Special Projects

Men capture 10th place for second straight year

Head Coach Jon Warren (Jones '88) has always proven to be somewhat clairvoyant about the men's cross country team's chances at their biggest meets of the year. Before the NCAA South Regional last Saturday in Waco, Texas, Warren said he could see the team finishing anywhere from fifth to 10th. As it were, the Owls finished at the bottom end of that spectrum, taking home a 10th-place finish from the regional for the second straight year. The usual cast of characters had strong performances, with redshirt junior Michael Trejo leading the pack with his time of 31:36 minutes and 41st-place finish overall. Following him were redshirt sophomores Gabe Cuadra and Matt Carey, who finished nine seconds and 23 seconds behind Trejo, respectively. Freshman John Cavallo continued his stellar inaugural campaign by finishing in fourth for the Owls with a 61st-place finish overall. Redshirt sophomore James Llamas finished the scoring effort with his 75th-place finish. Freshmen Wyatt Doop and Anthony Urbanelli completed the lineup for Rice, all finishing within the top 100 runners. Despite the Owls' season coming to a conclusion in Waco once again, Warren was pleased with the effort.

Please stop Unstoppable

The opening scene of director Tony Scott's (The Taking of Pelham 123) Unstoppable sets everything up to be good. The camera makes menacing, sudden cuts, foreboding music plays in the background and the text ominously scrolls on the screen. The terrifying subject of this opening: trains. Yes, trains. It was at this point of the movie I should have gotten up and left. But I stayed, and the only thing that helps me sleep at night is the idea that if my review prevents just one person from seeing this unbelievably terrible piece of trash, then I have done some good in the world.

Photo: Media Center turns 40

Famed actor, director and model Isabella Rosellini spoke at the Rice Media Center last Thursday to commemorate its 40th anniversary.

SpoCo victorious at regionals

Spontaneous Combustion, Rice's improvisational comedy troupe, returned victorious from the Nov. 6 College Improv Tournament's Southwest Regionals in Austin. Four of SpoCo's 12 members - Hanszen College junior Josh Herzstein, Martel College freshman Matt Vale, Jones College senior Becky Hofstein and Wiess College senior Danny Shanaberger - competed against 10 other teams in the region. With their recent win, the improv comedy troupe is guaranteed a spot for four to six members to compete in the College Improv Tournament Nationals on Feb. 26 in Chicago."It went excellent for us," Herzstein said.

Beyond The Hedges

National

Beer Bike parade undergoing vast changes, new plan to be selected

In recent years, the format of the Beer Bike parade has been the subject of intense scrutiny by student leaders and administration alike. With increased concerns about liability and rising costs to safely operate the event, we are forced to reevaluate the event yet again.Dean of Undergraduates John Hutchinson asked me to seek ways to ease concerns about the safety of the parade. I elected to approach the Campus-Wide Beer Bike Committee, which is composed of myself, the area coordinators, Rice Program Council executives and the college coordinators, to open a dialogue about this issue. The committee discussed several options and agreed that student input was absolutely necessary before any final decision could be made. Learning from mistakes made in previous years, we are seeking your input on how to best change the parade.

McMurtry LEED gold certified before dedication

Just in time for its dedication, McMurtry College became the second new building at Rice to receive Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design Gold certification, the U.S. Green Building Council's second-highest designation.Named for Burt (Baker '56 and '57) and Deedee (Brown '56) McMurtry, the 10th residential college incorporates several environmentally friendly features into its design. McMurtry gained LEED Gold-certified status on Oct. 5 and was dedicated on Oct. 29.

Photo: Stop teen bullying

Health educator and motivational speaker Scott Fried talked to Rice students about bullying and LGBT teens.

Bouncing Cats: not about funny kittens

Because of my undying love for feline-related videos, I was immediately excited to review a film entitled Bouncing Cats and interview the filmmakers. However, upon discovering that the title of the film referred to a Ugandan beatboxing technique instead of cute kittens, I was less enthusiastic. Due to my lack of interest in actually doing work and my self-diagnosed agoraphobia, I almost did not go to the screening - until I came across something that changed my mind on the spot. I was going to interview Bun B. I was down to ride, and thanks to my hypochondriasis-induced amnesia, I was able to forget about my aforementioned preoccupations.Much to my surprise, I walked away from the event not starstruck from meeting Bun B or the others associated with the film but with a fresh and inspired perspective of an unbelievable cause. While I had an interesting conversation with Bun B, I was awestruck by my time with Abraham Tekya.

Getting going green

Classic Flicks:Terry Swigoff's Crumb

Although he has been compared to classical painters, Robert Crumb does not work with oils, pastels or charcoal: Crumb led the underground comic movement of the 1960s with a scratchy drawing style and a controversial autobiographical edge that remain influential in graphic literature today. Few films probe into the depths of artistic genius better than Terry Zwigoff's Crumb. We are given a look into Crumb's depressing childhood, when he is bullied at home by his domineering father and at school: Crumb remembers, "I was good looking, but there was something wrong with my personality; I was the most unpopular kid in school." Even as an adult, Crumb is an outcast, enjoying obscure blues records and collecting dated pop-cultural ephemera. He speaks frankly of his outrageous fantasies and shows us the impetus behind his more twisted comics. Becoming an artist was Crumb's way of dealing with a culture that rejected him from the beginning.

Letters to the Editor

To the Editor:While I share the Thresher's interest in the importance of sustainability efforts on campus ("'Green' grade disappoints," Nov. 5), I don't share your disappointment in this year's grade. When the College Sustainability Report Card was first issued in 2007, Rice got a C-. Every year since then, our grade has improved. If that trajectory continues, the B+ we earned this year may progress to an A- or better next year.

NetID locks out Rice

If you had problems using the Rice Owls Internet network last Friday, you weren't alone: A programming error on Rice's BANNER system locked all students out of anything that required a netID login, including Internet and e-mail. Most of the problems were fixed by 11:30 a.m. Friday, and registration and records were not affected.According to Systems, Architecture and Infrastructure Director Barry Ribbeck, not all systems were affected by the crisis - for example, lab machines still allowed students to log on and print, and the Rice Visitors Internet network still worked. Although the issues were resolved, Information Technology stayed late on Friday night to be sure the systems were all running properly, Ribbeck said.

Kinders give for research

Rich and Nancy Kinder announced a $15 million gift to Rice's Institute for Urban Research on Wednesday. The institute has been renamed in their honor as the Kinder Institute for Urban Research.An event was held at Baker Hall to announce the newly named institute as well as to thank the Kinders for their donation to Rice. Speakers at the event included President David Leebron, Houston Mayor and Rice alumna Annise Parker, Sociology Professor and Co-Director of the Institute for Urban Research Stephen Klineberg and Rich Kinder. Many prominent figures of Houston attended the event, such as religious leaders, heads of museums and local government members like City Council member Oliver Pennington.

My Dark Twisted Fantasy: West's comeback album

Hip-hop is about stories and the people who tell them. Kanye West is one hell of a storyteller, and his latest album, My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy, cements his place as one of the most important artists of our time. His most personal album so far, Kanye makes a great departure from his previous albums musically, lyrically and in content by telling the story of his comeback from the nadir of his career. Unlike his previous albums, Kanye is no longer appealing to every man; there is no "Good Life" to sing along to on this album. Instead, Kanye delivers a brilliantly crafted, occasionally dark and empowering story of redemption and triumph.This album's story really begins more than a year ago. Whether it was caused by the "Fishsticks" episode of South Park (that prompted an all-caps response on Kanye's infamous blog) or the MTV Video Music Awards snafu with Taylor Swift at the end of 2009, Kanye's public image had completely deteriorated. Kanye stayed under the radar, except for a little known short film released in October 2009, directed by Spike Jonze, that is essentially a metaphor for Kanye's public relations suicide - until he leaked the song "Power" in May. "Power" is an appropriately strong entrance back into the limelight. Cleverly using a King Crimson sample, Kanye simultaneously addresses his detractors for obsessing over him and proudly proclaims his influence on the music industry. Combined with his weekly music releases via his G.O.O.D. Fridays music program, the leak primed fans for the most exciting comeback album in recent memory.

Rice in a Box finalized

Twenty-five, 50, possibly even 100 years from now, with the help of a few boxes of memories, it will be possible to reconstruct the college experiences of Rice students. This is the goal of Rice in a Box, a Student Association initiative designed to collect the history of student experiences at Rice for each graduating class.According to SA Secretary Georgia Lagoudas, the name "Rice in a Box" is intended to be a fun representation of the project premise. She said boxes for collection of memorabilia will be placed at colleges and around campus and will later be stored in the off-campus Fondren Library storage facility. Examples of items for Rice in a Box include brochures, pamphlets, T-shirts, glassware, photos and event programs.

Societal intolerance of gays unfounded

In September, a Rutgers University student named Tyler Clementi jumped off of a bridge and fell to his death because his roommate invaded his privacy and transmitted a live broadcast from a webcam of Clementi having a sexual encounter with a man in order to humiliate and degrade him. Clementi was 18, with all the normal worries of school, activities in college and desires to live ?his life. In the same month, Seth Walsh died from injuries sustained while trying to hang himself in his family's garden in a town in California after being harassed and bullied by both peers at school and neighbors. He was 13.

Harry Potter 7 pre-screening a major accomplishment for RPC

The Thresher would like to commend the Rice Program Council for procuring six theaters at Edwards Cinema for an exclusive Rice pre-screening of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 1 (see story, page 6). After all, for a university that has so much in common with Hogwarts - the House Cup is the President's Trophy, Hogsmeade is the Rice Village, Leebron is Dumbledore, the Grand Dining Hall is the Baker College Commons, the Sorting Hat is a computer in Lovett Hall and Slytherin is Sid Richardson College - it is only fitting that Rice students should be privileged to see the penultimate film of the series four hours before our peers.The RPC truly planned outside the box in orchestrating this event. It is not only a unique event in itself, but it is one that captures the interests of a near majority of the campus. Of course, there is no one single event, whether it be a musician, show or performance, that captivates every student on Rice's campus, but Harry Potter comes pretty close.

Errata

In last week's issue, two sentences were erroneously added to Evan Mintz's letter to the editor.Last week, the Thresher incorrectly identified Chef Annette Burnam as Salento's head chef ("Class project greens Brochstein"). Burnam is Salento's local jam supplier. Additionally, the survey offered at the event was made to gauge if customers would pay more for other local products to be put in different menu items. The coffee discount mentioned in the article was not a one-time promotion, but instead is still in effect.

Student-athlete grad rates go up

While the football team might be struggling on the field, Rice athletics retains its dominance in the classroom with the release of the most recent student- athlete graduation success rates. The annual study of student-athlete graduation rates by the National Collegiate Athlete Association placed Rice sixth of 120 NCAA Division I-A schools in the nation, according to both the NCAA's graduation success rate and the federal graduation rate released in an online NCAA report two weeks ago.