Feeling a little silly, I wrote a letter to the campus newspaper this morning. Most likely, they are not going to print it. Anyway, here’s what I wrote:

We don’t miss much at the Penn State Monty Python Society, and so it’s come to our attention recently that the Daily Collegian might be running out of things to write. Let’s face it: there’s only so much you can say about whether or not students on campus are wearing winter coats. And at over 600 words, Laura Kruczynski probably said it all in her article last Friday. But that’s why we’re here to help. You see, we’re not just silliness and squirrel-fishing at the Monty Python Society, and we’ve recently made an important scientific discovery that we feel ought to be shared with the Daily Collegian and its readers. We have determined, after exhaustive debate (and more than a little name-calling), that the true nature of the universe is, in fact, big. How big, we could not say, but bigger than a breadbox seems likely. Have you ever seen a breadbox that could hold an entire universe? And if so, where do you keep your bread? We’ve only been in this astrophysics business for a couple of days now, and while we’re no Stephen Hawking, even we know you can’t just ignore important questions like that. We promise the Daily Collegian and its readers (coatless or otherwise) that we will continue to search for answers, and we will never rest unless we get sleepy. We owe you all that much.

We actually did vote on the nature of the universe last night. I was sort of proud my suggestion won. I knew that astro class would pay off!

The coat article, incidentally, can be found here. Journalism at its finest.

This is also shaping up to be an exceptionally boring week. However, this one will be significantly shorter, since Thursday is Thanksgiving and, therefore, a long weekend spent at home in New York. Which, the more I think about it, is both good and bad. As I told my sister, I like being home, but I’m starting to hate getting home. At best, it’s a five-hour trip of sheer boredom punctuated by the real fear of getting lost somewhere in New Jersey or Manhatten. At worst — and this weekend might be the worst — it’s also holiday traffic, bad weather, and unfamiliar roads in the dark. Right now, the plan (suggested by my father) is to leave Wednesday evening after work and drive three or four hours to the Poconos. Then I’ll stop at a motel and finish driving the next morning. Ideally, I would have taken Wednesday off from work, but that would have required asking for two days — we only get Thanksgiving — and that’s sometimes more trouble than it’s worth, even with all the vacation time I still have coming to me.

I don’t know. I’m just tired of driving back and forth to New York, that’s all. I’m going to be doing it again around Christmas in just over three weeks.