Darts and Laurels: Sept. 20
Those all-nighters are really starting to catch up to you. Your caffeine intake maxed out like a credit card on your fifth cup of Pumpkin Cream Cold Brew.
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Those all-nighters are really starting to catch up to you. Your caffeine intake maxed out like a credit card on your fifth cup of Pumpkin Cream Cold Brew.
Tuesday afternoon, approximately 200 protesters marched along UF’s Fraternity Row, the only place on campus without blue light emergency poles. These lights represent security and are designed to call law enforcement at the press of a button. The protest was organized by student leaders and the Gainesville chapter of the National Women’s Liberation Association. Since the protest was announced, the debate surrounding blue lights has been a point of controversy, finger pointing and a focal point of The Alligator’s news coverage for the past week.
This week, Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh was once again accused of sexual assault during his time at Yale University. The accusation comes from Deborah Ramirez, a former classmate of Kavanaugh’s, who claims the current justice exposed himself to her. While it stands as an accusation as of now, we need to take these cases seriously no matter our politics.
It’s been a long week. Actually, a long month. You decided to treat yourself (again), and hit the town with friends. After a long night of… never mind, it doesn’t matter, you flop face-first into bed and curl up in your plush comforter for some long deserved sleep. But, you don’t get to sleep in as planned.
By now, you’ve heard the big news. Gov. Ron DeSantis even made a trip to UF to make the announcement.
We are trying to take our medication and be OK, but we are now in a world without the Harajuku Barbie herself, Nicki Minaj. The self-proclaimed Female Weezy retired from the music industry Thursday when she tweeted that she wants to focus on raising a family.
You arrive to class 15 minutes early Thursday morning. You feel strong, confident and beautiful. When the professor calls for the assignments to be passed forward, you pull out your paper and take a moment to relish your excellent work. Even the staple in the corner is gleaming. You took advantage of the hurricane closings to read ahead in the material. During the lecture, you raise your hand multiple times to contribute, earning several good points from the professor. Today is just the start. The entire semester is going to be like this. It is finally your time to shi— BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP! You peel open your eyes. Ugh. Make it stop. You flop your hand around until it connects with your phone. Darn it. It was a dream. DARN IT. WHAT TIME IS IT?! You roll off the couch and scramble around trying to pull together clothes. There’s drool all over your cheek and chin. You trip over trash on the floor. You flip open your Mac and pull up the paper that you fully intended to write days ago but only started around dawn. You send it to the printer. Something smells and you’re pretty sure it’s you. You grab the pages and rush out the door. You finally get to class. Everyone has already handed in their assignments and you do your best to inconspicuously add yours to the pile. It’s a little crumpled and held together by a folded corner. You aren’t optimistic about your grade. Is it too late to drop the class? You sink into your seat and notice something written on the board. In big, dry erase block letters it reads
“Yes, Mom. I am prepared for the hurricane. Yes. Uh-huh.” You roll your eyes and shift your cell to the other ear.
There is a presidential feud taking place over the news and on social media. Surprisingly, President Donald Trump doesn’t appear to be in the middle of it. It started when Brazil’s President Jair Bolsonaro took offense at France’s President Emmanuel Macron’s suggestion to the G7 summit leaders that their countries band together to aid Brazil extinguish the Amazon fires. It escalated when one of Bolsonaro’s supporters posted a meme on Bolsonaro’s Facebook page with an unflattering comparison between the two leaders’ wives. Bolsonaro’s reply to the meme seemed to support the insult. Macron responded by expressing sympathy for the Brazilian people stuck with such a shameful president, and said his hope is that Bolsonaro will soon be replaced with a more dignified leader. Bolsonaro is now refusing the G7 countries’ offer of $20 million to aid fighting the Amazon fires until Macron apologizes.
Grief does funny things to you. Not the “ha ha” type of funny, but a “food doesn’t taste the same, and colors look different” type of funny. There are as many responses to grief as there are loved ones who have died. Some people throw themselves into their work, some throw themselves into their bed and some become obsessed with collecting Disney memorabilia. When Richard Kraft’s big brother David died, he responded in the latter way. Over two and a half decades, Kraft amassed a collection of more than 750 pieces of Disney history. He used to go to Disneyland with his brother and parents, and collecting the pieces reminded him of those happy moments. We all hold onto things that remind us of the loved ones we’ve lost, though such an extreme collection is rare. A less rare, but still unusual expression of remembrance is to have the ashes of a loved one turned into a synthetic diamond. Couples have even used such stones as their engagement rings or wedding bands.
The United States Department of Justice (DOJ) longs for a return to simpler, more ignorant times: when men were manly, women were womanly and you could tell what was between a person’s legs by whether they were wearing a skirt or trousers. Because in the olden days, that was incredibly important knowledge. You had to know what reproductive organ a person had so you knew how to treat them, how much to pay them, whether you were attracted to them, which bathroom they should use and whether or not to fire them.
Last semester, we sat in the back of the class with our heads down and our mouths sealed shut. When we spoke, we prefaced our remarks or questions with “I just…” or “Sorry, this might be dumb,” conveying to our listeners that what would follow was of little importance. We would not blame them for disregarding our words, ideas and opinions; but we knew the right answer, we had something to add to the discussion and we had questions that warranted responses. We minimized our presence, our impact and our power. We made our voices small and let our classmates fill up the space. Our classmates who sat in the front. Our classmates who always had their hands raised. Our classmates who punctuated their statements with periods, not question marks. We chose to keep our depths hidden rather than make ourselves vulnerable.
Move out day is here. The cardboard boxes clutter your room in a claustrophobic way. You start to see the appeal in minimalism as you cram the umpteenth box with the umpteenth useless piece of junk. The floors are bare. The walls lack personality. It is time to say goodbye to your favorite corner of the apartment where all the spiders hang out. You take one of the Comfort Color T-shirts that now serves you no use and cry into it. After five minutes of bawling your eyes out, you lift your head and look into the shirt. You don’t remember what function you got it from, but the tear stains spell something out...
Sunday night, a teenage gamer became a multi-millionaire and also a Fortnite World Cup champion. Sixteen-year-old Kyle “Bugha” Giersdorf beat 99 other players, and in doing so, became the game’s first solo world champion. He won $3 million. And although he didn’t ask, we have a few ideas about how he should spend it.
The last thing you want to do right now is go outside, but your dog needs a walk. You grab the leash, clip it to your furry friend’s collar and get ready for the heat and humidity to hit. It’s actually not too bad today, so you feel you might give your dog the walk she deserves. Two miles later, you return to your apartment feeling accomplished and worthy of calling yourself an above average pet owner. As you get to the pathetic, small grass area around your apartment, you can’t believe your eyes. Someone “forgot” to pick up after their dog. The worse part: it kind of spells something out….
The internet’s resident troll has struck again, this time in our very own Turlington Plaza. If you’re lucky, you’ve never heard of him. If you have, you probably wish you had not. Instagram user Supreme Patty posted a video on Saturday of him smoking a bong in front of Marston Library as a UPD patrol car rolls in the background. Although the video may have you believe the 20-year-old Daytona Beach, Florida, native was smoking weed, UF Public Safety tweeted “it was oregano...”
Your face reflects off the shiny wooden counter wet with spilled drink. “Is that really what I look like?,” you think to yourself. Somehow you’ve found yourself in a deserted bar. There’s some sort of “deal” going on that isn’t really a deal at all. The drink prices are barely any different, and the deal is canceled if you only want one drink because there's a card minimum. What is this, the 90’s? If you don’t leave now, you’ll spend more money you don’t have on subpar food and drink you don’t need. You leave a tip and sign your receipt. As you do the math, you see something doesn't add up. The price is too low. The bartender forgot to charge you for half of your order, then you see it on the bottom of the receipt…
Get your hiking shoes on and perfect your “Naruto run” because in another case of ‘the internet made me do it,’ it looks like we are raiding Area 51.
Swimming until your fingertips form mountain ridges, reading library books as the regularly scheduled rain pings at your window and napping with the smell of sunscreen lotion lingering on your cool sheets are just a few of the childhood summer mementos we hold close to our sunburnt hearts. Just because you have summer classes doesn’t mean you can’t tap into a youthful experience with exploration and adventure in a town most students only get to know in their adult life. Here are our favorite (somewhat) hidden gems and summer pastimes.
The time has come to leave this ghost town and return a week later when it’s renewed with young, innocent, naive and hopeful life. It's time to prepare yourself for Summer B. During this interlude you will use the time off to recenter your chakras, align your aura and detox all the negative energy you have toward the younger students who have not had their spirits crushed yet. You refuse to be the crotchety upperclassman who looks upon the younglings with jealousy and a mild tinge of second-hand embarrassment as they send you into a spiral of your own freshman flashbacks. You have taken up meditation in a bid to prepare for the second half of summer madness. You’re breathing in and out. Letting all your thoughts go. Then it pops into your mind…