Crescent Magazine March 2015

crescent

WE ARE WHAT WE EAT

MAGAZINE

Most people don’t know what goes into their food. What are we eating, and is it good or bad for us? | pg 20

RACKING UP THE RECORDS His natural skills show why centerfielder Kevin Kaczmarski is the Aces’ main man on the diamond.| pg 26

ALL ABOUT

BREAKFAST Regardless of how you define it, there simply is no joy like breakfast. We love it and we want it our way. | pg 16

March 2015 | University of Evansville | College Culture Upfront | issuu.com/uecrescent | $2.50

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Crescent Magazine

•

March 2015

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Contents THIS MONTH 6

December graduate Ryan Paulin looks into how people view modern men. Have perceptions of masculinity really changed all that much?

EDITORIAL Writing Directors CHRIS NORRIS ANNA SHEFFER

9

Writers HALEY ALBERS GRAHAM CHATTIN MCKENZIE ELLIS IAN HESLINGER DEJA JOHNSON RACHAEL MCGILL RYAN MURPHY

EDITING

12

16

20

Editing Director ASHLEY MATTHEWS

Copy Editors EMILY KRIEBLE PAIGE WATTS

CREATIVE Creative Director

QUITE A PAIR | Deja Johnson As strangers in a strange land, seniors Andrey Biryuchinskiy and Suhrob Muratov connected and have been inseparable ever since.

Senior Writer MARISA PATWA

INNOVATION | Ryan Murphy

26

29

FASCINATING PEOPLE | Marisa Patwa

DEPARTMENTS 3 OUR VIEWPOINT 4 POSTSCRIPT 8 WITHIN FAITH

Psychology is a fascinating subject to senior Tyler Plogher, who takes advantage of the opportunities many undergraduates don’t get.

10 SEXUAL TENSION

COVER | Graham Chattin

14 BRAIN BOMB

Everyone eats breakfast — when they get up on time. Today, bacon and eggs have become a meme, and cereal mascots are celebrities. How did our obsession with breakfast become what it is today?

15 WHO KNEW?

FEATURE | Ryan Murphy & Anna Sheffer

11 THROUGH THE LENS

19 Q&A 23 FIRST TIME 24 FULL-COURT PRESS

We all know there are chemicals and additives in our food. Many believe it’s time to go organic; others ask, “Is there really a problem?”

25 ATHLETES IN ACTION

OVERTIME | Haley Albers

28 CAMPUS CRIME

As he makes a name for himself in the UE record books, centerfielder Kevin Kaczmarski hopes his senior season boosts his stats even more.

30 OFF THE WALL 32 MOTLEY CREW

A CLOSER LOOK | Chris Norris Energy, humor and a desire not to ever grow up spark Chris Mohn, associate professor of Spanish, in her desire to connect with students.

TRAVIS HASENOUR

Photo Editor KATE SARBER

Photographers MAKAYLA SEIFERT

Designers TROY BURGER KAYLA SEIFERT

MARKETING & SALES Circulation Assistant PATRICK ROQUE

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facebook.com/uecrescent | twitter.com/uestudpub | issuu.com/uecrescent | crescentmagazine@evansville.edu

Find out what’s happening with Student Congress each Friday on the magazine’s Facebook page.

HOW TO CONTACT US Ridgway University Center, University of Evansville, 1800 Lincoln Ave., Evansville, Ind. 47722 Editorial email: crescentmagazine@evansville.edu • Phone: (812) 488–2846 • FAX: (812) 488–2224 Marketing & Sales: (812) 488–2221 & 488–2223 • crescentadvertising@evansville.edu

Crescent Magazine is the University of Evansville’s student magazine. It is written, edited and designed by and for UE students and published six times during the academic year. Circulation is 1,700, and it is distributed to 18 campus locations and housed online at www.issuu.com. It is funded through advertising sales and a subscription fee paid on behalf of students by the UE Student Government Association. Printed by Mar-Kel Printing, Newburgh, Ind. © 2015 Student Publications, University of Evansville. z editorial policy: Commentary expressed in unsigned editorials represents a consensus opinion of the magazine’s Editorial Board. Other columns, reviews, essays, articles and advertising are not necessarily the opinion of the CMEB or other members of staff. z letter submissions: Crescent Magazine welcomes letters from UE students, faculty, staff, administrators and alumni, but material the CMEB regards as libelous, malicious and/or obscene will not be published. Letters should not exceed 250 words. For verification, letters must include the author’s name, class standing or title and email address. Crescent Magazine does not print anonymous letters or those that cannot be verified. Letters will be edited as needed. Email letters to crescentmagazine@evansville.edu, with “letter” written in the subject line.

March 2015 • Crescent Magazine

Crescent Magazine • March 2015

messages from campus resources such as Safety & Security and Residence Life.

Because of this, we don’t know what’s happening on campus unless we are part of an event or know someone who is. And if we don’t know what’s happening around us, how will we know when something is happening that we need to know about or would like to attend?

Crescent Magazine tries to keep students informed through its social media and the stories we publish. We report on Congress every week, we cover campus stories and we include campus crime reports every month, but these are only helpful if people read them.

Just as it is important to be an informed global citizen, it is important to be an informed campus citizen. If we pay attention to what is happening, we can influence policies that affect all of us, and we can speak out when something happens with which we disagree. Changes are only made when the members of a community educate themselves and speak out.

We have freedom of speech at UE, but this right does not do us any good if we don’t make an effort to stay informed so we can use it. And we need to be careful about the sources we use to inform ourselves as well. It is easy to repeat whatever one reads on social media as fact, but this is how misinformation spreads. If you reblog a post on Tumblr or share something on Facebook without verifying the information, you could inadvertently pass along something that is biased or just plain wrong, just like repeating gossip in the real world, but with a wider audience.

It is easy to be overwhelmed by the amount of information in the digital age.

The key to being an informed citizen is to read the information that’s out there, and not just tweets, either. We have a responsibility to notice the world around us, not simply through social media, but also through reputable news sources and other announcements.

We may trivialize sources of information like AceNotes, but the fact is, they exist for our benefit, and we should take advantage of them. Current events affect us, sometimes in ways we might never imagine. The world around us is more than just the screens at our fingertips.

We need to start paying more attention.

Our Viewpoint

I

n an average day, we check our phones countless times for text messages, Facebook posts, retweets and Instagram likes. We are constantly surrounded by easily accessible information, whether we want to be or not.

But even with the wealth of knowledge around us, we remain oblivious to a lot of what is going on in the world. Most people don’t watch the nightly news or read the newspaper anymore — what we know of the world comes from what shows up on our social media feeds, and that is usually just what’s going on in our friends’ or favorite celebrities’ lives.

Social media seems to have replaced mainstream news, meaning that almost anyone can distribute information. YouTube stars GloZell Green, Bethany Mota and Hank Green interviewed President Barack Obama on Jan. 22, and the questions they asked ranged from racial tension to political apathy to partisanship. Celebrities and politicians answer fan questions on Reddit via Ask Me Anything, and nearly every public figure has a Twitter page.

The nature of how we get our news is changing. Breaking news comes to us quickly, and it is prepackaged in bite-sized portions so we do not have to sift through tons of information to find the answers to who, what, when, where and why. Thanks to social media sites, we are more connected to the world than ever before, and news is available to us in various forms.

But being constantly fed small bits of news is not always a good thing. Serious issues like climate change, ISIS and net neutrality cannot be understood in tweets or blog posts, and this fact often leads us to ignore important issues. The fact that something is not happening in our social sphere does not reduce its importance. Millennials are the next generation to influence the world, and it is up to us to be informed so we can make good decisions and change the world in a positive way.

But the problem isn’t just global. It’s also local. AceNotes is a valuable tool for finding out what is happening on campus, but it has become a joke as hardly anyone reads it. Similar jokes are made in Student Congress about representatives telling their groups about what happened at each meeting. Some students do not even check their UE email, which often contains important

PAYING

ATTENTION

TO DETAIL We live in an age of nonstop communication. But somehow, we seem to know nothing about the larger world. Speaking up is only good if we listen, too.

COVER ILLUSTRATION | Rebecca Webb DIGITAL RENDERING | Travis Hasenour

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The Postscript

CHRIS NORRIS

CONNECTING

WITH THE WORLD C Technology is redefining our sense of community and the way we gather information.

ommunication is changing. Cell phones and social media provide new ways of talking to each other and new ways to get information. Texting replaced phone calls, and now texts are being phased out for image-based programs like Instagram and Snapchat.

Timothy O’Brien, assistant professor of sociology, said these changes are affecting the way we function as a society.

“The notion of community is changing,” he said, “and what it means to be part of a community is changing.”

That means while Facebook allows people to have a greater number of “friends,” the number of people they have real contact with is smaller. O’Brien said he knows everything his friends from high school are doing, but if he needs someone to take him to the airport, he can’t just ask a neighbor.

This is often the basis of criticism of millennials — that they don’t connect with each other. But junior Jacob Green said communication exists — it just takes a different form.

“I think that’s kind of an overstatement of it,” he said.

“When they’re connecting to this device, they’re trying to connect to other people.”

Older generations also criticize millennials for ignoring the world around them. Chair Mark Shifflet, associate professor of communication, said focusing on cell phones and listening to music creates a secluded environment. But he said cell phones just give people an excuse to avoid conversation.

“If you take them away, would [people] be talking more?” he asked.

O’Brien said his colleagues ban cell phones and laptops in their classrooms to prevent students from getting distracted, but he knows students will be distracted no matter what.

“That’s essentially another version of the ‘kids today’ argument,” he said. “If you were bored 50 years ago, you could doodle in your notebook.”

The format of the information people are reading is different now, too. Shifflet said the key to getting information across is brevity and frequency. People want short bursts of news as soon as it happens. But this causes readers to spend less time engaging with a piece of news.

“We spend so much time collecting information, we don’t spend time analyzing it,” Shifflet said. “There’s this need for

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information, but when do you really have time to digest it?”

Instead of reading newspapers or websites, Shifflet said many people follow reporters on Twitter. Readers get updates on stories as the reporter gets them, which means they get information faster but at the cost of accuracy and insight because reporters have to rush stories to print.

“The reporter doesn’t have time to reflect and say, ‘What does all this mean?’” he said.

And even though there is greater access to information than ever before, people tend to focus only on things that already interest them. This mostly happens in political discourse, where it is easy to find sources to back up a certain side or way of thinking. O’Brien said this causes people to develop stereotypes because they are not informed about other sides of an argument.

“I think the tendency that people have is to close themselves off,” he said.

But websites like vice.com and fusion.net are finding ways to make information more accessible to millennials. These sites present stories without breaking them up into categories on a main page, which prevents readers from automatically gravitating to one corner of the site and makes them at least see the headlines. And Snapchat recently introduced the “Discover” feature, which hosts content from outlets like ESPN, Vice and CNN in a format people are already using. The stories are short, but they only update once a day, and they direct readers back to the main sites for more information.

Often the problem is getting people to read the news at all, especially on campus. Green said he reads AceNotes because it has relevant information, but he knows most ignore it and their emails because they are not visually attention-grabbing.

“If it’s there, it’s there,” Green said, “but not many people seek it out.”

It’s impossible to deny that people connect differently with the world. But while some say this is a problem, O’Brien thinks it is just another step in the evolution of society.

“I’m sure previous generations didn’t like how younger generations communicated then because it was different from what older generations did,” he said. “Young people are just going to be young people, no matter what.”

March 2015 • Crescent Magazine

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Crescent Magazine • March 2015

5

Innovation & Science

FINDING OUT

photo by Kate Sarber

WHAT MAKES A MAN RYAN MURPHY

B

rave, courageous, virile, chivalrous, strong, macho. Most men want to be seen as masculine, and these words are used to make the definition. But what does being manly really mean today?

Views vary from person to person, and what was once considered masculine may no longer be. A man was traditionally seen as masculine if he used harsh language, went against feminine traits and was aggressive.

Through a survey conducted in late fall 2014, Ryan Paulin, a December 2014 graduate, found that what society once thought was masculine is not necessarily the case today.

Since there has been so much growth and development in the feminist movement, Paulin wanted to see what had changed about masculinity, a main topic in talks about gender equality and relations. The survey focused on the relationship among the views on masculinity based on gender identity, socioeconomic standing and religion.

Paulin had 123 respondents in his 400 student sample, and he asked them to identify what they saw as masculine. He used an established sex-role inventory to measure which traits were seen as masculine and a scale he

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“

created based off this inventory to gauge the masculinity of occupations and activities.

There was little correlation between religion and socioeconomic standing, but there was a significant link between gender identity and what was considered masculine. Female respondents largely agreed on what they saw as masculine, and male respondents agreed with each other as well.

Paulin also found that many stereotypical masculine traits, such as forcefulness and aggressiveness, are considered to be less masculine today than some traits traditionally seen as feminine or androgynous, such as being loyal or truthful. Paulin said he wasn’t surprised by these results.

“Society’s changing,” he said. “We’re seeing it everywhere.”

Kevin Gray, associate professor of sociology and criminal justice, worked for five months on the project with Paulin. He credited the results to people becoming more accustomed to the idea of being different.

“The results didn’t confirm everything,” he said, “but they confirmed what Ryan was thinking in terms of changing attitudes.”

Results did represent how society has

changed, but Gray also thought this outcome was likely because the scales and results from previous studies were outdated.

Earlier studies had a much narrower scope, and Paulin wanted to get a larger perspective.

Going forward, he wants to test different factors, such as other cultures and religions, to see how they line up with masculine views.

Paulin believes the results could be used to determine more information about gender relations and as a supplement for gender relations studies. Data could even be used to predict how future generations will think by tracking the evolution of masculine ideals.

Gray believes the study illustrates a changing culture in terms of masculinity and feminism. He also thinks the data could show how some groups still possess stereotypes and how those stereotypes can be damaging, inappropriate and inaccurate.

Paulin is working to see what parts of the study can be improved. Since graduating, he has been focusing on making changes to the study since he wants to take different aspects of it into consideration.

“I want to find a way to do it better,” he said.

Society’s changing. We’re seeing it everywhere.

”

March 2015 • Crescent Magazine

WE’LL KEEP YOU

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Crescent Magazine • March 2015

T

MY EXPERIENCE BEGAN WITH VOLUNTEERING for a number of local nonprofit organizations. I was also able to gain valuable connections by networking through my internships. But most importantly, I learned from those experiences where my degree could lead me after graduation.

UE Connect is a fantastic program, and one of the things I found to be most beneficial was the mentoring program. Even today, I am still fortunate to have a wonderful mentor who has confidence in me and is available to me whenever I need her. We set three goals at our very first meeting — job shadow her and others in my discipline whenever possible, create an eye-catching resume to present to prospective employers and continue to update it, and by making connections, find a job. I am proud to say that by following her advice, I achieved the ultimate goal.

Being a part of UE Connect — a program that believed in me — was all I needed. Don’t let the opportunity pass you by. The Center for Career Development staff will give you that extra boost to get you exactly where you want to be after graduation!

Brooke Reneer, ‘14 Visual Communication Design Princeton, Ind.

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ime, guidance and support. That’s what it takes to get a jump on your career, and it’s never too early to start checking into options. UE Connect can help you network and gain access to people and other things that can make a difference in your quest for the ideal career. Let UE Connect help you as you navigate your future.

• Provides a professional development network.

• Increases involvement and positive relationships.

• Encourages connections across the UE alumni network.

• Many, many more benefits!

For more information, visit www.evansville.edu/ueconnect

UE Connect is a partnership between the Office of Alumni & Parent Relations and the Center for Career Development

7

Within Faith

RACHAEL MCGILL

NO DIRECTION OR

NO DIALOGUE? The concept of spirituality without religion is gaining followers despite skeptics.

R

eligion and spirituality are often seen as the same thing, with people using the words interchangeably.

But believe it or not, religion and spirituality are not exclusively paired. Those who reject organized religion yet retain spiritual lifestyles often identify themselves as spiritual but not religious, and the number of people who feel this way continues to grow.

A 2012 Pew Research survey reported almost one-fifth of Americans identified themselves as unaffiliated. But most of those detached from a religion declared a belief in God, and one in five said they pray often.

This means SBNR people are not the same as agnostics or atheists. Agnostics are uncertain of the existence of a divine being, and atheists disbelieve. In contrast, many SBNR people believe in some notion of a higher power. And many live active spiritual lives, regardless of whether or not they believe in a higher power.

Lisa Kretz, assistant professor of philosophy, has an active spiritual life while not affiliating with any religion and said much of her spirituality comes from nature.

“When you walk through the forest, and the sun is shining, and you hear water running, it’s an awe-inspiring scenario,” she said. “It speaks some of the beautifulness of life.”

Kretz said she perceives the relationship between religion and spirituality to be complex and often misunderstood, yet not always connected.

“I don’t think religion is necessary for spirituality,” she said, “so you don’t have to be engaged in religious practices to be spiritual.”

Kretz also said morality can come from a person’s own conscience and religious doctrine alike.

“Whether you’re coming from a religious set of ideas or from a secular set of ideas, if we want people to be compassionate, we should be happy about that,” she said.

Kretz said people should respect differences between religious and nonreligious people. But if they focus on that difference, it can shut down dialogue between the two groups.

Even some students can agree that spirituality and religion do not always have to be connected. Senior Daniel Poelhuis said he thinks the two terms refer to distinct ideas.

“Religion is a set of beliefs that are typically put together by

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a group of people as they’re seeking a higher power,” he said.

“Spirituality to me is not necessarily part of religion but rather a general proximity that someone would have to the spiritual realm.”

Poelhuis said he sees spirituality separated from religion as an effect of a secular society and people looking for a middle ground. But he said that is nothing new.

Other students say SBNR might not be the best way to go. Some believe it is a sign of stagnation within one’s spiritual growth. Junior Mustafa AlHajji said his home country of Saudi Arabia makes no distinction between religion and spirituality. Encountering the concept of spirituality without religion in the United States was a new experience for him. But it does not change his views on the direct correlation between the two.

“If [someone] believes he is spiritual, he must believe in something strongly,” he said. “That is religion.”

AlHajji said without strong belief there is no clear path.

For him, a lack of a clear path would seriously hinder spiritual growth.

Senior Zoe Post also expressed strong concern for those who identify themselves as spiritual outside of religion. She said she sees a lack of direction. But rather than seeing no strong beliefs, Post said her concern was with the idea that virtually anything could be seen as a spiritual connection.

“If being spiritual but not religious means having a connection with Ronald McDonald, sorry, that’s not as legitimate as other religions,” she said.

Post said people need the community religion offers. Without community, there is no direction. For Post and AlHajji, religion is a gateway to discovering one’s own spiritual development by means of knowing where your growth is heading.

The rise in affiliation with the SBNR movement has inspired many people to embrace a spiritual life outside of religious institutions. Though some see this as spirituality caving in on itself, others see it as a gain in momentum in the right direction. But whether you are religious or not, Kretz said the focus of both is to live a healthy spiritual life.

“If it’s a spiritual expression of what’s good and true, ethical and beautiful, then anyone doing that, we should be happy for them, regardless of who’s doing it,” she said.

March 2015

•

Crescent Magazine

Quite a Pair

Andrey Biryuchinskiy & Suhrob Muratov

WORK HARD,

LAUGH HARDER DEJA JOHNSON

photo by Kate Sarber

F

or most people, taking a flight is really no big deal. But for seniors Andrey Biryuchinskiy and Suhrob Muratov, their flight to the U.S., one they made together by chance, was anything but a flight through the friendly skies.

It was just before the beginning of their freshman year when they boarded a plane that would bring them to Evansville. But first they had to endure the turbulent flight from hell.

“We looked out the little window, and the plane was shaking,” Muratov said.

Both spoke Russian — Biryuchinskiy is from Moscow and Muratov is from Dushanbe, Tajikistan — and this commonality helped them endure the scary flight and facilitate the start of an amazing friendship.

Of course, they landed safely and then started their experience at UE together. They had studied British English for years, but once classes started, what they thought they knew about English went out the window.

“Our accents were so thick,” Biryuchinskiy said, laughing. “Our grammar was good, but no one understood us.”

Getting accustomed to American slang was also a challenge for both.

“People were saying, ‘What’s up?’ We were like, ‘What?’” Muratov said, also laughing.

Crescent Magazine

•

March 2015

“One time someone said, ‘What’s up?’ and I said, ‘Good.’”

They both enjoy listening to the same types of music, playing pingpong and tennis and eating at Manna Mediterranean Grill.

“It’s great spending time with them,” senior Jawad AlDhalemi said. “It’s always fun, and there are always things to do. They just have chemistry.”

Funny things seem to follow the pair wherever they go. They once spent Thanksgiving break in South Carolina with senior Brianna Gaddis and her family. At some point she allowed them to drive her car in an empty parking lot. While Biryuchinskiy did fine, with Muratov behind the wheel, Biryuchinskiy had to use Russian to explain to Muratov what Gaddis meant when she repeatedly said “brake” as he made turns, each time pushing his foot a little harder on the accelerator.

Biryuchinskiy started hosting WUEV’s international show, “World Safari,” his freshman year, and Muratov joined him when they were sophomores. The show quickly became a favorite with listeners because of their chemistry and on-air personalities, pretty much what you experience with them face-to-face.

“We got letters, played international music,” Muratov said. “One time we got a letter

from a girl from Canada telling us she wanted us to come visit.”

Although they always seem to be having a good time, Biryuchinskiy, a finance and economics major, and Muratov, an accounting and business management major, also know when it’s time to get serious.

“They are really good, both outgoing, but focused,” AlDhalemi said. “Sometimes when I ask to hang out, they will say, ‘No, I need to study.’ Their main focus is school. They love what they are doing.”

Muratov spent last summer interning with PricewaterhouseCoopers in New York, and Biryuchinskiy interned last semester with Norddeutsche Landesbank in NYC. “It’s really cool to see how hard they both work,” Gaddis said. “Meeting them freshmen year, and now with them both having interned in New York and Suhrob going back to work there after school, it’s really cool.”

Even though Muratov graduates in May and Biryuchinskiy graduates in December, these two will probably always depend on the other for a good laugh and a fun time.

“I think they’ll be friends forever,” Gaddis said. “They may not see each other for a while, but I believe they made a lifelong connection.”

9

Sexual Tension

MARISA PATWA

TURN-ONS YOU

CAN’T TURN OFF

Sexual fetishes are not as uncommon and perverse as some people believe.

F

oot worship. Hand worship. Spanking. Crossdressing. Voyeurism. Exhibitionism. Watersports.

Latex. Silk. Leather. Rubber. Older women.

Roleplaying. Domination. Submission. Sex with a stranger. Forced fantasies. Threesomes.

These are all common sexual fetishes, but most believe these acts or stimulants are strange because they are not considered ordinary parts of sex. But are they perverse just because they are unfamiliar or not what most think of where arousal is concerned?

“We don’t talk about human sexuality enough to know what’s in the normal realm,” said Lora Becker, associate professor of psychology, “so when we talk about something that seems out of the norm, it is threatening.”

Because we aren’t comfortable with exploring what arouses us sexually, Psychology Today reported that the mere mention of the word “fetish” makes many of us uncomfortable, and that seems to be true.

Anything can be a fetish, and they go from mild to extreme. It just depends on a person’s desires and preferences. Therapist Jackie Castro, author of “Fetish and You: Understanding and Embracing Your Fetish,” said a fetish describes people who are aroused by parts of the body, activities or objects that are generally not associated with conventional sex. Many times that fixation is psychologically necessary for sexual pleasure.

To further clarify fetishes, an article in askmen.com states that they basically come in one of three categories — media, form and animate. With a media fetish, some type of material is obsessed over. This is why materials such as leather and latex are associated with fetishes.

The shape of an object is the significant part of a form fetish. Stilettos, knee-high boots and lingerie are examples. Anything having to do with the body — feet, hands, butts and breasts — are animate fetishes. And some people’s desires include something from one or more of the categories.

There are a lot of fetishes, and while people may see any fetish as odd, there are a number that have become fairly mainstream. While most people will not admit to others that they have a fetish, men are usually the ones who most easily will, even though some women are starting to own up as well.

The following are just some of the more common fe-

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tishes: Anililagnia is an attraction for older women.

There are tons of guys who seek them out. Voyeurism is getting aroused from looking at naked bodies or other people having sex. Pygophilia is a fixation with butts.

Pictophilia is having a fascination with pornography.

Stigmatophilia is an obsession with tattoos and piercings. Retifism is an affinity for high heels. And podophilia is more commonly known as having a foot fetish.

Analyzing fetishes has been going on for years. Many believe fetishes can be traced back to childhood. Psychologist Mark Griffiths, of Nottingham Trent (U.K.) University, said research has shown that many fetishes appear to be the result of childhood or adolescent experiences, such as when sexual excitement is paired with nonsexual objects and body parts, or as a consequence of some traumatic experience.

Gary Brooks took it a step further in “The Centerfold Syndrome.” He said men have been conditioned to make their sexual arousal more dependent upon the use of sexualized images while women have not. And since many people have not been programmed to see sex as a natural part of a healthy life anyway, we won’t admit when additional things turn us on.

Senior Mariah Gardiner learned about fetishes in Psychology 416, “Human Sexuality.”

“I thought they were weird before, but after this class, I realized that some are not that far-fetched, and I could see why people have them,” she said.

Not everyone thinks fetishes are perverse or that people need to be cured of them.

“It’s as absurd as people who have aversion therapy to turn gay people straight,” Castro said. “That type of therapy comes from a negative place.”

Changing people’s perceptions of fetishes is an unlikely task. Becker said society has been conditioned into believing that there is only one model of normal sexual health. And being spanked during sex is not it.

“The vast messages we see in the media about what is usual sex is a married couple,” she said. “Think about a mattress commercial. The man and woman sitting on the bed always have wedding rings on. If that’s the image you have of proper sex rather than seeing a guy on a mattress wearing a high heel, that’s what you will think is normal.”

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Crescent Magazine

KATE SARBER

BE MY HERO And learn to laugh along the way.

With the popularity of such superhero movies as “Man of Steel,” “X-Men: First Class” and “Guardians of the Galaxy,” it was no wonder that the theme of this year’s Musical Madness was based on those meant to save the day. With four teams vying for the “Super” title, 12 organizations teamed up to present farfetched tales involving some of our favorite superheroes, while throwing in puns, dancing and a change in song lyrics to add a UE twist. But the Aquatic Ace was the one with superhuman strength as Sigma Alpha Epsilon, RSA and Alpha Omicron Pi took home first place with their musical “Aquaman: Quest to Make it Rain,” a humorous and clever interpretation of Aquaman’s adventures on campus. Proceeds benefited the Evansville Vanderburgh School Corp.’s music program’s All-Star Marching Band.

Shedding his secret identity, sophomore Andrew Stewart reveals himself to save the kids on the bus from hurting themselves in traffic. | MaKayla Seifert

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Before singing a sandy rendition of “Frozen’s” “Do You Want to Build a Snowman?” junior Katherine Eckert reveals her evil plan. | MaKayla Seifert

Freshman Chris Johnson tries to save his sandwich from a bunch of hungry squirrels, including senior Emily Naas, sophomores Melissa Blythe, Becca Laskey and Kelsey Fields and freshman Annie Stenftenagel. | Kate Sarber

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Fascinating People

This first-generation college student is challenging societal norms by excelling at everything he does.

CHANGING THE

WAY WE VIEW

THE WORLD MARISA PATWA

W

hat makes a student interested in researching the loved ones of sex offenders? While it is a titillating topic, it is not the first one that comes to mind when one thinks of worthy research material. But senior Tyler Plogher likes to think outside the box.

The straight-A student became fascinated last summer by how spouses of sex offenders are treated after he began looking into sex offender registration studies.

“Some people think they’re deviant,” he said. “And some think they’re loyal, resilient and brave to stick with someone like that.”

And so the psychology and sociology double major decided to make this topic the focus of his senior project.

Plogher interviewed 160 people for his study. He funded it through grants, including one from the Minority Affairs Committee of the American Psychology-Law Society. Plogher said being gay and a first-generation college student, as well as studying another minority group, helped him to get the grant.

“He is a minority himself, and that might, in part, motivate him to care about racism, stereotypes and prejudice,” said Maggie Stevenson, associate professor of psychology. “To me it says something about his values and who he is as a person.”

Plogher works at least nine hours a week as a co-manager in Stevenson’s law lab. He also keeps a full plate as president of Psi Chi, Pi Gamma Mu and Psychology Club.

“

Junior Taylor Wornica said he is one of the most driven people she knows.

“I’m just blown away by his ability to get everything done and still be a nice person,” she said. “He has so much on his plate, and he doesn’t do anything halfheartedly.”

When Plogher does get free time, he enjoys spending it with his boyfriend of five years, 2014 alumnus Evan McCracken.

“We love to binge watch shows on Netflix and eat a lot of pizza,” McCracken said. “I try to guilt him into relaxing at night and calming down.”

McCracken volunteers as a lab manager with Plogher, and they have also worked on research projects together. They will travel in mid March to present research at the International Convention of Psychological Science in Amsterdam. Their research focuses on why political conservatives are more likely to blame rape victims than perpetrators.

The couple will fly to San Diego straight after to present another paper at a conference sponsored by the American Psychology-Law Society. Plogher has already presented research at conferences in New Orleans, Long Beach, Calif. and Austin, Texas.

Plogher was raised in Evansville by his grandparents. Although they never went to college, he said they always wanted him to pursue his education.

“My family has supported me emotionally, financially and in a million of other ways,” he said. “I’m not one of those people who

think that they did everything by themselves.

I didn’t.”

Plogher came to UE as a biology major with hopes of going to medical school. But he discovered his love for social psychology and sociology during his sophmore year when he took Psychology 229, “Social Psychology.”

“Growing up, when National Geographic would play real history and not just ‘Ice Road Truckers,’ they used to have shows about ancient civilizations,” he said. “I didn’t realize social psychology could be a real career path.”

When Plogher is not hanging out with McCracken or experimenting in the lab, he is watching favorite shows such as “Orange is The New Black” or “Dexter.”

“I’m also a huge comic book nerd,” he said. “I think comic books have been unfairly stigmatized, especially given their recent surge in popularity. Batman is deep, psychologically and philosophically.”

After he graduates in May, Plogher plans to attend graduate school. He has been accepted into the legal psychology program at Florida National and is also looking at Indiana to study social psychology.

He plans to continue his research on sex offenders’ families again this summer by examining how their children are treated, adding that the goal of this research is to inform public policy one day and shed light on topics people do not normally consider.

“The essence of social life is the truth,” Plogher said.

I’m just blown away by his ability to get everything done and still be a nice person.

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13

Brain Bomb

POSITIVELY CHARMING In the words of Daft Punk, “We’re up all night to get lucky.” Superstitions are so ingrained in most cultures that people often follow them without knowing why. A common practice is carrying around cer-

Vikings associated oak trees with the god Thor, so during storms they would put an acorn in their windowsill to keep their homes safe from lightning. But who will protect the acorn from hungry squirrels?

tain “lucky” objects, like ancient Egyptians wearing the “eye” of Horus to ward off bad spirits. The effectiveness of these charms is debatable, but humans across all cultures love believing they can use simple objects to change their luck.

As anyone who has seen 1998’s “Mulan” knows, crickets are good luck charms in China.

Supposedly they will stop chirping at the first sign of danger.

The lucky rabbit’s foot originated in Africa where carrying the foot of a fast animal would help you quickly escape tricky situations. Sorry Tortoise; Hare would definitely win this one.

Pennies are associated with wealth, so finding one could indicate a monetary gain in the future. Specifically, a penny heads up should be kept, while a penny heads down should be flipped and left for the next person. Makes cents.

They may not be the brightest fish in the pond, but goldfish represent prosperity in many cultures. Ancient Greeks thought they were lucky for marriage, while in Asia they are associated with wealth and success.

Ancient farmers in Britain believed preserving a sheep’s heart would keep their other animals from dying. Ewe.

Saint Dunstan allegedly captured the devil using a horseshoe, so now the devil will not enter any home with a horseshoe above the door.

In Japanese culture, wearing three keys tied together will supposedly unlock the doors to love, health and wealth. Try not to misplace them.

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Rainbows are associated with God’s covenant. They are mentioned in the Old Testament as a sign that the Earth will never be flooded again. But you’ll still need rain boots around campus.

Most pagan cultures believed nature spirits inhabited trees, and to seek their help one only had to knock on the bark. The Irish also believed that this was how to thank leprechauns for any good luck they had received.

Vultures have such good eyesight that people in Africa believe these birds can see into the future. Lottery players there have started carrying vulture heads for good luck.

We’ll stick with the rabbit foot.

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Who Knew?

EVER WONDER WHY YOUR CAT PURRS? Even Grumpy Cat purrs! She might even have been purring in the original meme photo. Purring is a form of communication and a soothing tool. It can show contentment from petting or distress from pain. Air hits vibrating muscles in the diaphragm and voice box, which means cats purr by breathing. Kittens start purring a few days after birth. This purring establishes a bond with the mother. Sometimes purring mixes with meows to indicate hunger. If you hear a “purreow” from your cat, it may be lunchtime.

WHY ARE TATTOOS PERMANENT? Sharpie will eventually disappear, but a tattoo lasts forever. Sharpie never reaches the dermis, the inner layer of skin lying underneath the epidermis. A tattoo is made by tiny needles repeatedly poking through to the dermis. The body reacts by summoning immune cells to consume the invading material to heal the open wound. But not

CAN I STOP PEEING MIDSTREAM? Both men and women can flex certain pelvic muscles to immediately stop peeing. These muscles can be strengthened through Kegel exercises.

AND JUST WHY ARE YOU CRYING? Have you had a bad day and need a good cry? Just cut up an onion! Chopping an onion shoots enzymes into the air that react and turn into a gas that irritates your eyes and makes you cry.

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all of the dye gets eaten by immune cells.

Some of it stays and gets absorbed by dermal cells. That ink is still visible even after the ink on the outside wears off. Dermal cells stay in the dermis until they die and are absorbed by younger dermal cells. So don’t you worry; your tattoo is probably not going anywhere.

DO YOU SMELL THAT? A cherry-scented sticker’s surface has lots of tiny capsules holding cherry-scented material. To get that cherry smell, you scratch the surface and tear open those capsules.

HOW DO WE KNOW WHAT A PLANET IS? Pluto cannot join in all the other planet games because it does not follow the third rule of being a planet. It’s big enough for gravity to squish it into a ball, and it orbits the Sun, but it does not clear its own orbital path.

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Cover Story

t u o Ab

l l A

reakfas t B GRAHAM CHATTIN

Breakfast is a multifaceted, nuanced phenomenon.

Regardless of how you define it, there is no joy like breakfast.

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Some things just go together, like movies and popcorn, cheeseburgers and french fries or March and basketball. These are the facts of life, and a mere mortal cannot dispute them.

Other things not only go well together, they are inseparable — amazing things like toast and jam or bacon and eggs. Among humanity’s greatest accomplishments is the creation of a single word to encapsulate the harmony that can only exist between certain foods. It is called breakfast.

For some it is a meal, for others a way of life.

Like most traditions, the history of breakfast is long, complicated and full of deceit, not unlike every episode of “Game of Thrones.”

“The idea of what good foods are has changed,” said Don Rodd, professor of exercise science. “Your day was different hundreds of thousands of years ago.”

In those days, eating breakfast was quite literally a matter of life and death. Not dying was the prime motivator, especially when you didn’t know the next time a tasty mammoth would let down its guard and allow you to kill it.

Of course, times are different now. The mighty hunters of the 21st century stalk their “prey” in grocery stores and open-all-night diners, and have traded hunting spears for stainless steel forks and spoons. Very few of us hunt for our first meal of the day, and the only way it kills us is when it isn’t properly prepared. Breakfast has become less about why we eat it and more about what we eat.

Most Americans’ breakfasts consisted of pork, coffee and whiskey during the early part of the 19th century. Not only were these hard on the bowels but many believed they made people lazy and lustful. While cereal has been around since the mid-1800s, it was John Harvey Kellogg who accidentally developed cornflakes in 1905 that started the cereal industry we know today.

With Kellogg and Charles Post, another manufacturer, advertising their cereal, 107 brands of cornflakes were being made by 1911 in Battle Creek, Mich., alone.

Radio advertising in the late 1930s and the introduction of mascots — think the Lone Ranger and Dick Tracy — hooked children. And TV advertising took sugary cereals to a new level in the 1950s when advertising giant Leo Burnett invented TV shows designed to entertain children and sell Kellogg’s products.

But everyone knows everything goes better with bacon, or so the saying goes. Some may be shocked to know that bacon was not always a part of a balanced breakfast. During the late 1800s and early 1900s, a simple morning meal

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for most consisted of coffee and toast. Breakfast was an unpalatable, bacon-less chore.

Mercifully, public relations pioneer Edward L. Bernays, who was working for the Beech-Nut Packing Co. at the time, devised an ingenious plan that would change people’s minds about what should be eaten for breakfast. And he used his uncle’s — Sigmund Freud’s — ideas to convince the public of it.

Beech-Nut wasn’t known for its chewing gum and baby food at that time. It was a producer of ham, and its success ultimately came from its vacuum-packed jars of sliced bacon. To sell more bacon — and eggs along with it — Bernays asked physicians if a “hearty” breakfast was better at replacing the energy people lost while asleep. Physicians agreed that it was.

Those results were published across the country, with Beech-Nut promoting that a hearty breakfast consisted of bacon and eggs. Much to the chagrin of pigs and chickens, Americans embraced the advice with open mouths.

While the debate about whether or not bacon and eggs are good for you continues, Rodd said people must realize that they are, in fact, being marketed to.

“I don’t think people all woke up in unison and all said, ‘bacon,’” he said. “Marketers were overselling it. It’s like around the holidays and everything is a pumpkin.”

Still, the evidence of the bacon-matrix is everywhere. There are bacon-themed clothes, memes and accessories. Candles, cologne and even soda come in bacon varieties, but they are about as natural as you would expect them to be. “[Marketers] are extremely, extremely bright at exploiting this,” Rodd said.

Images of bacon strips and cereal mascots have achieved a level of respect that was once reserved for religious iconography. It cannot just be a coincidence that both the religious and the breakfast-faithful wake up early to fixate on their holy images. Senior Aaron Reynolds certainly has an image of the perfect breakfast icon.

“Clearly, it should be a caveman pancake wielding a bacon club,” he said.

The symbolism is complicated to say the least. In the same way technology improves human society, bacon perfects the food it touches.

“The caveman could beat other cavemen with his fists,” Reynolds said, “but then his hands would get bruised, so he would use the club. Bacon enhances the pancake, and the club enhances the caveman.”

Sophomore Cesar Guitunga’s symbolism for American breakfast is no less profound. “[It’s] definitely pancakes right next to a bacon cocktail,” he said. “Pancakes are the appealing side to me. And then you have the bizarre side with bacon cocktail. Variety and quantity describe America to me.”

Everything is better with bacon.

You take something and something is just a normal amount of good, and then you add bacon, and it’s better.

While breakfast is an institution across the world, what is eaten is not universal. What is tasty in some places would be considered offensive somewhere else. And other things are considered gross no matter where you are. But the splendor of breakfast can be a uniting factor.

Guitunga has had the opportunity to eat breakfast in six countries. A typical breakfast in England might consist of beans, sausage, toast and an egg. A morning meal in Mozambique, Guitunga’s home country, would be mor similiar to an American breakfast — fruit, cereal with milk, and toast with ham and cheese. But breakfast can be much more than food.

When Guitunga went to Turkey to visit family, they offered him tomatoes, which they eat plain, as well as string cheese and different kinds of bread. They also drank hot tea shots.

To complicate matters, nobody used silverware, and he was not fluent in Turkish. He couldn’t follow the conversation, but the breakfast held it all together.

“I feel like it is less awkward to talk when there is food involved,” he said.

Fortunately, the joy of breakfast extends well beyond the food we eat and into the things that remain unsaid.

“A meal is a good place to tolerate a group of people,” Reynolds said. “Somehow, meals make it work.”

Like the childhood games of tag or hide-andgo-seek, breakfast is something that is best enjoyed with a group. Guitunga prefers to eat with friends if his schedule allows. As an athlete, he sometimes must wake up early for practice, and he sees differences in his teammates and friends.

“At breakfast, they just seem more positive, even when they’re tired,” he said. “At dinner it just looks like the day got the best of them.”

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Feature

But there are perks to eating a healthy breakfast for nonathletes, too.

“You need to make sure you have enough energy for the day,” Rodd said. “People say breakfast is the most important meal. You must eat breakfast.”

This means avoiding the sugary, nutrient-empty, mascot cereals people have learned to love and instead consuming sources of protein, whole grains and fiber. Through some biological fluke, bacon only provides some protein.

“You want to find that fine balance where you can get your energy and still feel satisfied,” Rodd said. “If you find something that is relatively healthy, that’s an advantage and you want to go back to it.”

Getting a nutritious start to the day should not be underestimated. Guitunga’s ideal breakfast is orange juice, a wonderland of fruit salad and a bowl of granola with vanilla yogurt.

“My dream breakfast is healthy,” he said. “It has to be healthy. It’s my feel-good food because junk food makes me feel sluggish.”

Of course, just like everyone else, Guitunga has his guilty pleasures. While many like to drench their French toast in syrup and butter, he prefers to eat his topped with cheddar cheese. When his friends remark on this oddity, he reminds them that America is the home of bacon cocktails.

Reynolds’s perfect breakfast would consist of waffles, bacon, pancakes, bacon, eggs, bacon and a side of bacon.

“I could live off bacon,” he said. “I really could.

I feel sad for [healthy eaters]. You can be healthy when you’re 40.”

But under no circumstances should this be misconstrued to mean that breakfast is not a divisive issue. What constitutes good breakfast taste has not yet been agreed upon.

“Fruit belongs by itself,” Reynolds said. “Mixing things with fruit that are not fruit is just wrong. I suppose if they like it, it’s their prerogative to be crazy. Everything is better with bacon.

You take something and something is just a normal amount of good, and then you add bacon, and it’s better.”

He also believes what constitutes breakfast food is a matter of personal preference and depends on when you eat it, adding that he has been known to eat sandwiches for breakfast. On the other hand, Guitunga said there is no room for Coke, pizza or hot dogs in his morning ritual.

So what is breakfast? Is it a means to good health? A social activity? A cultural tradition? A way to make you happy at the beginning — or end — of your day? As with all questions of this scale, there are no obvious answers. This amazing and ever-expanding universe of ours continues to keep its secrets. And we continue to eat cereal, bacon and eggs, unto eternity.

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March 2015

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Questions Many colleges and universities are fighting to get their enrollment numbers up. What is UE doing to stand out to prospective students?

SHANE DAVIDSON Vice President for Enrollment Services

photo by Kate Sarber

from here on out, we’ve stabilized. If you look at our trend line, you have some peaks and valleys and, yes, it has been, in a linear sense, a slope in the negative direction, but I feel like we’ve done a good job of flatlining, so it hasn’t been as dramatic in the peaks and valleys. We always want to grow, but we have to meet targets and stabilize so those differences are not major surpluses one year and major deficits the next year.

Q: What are the national enrollment trends?

A: It is kind of a mixed bag. Overall, I think

Q: How many students are enrolled at UE? A: For fall 2014, our full-time undergraduate and Physical Therapy Department, the doctorate program, head count was 2,232. Then for spring 2015, we came in at 2,139. That’s not counting Harlaxton. In the fall, we didn’t quite make our budgeted goal. As for the spring, we did. Our fall 2013 to fall 2014 retention was 85 percent.

Q: Are those numbers up or down from previous years?

A: In fall 2012, we had an incoming class of 512. In fall 2013, that went to 543. In fall 2014, we were at 532. Prior to 2012, the incoming classes were anywhere between 585 and 625. So in those terms, it has been a downward trend. It really hit an all-time low in 2012, but I feel like

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private colleges have had moderate-to-flat growth.

Based on our stabilization, we’re right in with that national trend. If you look at the institutions that had substantial growth, it’s all been in graduate programming.

Q: What is the Enrollment Services staff doing to bring in more students?

A: We’ve gone back to a grassroots approach.

That’s where we’re trying to get in front of high school counselors and parents. The greatest influence of a college choice today is still Mom. We’re going to work with the testing agencies to get names of students that have taken the SAT that fit our profile. President Kazee created a marketing division that UE had not had. The last thing is making sure that our scholarships are competitive. It’s not all about money. There’s a fit end-value component to recruiting students.

If it doesn’t fit, you’re probably not going to be

happy. So if it fits, we know we’re a good value and we can talk about that part.

Q: How do you approach prospective students now as opposed to in the past?

A: The key is social media and mobility. Juniors or seniors in high school are making decisions based on social media and websites. Prior to those being at the height they are now, students would get in their car and visit a campus and keep a checklist of likes and dislikes. Now they make the determination by reading the social media threads and looking at schools’ websites. Students will come to UE and never have visited because of social media. But I feel like we have a better opportunity of enrolling a student if they visit as opposed to if they do not.

So that’s why we do individual visit days and open houses and Road Trip because if we can get them back more than once, we get our hook in them. We get great students because they feel a connection.

Q: What does the future look like as far as UE’s enrollment is concerned?

A: It looks very, very bright. I think we’ve got a lot of great things in the works. These things are going to add to our foundation of strong academics in order to give us the opportunity to net even larger classes in the future so we’re not just stabilizing enrollment, we’re actually turning the slope in a positive direction.

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Feature

ARE

WE

WHAT Genetically modified organisms and various additives have become the norm in the food industry today, despite controversy and opposition.

g

rocery store shelves are jampacked with foods of all kinds, from healthy superfoods to decadent sweets. But the food consumers buy today is certainly not the same as what their grandparents — or even their parents — bought years ago. Additives and genetically modified organisms — commonly known as GMOs — are in most of our foods, and they are reshaping the way we eat.

But what are these extra ingredients, those added to foods or listed on food labels we don’t often recognize and sometimes cannot even pronounce? Should consumers be worried?

There is a lot of confusion surrounding additives and GMOs. According to the Food and Drug Administration, additives are simply ingredients that have been added to food either directly or indirectly during handling or packaging.

They include such benign things as xantham gum, a substance used in foods as a gelling agent and thickener, or as controversial as aspartame, a low-calorie sweetener that is about 200 times sweeter than sucrose.

Additives are used in the U.S. and other countries to preserve flavor or enhance color or texture. And they are subject to many rumors.

The dye Yellow No. 5 is rumored to cause hyperactivity in young children. According to the FDA, a small number of children — 1 in 10,000 — have a Yellow No. 5 sensitivity and break out in hives when exposed to it.

There is no evidence that it and other additives like it cause hyperactivity. but the FDA still

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EAT

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RYAN MURPHY & ANNA SHEFFER

requires it to be indicated on packaging.

Aspartame has been said to erode stomach lining and cause cancer. The FDA refutes the claims that it causes any medical issues at all, but others would disagree. Payal Patel-Dovlatabadi, assistant professor of public health and director of the public health program, said aspartame leads to an increased risk of more than 90 conditions, ranging from headaches to cancer.

She said the body cannot properly digest aspartame, and this causes it to negatively affect one’s neurons. She added that aspartame is particularly insidious because it is in many sugar-free foods, and consumers may not realize they are eating it. She said other, naturally occurring sweeteners like stevia could be good alternatives to aspartame.

Patel-Dovlatabadi also expressed concern about carrageenan, a thickening agent used in dairy products. She said it is naturally occurring but can cause inflammation and should be avoided by those with a gluten intolerancy.

Ann Powell, associate professor of biology, said it is nearly impossible to avoid all food additives, but there are some she avoids. She said she buys antibiotic- and growth-hormone-free chicken, as well as growth-hormone-free milk. She also does not eat foods containing monosodium glutamate, a flavor enhancer, because it gives her headaches.

Patel-Dovlatabadi said there are thousands of food additives, and while several can cause health problems, there are many that do not.

Some are even beneficial, such as foods fortified

with Omega-3 fatty acids, which can help aid brain function.

“There are quite a few additives that are perfectly safe for consumption,” she said.

Powell said the more consumers are aware of what is in the food they eat and its possible effects, the better. She supports the labeling of GMOs in food for this reason.

“It would be nice for the consumer to have a choice,” she said.

Han Lai, a visiting Fulbright Scholar from China, grew up on fresh, completely natural foods. She said this is because China is careful about its food, focusing on freshness and natural methods of production. The result: it has no additives. She said American-produced food has left her missing home.

“Some of the fruits do not taste like the original flavor,” she said. “It does not have the fruit flavor.”

GMOs were first approved for human consumption in the United States in 1995, and by 1999, almost 50 percent of the corn, cotton and soybeans planted in the country were GM. By the end of 2010, GM crops covered more than 3.8 million square miles of land in 29 countries worldwide — one-tenth of the world’s farmland.

GMOs are created when a gene from one organism is spliced into the DNA of another.

Common genetic modifications include resistance to pesticides, but many different kinds of GMOs exist.

Karen Batra, director of Food and Agriculture Communication for the Biotechnology Indus-

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try Organization, said the eight most prevalent genetically engineered crops are corn, soybeans, cotton, sugar beets, papaya, squash, canola and alfalfa. Of those, corn, soy, cotton and sugar beets are the most prevalent.

“Of all those four crops grown in the U.S., more than 90 percent are GMOs,” Batra said.

GMOs have many different advantages. One strain of rice has been modified to be more nutritious, making it sought after in a number of developing countries. Some bananas have been grown with weakened viruses in the sapling, resulting in edible vaccines for diseases like cholera. British scientists have even modified a breed of hens to lay eggs with medicinal egg whites, used to treat cancer.

But not everyone is on board concerning GMOs and additives. Lai teaches at Chengdu University of Traditional Chinese Medicine in China. Her view on GMOs is highly focused around the traditional teachings about health through prevention instead of through treatments. She said when at home in China she buys natural food, or foods explicitly labeled non-GMO, even if they are more expensive.

“We cannot change the natural process,” she said. “We like to respect and obey the rules of natural order, and that’s how I perceive it.”

Powell thinks the way GMOs are used in the U.S.’s industrial agricultural system does not harness the benefits of GMOs enough.

“I sometimes wonder if that type of system has done more harm than good,” she said.

“But that being said, there’s no evidence they do harm to the human body.”

She believes this is a common view, even with the onset of healthier GMOs, but some believe GMOs are dangerous and can even cause cancer.

Patel-Dovlatabadi said that since GMOs were created in the 1990s, there has not been enough time to test them thoroughly enough.

“The effects are not short-term,” she said.

“These are long-term effects.”

She said that while there have not been longterm studies performed studying the effects of GMOs, incidences of health conditions like

cancer and gluten-intolerance have increased since GMOs were introduced.

A 2012 study published in the journal Food and Chemical Toxicology supports this. Rats fed of processed foods glycophosate-resiscontain GMO tant corn — otheringredients wise known as the Roundup Ready crops created by the Monsanto Co. — developed liver and kidney problems. About 80 percent of the female rats in the test group developed tumors, creating outrage against Monsanto.

But the study had some problems. The rats used were from the Sprague Dawley strain — a breed prone to tumors. The study was also criticized for its small sample size, too small to reach a definite conclusion, and was retracted in 2013 because of a lack of evidence.

Batra said GM crops are first tested by the company that creates them in a greenhouse and then by field tests. The company then petitions the U.S. Agriculture Department for approval, and after that, governmental agencies conduct further testing.

The Environmental Protection Agency also tests the crop if it is modified to be insecticide or pesticide resistant, and the FDA performs tests to ensure GM foods do not cause allergic or adverse reactions.

Some believe the government should adopt policies like those in Europe, where in certain European Union countries GMOs have been banned. Others countrie have placed heavy restrictions, requiring labeling and extensive testing, before any produce is made available. Ballot measures to label GMOs failed in both Oregon

GMOS ARE COMPLICATED Here’s a quick run-down of the arguments on both sides of the fence.

75%

170 million acres of GMO crops were planted in 2013

PROS: Potential health benefits: Crops can be modified to have extra nutrients or a longer shelf life. Testing is underway to create edible vaccines in produce.

Greater yields: With GM crops, farmers can use fewer pesticides, and their crops could survive harsh climates, weeds or poor soil conditions.

Lower pesticide use: Crops engineered to be pest-resistant won’t need to be sprayed with pesticides, so there will be less chemical runoff in the water supply.

More food for more people: GM crops can be engineered to adapt to multiple environments, resulting in more food produced worldwide.

CONS: Potential health risks: GM foods could cause allergic reactions, and bacteria-resistant genes could potentially spread to the bacteria in our bodies.

Cost to small farmers: Small farmers have to purchase expensive GM seeds from agricultural companies, causing them to lose money. These seeds can only be used for one year.

Possible harm to wildlife: There is the worry that insects will become resistant to the pesticides in GM crops and that GM crops will become invasive or be poisonous to native species.

Biotech companies:

SUGAR BEETS

CORN

95%

93%

COTTON

96%

Percent of U.S. crops that are GMO

Crescent Magazine

•

March 2015

SOY

94%

about half of all land used to grow crops

Companies like Monsanto are profit-driven and don’t seem to care about farmers.

21

and Colorado in November 2014, and amendments in other states also failed to pass.

Patel-Dovlatabadi said it is difficult to avoid GMOs and additives entirely, and so it is important for consumers to read ingredient labels and be aware of what they are purchasing.

She said two of the most common ingredients in processed foods are high fructose corn syrup and soy lecithin, both of which come from common GM crops.

“It’s amazing to understand that corn byproducts are in practically everything,” she said.

GMOs can also have negative effects on small farmers. These are farmers who cannot afford to pay the higher prices for GM seeds and ultimately find their businesses dwarfed by those who can.

Batra said GM seeds cannot be replanted because they do not grow well after a year of use.

Farmers must sign a contract with seed supply companies like Monsanto to purchase the seeds, and they must agree not to save seeds from the crops. Also, seed companies can sue for royalties when their seeds end up on a farm that didn’t purchase them, even if they were spread by natural means, such as wind or rain.

The Supreme Court ruled in 2013 that farmers must pay royalties to Monsanto if they wish to create new seeds from the company’s patented seeds. There are even reports that weeds have interbred with the modified crops, resulting in pesticide and herbicide-resistant weeds that are much more difficult to remove.

But Batra said she believes GMOs can help small farmers as much as large farmers. She noted that GMOs can help farmers get a higher yield from their crops in developing nations since the GM seeds can grow in poor soil conditions or in areas where there are a lot of weeds or pests. She said small family farms could also benefit in the U.S. because farmers do not have to plow the fields or spread fertilizer as much.

“We’ve got a lot of stories where farmers don’t have to spend as much time in the fields,” she said.

The debate surrounding GMOs will continue since food is such a crucial part of life everywhere, regardless of how involved science is in its production. But Lai will continue to focus on the balance of foods and its benefits with her studies in Chinese medicine.

“The food we take can shape our thinking and our mood,” she said.

One thing is clear: For better or for worse, food these days is not what it used to be.

“It’s a complex issue,” Powell said. “We want issues to be black and white, and in some cases, they’re just not black and white like we like them to be.”

22

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First Time

Want to look even hotter in those yoga pants?

Try drenching yourself with sweat and almost passing out.

A LITTLE TOO HOT

TO HANDLE MCKENZIE ELLIS

I

’ve done riskier things on less sleep. That’s what I told myself as I left the house for an 8 a.m. hot yoga session at Yoga 101.

The website said to drink lots of water the day of class and not to eat for two hours before. But anxiety over this new event kept me up until morning, so I was running on two and a half hours of sleep and just half a cup of water. I woke up without time to spare and didn’t want to risk eating breakfast and potentially sabotaging this session even more.

Entering the studio, I was nervous but determined. The small lobby was calming and warm and didn’t even smell sweat-drenched.

I began to relax. At the front desk, instructor April Nading gave me a waiver to sign that asked for an emergency contact. No big deal.

The hot yoga room was dimly lit. Temperature-wise, I’d call it a notch above cozy. I later asked Nading how hot the room is.

“Hot,” she said. “Around 105 degrees.”

The few people inside were lying on their mats or sitting down stretching to their toes. I picked the option I could actually do. But the exposure of lying down in a new place made me anxious as more attendees arrived, so I sat up. Nading said the heat varies with class size, and when class began, the room was definitely near capacity.

Nading reminded us to stay focused. Basically, don’t be distracting and don’t get distracted. If you have to break pose, quietly revert to hero or child’s pose. She jokingly added that the doors were not locked, but opening them too often interrupts the session and messes with the temperature.

First we learned to breathe. Breathing in

Crescent Magazine

•

March 2015

through the nose, we held the air inside before exhaling slowly. We started in child’s pose — knees tucked under the body and arms outstretched, forehead to the mat.

Nading walked around the room as we did the poses, praising and advising students as she went. During downward dog, she came to me and asked if she could stand on my fingers for a second. I obliged. How could I say no?

While on my fingers, she adjusted my form.

This felt less stretched and a lot more natural.

It was just enough tension to feel like exercise.

The hotness of hot yoga gives it key advantages over ordinary yoga.

“Heat and humidity,” Nading said. “Those help make it more cardiovascular. It also helps you get into the poses a little deeper than you would in a cold room.”

Nading said sweating releases toxins and that the exercise can burn up to 600 calories.

“I love the way I feel,” she said. “I’m in better shape now than I’ve ever been in my life.”

Almost without notice, the room had really heated up. I wiped sweat from my eyes as I scanned the room, trying to get a better visual grip on the poses. Then I almost passed out.

The yogis posed all around me as I focused on controlling my collapse, and Zen music played in the background like the soundtrack to my demise. I sat with my arms hugging my knees until I felt steadier. I stood up but was back down in a hot second. I was not quite slipping away, but I wasn’t making much progress back into the here and now.

Nading told me to sit in child’s pose. I was really a distraction now. Out of my element and grossly unprepared, I had disturbed

not only the gods of yoga, but the disciples as well. Humbly and half in a daze, I bent down into child’s, head down and eyes closed.

Nading quickly grasped the situation and set a cool, damp cloth on my neck. She guessed I hadn’t had enough water. An offbrand electrolyte drink appeared like a magic elixir. She said to be fully hydrated before coming to class.

“It does require fuel,” she said.

The yogis around me whispered kindly, asking me if I was OK and reminding me to take small sips of the drink. Despite this setback, I had to persevere. I spent at least twothirds of the session in hero pose, sitting back on my heels, trying to break my cycle of slow recovery and swift defeat.

In the dressing room after class, the yogis swarmed me with concern. One lady told me she herself had gotten sick last time.

“Give yourself permission to sit down if you need to,” Nading said. “Be prepared to not be able to do it the first time.”

The studio, located at 2800 Lincoln, offers introduction and higher-level hot yoga classes. A single class pass is $12 for full-time students, and deals for multiple classes are available at evvyoga101.com. Yoga 101 can be reached at 812–454–0524.

I came in as a skeptic. I severely underestimated hot yoga, and I paid the price. But near the end, as we lay on our backs and relaxed every muscle, I felt a strange power in this yoga and the people who practice it.

Or maybe I was dumbstruck by how badly I’d been beat. Whatever the case, hot yoga should not be taken lightly.

23

Full-Court Press

College sports fans go all out for their schools, creating a unique perspective of American society.

NOT CRAZY, JUST

PASSIONATE IAN HESLINGER

T

he arena is filled to capacity. Covered from head to toe in school colors, fans possess everything from rah rags and spirit wigs to temporary tattoos and foam fingers. While some would say these people are behaving way over-thetop, they aren’t sick, weird or insane — they’re passionate. They’re sports fans.

Fan passion is an important part of college sports. Cheering for a school evokes different emotions than those conjured up by rooting for other sports teams. There is usually a personal connection of some sort, and this separates collegiate athletics from professional sports. And fan support is certainly not lost on collegiate athletes.

“It’s big,” said reliever Alex Gould, a third year-member of UE’s baseball team. “Obviously, we don’t have a huge stadium, but the more fans we get, the better. We feed off that.”

A school’s alumni greatly contribute to this dynamic as well. Danette Leighton, the PAC12’s chief marketing officer, said the age demographic for college football fans ranges from 18 to 80, and this creates a different atmosphere at college games.

“That’s what’s been so different and maybe so challenging for collegiate athletics,” she told CBS Sports. “You can’t just focus in on one, but that’s also what makes us so special. We have this affinity fan base because maybe they were coming of age and found their alma mater, or they grew up with a region in which everybody went to that school.”

Alumni are usually a university’s most loyal fan base and biggest monetary supporters.

They can relate to the student-athletes because

24

they were once those student-athletes. Of course, every team has its “bandwagon fans,” those who only root for winning teams. But overall, fans go to games or cheer for a specific team because of their love for the school.

Libero Kim Deprez, a third-year member of UE’s volleyball team, said good fans go to sporting events regularly and are definitely a part of the game. She said their commitment motivates players so teammates want to win for their team and for their fans. “[Fans] give you a ton of advantage,” she said, “[and UE’s] school spirit needs to improve dramatically.”

College sports are clearly important to American society. Rasmussen Report’s 2012 Discover Fan Loyalty Poll reported that 90 percent of college football fans would still watch their team every week even if they were having a bad season. And the 2013 version found 42 percent of fans would rather watch a college football game from the 50-yard line on Thanksgiving Day than enjoy holiday dinner with their families.

But how much do fans really value their teams? A 2012 study published in the Journal of Contemporary Athletics found that people identified more strongly with their favorite sports team than they did with their religion, occupation or other social activity.

And that is evident by how fans react at games. They use their loyalty to cheer on their team and heckle the opposition. And while they sometimes go too far, it happens in the heat of the moment. While fans can certainly lose control, like when an Arizona State fan spit on an Oregon assistant basketball coach

and an athletic trainer last year, those instances are the extreme and not the norm.

There are passionate fans all across the country, and UE student-athletes have dealt with plenty of them over the years. While there have not been incidents as dramatic as what happened at Oregon, there have certainly been those that are similar.

Deprez said any team wants to beat another team more when on the road just to make their fans quiet down.

“Whenever we go places, their fans say, not bad stuff, but joking stuff,” she said. “They don’t say something that actually hurts.”

She said opposing fans once went on her Twitter account and found that she had recently dyed her hair. They tried to use that information to heckle her during a match, but she said she paid little attention to it, laughing off the attempt.

As a pitcher, Gould has experienced his fair share of obnoxious comments. Standing 5 feet, 6 inches, he said many of the remarks are directed at his height, adding that he tries not to let those bother him. He usually laughs about them and moves on.

“If you don’t deal with that stuff, you’re not going to be successful,” Gould said. “Life’s about overcoming haters.”

College sports fans show passion in a variety of ways. Whether through body paint or props, they root for their team. And although fans might take it too far sometimes, they are usually sincere in their love for their team.

They are not sick, weird or crazy, just passionate sports fans. And there is nothing wrong with that.

March 2015

•

Crescent Magazine

Athletes in Action

KATE SARBER

UNDERDOG Keeping their heads in the game.

Climbing the MVC ladder is never easy, but the Aces once again keep clawing away at it even after suffering a series of recent loses. While the MVC Tournament is set for March 12–15 at Family Arena in St. Charles, Mo., with coverage by ESPN3, there are still two chances to see the Aces play at home before the tournament begins. UE takes on MVC powerhouse Wichita State at 7 p.m. March 5 at Ford Center and returns at 2 p.m. March 7 to face Missouri State for the final home game of the season. There are a number of highlights on the season so far, including guard Sara Dickey becoming the 19th player in program history to score 1,000 or more career points, forward Sasha Robinson so far pulling down more than 200 rebounds and UE having the best three-point field goal percentage in the MVC.

Scoring her 1,000th career point, guard Sara Dickey gets by Illinois State guard Lindsay Smith to score yet again. | Kate Sarber

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March 2015

Out of my way! Guard Kat Taylor flies by Northern Iowa guards Brittni Donaldson and Brooke Brown and forward Alyssa Johnson, while forward Sasha Robinson watches as her teammate gets two more. | MaKayla Seifert

Northern Iowa guard Sharnae Lamar can only watch as guard Kenyia Johnson gets airborne on her way to the basket. | MaKayla Seifert

25

Overtime

photo by Kate Sarber

26

March 2015

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Crescent Magazine

HALEY ALBERS

RACKING UP THE RECORDS UE’s top hitter has more than talent; he has the winning attitude to go with it.

T

alented athletes are almost always expected to be cocky. It’s an attitude some feel is needed in order to be successful. Turns out, that’s not the case where centerfielder Kevin Kaczmarski is concerned. He defies the norm.

While the senior has made it into annals of UE baseball history, his talent is not the first thing many notice about him — it’s his affable, down-to-earth personality. Friends are quick to say that even though he is a great player, Kaczmarski is a genuinely nice guy.

“He’s an interesting personality that each member of the team gravitates toward because of his example on and off the baseball field,” coach Wes Carroll said. “He commands respect because of his talent and how he is out there.”

With a father who was a San Diego Padres minor leaguer and several uncles who played college sports, raw talent runs in the Kaczmarski family. Sports were simply a part of growing up.

“It definitely made me want to take the same path,” he said.

Kaczmarski tried other sports, but baseball was the one that found its way into his soul. He worked hard, and discovered he had a natural aptitude for the game. While he was a medical redshirt his freshman year at UE, Kaczmarski has had an incredible career since.

His statistics are what ballplayers dream of. He led the team last season with a .315 batting average and a .502 slugging percentage. He hit 19 doubles, had five triples and batted in 50 runs, one of only three players in the MVC to accomplish this feat. He posted a .375 on-base percentage, recorded multiple hits in 18 games and drove in multiple runs in 12 games. In addition to being named to the all-MVC first team and being an all-MVC scholar-athlete honoree, he finished the 2014 season ranked 20th on UE’s all-time hits list with 210.

“I think he’s one of the most talented players that’s come to our program,” Carroll said. “At the plate, he brings something special. How the ball comes off his bat is different than the average player’s.”

And last season wasn’t the only one where he recorded unbelievable statistics and racked up honors. Those things have been happening since he first took the field for the Aces in 2012, including being UE’s 10th player in history to earn Louisville Slugger freshmen All-America honors.

Hitting has always been one of Kaczmarski’s greatest strengths. He has led the team in batting for three seasons, and a favorite game was the 2013 MVC Tournament win over Bradley when he hit a walk-off, threerun homer for the win.

“The joy he had is one of the most memorable moments for me,” Carroll said.

While hitting comes naturally to Kaczmarski, he doesn’t get by on talent alone. He puts in long hours of practice and conditioning.

“Natural talent can only take you so far,” he said. “What sets you apart is your work ethic.”

And his work ethic extends off the field since the classroom is important to Kaczmarski, too. He completed his exercise science degree last year and is now finishing another degree in psychology. He definitely succeeds in keeping baseball and academics in check.

“It’s all about maintaining a good balance and keeping yourself sane,” he said.

Staying sane seems to come easy to Kaczmarski as people are naturally drawn to his fun-loving personality.

“He’s a clown,” pitcher Forrest Herrmann said. “He’s a great guy. He’s always dancing or joking around with somebody. Six in the morning and we’re heading to weights, and he’s always dancing. He’s one of the hardest working guys, and he has fun with everything he does.

Rituals rule the sports world, and while Kaczmarski said he has cut out his game day routines, there was a time not so long ago where he put himself through the paces like most athletes. Herrmann said Kaczmarski used to talk to his hat and glove before batting. One time, his teammates hid his glove, with Kaczmarski frantically searching the dugout before reluctantly stepping up to the plate to bat without it.

“He nevertheless got a single,” Herrmann said. “And while he was standing on first, our catcher held his glove up and got his attention. He didn’t think it was as funny as all of us did and yelled, ‘Real cool guys.

That’s really funny.’”

Kaczmarski shook it off pretty quickly, which is indicative of his personality. He finds motivation by concentrating on what he loves to do, and what he hopes to do this season is break a few more records, win a few more games and have fun.

“He brings a little bit of everything to the table as far as skills go,” Herrmann said. “Anything can happen when he comes to the plate. He has a talent to make really anything happen.”

As UE works its way through nonconference play, Kaczmarski hopes the Aces can best their 2014 record and advance further in the MVC Tournament. And with him leading the way, those things could happen.

“I think he’s one of the best players that has ever put on an Aces uniform,” Carroll said.

Anything can happen when he comes to the plate.

Crescent Magazine

•

March 2015

27

campus crime

FREE

campus DELIVERY

Sorry to hear your sick day was due to actual sickness.

OAK HILL PHARMACY

The following information was compiled from criminal offense reports filed Jan. 21 through Feb. 17 in Safety & Security.

Feb. 15 – Student found intoxicated in the Moore Hall main bathroom. Transported by ambulance to St. Mary’s Medical Center. Referred to the vice president for Student Affairs for disciplinary action.

Jan. 29 – Health Center parking spot sign stolen from A-lot. Loss reported at $45.

Jan. 26 – Velcro-backed men’s soccer sign stolen from the Athletics Department median sign found in a Hughes Hall first floor room. Student responsible referred to the vice president for Student Affairs for disciplinary action.

Jan. 25 – Student found with marijuana in a Brentano Hall third floor room. Referred to the vice president for Student Affairs for disciplinary action.

Jan. 24 – Two students found with alcohol and marijuana in a Hughes Hall first floor room. Referred to the vice president for Student Affairs for disciplinary action.

— Money stolen from a Moore Hall second floor room. Loss reported at $20.

— Money and an architect’s pen stolen from a Moore Hall second floor room. Loss reported at $170.

— Student found with marijuana in a Brentano Hall third floor room. Referred to the vice president for Student Affairs for disciplinary action.

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BE SMART. BE NICE. BE SAFE.

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March 2015

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photo by Kate Sarber

FULLY ENERGIZED CHRIS NORRIS

S

ome people talk with their hands.

Chris Mohn, associate professor of Spanish, talks with her whole body.

When she’s telling a story, or more often, a joke, she has the energy of a performer.

“She’s very energized,” senior Briana Boyles said. “She cares about all of her students and wants to see them achieve.”

Mohn has been at UE since 2005 and in her time here has made a distinct mark. She received the Dean’s Teaching Award in 2010, served on Faculty Senate for two terms and currently serves as general education director.

With all her accomplishments, Mohn seems like someone who has been teaching her whole life, but she didn’t start until her 40s.

She worked as an insurance writer, a radio copywriter and editor of a newspaper she ran with her husband. She only started teaching when a college near her home in Great Bend, Kan., was going to shut down its Spanish program if it didn’t find an instructor.

“It took a lot of growing up,” Mohn said. “I didn’t want to do it right away.”

Of course, if you spend enough time with Mohn, she doesn’t always seem so grown

“

up. She enjoys teaching Spanish because she doesn’t always have to be an adult.

“I think you have more license for craziness, if that makes sense,” Mohn said.

Whether she’s doing simple things like wearing red stockings to teach a poem about red stockings or telling students about her “husband” Antonio Banderas, Mohn believes humor is essential to learning.

Mohn’s humor goes beyond the classroom.

Daniel Byrne, associate professor of history, said even though she takes her work seriously, she is always able to relieve tension during meetings.

“She works really hard,” he said, “and part of that is to keep people balanced.”

Mohn also takes an interest in her students’ lives. She wants them to know everything they can do with a language and believes everyone should take a foreign language course because it’s a valuable life skill to have.

“Even if it’s nothing more than to say, ‘Hola, dos cervezas,’ you’ve done something,” she said.

Mohn is also a big advocate for students studying abroad. She has found when students

are in another place and forced to use their language skills, they realize their potential.

“It gets you out of your comfort zone,” she said. “You grow exponentially as a person, as a student and as a scholar.”

For Mohn, going the extra mile for students is second nature. She sees it as a pact between teacher and student to put in equal effort.

“It’s the way it should be,” Mohn said.

“That’s what we’re here for.”

Boyles recalled a time when she should have failed a paper, but Mohn walked her through what she needed to do and gave her another chance.

“She’s one of those teachers that, if you put in the effort, she will not let you fail,” Boyles said.

Because of her many commitments, Mohn said she doesn’t have any free time. But when she does get a moment, she watches “garbage TV,” talks with her children and grandchildren and reads. Even with a full schedule, she is able to give students the energy they deserve.

“I don’t think the students miss out,” Byrne said. “A lot of time teaching comes second.

She’s definitely teaching first.”

She cares about all of her students and wants to see them achieve.

Crescent Magazine

•

March 2015

”

29

Off the Wall

DOTM

GOTTA GET IT magneto helmet — days of awesome past Admit it — you have always wanted awesome superpowers. This MAGNETO REPLICA HELMET may not turn you into the super-magnetic mutant of your dreams, but at least you will feel more powerful when you’re wearing it.

And when you’re fighting in the war for mutant rights, you need all the extra power you can get. Available from PROPSTORE.COM for just $779, this wearable replica is a limited edition model, with only about 700 made. It is constructed with poured vinyl and finished in black and burgundy with a tarnished surface. Featuring a detailed insignia on the

crown, it looks exactly like the one Michael Fassbender wears in 2014’s “X-Men: Days of Future Past.” This helmet also comes with a display base, acrylic case featuring the helmet’s edition number and film’s logo, and a certificate of authenticity so you can show your friends you’re ready to take on Professor X. Forget tinfoil. This helmet is guaranteed to protect your brain waves from manipulation by the world’s most powerful telepaths — all while making your friends sick with jealousy.

Wear it with caution, though, because Hugh Jackman might just attack you out of habit.

Looking for the note-taking app that has it all? Try GOOGLE KEEP. The app keeps you on track with color customization, checklists, photo capturing and voice-to-text transcription. It even syncs up with your email account.

TIDBIT

Forgetting something? Keep the READY TO GO daily reminder app in mind.

Simple reminders and adjustable checklists can help you keep track of tasks like turning off lights, feeding pets and clearing your Internet history.

30

Looking for the perfect drink to spice up your (off-campus) March Madness party? The BRACKET BUSTER is a sweet, South-inspired cocktail that just begs to be sipped while watching your favorite team in the big tournament (from a non-university owned location).

According to TAYLORTAKESATASTE.COM, muddle basil, brown sugar and lime juice for 30 seconds before adding peach-infused bourbon and stirring. Top it off with some Sprite and pour into a tall glass with crushed ice. Enjoy (at home, a bar or, well, you get the idea).

ingredients: 6 basil leaves | 1 tsp. dark brown sugar | 1 tbsp. fresh lime juice | 1/4 cup peach bourbon | 1/2 cup Sprite

THERE’S an APP for THAT

KFC recently tested the Double Down Dog, a hot dog covered in cheese sauce and served in a folded fried chicken “bun,” at stores in the Philippines.

the bracket buster

heard it here “The goal of all inanimate objects is to resist man and ultimately defeat him.”

It has been illegal to mail buildings in the U.S. since 1916 when a man mailed a 40,000-ton house across Utah so he wouldn”t have to pay freight rates.

—journalist Russell Baker

An American man faked his own death in 2007 so he could get out of a long-term cell phone contract without paying the $175 fee. He was unsuccessful.

March 2015

•

Crescent Magazine

people tweet the damndest things “Can you tell me what I missed in class?” is the battle cry of the millennial generation.

@TheTinyAcademic There are few things more humbling than having to delete a wise-ass Tweet for grammar reasons.

@JordanPeele Spider-Man: Hi! What have you been up to? Avengers: Saving the world from cyborg aliens. You? Spider-Man: Fought a guy in a rhino outf — nm.

@kumailn Kanye West just ran up, grabbed my “World’s Greatest Dad” mug and gave it to a more deserving recipient.

@ConanOBrien Let’s talk about sex, baby — Salt-N-Pepa Let’s talk about Sex Baby — toy designer at Mattel who’s about to get fired

@mikeleffingwell While delicious in theory, Buffalo Wing popcorn has to be the closest thing to a fart I’ve ever eaten.

Things that make us Crazy OUT OF SYNC

FROZEN IN TIME

When figuring out how fast we can get to class, we shouldn’t have to factor in how fast the professor’s watch is. We are not late. You are early. We have carefully calculated exactly how much time it takes to get ready so we can maximize our moments of sleep and leisure.

Don’t jeopardize our attendance grade just because you have “fast” time.

Frozen food instructions usually list microwave, oven and fry options. But not all are created equally. A select few omit any mention of microwaving. Some even warn against it altogether. But waiting 20 minutes for oven-baked crispness is a huge luxury for students. If it can’t be zapped ready in 5 minutes or less, then it’s not going to get eaten.

OPEN-DOOR POLICY

ALL MEME’D OUT

If you are going to open the door for me, I need to know by your body language before I reach the door. We may have less than three seconds of interaction time, but let’s try not to make them awkward. Either way is fine — I could even hold the door open for you. But I would rather we open our own doors if that will save us both some embarrassment.

Tumblr is a great way to share pithy observations about pop culture, but can we establish a grace period after something happens before we make a million memes out of it? Just moments after Katy Perry’s Super Bowl show, one of the sharks had its own Twitter feed. It’s all good fun, but there’s a point where you have to enjoy things for what they are.

@feliciaday

REMEMBER WHEN... …children’s TV looked like a bad acid trip? Starring Technicolor nightmares Tinky Winky, Dipsy, Laa-Laa and Po, “Teletubbies” ran from 1997 to 2001 on PBS. The baby-faced creatures ate Tubby Custard, interacted with a toddler sun and generally terrified parents and children alike. For some reason, the show is being revived later this year. Eh-oh. …you could lick it, shake it and dunk it? Baby Bottle Pop was a radical candy experience because apparently everyone was obsessed with babies in the ‘90s. You ate the treat by dipping a lollipop bottle nipple into flavored powder that may as well have been cocaine when someone busted it out on the playground. The candy was advertised with outrageous commercials featuring an insanely catchy jingle that’s going to be in your head forever. …you could make any room a roller rink? Heelys were the coolest way to get around before people got worried about a few injured children and started banning them. The shoes were mostly used by rad kids to escape hall monitors, but advanced users could use them to spin around, jump on stuff and even grind — provided you had the model with a nylon pad on the bottom. …“Bill Nye the Science Guy” taught us about friction instead of global warming? Airing on PBS from 1993 to 1998, the educational program used goofy sound effects and bright colors to teach children about basic science like atoms and fossils. Nye now serves as the voice of reason in the face of science blasphemers, taking on topics like evolution and deflated footballs, but he never stopped rocking those awesome bow ties.

Several citizens of Strasbourg, France, literally danced themselves to death in the space of a month during the Dancing Plague of 1518.

Crescent Magazine

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March 2015

In mountain or alpine environments, pink snow, called watermelon snow, results from a species of algae that contains a red pigment.

Some moths never eat anything as adults because they don’t have mouths. They must live off the energy they stored as caterpillars.

The northern leopard frog may literally eat with its eyes. By retracting its eyes into its head, it helps push food down its esophagus.

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Motley Crew

The best way to find yourself is to get lost.

The best way to get lost is to misread Google Maps.

TAKING THE ROAD

NOT TAKEN CHRIS NORRIS

I

do not like getting lost. If I don’t have a GPS, a map and a Bear Grylls survival guide, I get nervous. It gets worse when I’m in a car. When I’m driving and don’t have directions, traffic laws get broken, swear words are shouted and lives are risked.

Don’t get me wrong; I like a good aimless wander as much as the next person, but there’s a limit. Walking through a city and stumbling onto a burrito place is fun. Being stuck in the middle of an English forest is not.

It all started when my girlfriend, Emily, and I were celebrating our second anniversary.

We were studying at Harlaxton, and she wanted to visit the New Forest because of a song we both liked. I let her plan the trip.

We took multiple trains to get to Bournemouth, England, where we spent a few quiet days by the ocean before heading to the New Forest. We took a train to Beaulieu Road Station in the New Forest because it looked close to a town where we could walk around and eat. We picked wrong.

The first clue this was going to be one gigantic clustercuss was when no one at Bournemouth Station knew where Beaulieu Road was. Probably because I was pronouncing it “Bay-lee-oh,” when I should have said “Byoo-lee.” Silly me. But even when they corrected me, it took them a second until they said, “We’ve never had anyone ask that before.”

They eventually found the departure time buried deep in their charts, and we got on the train. There were other people. There was hope. Then the conductor announced we would be stopping at Beaulieu Road soon and to make our way to the exits. No one moved.

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No one even acknowledged that the conductor had said anything. They all continued watching “Downton Abbey” and drinking tea or whatever British people do when they’re ignoring stupid tourists about to make a mistake.

The man at the train door was a kindly old gentleman with glasses and a slight hunch in his back. As the train pulled into the station he smiled and asked us if we were going for a hike before opening the door, shoving us off the train and closing the door again while cackling, probably.

Slightly dazed, we surveyed our surroundings. Beaulieu Road Station was located in the middle of the New Forest along, well, Beaulieu Road. I say station, but it was really more of “a place where trains stop sometimes.” There was a metal bench, a big sign with a (not-upto-date) schedule and a machine where you could buy tickets. There was also a big blue “Help” button that I’m not sure did anything.

Morale was low.

We saw some buildings nearby and decided to find out if there was civilization in the area. We came across a small tavern and asked the bartender inside where the nearest town was. He asked if we had a car. We said no. He just looked over his glasses at us.

Google Maps placed the station maybe a mile away from a town called Lyndhurst. We walked three miles through the New Forest — which was not nearly as picturesque as we had expected — before finding Lyndhurst. I spent most of that walk loudly complaining about the beautiful weather and free workout I was getting, trying to make Emily feel bad for an honest mistake. I never said I wasn’t a jerk.

Lyndhurst finally greeted us with a smattering of ponies walking around the entrance to the town. Ponies. Just walking the streets like people. It did not inspire confidence.

We spent maybe an hour in Lyndhurst. After eating an overpriced bacon, cranberry and brie sandwich and being cornered by a petitioner trying to save some old building, we walked back. This time, we took a more scenic route. On this route, we walked right next to wild ponies and even found some hairy cows in a clearing on top of a hill. It was beautifully grungy and peaceful. It reminded me of home in Southern Indiana, which isn’t something I ever thought I’d say in a good way.

We made it back to the tavern, partially to brag to the bartender and his over-the-glasses judgment and partially to grab a well-deserved drink. I got a local beer named after the wild boars that are also in the New Forest.

We had to wait on the unpleasant metal bench at the station for half an hour before the train came to save us from this wooded hell. In the end, I survived. And the scenery was beautiful in a burned-down-forest kind of way. Not to mention I got to spend a day alone with my girlfriend, which, in the middle of a crazy semester where we didn’t have any privacy, was much appreciated.

Maybe getting lost every once in a while isn’t the worst thing in the world. For all my spatial obsession, I’m a bit lost in the whole big-picture, what-am-I-doing-with-my-life sense.

Maybe if I could let go of my maps and make a life decision for once, I’d be better off.

But I’m still not going to let Emily live this one down.

March 2015

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Crescent Magazine

i am straight gay bi transgender queer ...a person TRI-STATE

ALLIANCE

Serving the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender communities of the region since 1980

TSAGL.org | For more information, email wallypaynter@aol.com or call 812.480.0204

The youth group for LGBTQ students under age 21 and their straight-supportive friends meets at 7 p.m. each Saturday at the TSA office, 501 John St., Suite 5, Evansville. noh8campaign.com

Create the best YouTube video to promote “Pride Prom” and receive a $100 prize!

10

$ Tri-State Alliance invites you to its 14th annual

PRIDE

at the door

PROM

7 p.m.–12 a.m. • Saturday, April 11 Evansville Airport Holiday Inn, 7101 U.S. Highway 41 North

Appetizers at 8 p.m. • Drag Show begins at 9 p.m. • Everyone is welcome! facebook.com/tristatealliance