Today's Top Stories:
CCSC Combats "Study Day"

kegOverheard, unfulfilled goals.

Boy: On the list of things to do before I die, "keg stand" is a big unfilled checkbox that has been staring me in the face for a while.

Overheard, ungrateful prof on the phone.

Prof: You know that undergraduates don't mean ANYTHING at this school!

Overheard, unaware Art Hum student in class:

"Do you recommend we read the Recommended Reading on Courseworks?"

Overheard, the unexpected

Professor Yosef Yerushalmi, in his 45th year of teaching (he's in his seventies) said the following during his graduate Comparative Literature & Society Seminar entitled "Job and Other Arguments with the Lord:"

Yerushalmi: So what is gnosticism asking?
Student: Why does life suck?
Yerushalmi: No, why does EVERYTHING suck!

Overheard, un-Nalgenes (?)

Girl: Those nalgenes look really small.
Guy: I think that's because they're far away...

And at Ruggles, Saturday Night, the nalgene strikes again.
Girl #1: How do you spell "nalgene"?
Girl #2: n-a-l-g-e-n-e. It says it right here. [gesturing to label
on nalgene]
Girl #1: Oh. I've never read a nalgene.

- Hat tips to Ethan Pack, Ashley Nin, Seth Berliner


gossipWe're all gaffeurs, but our gaffes aren't half as interesting as those of our distinguished faculty (and staff). The Bwog presents to you this week's finest moments:

A staff member walking out of the Hartley Customer Service Center, to another:
"I've got a baseball bat back in my office, if you're gonna need it."

A necessarily anonymous language professor (translated) speaking of university president Lee C. Bollinger:
"Yes, he's got a certain virility; it's the virility of a Cro-Magnon, but all the same..."

Professor Brigitte Nacos, during Mass Media and American Politics, speaking of Katherine Graham at the Washington Post:
"She was a woman. She had no idea how to run a business."

Spotted (Spotlit?):
Professor Michael Seidel's bald forehead, by a huge, colorful projection of the Microsoft XP "Start" button, for a good 5 minutes during his Thursday Joyce lecture.

Thanks to contributors Lenora Babb, Lydia DePillis, and John Klopfer.
Dear readers, we would love to have your contributions at: bwgossip@columbia.edu.


It would be against Bwog's better judgement to post this quasi-sensationalist personnel gossip... but... now that we've told you there is quasi-sensationalist personnel gossip, we can't leave you hanging..?

An anonymous tipster sent Bwog this excerpt of a personal email from Columbia's Human Resources department describing some inter-office identity theft.

"On August 15, 2006, an employee in Columbia's HR department was found to have misused the personal information of certain Columbia employees. The employee has been arrested by the New York Police Department, and its investigation is ongoing. The information included, among other things, names, social security numbers, home addresses, telephone numbers, and direct deposit bank account information. Unfortunately, it appears that this employee may have accessed your information...."

Bwog will also refrain from pointing out the irony of an identity thief posing as someone who does background checks for a living. Oops.

Beloved econ professor Sunil Gulati has always seemed to have a bit of an inferiority complex when it comes to his Nobel Prize-winning/poverty eradicating/just plain publishing colleagues. At least now he can cheer himself knowing he's the only one in the department elected president of the U.S. Soccer Federation.

Here's to better luck this time around, Sunny G.


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Bwog is compiled by the staff of The Blue and White, Columbia University's undergraduate magazine.

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