WAG - There is a light ahead in the tunnel…
Of course it's the headlights of an on coming train, but I choose to appreciate the shine of the illumination if not the oncoming locomotion.
Hi. This is Caleb and I'm back… sort of.
Official pre-opening training has come to a close this semester. It was finally all wrapped up this afternoon.
I know lots of "teachable moments" lie ahead, and more teaching modules are in my future, but for now we have a chance to take a deep breath before entering into the next storm.
Though we’d better breathe quickly.
Band camp starts tomorrow, which is the main train I have to look forward to. The dorms open tomorrow too and I am scheduled to work 9 hours during peak moving times. There’s also required participation in over a half dozen opening activities and learning marching routines and preparation for classes.
When you add it all up and crunch the numbers, I find I only have so much time to get all the important stuff done.
Let’s put it another way: sleep, though greatly desired, will not be very high up on my priority list until September.
Not that I’m complaining. I’ve been having lots of fun. I never slowed down during summer vacation; why should a perpetual increase in speed bother me?
The major highlight of my day, and probably the week, was working on a "Meet the Staff" board. In my experience they are often well meaning, but boring boards to read. It's good to get the names and faces down, and they usually include some interesting nuggets of information, but rarely have I stopped to thoroughly read everything.
I wanted to change that.
The theme for the Cramer (the Journalism and Mass Communications residence hall) this year is discovering journalism. Throughout the boards and decorations we’re trying to have a running idea of investigative journalism. Pieces included chalk outlines to TOP SECRET folders, masks made out of (news)paper mache (from the Wall Street Journal – always a high class paper to use for such projects), and other mystery flavored items.
Many of these ideas were brainstormed over the summer through emails and other lines of communication. I proposed the idea of having a “Usual Suspects” Staff bulletin board. In it, photos would be taken mug shot style – where people would hold booking numbers and everything.
When I got back to Mizzou this week, I was assigned the board I’d dreamt up. We had a photo session where I brought out a collection of props I’d collected from around my room (I didn’t buy anything specifically for this project; I just snatched it from my shelves) and the Cramer staff members REALLY got into forming characters.
Here is the finished board (minus some framing details) but otherwise complete in content. I hope you enjoy half as much as we did.
Note: Blogger currently allow the posting of pictures, so please accept a typed summary of what appears.
PA Katie Baumgartner
[Katie is calmly staring at the camera with shop goggles covering her eyes and an orange Hawaiian lei around her neck]
Katie was picked up in front of 009 Cramer for dishing out her own version of vigilante justice concerning illegal parking.
Wielding a chainsaw (NOT PICTURED), she worked her way through 3 illegally parked cars, two trucks, and one mini-van before officers reported to the scene. She then proceeded to finish off the MUPD cruiser that had arrived due to the fact they stopped in a handicapped parking spot.
Katie was only stopped when the chainsaw ran out of gas, but vowed to return to her duty of “keeping the streets clear” as soon as she could stop by a Conoco station.
CA Caleb Smith
[I am staring intently with crazed eyes at a skull whose bottom jaw is hanging in such a way it appears to be screaming]
Caleb was spotted sitting in front of 27 Cramer clutching what appeared to be a human skull to his chest.
Officers neither know where/who the skull came from, how it got into his possession, or if the two were somehow related.
The only thing agreed upon was the fact Smith displayed an unnatural fascination with the skull; which he constantly referred to as “Hamlet” even though officers agreed it would be better deemed “Yorick.”
CA Jason Nonnemaker
[Jason is wearing a pink cap backwards, but is framed in a way that it looks like an off-center bandana. He has an hard, stern look on his face that reminds me of Dr. Romano (the angry guy) from ER]
Jason was stopped outside 109 Cramer. He is a self-described “Bad-Mother-You-Know-What,” who is often seen striking menacing poses on poorly lit street corners.
Despite his constant use of street jive – word – he has yet to be arrested for something more serious than loitering.
He would also like it to be known he spent the past year at a Washington D.C. internship, word.
PA Ann Stratton
[Ann is smiling at the camera while chewing on her sunglasses. Her booking numbers are held off to the side and appears to have asked the question, "What's wrong officer?"]
Though the arresting officers know they stopped Ann outside Cramer 127, when it came time to book her, none of them could recall any crime that Ms. Stratton may or may not have committed.
Though no charges were pressed, the officers were adamant that her picture should be taken before she left. Attempts to get her phone number were denied.
PA Millie Munshi
[Millie is wearing a grab-bag of items including a pink hat that is cocked to the side, the Hawaiian lei, and clutches an orange squirt gun and spider beanie babie. Since her hands are full, someone holds the booking card for her. Millieis also sticks her tongue out at the camera]
What can be said about Millie “the Menace” Munshi?
A gangsta who now resides at Cramer 209 previously grew up on the mean streets of Skokie, IL. It cannot be denied she has the potential to raise an empire so large it could threaten to create a three-way West Coast – East Coast – Midwest rivalry.
Officers strongly hope this horrible nightmare will never come to pass.
PA Christa Meland
[Christa holds two squirt guns out to the side Charlie's Angels style. She has a "Don't Mess with me look" cultivated by her sunglasses and stern frown. Her hands are also busy so her booking hard is held out in front of her as well].
Last spotted outside Cramer 227, she is currently Number 2 on the F.B.I.’s Most Wanted List. John Walsh has hosted several TV specials dedicated to eliciting her capture. Also, it is rumored she tops a certain Superhero’s “Ones that got away list,” but due to copyright laws, we cannot mention this caped crusader man who often dresses in black.
She has only been photographed once, but after no one took her guns away she subsequently used them to escape.
Meland is currently listed as “At large, but better left alone.
PA Dan Burke
[A dark shadowy figure clutches a mallet close to his head and stares at the camera with cold, firm eyes. He looks like he's recently been through a street brawl due to a what appears to be a bruised eye]
Dan “The Hammer Man” was last spotted heading toward Cramer 303. Though more often equipped with his “Scepter of Justice,” he is well known for walking the hallways and whispering to himself, “Com’on. Somebody start something.”
He busted his way through a holding cell shortly after this photo was taken – he hammers well – and is currently considered armed (two, with both a left and a right) and hammered.
CA Emily Angle
[Emily clutches a bag with a large dollar sign on the front and has a small green parrot perched on her shoulder. She also has sunglasses, but are pulled down to the edge of her nose so that she's staring over the lenses]
Emily Angle, of Cramer 327, was arrested for public disturbance after interrupting a screening of “Finding Nemo” and demanding that “Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl” be put on.
Emily, a long time Johnny Depp fan, as evidenced by her “parrot” and “booty,” has been arrest three times for similar events since the Cineplex 14 and a half stopped showing the movie on August 12.
She was last heard screaming, “It’s more than a ride; I tell you. So much more!”
That’s that.
This is the only piece of creative writing I’ve done all week. If you have time to checkout the board in person, I encourage you to because the photos are so funny (and my paltry descriptions don't do them justice).
In closing, here are some final thanks.
Thanks to PA Emily, who did a final edit to save me from some of my more “interesting” lines.
I’d also like to thank all the Cops and Courts reporters I sat next to in J-306 who helped me pick up the lingo and style.
And last, thanks to MU for looking over my obvious defects and letting me work with a group of people who’d let me poke fun of them like this.
It helps me keep a smile on my face even as the train is fast approaching.
What more could one ask for?
I say bring on the train.
Toot! Toot!
'ALL_ABOARD'
