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So I had a great time at the Haverford reunion last weekend, even if I haven't posted anything about it in a week. I met my goal of running the Nature Trail twice in a row, which I always wanted to do before graduation and never did, and, I suppose, seeing so many people for the first time in five years was fun too. I hoped we'd lie in the grass and have deep conversations until 4am about our lives and where we've been and where we're headed, but it seems like we just drank. I left before the second night, though, so maybe I should have been more patient.
I also talked to the new president, who despite not having collegiate administrative experience seems to be really on the ball, i.e. he acted interested in what I had to say. Seriously, I think he'll be fine, but what do I know.
Anyway, onto the pictures. I took these with my new digital camera, so I have no idea what the settings are or why everything looks so blurry. It's a relatively inexpensive camera (AND I bought it with Lexis points, seriously) so maybe it's just not good enough. Anyway, I have about a 30-pixel-wide column here, so I'm linking each photo to itself so you can see more than the left quintile of it. Comments below each shot.
OK, this is scene-setting. My alma mater has a pretty campus!
Another scene-setter. The class of 2002 stayed in Comfort. (For everyone who didn't go to Haverford or live around there, that is actually the name of a dorm, and it's named after a real person. The traditionally fratty house is named after a guy named Drinker. I'm not making this up.)
I know, this is just getting excessive. But that was the last shot of stuff that looks the same as it always did.
So I seemed not to have any problems graduating from a college with the world's largest rubber floor as its basketball court and a dank pit for its cardio room, but evidently modern students needed the campus center green to have a gigantic athletic center in the middle of it.
Yeah, so it's an understated building, except that it's enormous and has "HAVERFORD" spelled out in giant red letters on the side that light up at night. (That's actually true.) In retrospect, my biggest regret in taking my new camera's original 16mb memory card to the reunion is that I can't show the walkway between the Coop and the new athletic building. It's actually really nice: on the right there's a hill curving down into a flower garden, and on the left there's a series of outdoor tables (with umbrellas? I don't remember) that would have been really nice in the warmer months. These kids have no idea how good they have it.
Here's Exhibit A. Again, the cardio room when I went there was a dank pit. It seriously was the wrestling room, until they decided it was too grimy for wrestling, and they threw in (literally) like two treadmills, an elliptical, a rowing machine, a Nautilus and some free weights. We did just fine without "space" or "a nice view" or "natural light." When I first saw this place I seriously almost went in and started screaming at the kids in there. A little abject terror would be good for the little SOBs. I'll move on.
OK, so on to the Coop, which has been completely redone. I apologize for the bars; it was closed when the alumni showed up so it was hard to get a good shot. Again, what kind of place is the Coop if they sell more than grilled cheese sandwiches and fries? Also, I forgot to check, but does this look like they took out Skeeters or what? Who's with me on bringing cheese-filled breadsticks national? It'd be bigger than pizza!
This is more or less a shot from the same place, 180 degrees turned around. I counted only two HDTVs in the Coop, which I think is what we had in there too. (Actually, for the record, when we went it was almost impossible to find anywhere on campus where we could watch WWF. No, we didn't have cable in the dorms.) Also, note the restaurant-quality tables. Seriously, did they decide that prospective students and their families who go to the eatery directly next door to the admissions office just might want to see something that makes them think the facilities might be nice enough to justify $40,000/year? What would give them that impression?
OK, now I'm just bitter. Note the DC has a better drink selection too. The DC has the same ice cream dispenser that you can see in the Coop photo too; no answer on whether it works 35% of the time.
There's a kindergarten by the cricket house!!! I have no idea who goes there, if it's children of faculty or staff or just some new revenue trick. Hopefully the presence of children around is convincing the college students to start asking each other out and stop turning each other down, but that's probably too much to ask. Also, I can still remember the first time I went in that cricket house on the left; it was a week ago when I went to reunion and drank.
Cross-posted over at the Law Students for Edwards blog.
I'll quote the CNN Political Ticker in full:
Howard Dean says it is incumbent on Democrats to bring the war in Iraq to a close, or risk becoming the minority party again.“The American people hired Democrats last November to ensure we end this war, so let me be clear.” Dean made the remarks Saturday in the Democratic response the President’s weekly radio address. “We know if we don’t keep our promise, we may find ourself in the minority again. But we have to face the reality. The Republicans in Congress are standing with President Bush as he stubbornly wields his veto pen in the face of overwhelming opposition to this war from the American people.”
I honestly don't see what's so difficult about this. Principled disagreements about the war and its direction are fine, but as a strictly political matter, the war is wildly unpopular, Democrats rode a wave of anti-war sentiment into control of both houses of Congress, and Democratic capitulation on the war funding bill last month collapsed Congress' approval rating. If Democrats want to win in 2008, they need to stand strong against the war.
The worst part is I've heard a line of thought that believes that if Democrats succeed in ending the war now, they'll be painted as weak on national security. Now, leaving out the point that Republicans will attack Democrats on national security from now until the end of time no matter what happens, ending the war would be a fantastic move politically.
How about this for a tagline: "Republicans got us into this war. Democrats got us out." Works for me.