It means everything to me and my family." -Grade 11 “I just want Christ back in Christmas." - Grade 11 There you have it folks, the results are in: family is the most important thing on Christmas. Have a very safe and Happy Holiday!

SPEAKING UP By Katelyn Snow