Arts Roundtable – Send us your answers!

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Forums, URSU, snow, oh my! /Image: Arthur Ward

Forums, URSU, snow, oh my! /Image: Arthur Ward

For we have many a question

Participants: Robyn Tocker, John Loeppky, Tanner Aulie, Charlie Macdonald, Dana Morenstein  

At the Public Forum on Oct. 24, Timmons mentioned a Liberal Arts Task Force. Do you think we need one/why?

DM: It’s just another money grab. I’m so sick of all of this crap being done, committees and the like, as an excuse to ding students with another fee all in the name of getting shit done.

RT: Depends on what the task force will actually do. From what I recall of the forum, she didn’t go into great detail. Hopefully it’s not just a front to calm the masses.

JL: What are they going to do, send a SWAT team into the history office? Put your hands up and drop all your essays! She should be creating a Timmons-like ability task force with the tag line: making the impossible seem a little less impossible.

TA: As long as it doesn’t mean an artsy version of the cast of Expendables is going to be walking around campus. Although, a hipster Sylvester Stallone with a turtleneck and fake glasses trying to articulate what he likes about Salvador Dali’s, The Great Masturbator, would be pretty extraordinary.

CM: I don’t think this one affects me too much. However, I believe that the Liberal Arts Task Force would have the most badass leather jackets on campus.

We had snow one week, now we don’t. How do you beat the winter blues?

DM: How do I beat the winter blues? Simple. Lots of holiday anticipation, chocolate, and a little good old-fashioned retail therapy. Shopping for fashionable winter clothing doesn’t have to be depressing. Instead, I scour thrift stores and stock up on comfy, over-sized sweaters.

RT: Movies, movies, and more movies. Ain’t nothing wrong with a nice blanket and some childhood favourites to make you remember when you used to love snowfall in the first place.

JL: Speaking as one of the few who is dreaming of a brown Christmas, I thank those who planned the U of R for making sure I never have to go outside. Check that, turn the Language Institute into a Sobey’s and then I would never have to leave.

TA: It would have been funnier to phrase that question, “how do you beat off the winter blues?” Cause then I would say “with my right hand”. Think about it. To answer your question: lots of inappropriate jokes.

CM: I’ll cope by spending as little time as possible outside. Remember, Snow Angels are cool but they are not fun to make at forty below in jeans and a T-shirt.

Midterms have come and gone, but there’s always more just around the corner. What’s your number one tip for handling these accursed things?

DM: Just get it over with. My English professor once told us that it’s crucial to replace a bad habit with a good habit. So, replace your habit of not studying, with something that will make you excited to study, like donuts.

RT: Studying can be dull, but if we break it up into 20 minute intervals with five minute breaks, things don’t seem so awful. Also, if you give yourself a reward, it will make you want to start sooner and get it done quicker.

JL: As a pessimistic third-year who is trying to foster a shred of optimism, just think, when I am in my chosen field, will this mark (provided it’s a pass) get me where I want to go? Hint: most of the time, the word starts with ‘y’ and rhymes with chess.

TA: Just rest in the fact that everything you are learning is a life lesson and will be transferable to your daily life in every capacity. Personally, I cannot count how many times I have used a cross section of a cell membrane while navigating my everyday life … because I failed that math midterm.

CM: My marks reflected that my tactic of apathy and indifference works quite well in a stress filled environment (in other words relax, tests are really 10% content 90% psychological). If you are one of my professors and are reading this, disregard this answer as a joke and move on to #4.

URSU is, apparently, having a forum of their own sometime soon. What do you hope they address?

DM: Hopefully, URSU will take a serious look at the increasing cost of student tuition, and how it can be mitigated. Oh, and what’s with all the U of R financial scandals, lately?

RT: URSU actually telling us things?! What is this witchcraft? If they do have one, I want to know what they’re doing about my tuition. Just be transparent! It’s not that hard people! Honest!

JL: Not that they will, but they seem more and more to be bending to the administration’s whims. Show concrete examples of when they have helped real people, not just set up meetings and pontificate on the ills of the university.

TA: URSU? More like cow-poo. I’m just kidding; URSU is a great organization and we are lucky to have it. I hope they address the disturbingly long list of bad things you can rhyme with URSU: bird-poo, dog-poo, whale-poo. They should make up a new name that can’t be rhymed into a taunt, like Breakfast.

CM: Any type of communication with the student population is a good thing. Especially considering they are giving an opportunity for those who complain to voice it towards someone who can change it. So, short answer for me? Hawaiian Punch in the water fountains, yes or no?

Between Halloween and Christmas, November is kind of a bland month. What holiday should we make up to spice up the month?

DM: Let’s not make up a holiday. Why do we need holidays to cheer us up? That’s what ice cream and sex are for.

RT: National Nap Day. We all just stay in bed. There. That’s it. That’s the plan. Students around the country, rejoice!

JL: Take a drink for every time your professor says um. This could be great fun, most of us would have alcohol poisoning, and armchair activists could call it a rallying cry against boring lectures and then we can all go to Denny’s, coursework in hand.

TA: I say Rational Consumer Day. It’s a day where people just buy exactly what they need instead of a $400 life sized animatronic Regan from The Exorcist. Or enough chocolate Santa Clauses to put Fat Bastard into a diabetic coma.

CM: Although it is wildly disrespectful to have parties over Remembrance Day Weekend, people still do it. So to pick a cool, hip new holiday for the No Shave month, I would go with Nobody Buy Anything Day. It would save money for Christmas and it could possibly wreck the economy. Good times.

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