Entries for October 20, 2006

. . . Washington State University's Matt James, a sophomore mechanical engineering major. "While other WSU students were sleeping . . . Tuesday morning," reports the Daily Evergreen, "Matt James was linking the final rings on his suit of chain mail armor." Chain mail armor! And there are five photos to prove it! Runner-up: Vanderbilt Chancellor Gordon Gee, who invites students to join him in a competitive bow-tie-tying race today at noon.

Police used batons and pepper spray to defend themselves against student protesters Wednesday, a University of California-Santa Cruz spokesman tells the Daily Bruin. Students timed their protests to coincide with a California Board of Regents meeting on their campus. According to the San Francisco Chronicle, the protest organizers' beef with the regents includes high student fees and low minority retention rates.

First Joyce Carol Oates's New Yorker story, now a Princeton student television production. A Princeton sophomore who asks to be called by his initials, C.F.A., made the film, in which he stars as a fictionalized version of the friend of a senior who committed suicide last April. After watching C.F.A.'s trailer, the real students' friends were not too happy, the Princetonian reports.

The former news anchor plans to donate "Testudo the Grad," a fiberglass sculpture of a turtle with a graduation cap on his head, back to the University of Maryland. Less famous people, including the owner of Terrapin Chiropractic, an actual business, bought 29 other turtle sculptures auctioned at a fundraiser yesterday. The sculptures were originally created to celebrate the university's 150th anniversary. Where will all the fiberglass turtles go? "This thing is tailgating with us in the parking lot," one purchaser told the Diamondback.

At press time, Texas Christian University's Alpha Kappa Alpha chapter had only four members. But now that they've hit the elementary school boys circuit--see this helpful Daily Skiff photo--that is bound to change.

• J. K. Rowling, your influence just keeps growing. Duke scientists appear to be one step closer to making an "invisibility cloak," the Chronicle reports.
• A University of Texas--Austin student who has cerebral palsy is generating fans with his comedy television show "That's Awesome," the Daily Texan reports.
• University of Utah's Heritage Center is set to become more modern, says the Chronicle.