Blog Daily Herald

Who are you most excited to see play Spring Weekend?

Blog Daily Herald — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 02:29:49 +0000

Snoop Dogg, MGMT, the Black Keys, Major Lazer and Wale are all playing Spring Weekend. It’s an embarrassment of riches. Who are you most excited to see? Vote in our poll (it’s over there on the right) and get ready for tickets to go on sale March 24.

Listicle: Our favorite Snoop Dogg covers

Ellen Cushing — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 19:24:29 +0000

In case we haven’t made it abundantly clear just how excited we here at Blog Daily Herald are about this year’s Spring Weekend lineup, we’ll be featuring various tidbits, musings and other exclamation-pointed nonsense in this space in the weeks leading up to the event. First up: apparently there’s a whole cottage industry devoted to people doing bizarre covers of songs by Saturday headliner Snoop Dogg, often in their living rooms. After the jump, we’ve plumbed the depths for of YouTube for our favorites:

5. Two guys do a violin-inflected take on Murder Was the Case:

4. British electro-popsters Hot Chip take on Sensual Seduction:

3. A crew of guys aptly billing themselves as “3 drunk white guys” do an utterly arhythmic, completely hilarious rendition of Gin n’ Juice:

2. Some rando with a webcam does a surprsingly good acoustic version of Sensual Seduction:

1. Alt-bluegrass outfit The Gourds covers Gin n’ Juice; hilarity ensues.

Norway wears the pants

Sydney Ember — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 19:00:32 +0000

If you think that guy wearing chainmail in your 9 a.m. biology class has an interesting fashion sense, wait until you see the pants on the Norwegian Olympic Curling Team. The brainchild of Scott Woodworth ‘82, these Argyle knickers caused a red, white and blue stir the world over as the team vacuumed — er — curled its way to a silver medal on Feb. 27 in Vancouver.

Woodworth designed the outlandish pantaloons for his company, Loud mouth Golf, which he founded in 2000. The Norwegian team apparently saw Woodworth’s Web site and ordered pants in the country’s colors. And though the team didn’t snag gold from the boringly black-pants clad Canadian powerhouse, at least the Norwegians did it with more style.

Take that, chainmail dude.

To add to your wishlist

Alex Bell — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 18:32:14 +0000

This watch, stamped from a solid block of steel, features “luminescent hands and markers,” “Swiss-made Quartz” technology, and, yes, the Brown University crest. You can add this notable Tag Heuer watch to your Amazon.com wish list, but with its nearly $2,000 price tag, you might as well commemorate your love for Brown by getting a building named after you instead.

Top ten ’10 commencement speakers

Heeyoung Min — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 16:32:08 +0000

“Unlike most colleges and universities, Brown imports no Commencement speaker for the College ceremonies,” according to the university’s Commencement website (though we’ve ‘exported’: President Simmons has given commencement speech at multiple campuses). Last year, we got journo Fareed Zakaria for the baccalaureate address, (which is apparently very similar to, but not the same thing as, commencement?!), and the year before that it was Dave Eggers. This year’s speaker — who addresses only graduating seniors in a small ceremony, rather than the whole mess of PhDs, MDs, and family and friends at the big Commencement — has yet to be announced, but here’s a — completely subjective — list of the most interesting people addressing the class of ’10 on other campuses:

10) Vanderbilt University: Khaled Hosseini, author of The Kite Runner and A Thousand Splendid Suns

9) Western Connecticut State University: Wyclef Jean, musician and producer

8 ) Vassar College: Lisa Kudrow, actress

7) Stanford University: Susan E. Rice, U.S. ambassador to the United Nations

6) Marquette University, Wendy Kopp, founder and chief executive of Teach for America

5) University of Tennessee at Knoxville: Al Gore, environmental leader and 45th vice president

4) Grinnell College: Jeffrey Sachs, director of the Earth Institute at Columbia University (The End of Poverty)

3) University of Notre Dame: Brian Williams, anchor and managing editor of “NBC Nightly News”

1) University of Michigan-Ann Arbor, President Obama & The George Washington University, First Lady Michelle Obama

Cup o’ (Pro)Jo

Caitlin — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 15:40:57 +0000

A Providence police union has said Mayor Cicilline’s proposal to test members of the Providence Police Department randomly for drugs violates state law. The office of Attorney General and gubernatorial candidate Patrick C. Lynch has expressed agreement with the union.

Central Falls High School students held a silent vigil outside the school Tuesday for the teachers the district fired.

A seal that the Mystic Aquarium rescued off the coast of Maine in January has been released back into the wild. Watch that little guy go!

Blorgchiving: A History of the Ratty (the important parts)

Blog Daily Herald — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 15:25:41 +0000

1950 — Sharpe Refectory opens. In 1952, the lunch and dinner meals are carried to table by student waiters, and dinner music plays every other night. Seriously!

1952 — A new “chit” system promises to put an end to free-loading at the Ratty, until the invention of the backpack later that year.

1964 — The Ratty re-instates a coat-and-tie dress code. No riots ensue.

1985 — More than three-quarters of Refectory respondents said they prefer Classic Coke, but the Ratty “reports minimal carping” when it switches to New Coke, The Herald reports. No riots ensue.

1986 — Executive Editor and no-guff-taker David Lavallee ’87 writes a guide to navigating the Ratty efficiently. His “Lavallee line” — calling for two napkins, three glasses, and “pointed assaults from the rear” on the toaster bar — today serves as the model for conscientious ’Factory fans.

2010 — The Ratty replaces its cereal canisters. Cups do not fit underneath. Riots ensue.

Bonus Ratty Trivia: It’s true, it’s connected to the fraternities by tunnels.

It’s a hard knock life

Emmy Liss — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 14:08:13 +0000

Princeton undergrads work “100-hour weeks” and opt for ” ‘bitchwork,’ ” while “superhero undergraduates” at Harvard create 28-hour days. Evidently, “Harvard kids don’t want to do 5,000 things at 97 percent; they’d rather do 3,000 things at 150 percent.”

For a glimpse of what your life could have been like, check out the start of Princeton’s “three-part series on careers in investment banking and consulting” or this feature on why students in Cambridge are just so busy.

Experts in one article call the nonstop lifestyle “overcompensation.” Others hypothesize that students hope to validate their undergraduate experience.

But perhaps it’s just one big cry for help because they simply aren’t happy.

Time-waster of the day 3/10

Alex Bell — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 14:04:31 +0000

For all you scientists out there (social scientists included!), here’s a falling sand game for you to practice your gravity/physics/chemistry skills, outside of lab.

Free food digest: March 10, 2010

Emmy Liss — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 13:15:35 +0000

Eat free or die trying.

——
Tea and Feminism: Men and Feminism
5:30-6:30 p.m.
Sarah Doyle Women’s Center
So it’s not quite food, but tea is restorative.

Hiccups in Investigation
5:30-7:30 p.m.
Smitty B 201
Royce fellows talk about unanticipated blunders and surprises; you eat refreshments

The Inaugural WiSE Wednesday Event at the Science Center!
7 p.m.
Science Center Lounge
(Pizza) dinner with Professor Jan Tullis
RSVP required to wise.at.brown@gmail.com