College Radio

"Music Monday" turns out to be a good place for embarrassing confessions.

Fosco had a fit of nostalgia the other night (conveniently, during a fit of insomnia). He was thinking back to his college years and the music that he and his roommates used to listen to. It turns out he has very vivid memory images of certain songs/albums that are associated with very specific years of college. So, as an exercise in self-archaeology, Fosco has attempted to identify the albums that provided the soundtrack for each of his years in college.

Freshman Year:

• 10,000 Maniacs, Our Time in Eden: "These Are Days" was the song of autumn 1992.
  
• Peter Gabriel, Us

Sophomore Year:

• The Cranberries, Everybody Else Is Doing It, So Why Can't We?: Remember when people liked this album?
  
• Pet Shop Boys, Very
  
• Ace of Base, The Sign: this may be the most embarrassing admission of all. If it helps any, I blame most of this on Dr. Steve.
  
• Sarah McLachlan, Fumbling Towards Ecstasy. I haven't listened to this in a long time--I should dig it out.

Junior Year:

• Liz Phair, Whip-Smart: did I mention Fosco got a little cooler that year? But just a little.
  
• Toad the Wet Sprocket, Dulcinea
  
• Weezer, "The Blue Album"
  
• REM, Monster

Senior Year:

• Alanis Morissette, Jagged Little Pill: In all honesty, I can't think of any other album that I associate with senior year of college. Realistically, this was probably the only album being played at Harvard that entire year. Yes, that's pathetic--I get it.

I think one conclusion we can draw here is that Fosco and his roommates were complete tools, even with the exception of several really good albums from Junior Year. Which just goes to show that, for all of the credit college students get for listening to hip and obscure music, lots of college students have musical tastes lodged solidly in the mainstream.

In related news, the other day Mashuptown.com suggested that its readers should

find an album that you haven't listened to in years and refresh yourself with why you loved it in the first place. At the very least it might resurrect some good memories--really, what have you got to lose?

You know what? I'm going to listen to Whip-Smart right now.

Omnibus Titbit Post

Some weeks, there's just too much to share with you, the Fosco Lives! reader. That's why you are now reading a "news digest" post, consisting of a bunch of stories that Fosco just can't not comment on.

• Guess who's back at Stanford! Hint: she's a lesbian war criminal. No, not Rosie O'Donnell, but good guess. Nope, it's Condi, who has returned to her life (and lifepartner!) at Stanford (aka America's anus). Her teaching load is still undetermined, but she eventually hopes to get back into the classroom:
  

  As a professor, Rice has said, she hopes to lead future courses on international politics, with a focus on decision-making. Specifically, she seeks to teach "decision simulation," where students are pressed to think about real-life questions and choices and not just abstract policy.

  You know, decisions like: "Which war is the right war for you?" or "How many dead Iraqi civilians is too many?". Come to think of it, she's going to fit right in at Stanford.
  
  
• There's more financial mumbo-jumbo to explain why Harvard is in trouble and it appears to have something to do with "dry powder." Fosco isn't quite clear on this concept, but he assumes it has something to do with the gunpowder that Harvard has amassed in the basement of Widener Library for the inevitable apocalyptic war against Yale in the End Times. Yale delenda est!
  
  
• Fosco went to prom in high school, because who doesn't love a little heteronormativity? For his senior prom, Fosco chose a lovely corsage for his date; the day after Fosco ordered said corsage, the date and her stepmother went to the florist and redesigned the whole thing. Guess who still paid (Fosco could afford it, but still!).
  
  Which brings me to my point: prom would be pretty silly and ridiculous if it weren't so damned expensive (and mainly for the girls). But, as per this article in a recent Santa Cruz Sentinel, things will be easier for girls in Santa Cruz this prom season: Free Prom Dresses! Yes, thanks to a city councilman and a local dry cleaners, a buttload of donated prom dresses (and yes, the appropriate grouping adjective for a collection of prom dresses in indeed "a buttload"--look it up!) has been assembled for girls who cannot afford to purchase their own. Which is actually a pretty good thing, right? I almost think everyone should wear a recycled prom dress. After all, why should you buy a new dress when it's only going to get covered with alcohol/vomit and ripped by an overeager date rapist? Ah, good prom memories...
  
  
• Speaking of prom, did you realize that one in every thirty-one American adults is now in the corrections system? As the brilliant Jonathan Turley goes on to note, Georgia is the leader in this statistic (1 in 13 adults in the corrections system), followed by Idaho and Texas. (Hmmm, is it me or are those all red states?) This is a shocking statistic, no? I don't think anyone believes that this kind of rate is sustainable--the burden on our society is just too great. I don't know what we need to do, but I'm willing to listen to proposals for increasing education spending and decriminalizing marijuana.
  
  
• Speaking of prison, did you see that former football-star Maurice Clarett is blogging from prison? You may remember Maurice Clarett as a star running back at the Ohio State University, who as a freshman, helped to lead that team to a National Championship. Or you may recall that Clarett then sued the NFL to allow him to enter the NFL draft a year early (he lost). Well, a few years later (after getting cut from several NFL teams) Clarett apparently committed an armed robbery and is now serving a seven and a half year sentence.
  
  Now Fosco has never been a fan of Clarett, but there is a surprise here. (And no, the surprise is not that an Ohio State player ended up in prison...) Fosco was prepared to make some comedic hay from Clarett's blog, but, well, he can't--it's actually pretty good. It turns out that Clarett is using his time in prison for self-improvement, including working on his college degree. He's been reading philosophy(!) and doing a lot of thinking about life. He's been counseling some of the younger prisoners. And you know, he's actually a pretty decent writer. I actually find the whole project to be both serious and positive. I don't want to make fun of someone who is clearly taking his mistakes seriously and thinking about what he can give back to society after his release. I'm a little impressed and, to tell you the truth, I've subscribed to the feed... You can find his blog here.
  
  (I wonder if the crooked administrators and boosters at Ohio State who took advantage of this kid will ever end up in jail... Yeah, I suppose not.)
  
  
• A Santa Cruz aerial photographer just swept the "2009 Professional Aerial Photographers Association print competition," according to this piece in the Sentinel. You can see one of his winning images at right. The story behind the image itself is actually pretty amazing:
  

  Back in May, David Sievert flew to the Black Rock Desert of Nevada to preserve for posterity one of the ephemeral creations of Santa Cruz sand artist Jim Denevan.
  
  Sievert circled for 40 minutes over a dry lake focusing on what Denevan hoped would be the world's largest freehand drawing. He spent a month and a half, using a stick to draw a series of circles, creating a composition three miles wide.

  Crazy! Think of the work involved! And think about all of the ways that the drawing could have been destroyed:
  

  Then a variety of circumstances could have smashed Denevan's composition, sitting unprotected in the wild.
  
  A ranger from the Bureau of Land Management drove out, wondering why Denevan had camped there and potentially jeopardizing the drawing.
  
  "He didn't know what we were doing," said Denevan, who tried to explain. "We told him, Hey, when you leave, would you follow the lines?'"
  
  Three days before Sievert was scheduled to arrive, a group of 30 machine gun enthusiasts in Hummers and pickups kicked up dust, heading straight toward the drawing.
  
  Luckily, they turned toward Denevan's camping bus, assuming their leader was inside, thus leaving the drawing intact.
  
  Even the weather cooperated.
  
  "It rained like crazy a week later," Denevan said.

  Fosco has always had a soft spot for good "nature art" (like Robert Smithson or Andy Goldsworthy). And while the circles thing is indeed pretty cool in its ambition, I wonder if it could have been a little more interesting. Like what about a giant Oprah head? Oh wait, that's been done...

Harvard Now Just Like Other Universities: Poor.

Fosco has been following the story of Harvard's financial dissolution for several months now. You may recall that, when we last checked, Harvard had lost 8 billion dollars from its endowment in 2008. But this week, new details have emerged. In this NY Times article, you can read a profile of Harvard's embattled Endowment Director, Jane Mendillo.

You have to feel for Mendillo, who took the job on July 1, 2008. How can you not admire timing like that? It's a little like being promoted to US Director of National Intelligence on September 10, 2001. If I were a Wall Street bank, I would have a standing job offer out to Mendillo. The day after she accepts it, you would know that it's time to sell.

But whether or not Mendillo got hosed by taking her new job, she still has to try to account for the largest endowment loss in forty years--a loss that has left Harvard short of the ready cash it needs to meet its immediate obligations. As the article notes:

Harvard has frozen salaries for faculty and nonunion staff members, and offered early retirement to 1,600 employees. The divinity school has warned it may not be able to cover tuition for all its students with need, the school of arts and sciences is cutting its billion-dollar budget roughly 10 percent, and the university president said this week than the unprecedented drop in the endowment was causing it to delay its planned expansion, starting with a $1 billion science center, into the Allston neighborhood of Boston.

The delay on the Allston Science Center (pictured above) is actually the saddest part here, because it will mean an additional four to five years until Harvard students will have access to Laser Floyd.

If you're interested, there is much complicated financial jargon to help explain Harvard's situation:

The endowment was squeezed partly because it had invested more than its assets, a leveraging strategy that can magnify results, both good and bad. It also had invested heavily in private equity and related deals, which not only lock up existing cash but require investors to put up more capital over time.
[...]
She has raised the equivalent of 3 percent of assets for a cash reserve. “For a long time, Harvard had a negative 5 position,” she said. “That means that 105 percent of the assets are invested at most times.”

I don't really understand any of that, of course. But I'm pretty sure it means that Harvard is broke. All I know is that I keep getting emails every week or so from Harvard President Peri Gilpin Drew Gilpin Faust soliciting items for a "Harvard Yard Rummage Sale." I'm thinking of sending along a nice tea set that I've never used.

Guess Who's Poor Now! (Besides Fosco)

The list of victims in Bernard Madoff's evil Fonzie scheme was released late yesterday. The client list is 162 pages long(!) and (oddly) organized by first name. However, Fosco knows that you, the Fosco Lives! reader, count on him to break news for you. And so, Fosco spent almost a half hour last evening skimming various random pages of this list, looking for famous or notable names.

Here are a couple of semi-notable names that Fosco found (and yes, he has already contacted the proper media outlets):

• Frank R. Lautenberg, Senator (D) for New Jersey
  
• Barbara Bach, former Bond girl and current Mrs. Ringo Starr
  
• The Barbara Gladstone Gallery, the famous NYC gallery that represents artists like Matthew Barney and Anish Kapoor
  
• A journalist/economist who was Fosco's classmate at Harvard. Fosco would be lying if he didn't admit to some schadenfreude on this one--mainly because the guy was always kind of a dick.
  

You can find the complete list here, along with a slideshow of some other famous victims (including, sadly, Kevin Bacon and Kyra Sedgwick).

Finally, a Reason to Care about Science

There is always something interesting going on at Harvard. Like, for instance, a visit from the best chef in the world, Ferran Adrià (of impossible reservation El Bulli in Spain). Adrià is responsible for molecular gastronomy, an approach to cuisine that uses experimental techniques based in chemistry and engineering to produce new preparations of food. You've probably seen it practiced (usually badly) by several "Top Chef" eliminees of the past few seasons. The foremost American practitioner is probably Grant Achatz of Chicago's Alinea (where Fosco had an ethereal and surreal meal in December 2007).

But dinner at El Bulli is beyond pretty much anything that you can find in this country. Dinner is a 35 course tasting menu. Adrià is a living legend, responsible for some of the most fascinating (and funny!) food preparations you've ever seen. Here is his "letter soup":

You can find an entire slideshow of his creations here.

Adrià's visit to Harvard is especially notable, however, because it came under the auspices of the Harvard School of Engineering. According to the press release, Adrià's talk actually focused on the use of hydrocolloids. Even more interesting, this visit allowed the signing of a "Memorandum of Understanding"(!) between El Bulli and the Harvard SEAS, which allows for a staff exchange(!!) between the two institutions. How cool would it be to be an engineering grad student who got to spend some time doing research at El Bulli? (Well, assuming that it could ever be cool to be an engineering grad student...)

Pictures of 2008: Society Wedding

Fosco recently realized that, by only blogging for three months last year, he never got to share tons of pictures with you from the rest of the year. So, for the next week or so, Fosco will offer a series of brief posts with some of his favorite pictures from his adventures in 2008. Check out the whole series here.

Last June, Fosco and Oz flew to Washington DC for the wedding of Fosco's college roommate Derek Ho to the lovely and talented Maria Glover (read the New York Times wedding announcement here). This was the nicest wedding Fosco has ever seen (black tie for the guests!) and it was a wonderful opportunity to catch up with most of his college roommates (except this no-show).

The reception was at the exquisite National Museum of Women in the Arts. Here are two photos from the reception:


Swanky!

The best part of the wedding (besides Derek and Maria's beautiful love, of course) was before the ceremony when Fosco and Oz were sitting in the pew at the church and Fosco turned around to find that Supreme Court Justice David Souter (one of the good Justices, btw) had been seated immediately behind him. For most of the rest of the ceremony, Fosco and his former roommate Dr. Steve scammed to get good candid pix of Souter without being too overt about it. Sadly, Fosco's best attempt is really too blurry; however, it's also the best he's got. And so he includes it here.

That's Souter in the foreground, being charmed by the Mother-of-the-Groom. On the right is the gorgeous Dr. Gloria, wife of Dr. Steve. Do you now see how Fosco got this shot? He was pretending to be taking a picture of Steve and Gloria. Pathetic, I know. A college rooming group with more cojones would have just asked Souter if he would be willing to pose with all of them; but then again, Fosco and his college roommates were always a bunch of eunuchs.

Harvard Domination Begins... Now!

Fosco loves sports, but he rarely blogs about it. For one thing, Fosco doesn't really have anything that interesting to say about sports. For another, there are already more sports blogs in existence than any other type of blog (it's true, I've checked). But Fosco cannot pass up this story because his Alma Mater Be Reprazentin!

Sorry about that.

But still--it is kind of big news. On Wednesday night, Harvard's Men's Basketball Team upset No. 17 Boston College, 82-70. (N.B.: ESPN prefers to rank Boston College as No. 24.) And the game was even at BC. This is a landmark win for several reasons:

1. The scrappy Crimson hoopsters had been pwned by BC previously, having lost 15 of their last 16 games against the Eagles.
   
2. In BC's previous game, they had knocked off No. 1 UNC in a surprising upset.
   
3. This is Harvard's first win over a ranked team EVER. EVER. Since when? Since EVER.
   
4. And the most amazing part of it all? Harvard's leading scorer in the game (with 27) was Jeremy Lin (pictured above). Now Fosco doesn't want to cross too far into the territory of racial stereotyping, but, um... when was the last time you saw an Asian basketball player? (Or, better yet, when have you ever seen an Asian basketball player lead all scoring in an upset of a highly-regarded ranked team?) This guy is hooptastic!

Fosco doesn't know that he's ever been this proud of Harvard sports. Well, at least the sports that people outside of the Ivy League care about (which eliminates squash).

You know what seems appropriate? A singing of the Harvard Fight Song! Join me, will you?

Illegitimum non carborundum;
Domine salvum fac.
Illegitimum non Carborundum;
Domine salvum fac.
Gaudeamus igitur!
Veritas non sequitur?
Illegitimum non carborundum--ipso facto!

Seriously. That's actually the first verse. But maybe we should sing one of the English verses:

Ten thousand men of Harvard want vict'ry today,
For they know that o'er old Eli
Fair Harvard holds sway.
So then we'll conquer old Eli's men,
And when the game ends, we'll sing again:
Ten thousand men of Harvard gained vict'ry today!

If you'd rather hear the music, listen here.

At any rate, Jeremy Lin should be rewarded. May I suggest a coveted audience with former Harvard men's basketball coach (and Lamont University Professor) Amartya Sen?

Cornell is great. Also poor.

A great piece this week from Michael Roth at the HuffPo on the benefits of a liberal arts education. As Roth notes, a liberal arts education (like the one you could receive at, say, Cornell) is excellent preparation for changing the world:

A quick look at several members of President-elect Obama's leadership team can stand as an example of how those with a liberal arts education are shaping the future of our society.

Of course, a liberal arts education ain't what it used to be, as the financial crisis hits even the most sterling Ivy League institutions. Even super-studly Harvard University (pictured at right) is in trouble. According to Fosco's old patron, the Harvard Crimson, Harvard's gargantuan endowment lost 22 percent this year (which translates to 8 billion dollars). Sadly, this means major budget cuts and austerity measures to be enacted by Harvard President Peri Gilpin Drew Gilpin Faust (who, by all accounts, does not deserve such an unpleasant and thankless duty). As the Crimson reports:

The Faculty of Arts and Sciences placed a freeze on staff hiring last week, following a cautionary letter from Faust a month earlier that warned of cutbacks ahead.

Sadly, this probably means that Harvard will have to lay off former president and Chinese water heater tycoon "Bell Johnson."

Of course, even in this time of crisis, the Crimson cannot resist a subtle dig at other, lesser universities. As the article notes,

The decline, which amounts to more than $8 billion, is larger than the endowments of all but four other universities—Yale, Princeton, Stanford, and MIT.

That's right, Cornell: Harvard lost more money this year than your university is worth. Pwned!

How to educate a generation on $10 a day

Well, it looks like Harvard is almost broke. Apparently, the once mighty endowment is down 25-30%! Even worse, the university

is also reportedly trying to dump 1/3 of its private equity holdings to raise cash, which would be a seriously distressed move.

If these rumors are true, we should expect to see:

1. A giant "Harvard Yard SALE!"
   Everything must go!
   
   
2. A slowdown in construction of Harvard's new Allston Campus (as seen below).
   
   
3. More pesky fundraising letters to Harvard alums. Sorry, alma mater, I gave all my extra money to fight Prop 8.

Alas, it is not just the storied Ivy League that is in trouble. Here at UCSC, we were informed by email today that the UCSC Provost has

advised principal officers to implement a $4.5 million budget reduction for our campus.

According to the same email:

In the meantime, I've directed principal officers to implement all reasonable cost-saving measures and to engage their staffs in identifying creative ways to invest limited resources as efficiently as possible. I invite you to share with them your thoughts and questions, as well as your own suggestions for belt-tightening. We will thoughtfully consider every reasonable suggestion.

In keeping with the spirit of "reasonable suggestion[s]" for "invest[ing] limited resources," we received a message four hours later from UC President Mark G. Yudof. President Yudof invites us to join him for a discussion of "the value of public education." Oh, but here's the good part:

Why, that's just crazy enough to work!

The Foscovian Update: Still Here, Still Queer.

It's been over a week since Fosco last blogged (did anyone win the betting pool?). But that doesn't mean that Fosco hasn't been thinking, Dear Reader. He's been thinking up a mess o' somethin'! And what thoughts have been rattling around in his gigantic gourdic cranium?

• Just like my third grade teacher always said, California seems to be the likely location of the coming apocalypse (although I think she meant it more eschatologically--and no, that doesn't mean what you think it means). And while all those insatiable wildfires were nowhere near Fosco's beloved Bay Area last week, the local media didn't lose an opportunity to remind us Northern(ish) CA residents that our doom is imminent, whether from a nearly overdue "tectonic time bomb" or our own giant flaming holocaust. The End is near! Whee! Even so, I'd rather die in a flaming crack in the earth than from getting lung cancer in a casino boat while losing my social security check in the slots.
  
  But seriously, if you want to read about the SoCal fire experience, check out my friend Ted's blog.
  
  
• Hey, did you hear that Dumbledore is gay? Fosco had known this for years, ever since he was fellated by the wizard in a Minneapolis airport mensroom. Even so, Fosco isn't quite sure what to feel about this whole story. To some extent, he'd rather let his friend Ted do the blog work for him (thanks again, Ted. At this rate, Fosco Lives! will eventually just be one big hyperlink to your blog). Fosco would like to raise two questions about the story that seem worth considering:
  
  1. Does a gay Dumbledore make up for Rowling's repulsively heteronormative epilogue to the seventh book ("Seventeen Years Later..."), in which everyone is happily married (heterosexually) with kids?
     
  2. What is the status of an extra-textual author's statement about a character? Could Dr. Seuss (from beyond the grave) tell us that the Lorax is gay? Would we have to believe that?
  These are the problems that a gay Dumbledore raises for me.
  
  
• Fosco was planning to spend most of this month in a blissful Jimmy Eat World coma. See, they're one of Fosco's favorite bands and the last three albums have been amazing. The previous release, Futures, obsessed me for several months. Plus, the first single ("Big Casino") from the new disc was the soundtrack to Fosco's September (because it rawks). But here's the thing: the new disc is TERRIBLE. With the exception of "Big Casino," there is no song on the disc that this Jimmy Eat World diehard fan ever wants to hear again. Fosco is sad.
  
  So what has filled the musical void in Fosco's month? Things have been a bit weird, to tell you the truth:
  
  • Radiohead's In Rainbows, which upon first listen sounded inaccessible and boring, but really gains by repetition. And I'm not just saying that because I paid £5 for it. Good tracks: "Reckoner," "All I Need," and "Weird Fishes/Arpeggi."
    
  • a short but excellent Bach chorale: "Heilig, heilig" (BWV 325). Bach is usually too boring for me, but I like the calm this month.
    
  • a trance track: Agnelli and Nelson's "Wear that Dress." Trance is great for driving and paper-writing. Really!
    
  • "Please Please Please Let Me Get What I Want," The Smiths. I could revive a different Smiths song every month and be happy. Well, actually, sad. I wear black because that's how I feel inside.
    
  • Bruce Springsteen, Magic. I've mentioned this one before.
    
  • an amazing work by my blogpal John Mackey called "Kingfishers Catch Fire." It is seriously one of the most amazing compositions I've heard this year. The CD comes from Japan, so it might be easier to hear it streaming on his website (under "Works" on the main page). The first movement is gorgeous, but the second movement knocks it out of the park. I've been listening to it a lot in my car.
  
  
  
• Has anyone else noticed that the New Yorker section "The Critics" has become the Harvard Faculty Lounge? I suspect that it's the influence of longtime New Yorker contributor (and Harvard English prof) Luke Menand. In addition to reviews by Menand, Fosco has recently run across reviews by Professor of History Jill Lepore, Laurence A. Tisch Professor of History Niall Ferguson, and the (oddly-titled) Professor of the Practice of Literary Criticism James Woods James Wood. Their ambition has lead them beyond traditional academic publishing and I, for one, welcome our new Harvard overlords.

Two Truths and Lie: Haunted by Mormons.

Remember this feature? Where I offer three titbits from the news? One of which (in some small, small way) has to do with lying? Here we go...

• Those two giants of social science research, the Associated Press and MTV, released the results of a major study today on "young people and happiness." By young people, they mean 13-24 yr olds.
  
  Here's something interesting and no entirely surprising:
  

  Young people who are non-Hispanic whites are happier than blacks and Hispanics by a wide margin: 72 percent of whites say they are happy with life in general, compared with just 56 percent of blacks and 51 percent of Hispanics.

  Well, as long as the white kids are happy...
  
  Even better news:
  

  In looking to the future, 70 percent say they want to be rich - and nearly half think it's at least somewhat likely they will be someday.

  I remember thinking that when I was a teen. I wish some cynical blogger had burst my optimism back then.
  
  Fosco finds the following result most telling:
  

  And contrary to popular views of technology as a source of stress, many young people would be more stressed out without technology, with nearly half saying they never turn off their cell phones - even when they're trying to chill out.

  As someone who almost never turns his cell phone ON, Fosco now understands why he hates young people so much.
  
  
• You may remember the horrible suicide last summer of UCSC's Chancellor Denice Denton. There were several unpleasant aspects to this story, including some possible relationship issues between Denton and her partner Gretchen Kalonji (as well as the possibility that idiot student protesters may have contributed to Denton's depression).
  
  The story got sadder this weekend, with the Kalonji is suing Denton's estate because she received nothing in the will nor from Denton's life insurance policy.
  
  Now Fosco has no idea what to make of this case. Clearly there is a cautionary lesson here: if you're in a long-term relationship, you should change your will to include your partner.
  
  But this is what is bothering Fosco:
  

  UC officials declined Friday to comment on what Denton's benefits were and how they were dispersed, but according to [a Denton family attorney], Denton didn't leave the insurance money to anyone and the policy has been split between Mabee and Denton's estranged father in accordance with UC protocol.

  Again, it is clear that Denice Denton probably should have named a beneficiary of her life insurance policy. However, why wouldn't the UC system pay that life insurance to Denton's life partner of nine years? If Denton and Kalonji were legally married (you know--that thing that straight people can do?), wouldn't Denton's life insurance money go to Kalonji without trouble?
  
  Gay people just keep getting hosed.
  
  
• The 2008 US News College Rankings are out! Princeton continues its dominance; Fosco's alma mater Harvard is still pretty good.
  
  But what of UC Santa Cruz? Apparently, UCSC is about where it usually sits (#79), but now it is TIED for #79 with... MORMONS. That's right, Bringem Young University is tied with ultraliberal UCSC.
  
  You know how Fosco feels about Mormons, so you can appreciate the irony here. I've been thinking of ways to resolve this problem: can UCSC challenge BYU to a tiebreaker?
  
  Suggested tiebreakers that UCSC would win:
  
  • bong painting contest
    
  • Diet Coke chugging
    
  • blow-job-a-thon
    
  • evolutionary biology quiz
    
  • surfing
    
  • voting for change
  
  That's my school! Go Slugs!

An Open Letter to the Harvard Corporation

To Members of the Selection Committee for the New Harvard President:

I am beginning to develop the suspicion that the Harvard Presidency is a lot like the job of Head Football Coach at the University of Notre Dame: it's one of those jobs that seems desirable to the general public, but no one well-qualified for it actually wants it. Who really wants to try to wrangle with such a notoriously arrogant and powerful faculty?

But if that isn't the case, allow me to throw my full support behind Amy Gutmann. Her qualifications are exceptional:

• current president of Penn, responsible for their recent return to academic relevance.
  
• brilliant political theorist at Princeton.
  
• Harvard College alumna, with a Harvard PhD.

But the most important reason for my support of Dr. Gutmann is that she is smokingly hot. In the above picture, you can see her (bottom) in relation to another potential Harvard Presidential candidate, Ruth Simmons of Brown (top). This excellent comparison (thoughtfully provided by the NYTimes) demonstrates that, while Dr Simmons may be an excellent leader and administrator, she cannot compete with the sheer wattage of the delectable Dr. Gutmann. I mean, look at her. Damn.

With the pulchritudinous Dr. Gutmann at the helm, think of what Harvard could do! It would not be an exaggeration to say that Dr. Gutmann would be the most attractive Harvard President since the coy and dainty Increase Mather--and remember all of the amazing things that she did!

If it will assist in the decision-making process, allow me to commit to a donation in the amount of $10 million to Harvard University contingent on the appointment of Luscious Amy as President.

Sincerely,
[Redacted], Harvard Class of [redacted]

P.S.: Can you give Amy my email address? I want to ask her how she gets her skin so radiant.

Weekend Update: A Little Bit of Outrage

Two news stories today that intrigued Fosco:

1. The NYTimes reports on the progress of the search for a new Harvard president. As an alumnus of the "Big H," Fosco is naturally interested in this topic (and wouldn't mind seeing the job offered to Al Gore). However, the Times took at different angle. Here's the lede:

Could Harvard be preparing to select a woman as its new president? A scientist? A female scientist?

Is it me, or are those increasingly incredulous question marks a bit offensive? I'm a little surprised the headline isn't something like "Harvard Seeks Scientifickal Lady: Feminine Charms Still Required."

One possible candidate for the position? Non-scientifickal political theorist Amy Guttman, president of Penn. That's her in the picture to the right during her 2006 Halloween party. She's posing with a Palestinian suicide bomber (costume). She's dressed as Glinda the Good Witch. As the Times article points out, this photograph may be enough to prevent her ascent to the Harvard presidency.


2. This story, from the Santa Cruz Sentinel made Fosco really mad at first. But then it started to make a little sense. Now Fosco is a bit ambivalent about the whole thing.

It seems that an anonymous donor has been paying for one-way bus tickets out-of-town for the Santa Cruz homeless. The program is being administered by the local Homeless Services Center. This sounds absolutely evil, right?

Well, except that, the idea sort of makes sense. According to the article:

the idea of helping homeless people move is gaining traction among people who think it makes little sense to provide meals and temporary shelter in a city where even the working poor have a hard time finding housing.

It is expensive to live here. And the program is totally voluntary, as the tickets are only offered to homeless people who want to leave Santa Cruz and start over someplace else.

Apparently, some other communities have been much less conscientious about the whole thing. According to the article, this is different from the "practice of dumping homeless people into other jurisdictions, as in 2004, when officials in San Benito County gave their homeless one-way bus tickets to Santa Cruz."

Now that's evil. Go to hell, San Benito County.

Two Truths and a Lie (Part II)

Let's talk about a new series of posts. Every so often, I will collect three tidbits of info that don't really deserve their own entry and then squish them together... Oh, and one of them will have something to do with lying. I did this once and I like how it works. So let's go, let's go, L-E-T-S-G-O!

• Stephen Colbert has issued the call to arms:
  

  We’re at war here, singles. Pick a side. You can be married or you can be gay.

  I know I've chosen my side, although I might prefer to have the singles team up with the gays to fight the marrieds... But oh well.
  
  At any rate, Stephen is going to be pissed about this: according to results released by the Census Bureau, married people in the US are now outnumbered by singles!
  
  The most interesting things about these data?
  

  Among counties, the highest proportion of unmarried opposite-sex partners was in Mendocino, Calif., where they made up nearly 11 percent of all households.
  
  The highest share of male couples was in San Francisco, where, according to the census, they accounted for nearly 2 percent of all households. Hampshire County, Mass., home to Northampton, had the highest proportion of female couples, at 1.7 percent.

  While it is no surprise to find that San Francisco is the place to live when you're gaymale and coupled, and while it is no surprise (to anyone who, like Fosco, has visited) that Northampton, MA is Lesbian Central, what is the deal with Mendocino County?
  
  Maybe I should think about moving to that swinger's paradise... I hear that Ukiah (the largest community in Mendocino County) has got a hella crazy club scene...
  
  
• Have you heard of this tool named Aleksey Vayner? It seems he's been a viral internet celeb lately, but not in a good way.
  
  
  
  He's a Yale student (it figures...) and it seems that he prepared this totally narcissistic and bizarre video resume (entitled "Impossible Is Nothing") for some ibanking job. According to the NYTimes,
  

  Mr. Vayner’s seven-minute clip, entitled “Impossible is nothing,” presents images of him bench-pressing what a caption suggests is 495 pounds and firing off what is purported to be a 140-mile-an-hour tennis serve.
  
  The tone of the video seems too serious to be parody, yet too over-the-top to be credible.

  As for the footage of him doing the ski tricks? Well, that's only "probably" him. Oh yeah, he also wrote a book. It's self-published and entitled "Women’s Silent Tears: A Unique Gendered Perspective on the Holocaust." And did I mention that it's largely plagiarized? Yesss... I love this story. Read the rest of it here.
  
  
• Fosco's self-promoting college roommate (God bless him), David Lat, is profiled in this article in the Legal Times.
  
  It's a good profile--quite fawning--and it doesn't dwell too much on David's bizarre and unpleasant conservatism. Did you know that David actually requires that his clothes be tailored by seven-year-old Cambodian orphans? It's true. If you want the real dirt on David Lat, now you know where to go...
  
  Oh, and does Fosco get mentioned in the profile? Not exactly, unless you know that Fosco is actually the nom-de-guerre plume of Jeffrey Toobin. But shhhh...
  

Vows

I don't normally read the "Weddings and Celebrations" section of the Sunday New York Times because, well, I don't like to read about happy people and when those happy people are also fabulously wealthy or quite successful... Well, let's just say that Fosco needs some extra happy pills to make it through the rest of the day.

But, despite the usual envy, I also was moved by today's article about the anniversary of Adam Berger and Stephen Frank.

One of the reasons for my emotion is that I was slightly acquainted with Steve Frank in college (although he knew my roommate much better). And, strangely enough, the fact that he came out after college never made it back to my ears in the last ten years (maybe because he wasn't actually in my class--he was a year or two ahead). As I recall, he was actually a bit conservative (although maybe only economically).

The years since college have been an especially interesting time for me, as I have watched classmate after classmate (including myself) come out as gay. In college, I lived with five other guys and all of us were supposedly straight. Now, at last count, three of us are out and, even though the remaining ones are married or seriously dating women, I'm not going to rule out another surprise (Dr. H****?)

I can't speak for Steve Frank (after all, things seem to have turned out well for him) or for my college roommates, but I still, after ten years, am envious of my peers who were out in college. I think one of the reasons for this envy is that (at least for me) high school and college were the periods of my life in which I had the closest relationships to other men. The college and high school friendships I had with men were really intense and very powerful. But, because I was closeted (and so were so many of my friends), we never got the chance to explore whether that intense friendship could admit/recognize an erotic element. I rarely develop friendships that intense anymore (after all, people in their late 20s/early 30s are busy and tend to be more isolated), and I doubt that any romantic relationship that I have in the future will develop out of a pre-existing friendship.

I think I could have had amazing romantic relationships with several of my male friends from the past, but (at this point) it's maybe kinda too late (although, to some extent, this blog is an extended love letter to one or two of them). The timing for Adam and Steve (*giggle*)seems to have been perfect and that makes me both happy and envious. Mazel tov to them!

Field Trip Week: San Francisco Treat, Part 2

[Read Part 1 here.]

After the spending spree at City Lights, Fosco and his personal assistant Geoffrey window-shopped their way through the Market St shopping area (why does the H&M at 150 Post St only have women's apparel? Women's clothes don't fit Fosco.)

Looking up, we were discomfited to see the spooky wraiths crowning the mansard roof of 580 California St. (see pic at right). Later research reveals that:

• the building was designed by Philip Johnson.
  
• the statues are "corporate goddesses" and were designed by Muriel Castanis.
  
• they are twelve feet high and HAVE NO FACES (note the hint of rising panic in Fosco's voice).
  

With due respect to Ms. Castanis, Fosco prefers to disregard the artistic intention (corporate goddesses? whatever.) in favor of a much more sinister reading of these figures. Clearly these figures mean harm (and are eerily reminiscent of Peter Jackson's Ringwraiths in his LotR trilogy).

Fosco has but one request for the 580 California wraiths: "Please don't kill me."

Fosco and Geoffrey decided that the best place to hide from the wraiths was inside the SFMOMA. Fosco will have a separate entry on this visit (including a full review of the Matthew Barney film and installation in an upcoming post).

After the museum, we decided to play tourist for a bit, with a visit to the sea lions at Pier 39. Despite the frigid grey weather, the sea lions were out in force and they were spunky.

I must admit that I'm quite fascinated by sea lions. I like that they sleep in big piles of bodies. I also think it is cute when they scratch themselves with their hindflippers--like they had fingers or something. And did you know that they are evolutionarily related to bears? And who doesn't like bears?

And then something weird happened at Pier 39: I walked right past my freshman-year roommate Chuck Kapelke, who was pushing a stroller. I hadn't seen Chuck in almost ten years, but I recognized him easily (as he did me). We hadn't been in touch, but it turns out that he lives in the Bay Area and has an adorable daughter named Dahlia. He's a freelance writer, and it seems he has co-written a book, which is exciting. Even more exciting, according to the amazon.com text stats, is that his book is written at a much more advanced level than is Rick Moody's Garden State (for example). Awesome work, Chuck!

Watching all those sea lions made me hungry, so it was time to head to Chinatown for dinner at the famous dive, House of Nanking. Yes, there are no frills and no atmosphere (and you can be in-and-out in under 30 minutes), but it is still worth a visit. Surprisingly, the executive chef, Peter Fang, (dressed casually in a rugby shirt) was actually taking the orders himself when we were there. Maybe he needed a break from the kitchen. He was not exactly "friendly"--in fact, he arched an eyebrow at one of the dinner selections we made, for reasons which we don't understand (nor probably ever will).

The food was exceptional:

• Steamed potstickers in a red peanut sauce.
  
• Nanking scallops were crispy on the outside and smooth on the inside, each one served on a bed of lemon and eggplant.
  
• Stuffed mushrooms (listed in the vegetable section of the menu, but don't be fooled): filled with ground beef and pan-fried, then covered with a brown sauce. These were addictive--I will order them every time I return.
  

As we were finishing, I looked toward the cash register and spotted football star Warren Sapp waiting impatiently for a takeout order. In spite of my better judgment, I like Sapp a lot--I think he gives an extremely entertaining interview. He's actually not as big as I would have thought (I didn't realize he is only 6'2" and 300). He was dressed in blue/white Nike Jordan shorts and sweatshirt, large white leather soccer sandals, and some nice bling (big gold watch, chain, bracelet). He was chewing on a toothpick and seemed a bit peeved that he had to stand in front of the whole restaurant for 10 minutes while he waited for his food. He kept checking his cell and his pager. I'm pretty sure that I'm the only person eating there that recognized him (this wasn't exactly a sports-loving crowd).

And no, I didn't say anything to him--I just smiled, nodded and went back to my mushrooms. I would love for him to be gay, though. Sigh.

All-in-all, a full day in San Francisco, no? On the drive back, it became apparent that the South Bay had enjoyed a beautifully sunny day. As we drove, it was quite cool to watch the fog return to slide down the Eastern slopes of the mountains:

The fog here is certainly like no weather I've encountered before. It's actually a bit like that "nothing" from The Neverending Story. Great, now I'm hearing Limahl in my head. See you in hell, Limahl!

We're here, we're queer, and we're looking for Matt LeBlanc

When Fosco was choosing a college in the early 1990s, how was he to know which university would serve as the best incubator of his latent queerness? All he had to rely on were publications like the Spartacus Guide (pictured left), which strictly speaking, aren't even college guides at all (despite the potentially-misleading cover). Fosco feels for you, his deceived queer brethren, who embarked on a four-year course of study at Rim U, hoping to meet the handsome varsity athlete pictured on the cover of the 90/91 Spartacus Guide. Fosco can imagine your sense of betrayal when, a few years later, you finally find the missing cover boy on "Must See TV" and discover that he is probably not (?) gay.

But now, college-bound queers need not suffer for lack of information, thanks to the The Advocate College Guide for LGBT Students.

As Fosco is A) well past college age, B) no longer willing to date high school students (so stop calling, Casey), and C) on a budget, he has no intention of actually purchasing a copy of this guide. However, he is quite curious about its contents, especially concerning his current academic affiliation, his various previous academic pit stops, and his alma mater...

For understandable reasons, the promotional material for the guide is very tight-lipped about the rankings, although they do list the Top 20 (unranked in alphabetical order). Gratifyingly, UCSC is one of three UC schools to make the top 20. There are a few surprises, I would suggest: Duke? Princeton? Clearly the East Coast preppy establishment has changed a bit in the last decade or so (or has it?). I mean sure, Duke used to have an exceptional Queer Theory contingent, but (last time I checked) the school is located somewhere in North Carolina (the exact location is unavailable at press time).

Luckily, local broadsheet Metro Santa Cruz has revealed some of the rankings within the Top 20, and this is where things get interesting. Ranked higher than UC Santa Cruz is... El Ohio State University. WTF?

Now, Fosco is willing to do a little (a very little) research and he has discovered that the campus resources for LGBT students at OSU do appear to be excellent. There is also the fact that OSU boasts the best-funded scholarship program for LGBT students in the nation. Sounds good... maybe even better than UCSC, but what about when you want to leave campus?

When you're a young queer, would you really want to go to a college (even a very gay-friendly college) in a place with

• this organization?
  
• this lizard?
  
• or this law?
  

Case closed.

And what of Fosco's Crimsonish alma mater? According to Metro, the Big H

didn't make it into The Advocate's guide at all this time around, partially due to the absence of an anti-discrimination policy that applies to transgender students at the time the book went to press. Harvard has since changed its policy.

Well, that sounds about right.