Notes FROM THE DESK

Author: Caroline S. Stauffer and Thomas C. Drescher

As our final production cycle draws to a close in the glorious fluorescent dungeon that is Hepburn Basement, we realize wistfully that it will soon be time to pack up the PCs, stash the red pens and strip the walls and bulletin boards of an amusing array of memorabilia accumulated over the course of two semesters. Eight months ago our subterranean office space was entirely devoid of decoration - it has since acquired a certain charm derived from the Editorial Board's various journalistic eccentricities.

What, you ask, adorns our walls after 24 sleepless Tuesday nights? Besides the editing guidelines, interview templates, long dash instructions (option + shift + dash) and "30 Facts About Chuck Norris," our collection has helped us maintain some semblance of sanity throughout the year, though perhaps at the expense of our integrity.

Note the mangled Marlboro box pinned up in one corner of the bulletin board, a testament to the efforts of a certain photo editor who valiantly conquered his nicotine addiction (mostly), only to further succumb to a crippling Red Bull dependency.

Sports headline gems like "Ruggers shipwreck overpowered Coast Guard" are posted in another corner of the board as a glorious tribute to the vigor and efficiency with which Tom, Ryan and Zamir crafted their section each week, despite Zamir's potty mouth and flagrant disrespect for authority.

Several Nantucket Nectars bottle caps are still present, evidence of an incomplete spring 2004 bet between the current managing and associate editors to incorporate the factoids from the underside of Nantucket Nectar caps into Campus articles. Did you know, for instance, that 19th century prisoners held at Nantucket's prison, The Old Gaol, were often allowed to go home for dinner? That'll be $10, Mr. Phillips.

The prize for most hilarious mailing goes to "Dandy" Don Logan and his promotional CD/literature (track three, "Harley to Heaven," is bound to get some serious radio play), narrowly beating out Caroline's invitation to the Spring Conference for African-American Journalists of Faith.

One particularly ill-starred attempt to improve editorial monkey grammar is commemorated in a three-page handout detailing the complexities of the collective noun. Note to England - you are wrong.

The pipes are clanging, the floor is flooded and the remnants of those endearingly awful pizza sticks are, disturbingly, all but devoured. We combat exhaustion one last time with a potent combination of caffeinated beverages and Charles Mingus tunes, signing off once and for all with a certain melancholy, but also with the encouraging thought that we managed to not completely blow it (yet) and that the next generation of editors will amass an equally representative collection of eccentric office junk.



-Caroline S. Stauffer and Thomas C. Drescher

5:53 a.m.