Aha! Vanderbilt! You have begun your descent into the reign of darkness! It is I: Doctor Convolution, the great mad scientist of the Great White North. For many years, I have desired to destroy Vanderbilt’s student organizations from the inside, and now I finally have my chance! Those fools who had the audacity to reject me from the Breakdancing Club will finally rue the day they crossed Doctor Convolution.
The plan is simple: First, I change my identity entirely to conform to a social group. For example, I can either pose as a Muslim, a Christian, a Jew, a Douchebag, an Unfunny Asshole, an Engineer, an Obscure Music Lover, or a Thespian. However, the joke will be entirely on them as I do not praise Allah, I do not worship Christ, I do not recite the Torah, I do not go to the gym after 5:00, I am actually quite funny, I do not know Math, I listen to mainstream radio all the time, and I am very very very straight.
Once I have infiltrated the ranks of the unknowing, my plan will engage into the difficult phase: inception. Using the power of subliminal messaging, I will convince everyone in the organization to vote for me as their president or treasurer. Thenceforth, I shall either dissolve the group permanently or embezzle all of its money and deposit it on the island banks of Micronesia. Then, after many months of careful strategy, my most simple plan of all time shall be completed.
And it’s all because of you, Vanderbilt! You gave me the tools and the legal backing to infiltrate the upper echelons of your most influential and important assemblies of unemployed 18-22 year olds. My reign will be supreme! I, Doctor Convolution, will have succeeded in bringing society to its knees once and for all! Just try to discriminate on me now, VU B-Boys! The “world’s worst pop drop n’ locker” will finally have his revenge!!!!
Letter: Evil Genius Infiltrates Selective Student Organizations
Quiznos Hoping that Professor Will Curve Health Inspection Score
Despite its best efforts studying all semester for the routine health inspection, the Quiznos at Carmichael Towers is desperately hoping that the teacher will scale up its score of 77. However, prospects are grim, as the other classmates such as Rand, Chef James and even The Pub scored at least 90 or better.
“I’m really hoping that there’s a curve,” Quiznos said. “I’m applying to Med School next year, and I really can’t have those recruiters seeing that I didn’t ace basic health.”
The adjunct professor, the Metro Public Health Department, has been unavailable for comment. Many close to the professor believe that he will simply give Quiznos an opportunity to retake the health test. Many other students of the basic health inspection class are not so approving of Professor Department potentially choosing favorites and giving second or even third chances.
“Professor Department always gave his nagging overachievers a second chance,” Suzie of Suzie’s Café said. “I never understood why he always gave the total wash-ups a second chance, though. New Super China Buffet took the test six times last year and kept getting under 60 percent. What other kind of class gives you the opportunity to replace a test score like that over and over?”
“Last year, I didn’t do so well on one of my health tests,” Rand said. “But with a little bit of studying and meeting very minimal health guidelines, I was able to up my score from ‘hide it behind the counter’ status. I’m really proud of that.”
Other former students of the health class are skeptical as to a grade influencing one’s future.
“I got a 59 on my last test,” Pancake Pantry said. “You don’t use any of that ‘health’ stuff in the real life. You think all those stupid customers outside care about my health credentials? Just goes to show you how much of a waste education really is when you can make money breaking all the rules.”
Do You Know a Brother Policy Implemented Across Campus
A recent update to Vanderbilt University’s mission statement has included the familiar phrase “Do you know a brother?” to be applied to essentially every situation administered by the university by the end of the week.
“The Community Creed currently consists of the following aspects: Scholarship, Honesty, Civility, Accountability, Caring, Discovery and Celebration,” said Dean of Students Mark Bandas. “Interestingly enough, we mistakenly displaced “Networking” from the initial draft of the creed. Nothing else at Vanderbilt represents this aspect more than ‘Do you know a brother?’”
An example of this new policy has been presented on the Dean of Students website and is described as follows:
A student signs up for his classes on YES, upon clicking enroll, a pop-up message asks “Do you know a brother?” Failure to answer this question honestly will result in being waitlisted for the class until a brother can be met.
Although initial reactions from the Greek community were positive, confusion has arisen as to how Greek students have been frequently been proven in fact not to know a brother.
“Dude, I didn’t think that teacher was going to drop a bomb on me like that,” said Delta Tau Pi brother Jake Denard. “I mean, I was accepted into Philosophy 101, so I thought everything was going to be ok, but then my teacher pulls me aside after lecture and asks, “Do you know a brother?” For the longest time, I thought I did, I mean – I’m in a frat, but after that first Philosophy class, I’m not sure anymore. Am I a brother? Aren’t we all brothers? Who’s actually a brother? I watched Big Brother once…”
Reports from normal students have also presented evidence of the new policy of actually being a rhetorical question rather than one to be taken seriously.
In a letter to The Slant, Sociology major Jessie Patrice wrote, “I was just talking to a potential professor about credit options for an African American Studies class, and he asks, ‘Do you know a brotha?’ Wouldn’t the proper response to that question be no?”
Stricter interpretations of the policy have resulted in professors confiscating cell phones of students in order to verify from their contacts list that they do in fact know a brother.
“In Physics class, I was falling asleep, so the teacher just comes up to me and demands to see my phone,” sophomore Julian Wang said. “’Who’s this ‘Jack’ you have listed here? Do you know how many Jacks there are? What makes you think I’m not Jack?’ the professor said to me. I was immensely humiliated in front of hundreds of students who all knew that Jack is a really great guy and got along quite well with him. What did I do to deserve that?”
It is unclear what the long term ramifications of the brother policy will entail. Most speculate that like all other rules, regulations and general etiquette guidelines, it will be completely ignored by all employees of the University except for freshmen-level class teachers and said students’ Resident Advisors.
Phone Manual is Disturbingly Well Written
A shocking discovery rocked the literary world last Thursday as Tom Radnerson, an everyman from Spokane, WA, found the instruction manual for his new phone, the Samsung Galaxy S II, was the most well written piece of English that he had read in his entire life.
“I was curious to see that it came with a booklet at all,” Radnerson said. “You know, so many companies these days cut costs by putting it online. But this thing was at least 200 pages long! At first, I thought it was just because it was in English, French, Spanish, all those gobbly ones… But no, it was a story! And a damn good one too!”
When asked to summarize the book, Radnerson stated that “he absolutely could not,” fearing that he “wouldn’t do the work justice.”
The Samsung Galaxy S II instruction booklet, the only known copy of the text, is untitled and unaccredited to any author. Scholars that have had the rare opportunity to delve into the magical prose have dubbed it “The Big One” or “Life and Death at 4G Speeds.”
“Whoever wrote this masterpiece has most certainly explored the longest reaching fathoms of the human emotional spectrum,” touted English professor Chip Buttovski said. “From the earliest onset of describing the Samsung Galaxy SII’s model numbers, GT-I9100, the reader automatically knows that this text will be the most enjoyably difficult read of the 21st century.”
“My favorite chapter was the one describing the battery life,” book enthusiast Linda Lindell said. “It brought me to tears to realize that even a freshly charged battery will lose a little bit of life with every plug-in. That’s just like you. That’s just like me. We’re human and breakable, just like the Samsung Galaxy S II.”
The search for the author has been a hotbed of contention by literary analysts.
“Why should we plague this man or woman’s desire to be left alone?” said Nobel Laureate and proud owner of a Samsung Galaxy S II, Orhan Pamuk. “Can’t we just appreciate the work for its beauty and get rid of all the celebrity?”
With Samsung being a gigantic company, many believe the author to be hidden away under the massive corporate structure. Samsung CEO Lee Kun-Hee was not amused by the requests for the employee’s name.
“Who cares about books?” Lee said. “I don’t care what you read, as long as you read it on a Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1.”
The raw, moving power of the Samsung Galaxy S II manual has also redefined the scholarly appeal of technical writing.
“The only time writing like that of the Samsung Galaxy S II made me cry was the first time I really dug into the iTunes End User License Agreement,” Sociology professor Marcus Portsmith said. “I never thought man could top section G’s ‘You also agree that you will not use these products for any purposes prohibited by United States law, including, without limitation, the development, design, manufacture or production of nuclear, missiles, or chemical or biological weapons.’ The Samsung Galaxy S II made that phrase look like ‘See Spot Run’.”
Resume Padders’ Club Promises Opportunities
Do you ever feel like you’ve not contributed enough of your time to building a record of meaningless accolades? Do you want to become absolutely not part of something larger than yourself? Well, look at other worthless student organizations no further, because Resume Padders of America has opened its Vanderbilt chapter for business!
Established in 2001, Resume Padders prides itself on its ability to fluff and fudge. Vanderbilt University provides a great opportunity for our members to do absolutely nothing worthwhile and boast about it incessantly, because our research has determined that this occurs amongst the entire student population already.
Membership in Resume Padders is as easy as it sounds! After signing our proprietary contract, you’ll be assigned to do some menial work that we like to classify as “community service,” “management,” “consulting,” and “human and organizational development.” You’ll not only be working right away for no reason, but you’ll also be elected by your peers to an insignificant position of leadership!
Your email signature will be so long after joining our club that every message you send will be caught by spam filters or just thrown away by people who see through your absolute lie of a life. Your friends will be so jealous of your endless dedication to a vapid cause that they might just in fact stop being your friends, because it’s unlikely that they were actually your friends at all.
Most importantly, your resume will have so much text on it that it will easily be confused for a black piece of paper. All business will see this as a reflection of your heart, or lack thereof, and will promptly seek psychiatric consulting to figure out what the hell is wrong with you. Your endless drive to succeed at nothing of any worth will send your life story straight into any employer’s shredding trashcan!
Welcome to the beginning of your bright future and empty present!
Promising Young Author Dies of Semicolon Cancer
Tragedy struck the literature community on Wednesday as the prodigy wordsmith Freddy Finklestein met his untimely end after a moderately long battle with semicolon cancer. Born under the sullen light of the protruding moon, Finklestein displayed his adroitness at the author’s desk as a wee nugget clawing and tearing away at the cliffs of unrefined exposition. After achieving every English professor’s dream, coming of age, Finklestein defeated his inner demons and prejudices as he published his first novel, Fuckler Knuckler, in 2009. Critically acclaimed and popularly praised, the story’s movie rights were sold to Naughty America Productions within fifteen minutes of publication.
Upon the book’s release, Finklestein’s life became one of self-doubt, existential distress, and sexual frustration. Forced into reclusion by the multitudinous throngs of fanboys and fangirls, Finklestein’s further ventures were never published despite the consistent demand from the industry.
Finklestein’s family was emotionally distant just as many of his characters. Paralleled in the magnum opus as the Cocklesons, Finklestein’s father had vanished during The War, and his mother worked the night shift in the red light district of New York’s meatpacking district in the industrial part of The Old Town. His uncle, a sailor and only father figure in his life, only stopped by on holidays to impart unremarkable words of wisdom that left an unprecedented image on Finkelstein’s artistic mind.
“Boy, you’re gonna sail that bitch one day. Now, bend over and give your uncle that Busch Light.” According to a 2010 interview with Playboy, these words of his uncles said on a brisk November night left the greatest impression on the young author. “My power to weld words as an artist comes from my experiences as a young boy growing up in an old world,” Finklestein said in the article that featured a centerfold of his mother.
Problems arose suddenly and excitedly for Finklestein in January of 2011, as he was rushed to the hospital after placing a 911 call.
“HELP! My semicolon is bleeding!” Finklestein said to the dispatcher. “I’ve been massaging it with my longest adjectives, but I think it’s serious this time!”
Studies found inoperable tumors, carcinomas, cysts, neoplasms sarcomas and tumefactions on Finklestein’s semicolon. Dr. Shen Twilight said that “You’re already dead; you just haven’t caught up yet,” and that accepting death would be “a demonstration of superior judgment.”
Finklestein crossed the ethereal veil into that immortal coil with the respect of the gods themselves. Let no man shame the name of Finkle! It shall live on in your memories as it has in our hearts, in our minds, and in our loins.
Top Ten Places to Store Your Stuff over the Summer
10) PODs with homeless dudes in them – they’re chill!
9) Your sister’s walk-in closet – she won’t mind!
Offshore Swiss bank account
7) Pokecenter PC – plenty of empty space there
6) That one room with the corner where, you know, no one’s gonna find it there…
5) Pawn Shoppe – it won’t cost you any more money to pick it up, I swear!
4) Level 6 Bag of Holding
3) Your roommate already stole all of it
2) Well, you can’t go home, because your parents disowned you
1) Shove it up your ugly ass; that’s right, shove it up your ugly ass!
All (adjective) Things Must Come to an End
Happy Friday, everyone! In honor of this special Friday issue of The Slant, I hope that all of you enjoy your Friday by doing what you do best on the weekend: don’t do any studying, go out to party really late, drink heavily, don’t remember when you ended up going to sleep, and waking up after noon to get disgusting Rand brunch. Enjoy today like you would the start of any other weekend!
It’s hard to believe, but it’s already April. It’s been so long since I was handing out pairs of orange Slant frat-glasses to you ungrateful freshmen at the August student organization fair. You assholes probably lost them too. If only back then you could have seen how cool you’d be today… Your loss!
Seeing as how my mind is now completely void of any future clever or creative ideas, the autonomous collective has decided to put me out to pasture and bring to you a new voice of reason for the final Slant issue of the year a few weeks from now. Listen for when the football stadium’s foghorn goes off randomly at 9:30PM on a Monday night. That means we have a new pope of joke!
For now, my image as a sprightly 20-21 year old will be forever preserved in the school’s library collections online and otherwise. I will join my predecessors in the continuum of cartoon fools that will be looked upon years from now by some crazy kid going through the entire back catalogue of The Slant just as I did myself. And then one day I will have a job, real or fake, but to Vanderbilt I’ll always be the one who consistently wrote esoteric sports and history references and for almost two years placed pictures of Asian girls and Japanese text all over the pages of the greatest student newspaper in the universe.
I leave you with these truths: invest money in your own personal hot sauce. Coffee is the greatest smell in the world. Some people take beer pong too seriously. Girls who eat junk food (responsibly) are awesome. The Chef James soda fountain is the fizziest. You can get two soda bottles from some vending machines if you stick your hand up the hole and hold the gate shut. The dorms are never actually closed over non-summer breaks. Picking up pizzas at Papa John’s on West End saves you tons of meal money. I love boobies.
STORY IDEAS ISSUE 9
3/14/11
1) Japan Quake
2) Charlie Sheen – still more newsworthy
3) Serious plea for donations
4) personal ad (Michael)
5) Four Penises
6) Q & A w/Mr. C (Mungan)
7) Fired & Sexual harassment (Michael)
Meet & Coup – burn shit
9) Freedom to harass
10) Diamond Zone inaccuracies
11) BYU honor code violation
12) Mormon Youtube Video
13) Crazy Water Bible
14) Eye contact 5 minutes – go crazy
15) Mosaic time
16) Sponsor a prospie for the price of a cup of coffee (Natalie)
17) Humane society guilt trip – Sarah Mclachlan
18) Mgill Biter – Forcible fondler in new outfit (Michael)
19) St. Pattyʼs Recap (Ryan)
20) Ides of March Recap
21) Pi day – not for real pie
22) Rites
” – Downloading to pretend to like,
” – Is Sara Bareillis hot??? (Jim)
- Rusty trombone
- Big practical joke
- Banking on rain
- Mainstream knockoffs, “Kanye Best”
23) Top Ten made up Band Names
24) Special Ed. & the short bus
25) Realizing real mass transit arenʼt Vandy Vans
26) Mathematical breakdown of Bitches & Hoes (Jim)
27) Replacing Charlie Sheen
28) Student found to actually have reason to vote in VSG (Ben R.)
- Widespread apathy
- Tiny guy grinding @ frat party; look at him, go
29) What if roller bag were #1 transporter
- Lisa Frank
- Steal it throw into dumpster & trck takes it away
30) Kids w/ heelies
- Fuck em
- cobblestone not condusive
- hit a snag, out of control
31) Pokemon B & W
32) Playing games in class
33) Krispey Kreme Recap
- Diabetes from tasting
- Crash segway off Cliff
34) Itʼs freaking lent
” – ATL: Whatʼd you give up?
” – sense of shame
35) Heroine receipts – no thatʼs my copy
36) Have you done anyting wrong? – not being catholic
37) “Library Cafe” name voting
38) Sarrattstitute
39) Bracketology
” – weʼre fuct
- dumb luck, fat kids unfamiliar w/sports
- colors
- crime rates
40) Sara Barielles
” – commercial w/lady
41) at&t buying Tmobile
42) Second City
43) Libya
44) Mosaic Fun (Natalie)
- code of conduct loopholes
- leaving kids
- going to get nipples pierced – again?
45) Hustler misspells
46) Donʼt mention Friday song (Ben)
47) Whatʼs worse Friday or whippy hair?
- pedophilia
- music company & rich white girls
- doesnt stop smiling
- anthropological study
- green rave
- figinow associated w/ lame parties
48) mental awareness
49) Bruce Pearlʼs crazy BBQ Parties (Clay)
” – to catch a predator
50) Battle LA (Katy)
- so much hate & love
- cliche galore
- goes in to suicidal solo mission
- grizzled vets
- young black soldier newly married
” – Dead new father
” – Teamwork
” – “weʼve already had breakfast”
” – “Marines donʼt quit but your childhood did”
- Michelle Rodriguez… again
- “you let him goo you on the first date”
- alien torture
- shoot in.. heart?!
51) Print date as April 1st ****
52) Tax Day
53) Lent
54) Rites
55) “A lot of march brthdays… who has sex in June?” (Front)
56) St Pattyʼs & Bday liquor
57) Derby Days: Did they even find it?
58) overheard @ Rand (Natalie)
59) Networking Sex (Jim)
60) Surprise! Baseball is #1
