Relatively unreliable paper The New York Post is reporting that a grand jury has subpoenaed all Columbia's records on Madonna Constantine, citing financial records and personnel records of particular importance.

The investigation into last year's noose-hanging incident has yet to pinpoint any possible suspects, while the plagiarism investigation remains tightly under wraps, with both Constantine's lawyer and the University's PR firm declining to comment.

The Post also refers to sources who explain that the subpoena could signal "that the investigation is broadening to examine possible links between the teacher, her closest friends and the racially charged incident."

And a top of the Monday to you, Bwogophiles. We begin today's headcount with a pictorial update on one of Fair Alma's proudest and most rankling traditions: making sure South Lawn is closed all the time, no matter what, virtually year-round. Indeed, nothing says "long, depressing winter" quite like the antiseptic layer of tarp that carpets the south end of campus three months out of the year, exiling off-season frisbee-ers to Riverside Park, and heralding endless weeks of general gloom.

But cheer up, Columbians! According to the mobile isolation chamber currently parked outside of Broadway Pres., it's like, 75 degrees in the Carribbean! And American Airlines can fly you there ! The habitat-on-wheels--replete with plastic santa, cardboard travel guitar, mosquito torch and digital newscrawl advertising fares from JFK to San Juan--strikes Bwog as a pretty desperate cry for attention, what with JetBlue's recent attempts at making itself Columbia's airline of choice. Their marketing approach is heavy on the free shit and short on the kitsch; on top of which, the American Airlines traveling Carribbean whatever-the-fuck-it-is looks like a set piece for the weirdest psych experiment EVER.

And in the world of legitimate journalism: you might have read something in the Spec the other day about a New York Civil Liberties Union complaint on behalf of a Columbia grad student of South Asian descent who was detained by the NYPD for taking pictures in a subway station. Important to be sure, but you wouldn't think that it deserves a staff edit in the New York Post, would you? Well, you, reader, are wrong. Further proof that the 'bloids just can't resist the combination of Columbia, liberals, and protest, or, in this case, just can't resist the combination of Columbia with, well...anything.

-ARR

We don't do it for the glory, but it is nice to get some recognition once in a while (even if it is from another blog). US News and World Report's higher education page, The Paper Trail, is running a reader poll of the year's campus news, and we're up there for Best Alternative Media Outlet. So, go check out the offerings, and vote your college-educated hearts out. The faster our numbers go up, the less we'll have to self-servingly bug you about it.

Just please don't let us get beat by Wesleyan.

Now, back to our regularly scheduled programming.

- Whoa! She almost made it—Esther Reed that is, who was attending GS under the name of a missing woman, Brooke Henson. The tale of her undoing, which the New York Post is following with all the salacious zeal of, well, the New York Post, would make a good story for your dinner at Aunt Clara's tonight.

By the way, Columbia isn't being obstructionist, as the article not-so-subtly claims. There really is a law that prevents them from giving people your personal information, so you can sleep soundly again.

- Your second crack at registration probably begins today, and our magical webmaster Zach "the Man" van Schouwen has whipped up a handy Firefox plug-in that will help you search CULPA that much easier. Don't wonder how he did it, just use.

- File this under all the reasons you're glad you didn't go to Penn.

- If you're not one of the 513 + people who've already been invited to join, the late Dogears has been supplanted...by a facebook group. Next to go, Craigslist?

- BW staffer Paul Barndt spotted Professor David Sidorsky, currently Columbia's longest-serving member of the philosophy faculty, at Dreamgirls.

- LBD