What stories they will tell
It was my privilege this semester to go with my Yiddish class to the National Yiddish Book Center in Amherst. Not a bad destination for my first Brandeis field-trip. Its hard to describe: Bookstore, lecture-hall, cinema, museum, library, bindery, and research center. And youll hear young people speaking Yiddish there;
you should go.
Stranger still is its location. My mind and heart expect anything Yiddish to be somewhere in orbit around New York or Eastern Europenot rural Amherst, Massachusetts. Yet there it sits on a nondescript rural plot: A modern, unpainted wood building with a peaked roof, vaguely resembling a European shtetl. Its appearance is understated, sincere, definitely quirky, confident in purpose. Hey, thats us!
Whats shakin in the wizarding world?
As a Harry Potter fan myself, Im familiar with the crazy psyched feeling that comes with the arrival of the newest book or, in this case, movie. But with the movies, its a slightly different kind of anticipation. If youre like me, youre anxious to get into that theater to see Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire and show all of your friends (or that random old dude sitting next to you) how much you know about Harry Potter by pointing out every single unimportant detail that was left out of the film. Every five minutes you want to tap (or actually do tap) your friend and say, Hey, in the book, that line was said by Harry, not Ron! And that person sitting next to you is most likely mapping out the quickest escape route, possibly one involving duct tape, seven thumbtacks, paint thinner, and a rubber chicken.
A little pride and my prejudice
It really says something about the state of my hometown that absolutely no one save me and two friends were in the theater to see the evening showing of Pride & Prejudice on its nationwide opening weekend. Ugh, not a movie about a book that isnt Harry Potter.
Gingerbread Lady doesnt crumble
Neil Simons The Gingerbread Lady played in the Shapiro Theater Nov. 17-20. The show was presented by the Hillel Theater Group and directed by Kenny Fuentes 08. Songs by Dean Martin and Louis ArmstrongElla Fitzgerald duets played before the play began and during the two intermissions.
These Queens arent Through the Woods Yet
No one knows exactly how Queens of the Stone Age truly managed to capture the mainstream music world and rise to the top of the heap of modern hard rock. Most modern mainstream rock tends to stray from complex and eccentrically composed rock behemoth sized songs, yet Queens, and their politicized-metal peers who comprise System of a Down, have managed to find their way into the hearts of music fans everywhere and have risen above the many pop-metal artists who arose out of the nu-metal explosion of the late 90s to lead society into their uniquely new world of rock. To celebrate their glory, Queens of the Stone Age have released their first live DVD (and CD), a collection of live performances centered around two performances in London which were filmed this past summer, entitled Over the Years and Through the Woods.
Brandeis News in Brief
Maggie Balch, Director of Residence Life, has been selected as Brandeis new Assistant Dean of Student Life. The announcement was made Thursday in an email to the community authored by Dean of Student Life Rick Sawyer.
The History of SAF Funding
Over the summer students saw the Student Activity Fee (SAF) of $157.50 broken up into two different line-items on their tuition bills one for Student Events totaling $35 and one for everything else of $122.50 funded by the SAF. This change created concerns from current and past Union Officers that the administration was trying to control how students spend the SAF. Some students also wondered if the SAF was meant to be independently controlled by the student body without any administrative oversight.
In a multi-part series The Hoot will detail the ancient history of the SAF, more recent history, current reform efforts and finally student autonomy over the SAF.
Fair Trade passes
A majority of students voted last week in favor of a Student Union referendum that presses for a campus-wide conversion to Fair Trade Coffee.
Marder wins award
Professor Eve Marder (BIOL) has been awarded the Ralph W. Gerard Prize in Neuroscience for outstanding work in the field of neuroscience.
Fencing Notebook
On November 19th, the Brandeis Mens and Womens fencing teams traveled to Brown University to participate in the Northeast Conference Meet, and both sides were able to put on quite a show. The Mens team came away with four victories, topping UMass, Tufts, Boston University, and the University of New Hampshire. The Women were able to best those four teams plus Wellesley and Smith, to emerge with six wins. Neither side suffered a loss.
NFL Week 12 Recap
The Colts just won their eleventh straight game, making them only the eleventh team to go 11-0 in NFL history. They were fortunate to defeat the Bengals and Steelers, both of whom had seven wins. However Peyton Manning and Edgerrin James managed to get the Colts 26 points against the Steelers, while the impressive defense held young Ben Roethlisberger to under 150 yards, and just one touchdown score on Monday night.
This week in sports
Baseball
Josh Beckett, Mike Lowell, and Guillermo Mota were traded to the Boston Red Sox from Florida for Hanley Ramirez and three other prospects.
MBasketball survives Babson, heads to Tufts with 3-1 record
It was an improvement over the mysterious 79-70 loss to Suffolk before Thanksgiving, when the Judges led in seemingly every stat category except the most important, the final score.
MBasketball Notebook
In the championship game of the tip-off tournament, the inevitable happened: The Judges suspect shot selection and free throw-shooting caught up with them.
Swim Notebook
Two weeks ago, the Brandeis Mens and Womens Varsity Swimming Teams traveled to the University of Rochester in New York. Both the Brandeis Men and the Brandeis Women failed to win their respective meets.
The Brandeis Womens team lost by a score of 160 to 138. Brandeis took an early lead in the first event, the 200-Yard Medley Relay, with a 1st place finish. But two events later, in the 200-Yard Freestyle, Rochester took the lead and kept it for the remainder of the meet, despite Sarah Evans 06 finishing 2nd. Rochester increased its lead in the 100-Yard Backstroke when they finished 1st, 2nd, and 3rd.
Events 5, 7, and 9 for the Brandeis Womens team saw three incredibly close finishes. Britt Cindric 08 won the 100-Yard Breaststroke by about 3/10 of a second. Charlotte Rhea 08 lost the 50-Yard Freestyle by less than a tenth of a second. Evans finished 2nd in a 100-Yard Freestyle race that saw less than a seconds difference between 1st and 3rd place.
WBasketball Rules Opener
After the tip-off tournament, the Brandeis Judges lost their number 8 preseason ranking in the d3hoops.com poll They became number 7 and, after their game against Wellesley, they became number 4.
#4 WBasketball starts season off 4-0
I promise never to call Caitlin Malcolm 07 Malkin like I did with the season preview two weeks ago. Given her play recently, I doubt anyone else would make that mistake as her dominant play, which included a double-double (13 points, 12 rebounds) in little over 15 minutes, helped lead Brandeis to their 83-39 blow-out over the previously undefeated Wheaton Lyons.
