No lie...

$2.5 million is being spent to consider alternate designs for the new campus center to avoid removing the Council Oak Tree. To be fair, the tree is featured in the UWEC crest, and has some sort of Indian significance, but it should also be remembered that the actual tree died... this is an impostor oak. This was decided in the same week that the city council approved the original plans.

The same chancellor who elected to save the tree (might I suggest that $2.5 million could have been used as an effective landscaping budget to place plenty of greenery around the new building) is also leading the Tour de Chancellor, to support clean commuting. Of course it's non-competitive.

The local Newman Center, when there are few people in the congregation, celebrates mass by inviting the congregation to surround the alter for the entirety of the Liturgy of the Eucharist, neglecting to kneel at all. A rather flagrant liturgical abuse huh? Unfortunately the kids here don't think so. Where did we go wrong? I've been Catholic for 6 months and I know that the congregation stays away from the alter until after the priest's communion. This rule is commonly violated when the army of alter server's assembles so that the distribution takes 7 seconds, during which the priest can hastily clean the vessels, and get right to the fun stuff: announcements! Even the most liberal Catholics kneel! What's up? They don't even have a crucifix on the wall. Not even a Lutheran no-Jesus crucifix. Not'in!

Serving as the representative for the all-male sanctuary which is Emmet Horan Hall to the Ideas and Improvements board of the Resident's Hall Association I realized that all improvements in modern society are going to come down to how green they are. The hand dryers currently installed in the resident hall bathrooms are worthless. Because they dry your hands so unsuccessfully, most people simply choose to use their pants, or walk away with wet hands. The proposal for a more effective method of drying your hands was proposed. Understanding that paper towels are perceived as ungreen, a more effective hand dryer was suggested. But unfortunately these hand dryers use more energy than the current ones. But the humorous kicker: if we improved the hand dryers, people would actually use them, which would even further increase energy use. Why don't car manufacturs start making cars that only go 3mph, so it ends up being more effective to just walk?

I'd like to add that the University is being sued by the Sierra club for burning coal in their power plant. What an awkward position for the ultra liberals to be in. Imagine it... your all puffed up because in a week your going to go biking to promote freezing your butt off in the middle of winter biking to school (global warming?), when you get slapped with a law suit for burning too much coal. I can just envision it:

Ultra-Liberals who run UWEC: We propose that we offset our carbon emissions with carbon credits, as long as you drop the law suit.
Sierra Club: But think of the irreparable damage you've done so far.
Ultra-Liberals who run UWEC: Fine, we'll pay for the last 116 years of coal use.
(aside) we'll just raise tuition.