Passengers are still stranded, sweaty, and discontented along nearly every subway line, as the city recovers from this morning's as-of-yet unconfirmed tornado. People are still waiting in droves for buses and taxis or walking across the city's bridges and Mayor Bloomberg has canceled his entire morning to no doubt assess damage to homes and trees in Brooklyn.

Send Bwog the story of your wacky commute! We want to hear it!

UPDATE 12:59 EST - Wacky commute stories after the jump.

UPDATE 10:58 PM EST - Act of God correspondent Zach van Schouwen has photographic evidence of the Brooklyn Tornado here.

If you're looking for something to do in the upcoming days before spring break or are simply wanting a break from midterm studies, check out these upcoming events sponsored by the Center for the Core Curriculum and CU Arts Initiative:

• Members of the Classic Stage Company are doing a reading of Hamlet in Miller Theater today and tomorrow. Pick up your tickets at the Miller Box Office before 5:30 (now!) for tonight's 6 PM showing or tomorrow after 6 PM for Saturday's 7:15 show. You get 2 tickets per CUID -- plus, if you're fretting over Shakespeare in Lit Hum, it might be a good idea to check it out. There's no Kenneth Branagh, but the New York Times claims it "pulls you into the drama by the lapels," so it must be good -- right?
  

• The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center is offering all Columbia students and faculty members free tickets to the premiere presentation of Pullitzer Prize-winning composer Leon Kirchner's complete string quartets, performed by the Orion String Quartet on Wednesday, March 7, 7:30 PM in Alice Tully Hall. Kirchner will give a pre-concert discussion to ticket holders at 6:30 PM. There's an email you're supposed to print out and present with your CUID at Lincoln Center before 6:30 PM on the night of the concert -- perhaps they'll let that slide? Otherwise, find a friend in Music Hum to take care of it for you. A great opportunity to check out Carnegie Hall if you haven't had the chance yet.
  

Meanwhile, take advantage of the nice weather outside (if you can stand the wetness) and do some reading on the steps -- it's abnormally pleasant given the forecast for this upcoming week.

- MIP

Podcasting His Life Away:
Electrical Engineering Prof. Daniel P.W. Ellis has a hobby even his wife finds creepy: digitally recording every waking moment of his day. Seeing it as an audiologged diary (or a "lifelog"), Ellis recounts such highlights as the fight with his wife in which he made "asshole" comments and his pleas to doctors for information on his injured infant son (as well as their queries as to why he was holding an Mp3 player the whole time). See the rest in this piece from the Chronicle of Higher Education on the lifelogging phenomenon.

MIDI-Makers Frozen Out...Again: In the week since Bwog reported on subzero temperatures shutting down the Computer Music Center in Prentis Hall, the heat has been turned on...and then off once more. After CMC officials thought the problem had been remedied, the chill returned. Now, CMC director Brad Garton is demanding a permanent solution - and spare heaters installed, just in case - before the center reopens and classes are resumed. Seriously, admins, it's one thing to cut essential services to Columbia's computer musicians - and another to give them a brief spell of hope before shutting them back out in the cold.

Get Your Beauty Rest: All nighters can make you fat. Really. According to the Daily Times of Pakistan, which assembled a compendium on US universities' sleep research, Columbia scientists determined that "adults who sleep less than seven hours a night had an increased risk of obesity. The risk ranged from 23 percent for six-hour-a-night sleepers to 73 percent for individuals who slept only two to four hours. Experts attributed this phenomenon to the fact that sleep deprivation lowered the level of leptin, a protein that suppresses appetite, and raised grehlin, which makes you want to eat." Columbia researchers: doing their homework so you have an excuse not to.

-CJS

Vast uptown expansion? Check. Globe-trotting presidential trips? Check. Providing basic amenitites, like heat, to university buildings? That's always seemed to prove a little more challenging for this institution. As temperatures in New York plunged over the last two weeks, the radiators at Columbia's Computer Music Center (the vaunted 125th St. mainstay where the world's first music synthesizer, the RCA Mark II, was invented, and the likes of Edgard "electrical storm" Varèse and Charles Wuorinen have experimented) have struggled to keep up. As a result of the unbearable cold, professors have gotten angry, classes have been cancelled, and work at the center has ground to a halt until the university does something to remedy the situation.

Bwog was made privy to an email from a CMC professor with details, available after the jump. But first, in other faculty protest news, Bwog has also been told that Prof. Achille Varzi of the Philosophy Department has threatened to go on strike if his Symbolic Logic class, enrolled at 140+, isn't moved into a room that can seat more than the 90 currently accommodated. It seems the heat will be on, at least, over at Facilities today.

Poor Ghostface. And Hoplites. And maker-outers. And naked blood wrestlers.

Weather.com says rain through tomorrow night, but we Columbia-types are of a hardy sort. The Bwog is sure a little precipitation won't dampen weekend plans.

Wouldn't these midterms be bearable if the weather were at least half-way pleasant? Maybe. And where is the weather pleasant? South America. And what South American nation does Columbia have a kinship with? Colombia. That's why we should move there. And that's exactly what Anand Venkatesan pondered in this December 2002 Blue and White article:

If Columbia Moved to Colombia

As Columbia searches for new spaces to expand its physical plant, The Blue and White urges the Administration to consider a South American satellite campus, where the Stanford-like climate and atmosphere will lure boho bums to attend CC in the sun. In anticipation of what student life would be like, we have compiled some likely scenarios for the Administration to study. Hope this helps, President Bollinger.

Student 1: Hello, can you tell me where Lerner Hall is?
Student 2: I'm sorry, but I don't understand. You see, in Colombia, we speak Spanish, not English.
Student 1: Oh, I see. My apologies.
Student 2: Not at all.

*

Student: Hi, I'd like to pay my tuition for the semester.
Administrator: That will be 9,283,202,202 pesos, por favor.

*

To save further students the indignity of heading off to class, finding their favorite gate locked, and realizing class just isn't worth the extra 10 yard walk, know that the following entrances onto campus have been closed since this morning:

* 120th Street Gate
* Earl Gate
* Chapel Gate
* Lerner Gate

Anna Corke reports that yesterday afternoon Dodge Hall had to be evacuated due to an electrical fire. The fire was caused by an art studio class on the fourth floor that had plugged in over a dozen electric heaters to keep their nudes from getting cold. No word on whether the nudes were allowed to dress themselves before evacuating.

In dress reminiscent of Maggie Simpson's blue starfish sleepclothes combined with the little brother from A Christmas Story's winter-wear, this baby stole hearts on college walk when her parents posed her for next year's Christmas photo.

Find a cuter picture. We triple dog dare you.

Gothamist points the way to some snow videos, including a time lapse one of College Walk.

Poke around a little and you can find an entire page of Columbia time lapse videos, all seemingly shot from Butler, including a nice sunrise, and the fastest graduation you will ever see.

Update: Thanks to "Seth Low" for pointing out that the date of the video is a little questionable. At least we know now that Columbia is no longer recording our every trek to class.

After braving the mountainous snowfall to end up at the Manhattan Jewish Community Center on 76th St. at Amsterdam, one Bwog correspondent found her urge for ground chickpeas unsatisfied. The Center promised to set a Guiness World Record today with a 12 ft. wide, 500 lb. plate of hummus. Upon arrival, she was told the hummus was trapped on Long Island. There goes both the world record and this gentile's support for Israel. Give me hummus or I'll take Hamas!

- Josie Swindler

As Manhattan gets ransacked by the biggest snowstorm of the year, College Walk is transforming into a stage for the surreal.

Our correspondent reports:

If someone has a digital camera...he or she should head over to the Low Steps...some CAVA kids are using stretchers to sled down that glorious snow...

Also--in the midst of a snowball fight, a golden delicious apple was thrown.

CAVA sledding sounds like a sight to watch, but the Bwog would much rather watch Project Runway reruns and sip hot chocolate in her bed; so if anyone else sees strange things going down on her behalf, please send them to bwgossip@columbia.edu.