Yale Record Blog

By River Clegg

Just when I thought my vacation to Colombia couldn't get any better, I was approached by four friendly-looking locals. "Get een car," said one, pointing to a rusty taxicab parked on the dirt. What luck! Here I was, invited to join real Colombians on a genuine Colombian adventure!  Of course I got in.

By David Klumpp '10

When I was very young, the head of the mafia in Florence told my family we had precisely three days to get out of the country--Sunday, Tuesday, and Veteran's day.  I can remember the look in my father's eyes as he pleaded for Thursday as well, only to learn it had been loaned to the Pope for the war effort.

We packed all we could into our little horse-pulled carriage: bicycles, tricycles, barrels of bread, additional horses, the family car . . . but even so, some things had to be left behind.  The boat, for example.  That boat had been my whole life--looking at it, drawing it, imagining sailing it, watching friends sail it, sailing in similar boats, and the countless other things a child and his boat might do.  I shed a tear for my childhood as the carriage bumped along and the Swiss Alps grew larger in the distance.

By Avinash Chak '11

Rock & Roll

Elvis Presley, the so-called "King of Rock 'n' Roll," stole early rhythm and blues songs and remade them for white audiences. Further stealing from African-American culture, white people have copied Tupac fans in claiming that Elvis still lives.

 

Sliced Bread

White people have an irritating habit of saying everything with likeable qualities is "the greatest thing since sliced bread." They neglect to mention that sliced bread was invented by Australian Aborigines who felt this shape for bread would be ideal for toast upon which to spread marmite - another food white people claim to have discovered. Come on, white people!

Gangsta Rap

Popular hip-hop acts K-Fed and Vanilla Ice are not OGs as they claim. These gangsta frauds can usually be distinguished by the fact that what their drugs of choice are Aterol and Xanax, and that their definition of "trouble with the cops" is needing to hire a $600-an-hour lawyer.

 

Fried Chicken

No, fried goodness was not invented by Colonel Sanders. The Colonel, who fought under Robert E. Lee at the Battle of Bull Run, stole the recipe from a slave, then used it to start Kentucky Fried Chicken. KFC then butchered the original recipe by removing the chicken and just serving fried breading. Hooray capitalism!

 

Lacrosse

Contrary to popular belief, lax was not invented by a "Bro." Native American tribes were the first to play this sport--on mile-long fields, using enemy heads as balls. When Shawnee leader Tecumseh was told of how whitey plays lacrosse, his reply was, "Cradling? Cradling is for bitches."

 

Mayonnaise

White America's favorite condiment was first discovered by Mexicans in the early 1800s. During the war for Texan Independence, the Mexican army attacked a band of white settlers who had found the secret recipe for Mayonnaiso. They killed each and every one of them at the Alamo, but not before Davey Crockett sent a message by carrier pigeon detailing the recipe and telling all to "Remember the Alamo as a turning point in Caucasian culinary history." By the time this message reached American lines, the second part was covered in pigeon shit and was no longer legible.

Yesterday we had the pleasure of Jonathan Coulton's company at a Master's Tea in Pierson College. He talked to us about how his deep, dark, secret musical personality gradually edged out his computer programmer personality on his way to internet superstardom. He even played a few fan favorite songs for us, such as Chiron Beta Prime (a Christmas song about a human family banished to an asteroid by robots), Furry Old Lobster (a song memorializing the old, otter-like lobster that existed before the Crustaceous lobster edged it out), Re Your Brains (a song sung by the leader of a pack of zombies trying to break into a mall), and a few more. Our combined strength was just enough to lift Jon Coulton off the floor:

By Jordy Greenblatt '11

• Throw metal into the detector as people walk through
• Exchange a dollar for 16,000 Vietnamese dongs and make it rain money
• See how loudly you can say "bomb" before having your civil rights revoked
• Approach the ticket desk with song requests
• Insist on buying items in terminal shops only in dongs, as an anti-capitalist statement
• Make some money selling condoms in terminal headed to Las Vegas
• Lose some teeth selling evolutionary biology textbooks in the terminal headed to Tennessee
• Color in all the letter 'o's in the Wall Street Journal, and change the dollar signs to dong signs
• Go through security over and over until you get frisked by the one attractive security officer
• Get an aerobic workout on the escalator
• Lure children away from their parents by offering them candy and dongs from your trench coat
• Travel Scrabble

More to come in the Record's Travel Issue, hitting dining halls, mailboxes, and in-boxes tomorrow!

This past Thursday we had a wonderful Master's Tea guest here at the Record, David Wain. An actor, screenwriter, and director, among other pursuits, Wain shared with us his experiences all across the board, in the warmth and comfort of the Pierson Master's house. Wain is the man behind the movie Wet Hot American Summer, the TV series Stella (along with Michael Ian Black and Michael Showalter), and other gems. If you're near a computer while reading this blog, check out David Wain's internet video series Wainy Days, a website as hilarious as it is blue (it is very blue)!

Been asleep for the past three months? Whether the cause was practicing for the Hibernation Olympics, a really hard night of drinking, or an ordinary everyday drug overdose, no need to fret - the Yale Record's got you covered!




This fabulous one-page supplemental will fill you in on everything that's been going on this season. Read about defeats through history that were worse than the Harvard-Yale game, how notable people spent their Thanksgivings, clip a coupon that will help you out in impending robot wars later this century, and if you're out of gift ideas for the holidays, Lawrence Pinkwater has some top-notch suggestions for you.