The Plumber's Faucet

EUS Election Results You voted, and you were heard. Here are the results of the 2005 EUS elections.

President: Maria Mastorakos VP Services: Kate Gardner VP Internal: Alexandra Bishop VP External: Catherine Pollock VP Academic: Yunlu Shen VP Communication: Billy Denman SSMU reps: Elizabeth Munroe and Kristina Huss

“I do not regret the things that I have done, but those I did not do.” ome gather ‘round children. I wish impart my knowledge to you so that you may benefit where I have faltered. What entitles me to this grandeur status you ask? Nothing, other than the fact that we put this damned paper together on my computer and I always get to look at it last before we go to print. Therefore, I will make horrible abuse of my power and take the front page for my own personal agenda, vendetta, rant, rave, roar, bitch, piss, moan and just about any other form of blathery I can fathom. I will also defy all literary convention by randomly introducing new, nonsensical words such as blathery. Hmmm… shit, I just looked it up and blather is actually a word. Nevermind then.

As I was saying, the purpose of this article is to allow you to see five years of McGill university through my eyes, and in doing so, walk away with some knowledge of how to live life (or at bare minimum how NOT to live life). Before continuing, please read the disclaimer below.

Cat food is not an acceptable meal supplement.

I don’t care if you’re preparing it in a Bordeaux marinate, or smothering it in grey poupon, that shit was designed for Fluffy, not you or I. The point here is that nutrition is important. I started my first year in rez, which was a convenient transition. We had meals during the week, but were to fend for ourselves on the weekends. This allowed me to eat borderline sanitary food during the week, and experiment with my culinary arts over the weekend.

Several fire alarms and a few hours of blindness later, I started to get the hang of it. I began to do away with ramen noodles, KD and alphagetti. I learned that cooking can be fun, easy, rewarding and oh so tasty. (see page 11 for a few recipes) The key is to cook for your roommate and then guilt them into cleaning up.

Become a true master chef and start cooking for ladies at your place. Granted this has gotten me nowhere, but I’ll just bet someone could make it work.

Disclaimer: This is my life, it is not yours.

This is my opinion, not yours.

These are my actions, not yours.

This was my pain, not yours.

These are my pictures, not yours.

My body endured this, not yours.

My mind walked this path, not yours.

My knees suffered this, not yours.

My liver survived this, not yours.

This is the world through my eyes.

For the love of God and all things sacred, don’t make these things yours.

“Ok I’ll just have one” are the most infamous last words ever.

McGill Security has no authority unless you Drinking is not a bad thing. Normal human beings drink to be more sociable, to show them a McGill ID have a good time, to relieve some stress, and to get their mind off things. At Intrinsically tied to the drinking point is the long times during my university career, it appeared as though I was drinking to arm of the law. A lesson here is best taught practice projectile vomiting on statues. Albeit I can count the number of times through a fictitious example which of course I’ve puked on one hand, however this simply meant that when I drank, the never happened. When urinating off the roof of booze stayed with me. I may or may not have been kicked out of a bar for the arts building, it is best to speak to security falling asleep on a pool table. I may have more than once woken up with an in a drunken New York accent. Play the, ‘lost unidentifiable woman on my arm. I seem to recall jumping off a staircase while out of towner’ role that must have taken a wrong drunk and finding myself in crutches for 4 months. However, it is completely turn at the Ferrier building and somehow ended fictitious that I walked into blues pub naked and drunk off my ass; I was relatively up on the roof. Bonus points if tell him you’re sober for that moment. The key to drinking heavily is to always have friends to trying to get home and HORRIBLY drink with. A good example was my 20th birthday. I had a solemn crew of around 30 out whom had all mispronounce an obviously French street (De decided to purchase prairie fires (I’ll tell you when you’re older) for my birthday. The night was ended mayonnaise?). when Bram bought a tumbler full of tequila, which I mistook as water. Now, I’m not sure how I got home, but luckily, a note was left which my roommate, Jesse, received. It read: “Jesse, Shane may be dead. Love his friends.”

It’s not that professors hate everyone… they just hate you.

Think logically. In any given class, someone almost always gets an A. Therefore, the theory that professors simply dislike students simply does not hold. Professors are at University to teach. After all, from attending McGill for nearly five years I can tell you flat out that the most important concern of McGill’s administration is their students. While I attempt to shorten my nose, I’ll finish by saying that if professors logically must like students there is only one possible explanation. Since you, just like myself are no doubt a complete genius, the times in which we obtain bad marks, are simply situations in which our professors hate us. I therefore urge you to take pity on your professors and their petty trickery. Someday they will see our true genius and regret ever holding ill refute against us.

You Haven’s Lived until you: I can get A’s without studying, and I can get C’s by working hard.

For a long time this one baffled me. I’ve worked my ass off in certain courses to get by on the edge of my seat. I’ve treated other classes like a math competition with an arts student and pulled out with an A. Again, this could tie back to my previous point about hate; however I feel a deeper agent is at work. What we must realize is that some things just hit us, and others just hit us from behind. In every exam situation someone is always getting screwed, the key is to hope that you’re the one on top.

Deadlines are merely suggestions.

Everyone’s a pushover. Ask and ye shall receive.

-Date a waitress from your favorite bar -Go to the casino and learn that your friend has a gambling problem -Collect for charity wearing 20 cm long aluminum claws -Steal a keg of soda from a club (and have no idea what to do with it for 3 years) -Shave your friend’s head in his sleep -Five numbers, one night… good luck -Wear women’s underwear at a party -Carry $5000 across campus in a backpack -Join a male synchronized swimming team (www.eus.mcgill.ca/pictures/synchro_boys.avi) -Host your own pirate radio station (WFUQ will never die) -Chug a beer at an 8:30 calculus class -Win a national engineering competition with a presentation revolving around Baywatch -Loot a supply room at a ship yard in Halifax -Be the ‘shooter girl’ at a party -Mud wrestle in the remains of the broomball rink -Sing in a metal band -Host a party with your closest 4000 friends

Women are the creation of Satan designed to steal Christmas from baby Jesus and punch furry woodland creatures in the gut.

Now, let’s get one thing straight. It’s not that I have a problem with women; it’s that they seem to have a problem with me. As I am however infallible, the issue must therefore spawn from their extra X chromosome. They refuse to be categorized or labeled and we can’t tell the good ones from the bad ones. There is something about women that reaches beyond the grasp of a male’s train of thought. I personally think that this is all just a fun game they enjoy.

Meetings are every second Wednesday to discuss the latest flaws in the male persona and exploit new ways to torment us. Women seem to be a greater mystery than all of the world’s hidden secrets combined. Aliens may exist.

The lost city of Atlantis may not be a myth after all. The never-ending universe may just have an end. However, women are an uncertainty which shall forever remain a mystery.

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Next year SSMU plans to offer voters a 4.0 CGPA!!!

by Emma This year SSMU sent out a mass email bribing people to vote with a chance to win a choice of 1,600 in McGill tuition or $2000 in travel arrangements.

This is part of a well thought out plan to have the highest voter turn out in all of Canada. This is part of a 3 year plan, kind of like AA but the abridged version.

Step 1: As prescribed, SSMU is offering a chance to win money/tuition to bribe students to vote. This is an effective way to raise voting numbers and increase awareness of SSMU politics. This encourages people who don’t care about student politics to vote. They were always allowed but now they will surface in mass numbers in hope of winning money. This way, people who are even less aware of the current SSMU issues, than those who were already voting (who don’t know that much more) now will go and cast a random ballot for which ever name sounds the funniest or inevitably vote for “the girl”. This has one major advantage: it increases SSMU “democracy” by increasing the number of random ballots thus making the shoein candidates actually have to campaign for fear of losing to the chair or worse yet, one of the other candidates.

Step 2: Next year SSMU will offer a 4.0 CGPA to increase voter turn out even more. This is a good tactic for large schools like McGill where there is no end of discussion about an A+, so why not go one better? This also appeals to the larger faculties like Science and Arts who either desperate need a 4.0 or won’t get a job with out one. This has other positive side effects as well, like it could increase our science and pre-med enrollment.

Step 3: In the final step of this no fail plan, the SSMU will dangle the degree of your choice in front of voters. No better way to get 100% turn out than offering voters to get out of here ASAP, degree in hand. And even better, it may not even be the degree to were in, think of the glory of a lucky arts student trading in their McDonalds uniform for a hard hat and steel toed boots in order to design a bridge. Besides, I always wanted a boss from Music.

Volume 21, Issue 6, March 2005

The Plumbers’ Faucet Room 7, McConnell Engineering Building McGill University 3480 University St. Montreal QC H3A 2K6 Tel: (514) 398-4396 Fax: (514) 398-5004 Theplumbersfaucet@mcgilleus.ca Editors: Emma Petch Shane Saunderson The Faucet Would like to thank the following Contributers: Dave Birtch, Meryl Sponder, Larry Lessard, Zach Veaner, Peter Szilagyi, Maria Jaworski, Simon Dandavino, François Poirier, Zavie Berenbaum, Tommy Di Stefano and the EUS Executive.

For advertising information, please contact the editors for details about advertising in the Plumber’s Faucet.

Other ideas that failed to make the three year plan were paying each student individually but realized that this plan was too high maintenance and the cost of implementation was twice what would be doled out to students, thus it wasn’t good voter numbers for their buck. SSMU also considered paying candidates by the number of people who voted for them, they already pay exces why stop there, right? But this was candidates to do their jobs usually this is not a problem for SSMU, but it was deemed to undemocratic, even for SSMU. Giving out lollipops seemed too childish, despite its incredible effectiveness in engineering. Another idea, was actually raising awareness on campus about SSMU politics, but that was rejected because it was considered too hard and did not appeal to their demographic. There was also a lot of discussion about having bikini models working at the voting station, but there was concern that it might not draw enough voters, because if the Molson dancers couldn’t keep 4 floors alive there isn’t a lot of hope for keeping voting alive.

All material published in the Plumber’s Faucet is copyright of the Plumber’s Faucet as of the date of publication. The opinions in the Plumber’s Faucet are exclusively the opinions of their authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of McGill University, The Faculty of Engineering, the McGill Engineering Undergraduate Society nor necessarily the views of the editors. Submissions are accepted from all literate persons regardless of faculty. Content that is deemed not to be racist, sexist, seditious, libelous, or contravene the Canadian Charter of

Souls for Sale -Shaner Ah yes, iron ring time. All of the graduates gleaming with smiles as bright as the shimmer on their new iron ring. All of the undergrads congratulating them, with words of scorn under their breath; a truly emotional time for all.

To the bitter ones which spite me, let me say this: It is not all happiness and posies. That ‘best years of your life’ bullshit that I used to always giggle about, has recently found me in not as jovial a mood.

I used to be a student. I used to be a someone. I used to have personality.

I used to have a soul. I used to express my opinion. I used to have friends.

Now you should see me. I have entered a new stage of my life. I am a graduate. I am an adult. I am unemployed. I am an applicant. I am a kissass. I am a corporate whore. I am the all-singing, all-dancing crap of the world. I am a piece of paper; 2 pages, 11 inches tall, 8.5 inches in girth. I am filled with factual knowledge about my experience, skills and awards. I am easy on the eyes, well formatted, and in a convenient-to-read bulleted format.

My entire life is now summarized on two sheets of paper. If you ever want to be depressed, simply hold onto that fact. Until I find a job and become of some worth to a company, I have no personality. Unless of course I make it through to interviews.

Then you should see me. My face has a permanent smile plastered on it, with a small twitch in my upper lip indicating that I could snap at any moment.

My words are carefully placed with proper inflection and annunciation. I am an empty vessel, ready to be filled by my future employers with the skills that I will need to allow my company to prosper. I am a tool which will be used to support a company that I don’t care about so that I can develop and become a better human being.

My personality is the personality you want to see. I am a social chameleon and will bend and shape my will, opinion and being to suit your needs. In exchange for this ‘adaptation’ of my personality, I can only hope your gracious company will offer me a job. Currently, I have no soul. Unless of course I am synergized into the corporate structure.

Then you should see me. I no longer need my old family. I have my new family now. Along with the marketers, the messengers, the monitors and the managers. We don’t have family dinners anymore; we do lunch. My soul is full now, with my company and that is all I will ever need.

Souls for sale. Fresh, juicy and sweet. Purchase before April 29th and I’ll throw in my dignity and will at no extra cost. I’ll talk to my friends and try to work out a package deal. Buy one and get the second half off. Leasing starts as low as $149 a month, with no commitment to purchase at the end of the lease.

Rights and Freedoms will be accepted. The editors of the Plumber’s Faucet reserve the right to modify, abridge, or otherwise change any submissions without the author’s permission, in all cases content will be preserved as much as possible. All submissions must contain the author’s name and contact information. Anonymity may be requested.

This publication contains satire, parodies, and expressions of thought that not all readers may understand or share. Reader discretion is thus advised. Any comments about the Plumber’s Faucet or material within must

be directed in writing to the above contact addresses. Publication of such comments is at the writer’s request. Letters for publication should be kept below 500 words. Protests must follow Article 8 of The Constitution of The Plumber’s Faucet, which is available for public viewing at the above addresses. Any similarities between material in the Plumber’s Faucet and material that has a copyright is unintentional and coincidental, unless attribution has been given to use such material.

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The Plumber’s Faucet | March 2005

students were very much different from the Response to Ms. Petch’s Editorial students of other science faculties. Engineers In a recent issue of the Plumber’s Faucet, I read were supposed to be more practical people who the article “E-Week is going to Hell in a loved to deal with real-life problems. It was the Handbasket” by Emma Petch. In her article, she main reason that in my case, I never considered lamented about how things have changed over joining the Physics Department or some such her 5 years here at McGill. Specifically, how thing. However, engineers these days have a attendance has been dwindling, petty very heavy reliance on the use of computers that competitiveness has ruined the fun, and the near seems to have changed the very demographics absence of the “hard core” brand of engineering of the student population. Entrance into student that we once had. Emma noticed this over engineering is based mainly on grades, so an her 5-year period, but I have been in the picture engineer nowadays could very well be the type for over a 27 year period since I entered as a U1 of person that has been sitting in front of his Mechanical Engineering student in 1978. computer throughout his teenage years instead of going outside to play sports. For this we can The trend towards “non-participation” is always a easily verify the declining participation in flagball disturbing one, especially to those (like Emma) and broomball and confirm that there is little to who have put in a lot of effort and spare time into no participation from the likes of Computer and organizing events and contributing to the spirit of Electrical Engineering. The second major engineering. Similar trends happened in 1983- change in demographics is the ever-increasing 85 when a group of less-than-adequate types took percentage of non-Canadian students that make over the leadership of the PPO. This happened up our student body. This is certainly not a again in the mid-1990’s when the aura of the great negative thing for our Faculty, but it does show “Rob Megeney” (now owner of Brutopia Pub) that perhaps times are changing and engineering faded and participation in engineering fell to new must adapt. Does a student from Sri Lanka, low. I think we are currently seeing another one who has never seen snow except for in the of these low points in engineering these days also. icebox, have any desire to play broomball at The good news is that there always seems to be minus 20 degrees? I think it is unlikely. a cycle to these things (like the circle of life in the The Glee Club Effect: I noticed something Lion King). There will be years where participation bizarre a few years back. Some students were is low and then we may see things improve maybe going to events, such as the Blues Pub, wearing in a few years from now. “anti-PPO” regalia, and were proud of it. Some of these students seemed to be amongst the most Let me try to suggest, from the point-of-view of a active participants of our faculty. The reason was relative outsider, what are the current problems simple: to them, the PPO was some kind of “Glee facing participation and engineering spirit in Club” and these anti-PPO types were not about general. From what I see, there are four main to let them get away with being the social leaders problems. of engineering. The PPO appears more like the high school choir club, with its bake sales and Changing Demographics of the Engineering other charity events designed to make them Population: It used to be a given that engineering socially acceptable. Its almost as if the PPO was afraid to get its funding cut off from the EUS so it has gradually transformed itself into a “gentler, kinder” PPO to avoid trouble. The negative side to this attitude is that the PPO can no longer attract the Your training Votre formation kind of leadership and participation makes all the fait toute la it once had. The person who difference différence would normally be perfect for leading the PPO now finds it ridiculous and has rather become the leader of the anti-PPO. Thus times have changed and things can never be the same. I am sure the current membership of the PPO is very happy to be there and that they are having a good time doing what they are doing. Good for them. However, what does that do for participation? I think that some of your true leaders (“hard core” as Emma put it) are now doing other things.

Potential for a Possibilité de prime The EUS Clique: Emma also recruitment bonus d’embauche, en entrementions the fact that fewer people when you sign up for prenant une carrière are participating in events and its an engineering career en génie qui fera always the same people. It with a difference! toute la différence ! becomes a “clique” of people who all know each other as organizers and EUS volunteers who are at all the events. It becomes a vicious circle where only the clique actually find out about what is going on and they seem to be organizing events only for themselves. Once people feel excluded from the group, then you are not likely to see them anywhere. There has to be an ability to reach out to more people in order to avoid this problem.

RP Scum : The “Resume Padding Scum” can sometimes have the worst influence on engineering spirit. This is the type of person who badly wants to get himself a title on an EUS committee in order Strong. Proud. Today’s Canadian Forces. to make his resume look better.

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participate. I could cite specific examples of this in recent years in some of the committees that I have had to deal with as a professor. However, I don’t want to sound spiteful, so it is best not to mention any names. They will burn in hell someday if there is any justice in this world.

So what to do? All I have done is talk about problems and not solutions. I am just an outsider and as a professor, I am only a minimal participant.

Here is what I would suggest as a starting point for discussions that should take place amongst yourselves. First and most important is that the changing demographics needs to be recognized and you must adapt accordingly. Emma talked about engineering week non-participation, so new ideas need to be developed. Off the top of my head, I can come up with a few silly ideas. What about a game of “snow cricket” out on lower campus during E-Week? Certainly the East Indian students would participate and could combine with some crazy Canucks to play a completely silly version of the game (not to mention bringing cultural groups together). Another idea: I am not sure if this is still done, but it used to be that every day of E-Week there would be a different department putting on food and drink at 5pm in the common room (e.g., Civil Engineering Souvlaki and drinks on Tuesday, Mech Pizza and Beer on Wednesday, etc.). Why not organize this more along ethnic lines, such as Korean Barbecue on Monday, or some such thing, organized by different groups. This could increase participation and help with cultural awareness. I am sure that creative young minds can come up with a multitude of other ideas that could work.

One thing is essential, especially if one wants to combat the type of problem that is mentioned in points 2, 3 and 4 above: and that is good leadership. It is amazing what a few leaders can do if they can get people going. Since I avidly participate in the sport of broomball, I cite the current broomball season as a good example. The previous two years were plagued with frustrating problems that just made me want to quit. This year, the number of teams has increased dramatically from 6 to 10 and the whole operation seems to be running smoothly. Referees show up to their games, the games start relatively on time, there are few cancellations or rescheduled games, and there are fewer incidents of fighting (the referees are in control). The current success is due in large part to the work of two good sports reps, who have managed to bring the sport up from the brink of extinction. It is amazing what can be accomplished with a dedicated leader.

Other engineering committees should take note.

Larry Lessard Current job: professor in Mechanical Engineering Former career (a long time ago): E-Week organizer, captain of flagball and broomball team, Pubnite manager, class rep, and leader of the PPO.

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Concrete Toboggan Team hits 2nd highest speed in history of Toboggan Race!

It was a cold, slightly-snowy February day in Calgary. Ahead laid the beast ready for its pray. The beast was the track, former site of the 1988 Olympic ski jump hill. Five brave members of the McGill Concrete Toboggan Team begin their walk up to the starting line at the top of the hill. On our way up, we notice a banner displaying “the Hill vs. Us”, “us” being all the competing toboggans that successfully completed the track, “the hill” representing the crashes. The McGill toboggan was 16th to run at GNCTR 2005 (The Great Northern Concrete Toboggan Race). At this point the hill was winning by a landslide, or rather by an avalanche. The five McGill sledmen get into position on the toboggan we proudly built, at the top of the hill. The finish line and the hoard of onlookers look minuscule, the hill daunting, the slope scary and the toboggan designed by Josh petrifying. Green flag: aaaaand go!

A quick drop, stomachs in our chests, wind gushing past us, we hit 72 Km/ h within a matter of seconds. We continue our ascent praying that we do not flip over or crash into the snow banks on the sides of the track. The toboggan shifts towards one side of the track and slightly touches the snow bank, then shifts to the other side and touches the other snow bank losing the front nose of the toboggan. Our speed is still in excess of 65 Km/h and

From the Inside Looking Out: Engineer + Engineer = Disaster Have you ever noticed that as engineers, we are very isolated in our own little world. At McGill we make fun of the management students because they are over at Bronfman High, but we don’t realize that we are just as bad. What is even worse, is our unexplainable attraction to each other.

Being a female in engineering, things work to your advantage and disadvantage all at the same time. Everyone knows that two engineers together are doomed, and yet it happens all the time. To a certain extent anyways...

Our Friday night Blue’s Pub tradition helps us unwind from the long, nearly unbearable week of assignments, midterms and projects. What most of us don’t realize, or choose to ignore, that it is one large setup for internal engineering mating. Not that it is everyone, but some of us do put ourselves in that situation. How many times has it happened that on Monday morning there is a buzz going around the calculus class, that John and Jane hooked up last Friday? The question we should be asking is not why this is happening, but is this necessarily a bad thing.

As engineers, we are under a lot of pressure to succeed and get high marks, so that we can go out later in the workforce and continue working our asses off. The ultimate problem is that, once we get to the workforce, it is in that environment that we should be serious and concentrate on our work. So when do we get to go out and party and let loose and do some crazy stuff?

Well I think by now it is obvious, we are in our last stage before the work time, now is the best answer. But lets look at it logically. We claim that there are very few people, other than the ones in engineering, who understand the stress and work load that we endure. So when we are put in the situation of a quick fix needed to help us out with that stress relief, what better option do we have than one of our fellow engineers to help us out. So all these female and male engineers are just looking to have some fun, which they do, and there is nothing wrong with that being two (or more) consenting adults. But why are we doomed?

It is one simple fact, we are engineers, our apparent temporary understanding of each other and the highlife of university gets the better of us, but it at least helps us sell our wild oats while we are still young. Although this said similarity between us is what causes arguments and the highly unlikelihood of long term relationships to succeed. So what is the best response for this...well suck it up, and just go with the flow. We are all so bothered about how things are going to work out for us, that we don’t realize that the whole point of university is to discover ourselves, make mistakes, and well just have a good time (all the time while being safe). So do I think I will ever grow up to marry an engineer? Well probably not, but you never know, I rather just go with the flow and do what I feel like doing. I have dated engineers, and have vowed each time never to do it again, but I never seem to listen to myself. Oh well, we’re not all perfect (even though we claim we are)!

2nd Year Female Engineer

the finish line is now quickly approaching. Will the brakes work? Can any brake Josh designed possibly work? We pass the finish line- deploy the brakes!

So did the brakes work? You could say they did, you could also say that the five sledmen were instantly expelled from the toboggan as the toboggan went from 64 to 0 Km/h in less a metre. Don’t worry, no casualties, just a few broken bones. Nah, everyone was ok.

So did we win the competition? We did get 1st place for the fastest time. We did get the second highest speed ever attained in the 31 year history of the competition, but we didn’t quite win. It appears that a “good” brake is defined as one that provides the best deceleration while keeping the sledmen safely inside the toboggan. Small detail we overlooked. Oh well, next year. The important part is that we all learned about concrete, designing and building a toboggan, and teamwork.

Ok, who am I kidding? Aside from the 500 hours or so of preparatory work before the competition and the 4 hours or so of racing, we were partying with 350 of our closest friends from 30 engineering schools across Canada, from Wednesday, February 2nd until Sunday, February 6th – straight: Partied up the hotel, emptied “Outlaws” of beer, line-danced and judged a Hawaiian Tropic bikini-contest at “Cowboys”, and drank Purple Jesus, room-hopping at the hotel on closing night.

Oh yeah, before I forget our best award. Even among the many 30-member teams at the loudest, most spirited competition I have ever experienced, our small 16-member team was given honourable mention for team spirit.

Even more honourable is Josh being named Drunk of GNCTR 2005. To those of you that don’t quite understand the significance of this, it’s something like being called Drunk of the year at an Alcoholics Anonymous centre.

To the Team: it was a pleasure and an honour to be your captain.

The team: CPR, Super-Deb, Hummer, Special Ed, J-man, Cruiser, PWO, Heavy-K, BPP, Slippery, Scoopy, Shaver, Lex, Don’t Tell, Reena and Liz: You guys make my heart beat way down in the bottom of my chest, you give me that special feeling in the cockles of my heart, maybe below the cockles, maybe in the sub cockle area, maybe in the liver, maybe in the kidneys, maybe even in the colon, I don’t know. What I’m trying to say is I’m gonna miss you guys, but the good times and our friendships will always live on.

To everyone else: join the team; you won’t believe what you’ve been missing!

Congratulations to Debra Cohen and Ellen Kobayashi on winning the election for co-Captains of the 2005-2006 McGill Concrete Toboggan Team.

Make daddy proud.

-Captain Peter “Egon/Pickle/Princess” Szilagyi

The Plumber’s Faucet | March 2005

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MINING GAMES 2005 Sudbury, Ontario The 15th Annual Canadian Mining Games took place in Sudbury, Ontario from February 24th to 26th. The event drew ten Universities from across Canada and the three day competition consisted of numerous physical and practical events including Mine Design, Mine rescue and the esteemed Jackleg Competition. The McGill delegation had an outstanding performance throughout the events and finished 2nd overall behind the host University. In addition, McGill won both the Jackleg and Mechanical Design competition. The Jackleg event was done by Anton Chan and Erik Couture, and James Windisch led the Mechanical Design team.

The opening banquet played host to the Seminar competition, where Lloyd Rowson eloquently discussed the “Challenges and Opportunities in the Mining Industry” on behalf of McGill. Our delegates look especially sharp; all wearing red tops and black bottoms.

The first night proved to be some sort of initiation, with the Boat Race competition taking place at Peddler’s Pub. Our team consisted of Lloyd Rowson, Bernie Haley, Phil Goubau and Andrew Chapman. After that night of intoxication, live music, pool and wrestling in the bar it was time to prepare for the following day on two hours of sleep. As with all the events, winners were only announced at closing and awards ceremony.

After a great breakfast at Eddie’s on Friday morning, we headed to Dynamic Earth (Big Nickel), an interactive earth sciences centre where Mine Surveying, Mine Rescue, and Ventilation competitions took place. The surveying team had a slew of photographers and news cameras on them as they performed their timesensitive measurement. The team consisted of Daphnee Karine Dumas, Erik Couture, Thomas Bohdal and Anton Chan. Our Mine Rescue team didn’t fair quite as well, apparently leaving a shock victim but saving a dead guy. Better luck next time boys! The ventilation competition proved to be “slightly” over our heads. The stellar team consisted of Lloyd Rowson, Bernard Haley, Stephen Ling and Maria Jaworski. We were giving a box of exceedingly technical instruments and told to compute NVP and R1,2 values; all we found was that Lloyd can run at 184ft/min.

Following Dynamic Earth, we headed to the Fisher Wavy quarry for the first of two Materials Handling events and the Jackleg competition. Phil Goubau and Andrew Chapman took on the halfyard Cat Loader. This event consisted of driving through a series of cones, loading your shovel, travelling, dumping, and returning to the start point. This was a timed event and penalties were given for hitting or knocking down the cones. Our boys did quite well, playing it safe on the speed side in order to avoid any penalties. Right after, the Jackleg competition took place on an actually rock face, rather than the usual cement blocks.

One had to start from scratch, put the bit onto the rod, load it into the jackleg, collar the hole, drill four feet, remove the rod, take off the bit and place it on the finish line as it were. One mistake and your chances of winning plummet. Out of all the universities, our boys went last, and they were flawless in their execution and form. We would

find out the following day they had won the $500 cash prize.

Our supper that night was at a local buffet with absolutely every food you could imagine. The combinations some people made proved to be mind boggling. After a quick rest, it was a night out on the town at Cactus Pete’s, a nice club with a decent dance floor and good music. McGill was out in full force, dancing and joking around until the wee hours of the morning.

The last day of competition was now upon us.

Despite our lack of sleep, we all showed up with the desire to perform. The events of this final day were all academically oriented, meaning we were forced to use our brains rather than our brawn. Armed with laptops and textbooks (and the few brain cells we had left), we met every challenge head on. We were faced with a slew of different events, covering just about all aspects of mining. The day started with Mine Design problem being handed to us, or rather to Lloyd Rowson, since he would be the mind behind that challenge. He had help throughout the day from Andrew Chapman and sporadic assistance from various U1s and U2s. At the same time, various events would be taking place since Mine Design was an all day project. Bernard Haley and Stephen Ling would take on Mineral Identification.

Equipment Selection and Mineral Separation was done by Erik Couture, Daphnee Karine Dumas and Maria Jaworski. The Mineral Separation event stumped all 10 schools with the task of separating chalcopyrite from quarts with only a hose, some graduated cylinders, and beakers.

Luckily we were given the correct procedure five minutes before the end of the event in order to complete the task. An Environmental essay was written by Bernard Haley and Robert Thaemlitz, and the Rock Mechanics competition by Andrew Chapman. The AutoCAD Design competition was done by James Windisch and Thomas Bohdal and earned an impressive third place finish After a break for some pizza lunch, everyone’s spirits lifted with the Mystery Event taking place outside. It was a human sled race! Phil Goubau lay on the ground with Ben Wong sitting on his stomach, while Bernard Haley and Maria Jaworski pulled them through a small track. Our red coveralls served us well and we were likely the only team who did not end up snow infested. After a quick recovery, Haley and Jaworski would complete the Blasting assignment: choosing our blastholes and setting up the blasting pattern.

AutoCAD

3rd

Mineral ID

7th

Blasting

3rd

Mineral Separation

6th

Boat Races

3rd

Mystery Event

7th

Equipment Selection

5th

Problem Set

5th

Jackleg

1st

Environmental

3rd

Materials Handling

7th

Rock Mechanics

4th

Materials Handling 2

8th

Seminar

2nd

Mechanical Design

1st

Stock Market

5th

Mine Design

4th

Survey

2nd

Mine Rescue

th

8

Ventilation

5

th

One should keep in mind that most the events of the day are only covered in late second year or third year classes; we only had 2 third year students! Consequently, we had no choice but to assign U2’s to events that they had never previously studied, while the senior students concentrated on the mine design competition.

Nobody knew what was to come from this mediocre arrangement, but everyone persevered and kept focused on the tasks at hand. We finished the day with the mechanical design competition, where McGill’s presence was undeniable. The challenge was to design and build a manually operated conveyor out of household items that could carry three different materials (salt, corn kernels and jellybeans). Our spirits were high as we watched our team’s conveyor belt breeze through these challenges.

We were judged on the amount of each product our conveyor could transport in a given amount of time.

We returned to the hotel with a sense of accomplishment. The mining games were over, but we were still looking forward to the evening’s final banquet and awards ceremony. This was held in a very appropriate venue: the Inco Cavern.

This is a large, excavated hall built on the side of a local entertainment complex in the neighbouring rock. And so, the entire delegation of the 15th annual Canadian Mining games converged on this space to wine, dine and reminisce about the weekend’s events. After the main course, the organizers took to the podium to officially wrap up the festivities and announce the winners of the individual events. We took first in two prestigious events: Mechanical design and Jackleg. To have won these events came as a pleasant surprise, seeing that these competitions are truly hands-on and worth the most in the ranking system. However, we could have never anticipated the news we were about to receive.

After the winners of each event were announced, the organizers proceeded to list the overall standings based on each school’s performance throughout the entire weekend. We were not holding our breath, seeing that we had a very young and inexperienced team. In other words, we were not expecting a high placing among the 10 competing schools. However, McGill had yet to be mentioned upon the announcement of the 3rd place team! In utter disbelief, we watched the speaker with intense anticipation, waiting to see if we had somehow managed to finish in first place… Not quite, but a close second!

The 2005 Mining Games allowed our students to mingle with students who someday will likely be our colleagues. We were extremely fortunate to be able to send nineteen students, sixteen of which were first or second year students. This experience proved invaluable to them, especially with the guarantee that McGill University will host the 17th Mining Games in 2007. Our students left quite the impression on the other universities, and are looking forward to the 2006 Mining Games hosted by Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario.

WAY TO GO MCGILL MINERS ON A SECOND PLACE FINISH!

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Déjà vu? McGill finishes 3rd at the 2005 Quebec Engineering Games

By Simon Dandavino and François Poirier We’re back! Continuing McGill’s tradition of excellence that was started last year, the McGill delegation has returned from this year’s Quebec Engineering Games with an impressive ten top 3 awards. Also, we can proudly announce that McGill finished third overall in the Games, matching last year’s success. Considering we were only 30 delegates out of a possibility of 44, this really shows the skill level of McGill Engineers.

The 15th edition of the Engineering Games was organized this year by Polytechnique. It lasted from January 3rd to January 7th. In total, 4 days of competition were organized between 9 different engineering faculties of Quebec – Rimouski and Abitibi being absent this year.

Unified Games, meant to bring everybody together, were held on the first afternoon. In the evening, a party at Cafe Campus was held for the different delegations to present their respective flags. For the second year in a row, McGill presented the best flag out of all the universities.

Sports competitions were held on the second day.

McGill proved that we are both smart and good in sports, as we dominated our sports. McGill easily won the first place in flagball, thanks to the presence of engineers from the McGill Redmen, came to a very close second place finish in dodgeball, and placed third in kickball. This astounding performance allowed McGill to place first overall in sports. Later on that evening, McGill tried to maintain its domination of improvisation, but finished fourth.

The third day tested our brains. With the loss of a few key players since last year, McGill only placed fifth in the Reach for the Top competition.

However, we were still a force to be reckoned with in the academic competitions, obtaining four top 3 positions and placing second overall in the academic competitions. We want to congratulate our two U1 chemical engineers who managed to place third in the chemical engineering competition, and our football players for a second place in the general competitions. McGill truly produces top quality engineers.

• Academic Competitions : o Electrical : 2nd place o Chemical : 3rd place o Computer : 3rd place o Mechanical : 5th place o General Knowledge : 2nd place o Simply Brillant : 7th place Finally, on the last day of the challenges, our machine navigated the maze flawlessly. It was a close call for the top three positions, but McGill finished with a disappointing third position in the machine competition.

Still, everyone will agree that the 2005 Engineering Games were a memorable experience and, after resting up a little, everybody is just about ready to do it again. This year continued McGill’s success at the Engineering Games, which will hopefully continue for many years to come. We have to acknowledge the effort of all of those among us who made this possible.

Thank you. Special thanks go to our main sponsor, the McGill ECE department, and to our other associates, Oracle, the EUS, Molson, the Faculty of Engineering, Circuits Imprimés de la Capitale, Kiewit, Hype Energy, and the Mechanical Engineering department for their contribution to our success.

McGill has been represented with pride once again. Interested in being part of the fun next year? We’re already looking for enthusiastic participants and committee members. Just Email enggames@mcgilleus.ca to show your interest.

You can also visit our website at http:// enggames.mcgilleus.ca to download pictures from this year’s games.

Canadian Engineering Competition and What I learned about the West

By Meryl Sponder The University of Calgary hosted the Canadian Engineering Competition (CEC) this past March 3-6. McGill sent three people, well okay, McGill sent two (myself and Shane Saunderson), and the Quebec Engineering Competition sent Egbert DeGroot since he’s helping to organize QEC next year.

Shane and I participated in Debate. The level of competition was really high. But in very close decisions we lost two of our three first debates, which eliminated us from the competition. So I won’t bore you too much with details.

Some highlights of our debates were some of the usual expected fun. Shane tore in to Lawyers, as usual. I flirted with the competition to improve our chances of winning. Shane drank urine during the humerous debate, which he still claims was rum, but I’m somewhat skeptical. I learned that there is only one strip club in Calgary, named the

French maid. Much to Shane’s disappointment, the waitresses were not dressed as french maids.

I had the chance to meet Shane’s sister... that explained a bit, but the boy still remains a mystery for the most part. Shane managed to strike up a conversation with General Dynamics for a while.

He even dragged Eggy and I to sit at their table at the final banquet. I think everything was going well in their conversation until Egbert dropped a tampon onto Shane’s plate.

Of note over the weekend however were a few important conclusions: Calgary has a ton of money, Calgary is desperate for Engineers, Calgary has no issues ogling women, and if you want a job these days you need to be morally flexible.

Now three of those things belong together one of those things does not belong. So I’ll start with those things that go together. Now I personally have no problem with the military or oil industry.

I realize they are both vital to our way of life, but at the same time I realize many people have issues working for these industries. At CEC there was a career fair and, unlike McGill’s career fairs, companies were actually HIRING!! However, you needed to want to work for: the Canadian Forces (apparently the Navy is particularly desperate), Shell (a major oil and gas company), General Dynamics (military technology), Bombardier

(transportation aka Military planes), PetroCanada (more oil and gas), EnCana (even MORE oil and gas), Alliance Pipeline (transporting Oil and Gas), or EnMax (energy production aka burning oil and gas… there isn’t much hydroelectricity in the prairies). See my point. And if you think I’m leaving out the “normal companies” I suggest you take a look at the sponsors page at www.cec2005.ca; this is also a good place to look if you want a job and don’t mind moving out west and working in oil.

So, back to the ogling of women. The CEC had several evening activities, of note was Friday night. We were all shuttled to a bar called “Cowboys” where they promised to teach us how to line dance. A few $2 mixed drinks later, the majority of us were on the dance floor learning the “Electric Slide.” Dance lesson over, they cleared the floor and started setting up for the Bikini contest. I kid you not. In exchange for filling out a judge’s sheet you got a free Corona, and got to watch all the lovely ladies of Calgary strut down a catwalk in a bikini and stilettos. Very classy. In a funny side story, when we returned to the hotel that night we were craving a slice of pizza. Upon inquiring at the front desk we were directed to “in front of the French Maid” (the only strip club in Calgary). Way to use your strip club as a land mark.

I hope I didn’t give you a bad impression of Calgary. That really wasn’t my intention. It is a great city and CEC was really well organized. But since Shane failed to do anything stupid enough to warrant writing about, I was lacking in topics for this article. Way to go Shane.

Editors note: I had a plethera of idiotic moments in cow town, the trick was simply to wait until Meryl and Egbert weren’t present.

The Plumber’s Faucet | March 2005

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McGill Rocks QEC

By Emma The annual Quebec Engineering Competition (QEC) was held this year in Sherbrooke on January 27-30. McGill sent it’s largest delegation to date, 34 people, to compete in this prestigious event. This is where the best and the brightest engineers in Quebec compete in 8 categories for cash prizes and the opportunity to represent Quebec at the Canadian Engineering Competition in Calgary held in the beginning of March. The categories were: Jr & Sr. Design, Innovative Design, Solution to Industrial Problems, Sociotechnical Presentation, Technical and Theoretical Presentation, Consulting Engineering, and Debate. Not only did we have at least one team compete in every category but we placed in the top 3 in Consulting Engineering, Debating, Sociotechnical Presentation (Mac campus), and Jr. Design. This was an amazing and surprising result since this was the first year that McGill was able to send students to participate in every category.

Senior Design In Senior Design each team had to build a Dam to retain water in order to produce energy (Joules) that cumulated to be “points”. Teams needed to decide how much they wanted to excavate in the reservoir to create a more powerful dam. The more you excavate, the more you had to pay, in Joules. Teams also had to program a micro controller just to indicate the RPM of the turbine that produced the energy.

Then, the energy produced was used to power a small vehicle that each team built. This vehicle had a small micro-controller to control it’s displacement and actions. The vehicle had to climb a ramp and at the end had to pour baking powder in a small cup filled with vinegar. Once it was finished, a small motor had to be powered to shake the mixture.

And finally the last step, teams had to lift a rotor (~3kg) and to move it horizontally to a certain position, and doing so with compressed air as the only source of energy.

McGill team received a special mention for their success in the step which they achieved with an inflated balloon which turned the rotor to its final position.

All the construction materials were provided (wood, step motors, transistors, plastic bags, etc.) but cost Joules. The final score was expressed in Joules, so who ever had the most at the end won.

Solution to Industrial Design The solution to industrial design presented by McGill presented was about how to make a more environmentally friendly laundry detergent.

Innovative Design The innovative design presentation was a new design for a CD holder in cars. This design was inspired by the dangers of trying to change CDs in a car. This design mounts on the dash board and is used to rest CDs on, thus acting as another hand enabling the driver to keep one hand on the wheel at all times.

Sociotechnical Presentations “Sustainable Methods of Hydrogen Production” This presentation looks into why it is important to find other forms of energy and why it is critical for the energy to be sustainable. Sustainable hydrogen production is the main focus because of its wide versatility. The presentation also looks into what government and business are doing to introduce a hydrogen economy and what the impacts would be on the society.

“Water as a Commodity” This presentation looks at the emerging controversial issues surrounding privatization and exportation of water in Quebec and the technological, environmental and social implications.

“Gaming in ‘05" This presentation was on the effects of video games on the society. It was an animated and interesting, while offering new information to people who obviously knew a lot about video games already. It started with a one-minute clip out of the infamous eleven minute “Super Mario 3 Time Attack” (basically a video in which someone finishes all of Super Mario 3 in eleven minutes flat). Needless to say, it brought back lots of childhood memories! The presentation started out by explaining how big the part video games were playing in our current society was and the extent to which they had started threatening the sales figures in the movie and television industries. Then proceeded to explain how they were here to stay with technologies such as wireless gaming, online gaming and 3rd generation gaming devices. The presentation included both negative and positive effects of video games, including a discussion on the ethics of game development and the effective supervision of gaming by parents. Lastly, the presentation discussed the future of gaming and how they can be used as a major education tool by educators. .

Technical and Theoretical Presentations “Concrete Pavements” These are being used more and more to create longer lasting and more durable pavements. Although concrete provides a great solution to this, it also has a very complicated design. One small mistake can cost a significant amount of money. This presentation looked at the technicalities behind the design of concrete pavements and the proper procedure to follow during construction. It also looked closer at the mix design and chemical composure of different types of concrete that are used for pavements.

“Trans-Fatty Acid” Trans-fat has been a hot topic in health and nutrition in the past few years. The facts and claims surrounding them have exploded right into parliament and legislation. The Fatty Acids presentation addressed: what are trans-fats and how are they different from other fats; why are they so common in food processing; the effects they have on our bodies; and the implications of banning them in Canada.

Consulting Engineering The consulting problem was two-fold. Each team had to choose a pump that would meet specified flow and pressure requirements as well as design a treatment system that would ensure certain levels of chlorine in the water. Each group had to then present their design and respond to questions from the judges.

Debate The debate topics covered a huge range of topics, everything from the SAQ strike to allowing same sex couples to adopt children. Some of the more memorable topics were BIRT (Be it resolved that): -there should be a tax on junk food that goes towards financing the health care system -the beaver replace the snowy owl on the Quebec Emblem -drugs used to treat epidemics should be free for the whole world -the SAQ should become an essential service In the past, QEC hasn’t been very popular with McGill students; where as the majority of other universities have been sending full delegations for years. This was the first year that McGill has really shown that we are an engineering force to be reckoned with. McGill’s success in Consulting Engineering, Jr. & Sr. Design and Debate can be partially attributed to the McGill Engineering Competition (MEC) held in the Fall semester. We had 106 participants, allowing students to get a feel for their respective competitions and to ensure we sent the best students to represent us at QEC. Since MEC’s conception in 2000 it has become an increasingly popular event for students to participate in and has generated more awareness of and interest in regional and national events. This has allowed McGill students to really showcase their talents to the rest of the province and Canada.

Students have showed so much interest in the competition that McGill bid for and won the honor of hosting the Quebec Engineering Competition next year. This is a big step for McGill Engineering students as well, since we haven’t hosted QEC in a decade.

Congratulations to all those who participated in QEC this year and best of luck to those organizing it next year.

QEC 2006 The Quebec Engineering Competition is not only crucial step from McGill’s Engineering competition to the Canadian Engineering Competition but it is also a classy exhibition of some of the most promising students in the province.

For the first time since 1989 McGill will be hosting QEC 2006.

QEC is a three day long event in late January or early February where delegates from the engineering schools in Quebec come to compete in six categories: senior design, junior design, consulting engineering, debate, corporate design, and editorial/explanatory communication.

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When a Mech Project Runs Amok (or how not to blow up your neighbor’s porch.)

Imagine this: you finish your degree.

You graduate. You get a cushy job with an engineering consulting firm. The salary is great, you’ve got full medical and dental, and you leave work every day at 5:00. A couple of years and a mortgage later, you find yourself using words like “synergize”, “visioning” and “disintermediation”. Finally, one dull morning you wake up and realize that the cubicle life just isn’t for you- so you decide to quit your job and build a space ship.

It sounds preposterous. My advice to you would be to lay off the Prozac and satisfy your little mid-life crisis with a Corvette, like everyone else. I was a little skeptical, then, when I met the head of the Canadian ‘DaVinci Project’, a former X-Prize contender. Brian Feeney traded in his clean-cut aerospace-standard tie-and-blazer for bleach-blond streaks and an earring when he left his job nine years ago to start the DaVinci project. When I asked whatever possessed him to try and start up a private manned space program, he replied simply, “I thought it would be cool”. When I was fifteen years old, I also thought it would be cool to blow up my neighbour’s back porch; that didn’t necessarily make it a good idea.

I was on the verge of filing this guy in the same folder as the crackpot who tried to make his own jet-pack out of a barbecue, but then he showed me the photos.

It all started in 1996, when a bunch of engineers got bored with the work they were doing and started wasting a little desk-time daydreaming about concepts for a sub-billion-dollar recoverable space vehicle. They started bouncing their ideas off their network of friends and colleagues, who themselves became intrigued with the problem.

Before long, the number of people working on the project numbered in the dozens. Dr. Vladimir Kudriavtsev, who has extensive experience modeling hypersonic flows and has worked for both NASA and the Russian Space Agency, supervised the effort in the little spare time that he had (“you just can’t have a self-respecting space program [or hockey team, for that matter] without a guy named Vladimir”, Feeney quips).

Feeney took the leap of faith and quit his day job to manage the project when the scope of the brain fart became too big to handle. It was around this time as well that they decided to go for the $10 million U.S. Ansari X-Prize for the first privately-financed reusable suborbital vehicle.

Once the potential (though however slim) of future financial return became apparent, the team turned its sights toward corporate sponsorship. Sun Microsystems donated a few workstations, and AutoDesk, Maple and Matlab all donated software. A massive media and marketing campaign

followed to try and put together enough capital to start construction, while design and simulation carried on.

The concept of the spacecraft (dubbed ‘Wildfire’) was fairly simple: use a weather balloon to carry a small, singlestage rocket to an altitude of 22,000 meters (the altitude boost actually saves you a load of fuel); light the rocket engine and shoot up to 100 kilometers, turn around, re-enter and land.

The balloon Weather balloons are hardly new technology, but since only a trickle of corporate sponsorship had been secured, the team could not afford the tens of thousands of dollars it would cost for the 3.5 - million cubic-foot balloon needed. Instead, they resorted to making their own- using jigs and tools built by volunteers out of materials they bought at Canadian Tire. Completed this fall, their balloon is the largest ever fabricated, and cost only $6000 in materials.

The rocket is suspended at an angle of 15° from vertical several hundreds of feet below the balloon by a tether/ umbilical; the tether itself proved to be a challenge. Eventually contracted to Montreal supplier Barrie Cordage, the synthetic tether system weighs only about a hundred pounds, and is incidentally the single most expensive piece of string ever sold to a Canadian.

The balloon platform also houses some auxiliary equipment used to provide power and life support during the twohour balloon ascent, since the extra weight of these systems are not required on the rocket itself.

The engines The next problem to be addressed were the engines. The engines would need to provide 18,000 pounds of thrust for 66 seconds (for a 3 g acceleration), and the cheapest rocket engines available which could deliver this amount of impulse were the liquid-fuelled Microcosm lifting systems. Still, these bargain-basement engines cost upwards of six figures and remained out of reach of the DaVinci team.

Instead, they went back to Canadian Tire. For a housing, they used the largediameter cardboard tubes normally used as moulds for concrete columns.

They then developed a technique of layering paraffin (yes, candle wax) around the inside wall of the tube, stabilized by a support matrix made from commercial-grade ceiling tiles.

The oxidizer, liquid nitrous oxide (laughing gas), is stored in a reusable composite pressure vessel. The engine tube is fitted with a thin nozzle form on one end and an off-the-shelf pressure flange on the other, and the whole thing is then wrapped in carbon-fiber composite. The nozzle is designed to be ablative, eroding as the engine fires and modifying the ratios with the altitude. In the end, the engine cost $25,000 to build (and itself may be marketed at a later date). A number of test engines were already built and fired successfully. The engine needs to be replaced after each flight, and represents about half of the total per-launch cost (the helium used to fill the balloon, vented to the atmosphere after the flight, makes up the rest of the bill).

The capsule Two passengers and a pilot are accommodated in a six-foot diameter pressure sphere sitting atop the engine assembly. The

capsule is a carbon-fiber composite frame and skin, fitted with a number of windows (reminiscent of a B-29 cockpit), which separates from the engine section on re-entry. The avionics and cockpit instrumentation were salvaged from a scrapped DeHavilland Dash-8, heavily modified and shoehorned into the capsule. While the capsule looks a little claustrophobic, stability on re-entry drove the design team to go with a back-heavy sphere. The offset sphere is one of the most aerodynamically stable systems, ensuring that even if the thrusters fail, the capsule will always re-enter with its heat-shielded aft end facing down. The offset sphere is also very stable dynamically; a necessary requirement since at those speeds a decent oscillation could produce inertial forces strong enough to turn the passengers into pizza sauce. While the oscillations resulting from an uncontrolled reentry would be uncomfortable for the occupants of the capsule, they would be survivable (though I would not want to be the one who has to mop the vomit off of the radio stack).

Once the speed has been sufficiently reduced, high-speed drogue parachutes are deployed, followed at a lower altitude by a pair of larger parachutes. A large, inflatable air bag deploys between the heat shield and the capsule on touchdown; the heat shield acts as a bumper and the air bag absorbs the impact.

The capsule critical systems are all heavily redundant. Even in the event of a catastrophic systems failure, the passengers can re-enter in the sphere and then bail out. If the heat shielding fails, the air bag can act as an ablative shield, and the nose of the capsule is designed to crumple if the air bag cannot deploy on landing (resulting in a bumpy but not uncomfortable landing, or so the simulation says...)

The engine section re-enters separately, with its own heat shield and parachutes. Redundancies on the engine section are limited, since the safety of the capsule occupants does not rely on the survival of the rocket section after separation.

Ironically, one of the greatest challenges which the DaVinci Team had to face was administrative rather than technical. In order not to get arrested at touchdown (or worse- shot down by an American anti-ballistic missile weapon), the team needed to get Transport Canada certification for their vehicle. In order to get certified, they needed to get insured- and nobody was willing to insure an experimental, homemade space ship. After much haggling, they managed to get their needed $30 million in third-party liability insurance and on April 7, 2004, Transport Canada issued a launch permit - the first ever issued by the Canadian government (and the second ever issued by any government) to a private individual.

The future of the project The DaVinci project put in a good effort towards winning the X-Prize, but their budget ran out before they could give Burt Rutan and his SpaceShip One a run for their money. While they had a prototype completed in time to compete, some bugs turned up in the back-up stability systems. Before they could move on, they used up the whole of their $350,000 budget (fully 2% of what Rutan spent). The funding came

through at the eleventh hour from an unlikely source- an online casino- and the DaVinci Project officially became the ‘GoldenPalace.com Space Program’.

Still, this much-needed, last-minute cash injection wasn’t enough. Rutan won the prize.

Surprisingly, the DaVinci Project didn’t fold, as their dozens of corporate sponsors renewed their funding. They showed, if nothing else, that you don’t need billions in capital to build a manned space flight program. A new, inexpensive engine design didn’t hurt them either. So what’s next?

Feeney’s plan seems logical. Once you show that you can put a crew into space and get them back safely again, people will start taking you seriously. Then, go in search of project capital from the marketplace. Who better to approach than- you guessed it- the Vegas casinos.

They have the money to spare, and their patrons are just the type to drop ten grand on a suborbital thrill ride. Feeney is working out a deal already where a casino will build them their mission control facilities under the condition that people get to watch the action from the casino through glass walls. Still, altitude is only the first step; to be of any practical value, a commercial launch system needs to reach orbit. Once the team has a steady source of income, they plan to develop their phase II designs for an orbital vehicle, and start bidding on commercial and military satellite launch contracts- taking on the likes of Boeing and NASA. Early versions of their next design iteration currently under development (code-named ‘Tiger’) will shed the balloon in favour of a trio of small turbofans, and will sport a pair of their cardboard-tube engines. The longterm plan is to take a shot at the Bigelow Prize- a $50 million U.S. payout to the first privately funded team who can demonstrate a reusable vehicle that can get eight passengers into low-earth orbit.

When asked the date of the first flight of Wildfire, Feeney was elusive; all he said was to expect to hear about them “soon”.

For technical details, see Kudriavtsev, V. “DaVinci X-Prize Space Project: Mission Analysis”, Paper #39-2, Proceedings of the 3rd International Symposium: Atmospheric Re-entry Vehicles and Systems Arcachon, France, 24-27 March, 2003.

The Plumber’s Faucet | March 2005

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University Relations They really do make a difference

by Emma Friday night I went to the opening of the ETS’s (Ecole Technologie Superiere) opening party for their brand new Resto-Pub. It is huge, beautifully situated on the first floor of their brand new building. Its got everything a student could want, foosball tables, pool tables, a giant 12 ft bar, and couches. It is restaurant by day, serving great but inexpensive food (may I suggest breakfast, the potatoes are great) and then by night it is a busy student bar.

Over the past year I’ve learned a lot about the ETS’s student association, at first I was surprised that they had a van for all their technical societies to use to go to races, as well as a truck and minivan, used for special events.

Then I saw their bar, 100 Genie. This made our beloved blues pub look pitiful. They had a permanent student bar set up in the main engineering building, and now they have traded it in for this beautiful Resto-Pub. The Resto-Pub started at the end of last winter semester, and was completed in about a year, or so. I couldn’t understand how they had all these amazing tools to use within their association and manage to do things so efficiently.

on projects brought by both the university and their student association. Thus, they have developed a trusting, mutually beneficial relationship allowing both groups to prosper.

However, at McGill, our association-university relations are cold, untrusting, and bitter, which I now see is really doing damage to our student association. As we at McGill desperately try to hold to what little space, revenue generating services and dignity we have left, ETS is developing into a bigger and better association.

Apply to be an organizer of an EUS Committee. These committees include: Frosh, Engineering Week, Plumber’s Ball, McGill Engineering Competition, TeN and many more. Booklets with more information and descriptions of all the activities are available in the EUS Office (Mc 7). The application forms can be picked up in the EUS office and are due March 18. For more information, please email president@mcgilleus.ca.

Their new Resto-Pub, cost around 1 million dollar to build, a good chunk of which was loaned to the association by the school. I was floored by this, the Engineering There have been rumors that McGill might try to shut down our temporary bar, Blues Pub, which is a poor engineers solace for survive another week, and serves as a revenue source for committees. Yet ETS will just loan there student association a massive amount of money to build a really nice Resto-Pub, what gives?

Its not just the lack of co-operation between the EUS and the university that hurts both of us, but so much effort goes into just trying to work with the other. So much energy and time, that could be better spent by both groups is wasted on disappointing results from collaboration. However, the EUS must work with the university because it represents other interests of students academic and otherwise. Its not like the EUS could stop talking to them.

So why the disparity between our associations? What makes this staggering difference? I think university relations is one of the major differences. ETS has a wonderful, reciprocal relationship with their university; both the university and the association have worked hand-in-hand

This has only recently become an issue as well; it started to really surface three years ago, with rumors of losing the cafeteria that was run the EUS. It only became war when we actually did lose our cafeteria, like many other faculties, last year. Since then, the EUS has also lost the locker room, which included space for the solar car team, and there has also been rumbling of losing blues pub. Previously, some people were known to be hard to work with at the university but, at worst the red tape was a nuisance, but now when talking with the university, one must be prepared to defend all that we have.

Grad School Barbie Hey kids! Want to learn about the joys of pursuing a higher education?

Then check out the newest toy from Mattel: Grad Student Barbie!

Graduate School Barbie comes in two forms: Delusional Master’s Barbie (tm) and Ph.D. Masochist Barbie (tm). Every Graduate School Barbie comes with these fun filled features guaranteed to delight and entertain for hours: Grad School Barbie comes out of the box with a big grin on her face that turns into a frown after 2 weeks of research or her first advisor meeting (whichever comes first). Adorable black circles under her delightfully bloodshot eyes. Comes with two outfits: a grubby pair of blue jeans and 5 year old gap T-shirt, and a floppy pair of gray sweatpants with a matching “Go F*!k Yourself” T-shirt. Grad School Barbie talks! Just press the button on her left hand and hear her say such upbeat grad school phrases like, “Yes, Professor, It’ll be done by tomorrow” “I’d love to write it all over again” and “Why the hell didn’t I just get a job, I could have been making $35,000 a year by now if I had just started working with a Bachelor’s. But noooooo, Mom and dad wanted a doctorate in the family.

I wish somebody would drop a bomb on the school so that I’d have an excuse to stop working on my degree that’s sucking every last drop of life force out of my withered and degraded excuse for a soul...” (9 V lithium batteries sold separately.)

Grad School Barbie is anatomically correct to teach kids about the exciting changes that come with pursuing a higher education. Removable panels on Barbie’s head and torso allow you to watch as her cerebellum fries to a crispy brown, her heart race 150 beats per minute, and her stomach lining gradually dissolve into nothing.

Although the university may see the EUS as taking up space, but it provides students with the opportunity to develop those oh so sought after soft skills which all my teacher tell me are important. When will it end, when can the associations of McGill and McGill put aside the past and work together on a reciprocal and mutually beneficial relationship?

Barbie comes with specially designed eye ducts: just add a little water and watch Grad School Barbie burst into tears at random intervals. Deluxe Grad School Barbie comes with a “Snap” button, bendable arms and legs, and a small vibrating motor. Press the button to watch Barbie crumple into the fetal position and tremble uncontrollably.

Fun for the whole family!

Other accessories include: Grad School Barbie’s Fun Fridge (tm) Well stocked with microwave popcorn, Coca-Cola, Healthy Choice Bologna (99% fat free!), and small bottle of Mattel Brand Rum (tm) Grad School Barbie’s Medicine Cabinet.

Comes in Fabulous pink and contains Barbie sized bottles of Advil, St. Johns Wort, Zantac, and your choice of three fun anti-anxiety drugs!

(Barbie Medicine Cabinet not available without a prescription) Grad School Barbie’s Computer Workstation.

Comes with miniature obsolete PC (pink of course), rickety desk, and over a dozen miniature Mountain Dew cans to decorate your workstation with (Mountain Dew deposit not included in price, tech support sold separately) And Grad School Barbie is not alone! Order now and you’ll get two of Barbie’s great friends!

GRADUATE ADVISOR KEN: Barbie’s mentor and advisor in her quest for increased education and decreased self esteem. Grad Advisor Ken (tm) comes with a supply of red pens and a permanent frown. Press the button to hear Grad Advisor Ken deliver such wisdom to Barbie as “I need an update on your progress” “I don’t think you’ll be ready to graduate yet” and “This is nowhere near ready for publication.”

Buy 3 or more dolls, and you can have Barbie’s Defense Committee! (Palm Pilot and tenure sold separately.)

REAL JOB SKIPPER: When Barbie needs to talk, she knows that she can always count on her good friend Real Job Skipper (tm), who got a job after getting her bachelor degree. Press the button to hear Real Job Skipper say, “Sometimes wish I went for my masters degree” and “Work is so hard! I had to work a half an hour of overtime!” Real Job Skipper’s Work Wardrobe and Savings account sold separately. WARNING: Do not place Grad Student Barbie and Real Job Skipper too close to each other, as there have been several cases of children leaving the room and coming back to find Barbie’s hands mysteriously fused to Skipper’s throat.

Fun For the Whole Family!

The Undergrad Barbie will soon be made available, but is expected to be nothing more than a repackaged version of Grad Barbie.

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EUS Executive Reports

Output (EUS Artwork Journal): One truly beautiful issue was out this year, and the girls are working on another one that will be out before the end of the year. Output went through a complete makeover this year.

President – Vicky David (president@mcgilleus.ca) Hope you are all enjoying the midterms; I know I am. So what’s going on in with the president side of things? Well we awarded for the first time the Engineering Involvement Award and we will begin fundraising this summer. Also, we had our elections and congratulations to next year’s executive. I have also been working on an affiliation between EUS and EWB (Engineers without Borders). Hopefully, that will get finalized this week. Also, I encourage everyone to apply for committee positions! Deadline is this week! If you have any questions, please email president@mcgilleus.ca.

Handbook (EUS Agenda): Hank did a stunning job with this committee this year, and we were out of agendas in just a couple of days. Personally, I threw out my handheld for this baby. Yay!

VP Services – Nancy Nikolakakis (vpservices@mcgilleus.ca) Room users saw a nice change this semester after it received a nice paint job.

Copi-EUS managers got themselves very organized and tried damn hard to increase sales, without compromising the excellent service. The Frostbite crew, with their keen managerial skills, managed to actually make a profit this year.

And finally the General Store maintained low prices throughout the year and pleased its customers by supplying them with vital necessities.

All this was made possible by the great service managers: Michal, Michael, Mary, Preeti, Kelly, Shubhani, Nora, Kyrke, June, Maria, Antoine, Tim and Roy. You guys all did a terrific job and you all deserve big hugs!

Thanks to all!

VP Finance – Egbert Degroot (vpfinance@mcgilleus.ca) We’ll its March and there’s only a little over a month left of school.

It seems like only yesterday we were all sitting on the grass at OAP having more than a few beers. Speaking of beer, I decided to look up approximately how much the EUS will go through this year: The breakdown (in cases of beer): 1040 OAP 1079 Blues Pub 117 E-Week 300 OAP lite 2536 Total Now, 1079 cases of beer for Blues Pub is an interesting number. There are about 2100 engineering students at McGill so that means that everyone had about 12.3 beer over the course of the year, which in my opinion is a respectable average. Beer sales account for about 1/5th of the society cashflow or, about the same amount as COPI EUS, General Store and Frostbite combined.

Right, back to the exec blurb. Since we’re not all alcoholics, this year the EUS tried to reach out to those of us that don’t drink.

O-Week this year was much less centered on drinking than usual, beer die can be played with cola, and all events at E-week could be done in a nonalcoholic fashion. However, I’m not sure that chugging 8*341mL = 2.728L of cola in fewer than two hours is incredibly healthy either.

The vast majority of events run this year were organized extremely well. From a financial viewpoint, the EUS continued to be excellent at doing more with less, cutting costs without sacrificing quality.

One thing that was improved this year via mass emails and TEN, but probably needs more work is getting details of events and activities to more students.

I hope you all have a great summer, I for one am in the process of selling my soul to oil. I’ll see you all at OAP, but this time I’ll be enjoying instead of serving.

P.S. To oil: the selling of the soul bit: I’m just kidding.

VP Communications – Farah Qasami (vpcomm@mcgilleus.ca) Following is what’s been happening in the Communications side of things (in no particular order): Photo Reps: When there weren’t people with cameras around, Tat and Alex would make sure they showed up to the events and took pictures. Got any EUS pictures? E-mail me!

Faucet: Shane and Emma, what would I do without you? They completely changed the Faucet, and made sure it was out regularly and on time every single time. I (heart) The Faucet. I’m sad to not see it for a whole season. *sniff sniff* ten (The Engineering Network Bulletin Boards): If I was to sum this committee’s progress up in one sentence, it would be: “YAAAAAY!”. TeN’s back completely revamped, expanded, multiplied by four and 42-inch-LCDized. Pouya and Evgueni, you’re my heroes!

Website: We changed servers. There have been no hacking attempts. It’s completely secure. We also now have mailing lists. My personal focus this year was on the aspects of EUS Communications that were traditionally ignored.

With everything else in place, I’m pretty sure next year’s VP Comm will do a great job redesigning the website.

Pipeline (EUS Newletter): It was biweekly. It was bilingual. And people actually read it (as evident from the survey results and the claim your cookie day!) Oh and we didn’t kill any trees in the process. This makes me happy!

Publicom (EUS Graphic Design Committee): With a 100% turnover, it was hard to fill this committee up initially, but it finally happened. Now, they are 100% active – energetic, ambitious, and full of great ideas. More happiness!

Survey: 10% of all EUS members filled it out. Very interesting comments.

Results were well received by committees and council too.

That’s about it. Thanks to everyone who helped me keep my sanity. Dianne, you’re “THE” queen.

VP Internal – Andrea Linsky (vpinternal@mcgilleus.ca) I hope that your year has been as much fun as mine has. There have been countless memories over the past months that I will have with me forever and ever. The greatest part of working as VP-Internal this year has been the communication with so many people. It is an extremely rewarding experience to get to know so many dedicated and hardworking individuals.

During o-week this year it was great to see so much work go into the new idea of wristbands. The idea went really well and it not only increased participation in o-week but in multiple other events during the year, including MEC which went of without a hitch with a record number of people attending at 103participants.

Variety show was a pleasure to attend with both a wicked lineup and with the rewarding feeling of helping out with charity, the event made record amounts for the Children’s Wish Foundation and rocked the house.

E-week also began a new and exciting trend for the first ever completely dry option for e-week. It was great to see how ridiculously hyper people were after doing a pub-crawl with coke.

Iron Ring was a splendid event that showed just how classy the engineering graduates of 2005 really are, and to add to the beauty of Iron Ring Plumbers Ball is looking to be one of the most beautiful balls ever hosted by McGill Engineering!

Theses and many other events have been the basis of an amazing year. There have been so many friends made and amazing events put together that leaving this position turns out to be a heavy task.

This has been a truly amazing experience and I would like to thank all of the volunteers, execs, Dianne, friends and members of the EUS for making this year one in a million.

Much love and best of luck to next year’s EUS! VP External – Isabel Fernandez-Maillard (vpexternal@mcgilleus.ca) I would like to start out by thanking every single volunteer that helped out this year. You guys truly make the EUS one of the Best Engineering Student Societies across Canada and the World. For those of you who have not yet volunteered, go pick up a committee application booklet from the EUS (Mc7)!!!

Top Ten moments of the year: 10) The fall Techfair with 44 companies in attendance 9) Going to all those QCESO meeting 8) Having a 3 hour council about what I should say at those QCESO meetings 7) The McGill Engineering games delegation winning 3rd place overall 6) Winning the Charity Challenge at CFES Congress !!!

5) The largest McGill Engineering Competition ever (105 competitors) 4) The largest delegation ever sent by McGill to the Quebec Engineering Competition 3) Having the best hotel party at CFES congress (yes, you can fit 75 people in one hotel room) 2) QEC 2006 being held at McGill 1) Getting my iron ring (sorry guys I had to put it in somewhere!!)

Do not give up only 1 month to go and have a great summer,

The Plumber’s Faucet | March 2005

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MECH Machine, Dirty Debutantes, 2005 Broomball Champions!

By: Zavie Berenbaum The 2005 EUS Broomball Finals were played February 18th on the Lower Field rink in front of an excited crowd that braved the cold weather.

In the men’s division, the Mech Machine completed their undefeated season with a 1-0 win over Idontknowfuckasaurus-Rex. The Dirty Debutantes were the winners over the Chemical Impurities in the all chemical engineering women’s final by the score of 3-1.

The Mech Machine completed the regular season in first place with a 5-0-1 record. The team was led by three of the top 5 scoring leaders, who combined for 33 goals between them. Regular Season MVP Patrice Castonguay (10 goals), Scoring Leader Ronnie Lawand (12 goals), and Julien Cardinal (11 goals) formed this fabulous threesome.

The playoffs got off to a shocking start as the second place team and a favourite to make it to the finals, Ref Yur Ded, was bounced in the quarterfinals by the MedMen. This loss paved the way for Idontknowfuckasaurus-Rex to reach the finals. On the other side of the bracket, the Mech Machine faced a very tough test in the semifinals against Crack Propagation. Trailing 2-1 late in the second half, Lawand scored a heroic goal and second of the game to force the game to

AWARD WINNERS: Men’s Regular Season MVP: Patrice Castonguay, Mech Machine Scoring Leader: Ronnie Lawand, Mech Machine Pierre-Olivier Menard, Frogs Playoff MVP: Dominic DiBiase, Mech Machine Women’s Regular Season MVP: Corey Faubert, Mech Girls Scoring Leader: Corey Faubert, Mech Girls Isabelle Chavarie, Mech Girls Playoff MVP: Sandra Robaire, Dirty Debutantes

overtime before Cardinal sealed the victory 3-2. The finals proved to be a defensive struggle as neither team had scored in the first half. The Mech Machine took a 1-0 lead in the second half on a top shelf goal by Playoff MVP Dominic DiBiase. This proved to be the decisive goal as Mech Machine goaltender Zavie Berenbaum recorded the team’s fourth shutout victory of the season for the championship.

In the women’s playoffs, the Dirty Debutantes had no trouble advancing to the finals over Bitches Got Game. In the other semifinal, the Chemical Impurities profited from great play by goaltender Sarah Yonson to defeat the Mech Girls 10. Yonson stopped Regular Season MVP and Scoring Leader Corey Faubert on four breakaways before the Impurities scored in overtime.

However, the Dirty Debutantes proved to be too much for the Chemical Impurities, defeating them 3-1 in the finals. Playoff MVP Sandra Robaire of the Dirty Debutantes scored 2 goals and Jessica Huza added one in the victory.

The 2005 Broomball season was a tremendous success as the league doubled in size. Nine teams competed in the men’s division and four in the women’s. The league hopes to add even more teams next year.

For league information, check out http://sports.mcgilleus.ca

Tommy’s Kitchen Corner (Unless your kitchen is not in a corner, then tough luck buddy) TIRAMISÙ (Italian coffee and cream cheese cake) Makes one cake The cream 250ml of Mascarpone (or cream cheese) 3 eggs 50g sugar 5g gelatin Coffee (the amount is up to you) ***Optional — Liquor (any flavour you wish) 3 genoise layers (now you know why 3 were made above) • • • •

Mix the mascarpone, the egg yolks and half the sugar in a small bowl.

Mix the egg whites with the rest of the sugar in a mixer.

Gradually add the dissolved gelatin (same process as mentioned above) into the mixing egg whites.

Remove from mixer and incorporate the egg white meringue into the mascarpone mixture.

The cake set up • The cake will be built upside down to have a nice flat finish on top.

• Have a cylinder of the same diameter of the genoise, and about 2" high • Start with a small layer of cream; be sure to have enough for the other 2 layers you will be putting.

• Place in the freezer to make sure there is no spillage when add the rest of the cake parts.

• Remove from freezer, and add the first genoise. Pour some coffee throughout the genoise.

• Add second layer of cream and cover again with genoise.

• Add third layer of cream and cover again with genoise, this time the coffee would go on the inside of the genoise so as to have it touch the cream.

• Refrigerate • When ready, simply add cocoa powder on top and woila!!!

• Enjoy!!!

CRÈME CARAMEL (Requires little bowl containers capable of being put in oven, and also a larger pan able to hold these small containers) Makes about 4 little crème caramels Caramel 100g sugar 70ml water • • • •

Boil the sugar and water until the colour changes to a nice light golden brown.

Be sure not to mix or the sugar will crystallize and nothing good can come of that.

Once the desired tint of ‘caramel’ colour is achieved, quickly put the pot into cold water to prevent the caramel from burning.

Pour some of the caramel evenly into the bottom of the little bowl containers

Cream

Caramel Cream Crème 200ml milk 5 eggs 100g of sugar Vanilla • • • • • • • •

Caramel

Boil milk with a little vanilla and half the sugar.

When boiled, pour into the mixed egg and sugar mixture Mix well to get a uniform liquid. If there are clumps of egg white still not mixed, simply pass the whole mixture through a sifter and discard the left over egg white.

Pour the cream on top of the caramel in the little bowls Place the bowls into a larger pan Fill pan with water so that there is about 2" of water in the pan Place pan into oven at 375ÚF for about 30minutes or until the crème is nice and consistent when touched with a finger.

Refrigerate, because it’s nasty if eaten warm.

The Plumber’s Faucet | March 2005

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Across

Movie Quotes: Name the flick!

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It’s not what you say, but how you say it — and Publicom will help you get your point across effectively.

Who is Publicom?

Publicom is the EUS’s dedicated Publicity Committee. Our crack team of artistic enthusiasts can create customized advertisement posters and flyers that are easy on the eyes.

How can I access your services?

If you are a member of a committee, and you have an event that you need to publicize, all that you have to do is fill out the form request on our website (http:// publicom.mcgilleus.ca) specifying what you want on your poster.

People say crazy shit during sex. One time I called this girl “Mom.” It’s all psychological. You yell barracuda, everybody says, “Huh? What?” You yell shark, we’ve got a panic on our hands on the Fourth of July.

Greed is for amateurs. Disorder, chaos, anarchy: now that’s fun!

Human beings have neither the aural nor the psychological capacity to withstand the awesome power of God’s true voice. Were you to hear it, you’re mind would cave in and your heart would explode within your chest. We went through five Adams before we figured that out.

We’re not hosting an intergalactic kegger down here.

As it stands Plan B is to just keep on Given’r.

LOUD NOISES!!!

If I were to send you flowers, where would I, uh, No, wait. Let me rephrase. If I were to let you suck my tongue, would you be grateful?

You know, we’re always fascinated when we find legirons with no legs in them.

The defense department regrets to inform you that your sons are dead because they were stupid.

No! Not the buttons! Not my gumdrop buttons!

“When they come out... does it hurt?”

“Every time.”

How do you explain school to a higher intelligence?

I’ve fought many wars in my time. Some I’ve fought for land, some for power, some for glory. I suppose fighting for love makes more sense than all the rest.

Movies don’t create psychos, movies make psychos more creative.

We are the all singing, all dancing crap of the world.

Down 2.

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Email us at publicom@mcgilleus.ca and take the first step towards getting your publicity campaign rolling.

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Say hello to my little friend.

You’re so money and you don’t even know it. ...back and to the left.

You didn’t let me finish my sentence. I said, I’m not gonna hurt ya. I’m just gonna bash your brains in.

Before we let you leave, your commander must cross that field, present himself before this army, put his head between his legs, and kiss his own arse.”

And I will strike down upon thee with great vengeance and furious anger those who would attempt to poison and destroy my brothers. And you will know my name is the Lord when I lay my vengeance upon thee.

Some day, and that day may never come, I will call upon you to do a service for me.

But uh, until that day, accept this justice as a gift.

I will not fear. Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration. I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain.

Not many people know what their life’s worth is. I do. Seventy grand. That’s what they took from me. And that’s what I was going to get back.

Do you know what “nemesis” means? A righteous infliction of retribution manifested by an appropriate agent. Personified in this case by an ‘orrible cunt... me.

Follow the white rabbit.

Just so we’re clear, you stole a car, shot a bouncer, and had sex with two women?

Your produce alone has been worth the trip.