BACKPAGE 8 Don’t trust bee in Anderson 203
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Helena Mews Cat
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h my god guys, let me tell you. I moved here from Indiana with the dream of getting a good liberal arts education, but you will not believe what I have had to put up with! So my roommate is a total B---, by which I mean she is a bee, and also sort of a bitch. I mean, when I first got here she demanded that I pay half the rent, so I had been giving her
checks every month until last week when my RA told me that we don’t have to pay rent when we’re living in a dorm. And when I confronted her, that bee said she already spent all that “rent” money on a new pair of shoes. I can’t believe her... I mean, they are a pretty fabulous pair of heals... but really? Come on! She doesn’t even have feet. And that bee, oh my golly, she just is always on the phone buzzbuzz-buzzing with her BeeFF who lives in New York or something, (some guy who acted in some TV series when he was younger — OK, it may have been “Dawson’s Bee”, and OK, I mean, maybe I watched that show and maybe I was obsessed with that James Van der Bee when I was in high school — but that was AGES ago), but does she really have to be talking to him all the time? On my cell phone?
Don’t let efficient angles override campus aesthetics Arrah GonnaGetcha Look out
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veryone does it every day — go to class, go home, go to the gym or go visit friends. The most frequent landmark people need to trek across is the glorious Ankeny Field. Sadly, an unfortunate byproduct has resulted from the massive daily migrations of students across campus. Whitties, being generally well-versed in the Pythagorean Theorum, walk across Ankeny diagonally from the sidewalk entrance between Jewett Hall and Olin Hall to practically the library. Obviously there are many side paths that wind to the Sherwood Athletic Center, across to Maxey Hall and catty-corner to Prentiss Hall. But guess what?!
There are also sidewalks to all of those places!! In fact, there are sidewalks to all the buildings everywhere. Who would’ve thunk! The worst offense of all is when efficient, or should I say lazy kids, routinely skip the multitude of sidewalks leading to the Science Building. It’s one thing if you’re sprinting to an 8 a.m. (believe me — they’re rough) to cross through the volleyball court, but if you’re lounging in the sunshine killing time before your 1 p.m. lab, there is no need to kill grass and the microbes in the grass directly before learning about the same organisms in lab. The absolute worst result of the cattle trails is the one to the library. Apparently people prefer to walk between the tree and the sidewalk than use the 90 degree turn of the sidewalk. I guess the extra three feet is too far and the five extra seconds to work on homework justifies the giant mud pit that ends up forming. Come on people. Take a stand. Take five more seconds in the rain to keep our field looking not trod-on.
OK, and seriously, that bee gets wasted like every night. And I am all like, Oh, excuse me, bee, but some of us can’t go out partying every night since we are here for, oh I don’t know, school or something. And that bee is all like, Pa-lease, school is for losers, and I am all like, No bee, that’s how some of us plan on making a living at some point in our lives so we don’t have to work at a coffee shop for the rest of our lives, so I think it’s best not to go to class hungover (or still drunk) every day. I don’t think that bee even goes to class! But even though that bee can be a real bitch, I still love her. I mean, who else is going to take me out partying on a Friday night or sting me when my outfit is too boring? Despite all the cra-
ziness that that bee creates, especially here in Anderson 203, that bee is actually a great friend.
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don’t understand why people wear a Whitman sweatshirts at Whitman. Sensibly speaking, there are two and a half reasons people tell me to defend wearing a Whitman sweatshirt at Whitman. 1. To represent Whitman College The problem with this statement is that you are representing Whitman College at Whitman College. It is a clear redundancy if you already attend the school. Walking up and down the streets of San Francisco, someone wearing a sweatshirt that says San Francisco on it is usually a tourist who realized too late that it wasn’t seventy degrees and sunny. Additionally, the way Whitman students generally dress already separates them from Walla Wallans who only wear Carhartts if they are actually doing heavy duty work. If anything, wearing a Whitman sweatshirt at Whitman makes it seem like you want to further separate yourself from the Walla Walla community.
about oxford comma Hosemary Ransom Herb Thief
A little pretentious Favorite way to say red wines
Give a hoot A damn, rat’s behind, or care will do as well
Whitman on Whitman: eevee Redvines
21 2013
1.5 To show people you go to college (like a pretentious asshole) This is 1.5 because it has the same tone as the one before and doesn’t involve actually being on Whitman campus, because people assume if you eat in Prentiss and carry around books you go here. Which is valid. Why wear a Whitman sweatshirt — to grow your higher education cult? Put out representatives? Ridiculous. Do we have to go around pretending to be better than other people with our college that no one abroad or on the East Coast has even heard about? Regardless, it seems counterproductive to represent a small self-selecting liberal arts college. Self-selecting means people go looking for a school like Whitman, but not from what some kid is wearing on the bus or at Powell’s or at the mall. Yeah, I’m glad you love your tiny college that sends droves of students not to law school but to the Peace Corps. 2. To stay warm This is simple. There are other things that keep you warm other than college regalia, otherwise many of us would never be warm and never would have been warm in our earlier lives. Yes, the sweatshirts are warm, but you cannot deny what you are communicating when you wear one. Would you wear a sweatshirt that said “I like to fornicate with goats,” and assume no one reads it?
L
ists. They are very important in our day-to-day lives. We use them at work, at school, and even in text-messages. Yet there has been a shocking development when it comes to lists at Whitman College in the classroom, written publications, and public discourse. It is the lack of the serial, Harvard, or Oxford comma. This sacred, holy, and beautiful separation between the second to last word in the list, and the “and” cannot be ignored, shunned, or maligned. I will not say, hint, or insinuate that it is a religious commandment, a holy sacrament, or a divine pronouncement that the comma should be in place because I would be being hyperbolic, sacrilegious, and my point may not be taken seriously. But I assure you I am in earnest, I am well versed on the topic, and I am RIGHT! Now, some (including Whitman’s own newspaper) have turned away from this separation, this differentiation, and this clarification. This is a mistake, a miscalculation, and an oversight. If I write to tell my mother, father, or friends that I had chicken, hot sauce and cake for dinner, they will think that I was eating the hot sauce and cake together! Or if I write to tell her that I have dated George, Phil and Ronaldo, they will think me a sexual deviant, a bigamist, and a dabbler in a ménage a trois! The scandal, shock, and horror that would put them through! And so I say, to hell, to heck, and to hades with, to, and for the naysayers, antagonists, and opponents to the Oxford comma. It shall, should, and must remain, stay, and thrive where, when, and how it is, was, and will be. And the Associated Press Style Book can suck it.
Dinovember spotlight
20% OFF with student ID and this coupon
In this special month where toy dinosaurs come to life, The Pioneer has decided to give them a special section. When left unattended, these plastic prehistoric wonders expressed their opinions about rubber duckies. The dinosaurs that appeared in the WEB office this week are explicitly anti-duck. What are your dinos up to? Photo contributed by Johanson
Voices from the Community Dina Saur First-year
“Right now we’re reading Darwin, which doesn’t make sense, because all the other books are subjective, but like when Darwin says species evolved, like, it’s true.”
Whiskers Junior
What do you think about Whitman Encounters?
Brock O’Lee First-year
“Ireallylikedreading Mouse...Imean‘Maus.’”
“Um, like, it’s a totally unfair class because my friends all got A’s on their papers but I like got a B-, maybe because everyone else has like a physics professor.”
Beevon Shmoozian Senior
“Does anyone call it Transformers yet??”