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Monday, December 1, 1997

The best times this year

X-MAS: As the holidays approach, let's recount all those unforgettable memories we can't remember

'Twas the week before finals and all through the school,

The students were cramming except for that fool

With the overgrown neck and the wrap-around glasses

(Who hoped that, some day, he might write for the masses).

With skirts getting longer and days getting shorter,

He sat down to write his last piece for the quarter.

He kicked off his Nikes and opened a beer,

Reflecting on all that had happened that year:

A three-bucks-a-unit technology fee;

The BruinCard pimped out to AT&T;

Some e-mail from "Albert" (the chancellor, I mean);

The Hershey Hall hair-in-the-yogurt cuisine ...

He realized that nothing had happened this fall,

In fact, nothing happened the whole year at all.

First of all, let me apologize for the artwork you see here next to my column. The esteemed J. Jioni Palmer, Viewpoint editor, called me and asked what my article was going to be about and I told him it would be on what I'd like UCLA to get for Christmas. Then I got a different idea and changed my mind. So if the artwork here doesn't seem to match the theme of this piece, it's my fault. Sorry.

The reason the topic changed is as follows: I decided to rummage through the Daily Bruin's archives in an effort to help me recollect some of the more memorable campus-related events of the year. I guess they weren't all that memorable if I can't remember them. Anyway, as I was poring through dozens of issues, I kept coming across headlines that were quite the big deal then, but virtually forgotten by now.

Example: "SAGE members write words on bed sheet, use it to block alley" (This was not an actual headline, but it could have been). Whatever happened to SAGE? Yes, yes, dear SAGE members, we know you're out there polishing your whistles and proofing your placards. No offense. But, I mean, where are you? Why haven't you been blocking traffic or staging walkouts to remind us that you still don't have a contract? I miss waving and honking my horn as I drive across the picket lines. No doubt someone at SAGE will write to The Bruin protesting this article for making fun of its cause. I can only hope that The Bruin's editors will make red-ink corrections all over it and return it with a check-minus at the top.

Ready for another blast from the past? Remember chalk? You know, chalk: A soft, compact calcite with varying amounts of silica, quartz, feldspar and other mineral impurities, generally gray-white or yellow-white and derived chiefly from fossil seashells. It's the stuff those older talking people use to write on that big green wall in front of the class. Remember when people were writing stuff in chalk all over North Campus? One day someone would scrawl "We're not gonna take it anymore!" The next day it would be replaced with "We mean it!" and the following day by "This isn't a joke, we are really serious about this!" The next day, nothing; they must've run out of chalk.

Continuing on the chalk issue: I also saw lots of "Save the (whatever)." I kept waiting for someone to write "Save the chalk!" It didn't happen. Then there were the "Free (whatever)." The "whatever" was either a perceived political prisoner or a country. The grammar of this particular slogan has always bugged me because you can read it two different ways: as an imperative ("Chalk must be liberated!") or as an announcement ("Here, have some chalk; it's free!"). As far as chalk is concerned, either works fine for me. But what if the topic is something important like Tibet? I fear someone reading "Free Tibet" might accidentally interpret it as "Hey, have a piece of Tibet for free. Hurry while supplies last!"

Here's another non-issue of the immediate future: the food problems they're having up at Hershey Hall. (Brain fart: Food problems at a place that has the same name as a popular chocolate bar. Hmmm.) So, they say the food stinks. So what? Hello? We're college students, not gourmands. We eat crappy food for a reason: because we're supposed to. College students complaining about bad food is like fish complaining about water. For Pete's sake, most of them are grad students anyway. They can have good food later. Right now they have more important things to worry about, like reminding us that the period goes inside the closing quotation mark.

Conspiracy theory: Notice how most, if not all, of the bad-food complaints came from residents at Hershey Hall. Notice how Hershey Hall is occupied primarily by grad students. Don't you see the connection? Obviously, it's the administration's response to SAGE. "We're not going to give them a contract - we're going to give them botulism." But there's more: the food-service people know as well as anyone that graduate students are genetically related to trolls. In that trolls are accustomed to living under bridges and eating wild mushrooms (a fungus), why should they mind food that's got a few splotches of mold (also a fungus)? Hey, you wannabe epicures. Shut up and pretend it's cheese.

There's also a bit of discrimination going on here. But in order to explain that point I'll have to neologize (Note to South Campus: That means "create a new word"). The word is "saprophytophobia," from "saprophyte" (of or relating to mold) and "phobia" from -- well, you get it; it means "a fear of or aversion to mold." One of the characteristics of saprophytes is that they derive their nourishment from dead or decaying organic matter. Well, what do you think a hamburger is? I'd say it's dead. I'd say it's decaying. So I'd say the people who don't like mold growing on their food should look in the mirror and repeat after me: "I am a hypocrite." They're also speciesists, which, by anyone's logic, is worse than being a racist. Racists are down on a particular segment (or segments) of our species. Speciesists are down on a whole damn species. Elitist punks - that's what they are.

I was amused by a letter appearing in The Bruin sent in by an alum who had done time at Hershey. He wrote that he was "extremely traumatized" by the food there. "Extremely traumatized"? I can only imagine that he graduated with a degree in hyperbole. "Traumatized" is what happens when you observe a 747 crash into Murphy Hall and realize that your one and only copy of a crucial late-drop petition was in there.

"Extremely traumatized" is what happens when you further observe a screaming hot, tugboat-sized jet engine from said 747 break loose on impact, careen down Circle Drive like a huge bowling ball (taking a couple of Campus Express buses and the parking booth with it), shoot up the ramp to Lot 2, and in a flaming heap of twisted metal and $5 bills come to rest on top of your car, wherein you have your one and only copy of a heavily researched 10-page term paper on some obscure aspect of Dante's Inferno. Hey, buddy - that's "extremely traumatic."

What is wrong with these people? Which brings me to another point. What does "people" mean? Are you one of the "people"? Am I? I sincerely hope not. 'Cause when I think of "people," I think of slack-jawed morons. There are a lot of "people" out there who are wrecking it for everyone else. "People" don't have their money ready when they get to the parking booth. Able-bodied "people" with the physiques and endurance of long-distance runners rip off their grandma's placard so they can park in a handicapped space while they're at the tanning salon. "People" dining at LuValle Commons and North Campus leave their trash and the remnants of their meal on the table for others to dispose of. All those poseurs who've become cigar aficionados in the last 18 months are definitely "people." Screw "people."

Is it as obvious to you as it is to me that I have no idea where this article is going? I suppose I should try to end it on a happy note, this being the holiday season and all that. So, I'll tell you my two favorite UCLA happenings this year.

I was at this strip joint on La Cienega. It was my sister's fiance's bachelor party; otherwise, I'd never set foot in one of those squalid houses of assignation. Naturally. Anyway, about eight of us were sitting around a table trying to be casual about the gynecological display in front of us when one of the strippers walked by, tapped me on the shoulder, and said "Hi, Michael." The guys looked at me like "Who the hell was that and why does she know your name?" I, myself, was wondering the same thing, but I couldn't tell who she was because she was walking away from us and all I could see was her backside. Being a bit curious (take that either way), I followed her to the other side of the club where she had seated herself with a cluster of other "entertainers" (Gaggle? Flock? Herd? What do you call a group of strippers?). Not until I was about five feet away did I recognize her as one of my fellow Bruins. In fact, I had been sitting a few feet away from her - she had her clothes on - in class earlier that day. I didn't know what one says under such circumstances; so, I asked her if she knew when our next paper was due. She introduced me to her co-workers and then we talked for a few minutes trying to laugh away our mutual nervousness. She asked that I not tell anyone at school about our chance meeting. I said "Sure, Janet, no problem." Then I went back to my party. A few minutes later she came over to our table and danced for us and I distinctly recall thinking to myself: "I love UCLA."

Here's my other favorite moment of the year: Fellow Bruin columnist Stephanie Pfeffer and I had just returned from a romantic weekend in Bora-Bora when ... not!

Actually, I was walking to class and ahead of me I saw two nerdy-looking guys in a heated argument. I couldn't make out what they were saying but I could tell by the looks on their faces and by their posture that they were on the verge of duking it out. Their faces were all red and their fists were clenched and others nearby were giving them plenty of room lest a fist collide with the wrong face. Being a bit curious, as usual, I wandered closer, still cautiously keeping well out of harm's way; I didn't want to be the next day's headline ("Viewpoint columnist knocked out cold": think of all the people who would call in to claim responsibility). Anyway, as I was passing, I heard one practically scream at the other: "It's not a particle, it's a hole in space." I busted out laughing. I was overwhelmed with joy. They looked at me as though I'd just urinated in their swimming pool.

As I walked away, I thanked my God and my lucky stars for the thousandth time for the opportunity to be here. I love this place so much. I feel so absolutely, entirely blessed and honored to be in an environment where so many take their academic pursuits so seriously - sometimes so seriously that they're willing to engage in fisticuffs over quarks, diminishing marginal utility, eutrophication, the great vowel shift, or whatever. I know there are plenty of you out there who don't share my enthusiasm for UCLA. And that's fine. All I can say is I'm having the time of my life. For that, and for whatever part you play in that, dear reader, I am deeply thankful.

On that note, may I wish to those of us who will be contending with finals next week the best of luck, and to all of us and our friends and family, the happiest and healthiest of holidays.

Michael Daughtery

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