From jmrobins @ condor.sccs.swarthmore.edu Thu Apr 24 01:39:17 1997 Date: Sun, 23 Feb 1997 23:32:52 -0500 (EST) From: Snibor Eoj To: "_swat.org.swil" <_swat.org.swil @ swarthmore.edu> Subject: A long time ago, in a SWILnews #2 far, far away... Yes, we apologize. We're doing a Star Wars SWIL news. It's tacky. It's overdone. It's cliche'd. But it IS topical. And besides, we're late. We promise to do better next time. Honest. We mean it. We never lie, we're presidents. Episode XLII: Attack of the Death Meteorite In the years following the victory of the rebellion, the empire struggled to recuperate and take back power in the galaxy. With their limited resources they were unable to build another Death Star, so instead they constructed a Death Planetoid. It got blown up by the rebels. Still, the empire perservered in the face of defeat and built a Death Moon. It got blown up by the rebels. Thinking that the third time's the charm, they constructed a Death Asteroid. That got lost in a nebula, crashed into larger asteroid, THEN got blown up by the rebels. But the fourth one, the Death Meteorite [insert inspiring music here -I] survived. Unfortunately, a Death Meteorite is not much of a threat to anything larger than a meteorite, so they had to take on a smaller challenge. The surviving imperial officers (both of them) met in secret to formulate a plan. They decided that the empire suffered most from a lack of intelligence. They needed a large, sentient mass and they needed it now. Meanwhile, back at Swarthmore College, it was Saturday, noon. The place was Sharples room four (I carry a badge. - I) (But I carry a spruce goose! - R). That large sentient mass known as SWIL was convening for its weekly meeting. When out in the hall there arose such a clatter, I sprang from my chair to see what was the matter -- an alien, green, was attacking the batter -- waffle, that is. (hatter, splatter, patter - R) They killed the alien. (End sub plot - R). Suddenly, there came another clatter inside Sharples room 4. (It turned out Sarah had caused another cup to fall. - I) A small metorite had crashed through the roof and landed in the circle of tables much to the astonishment of the SWILfolk (and the druids who were worshiping there - I). "That's no metorite!" cried Fred Sidewalk-Walker (Sidewalk-Walker?! - I) (Well, he doesn't walk the skies, he walks the sidewalks. - R)(It's the old park-in-driveway conundrum. And after all, why _is_ there an interstate in Hawaii -A) "That's a space station!" Not losing a beat, the imperials sucked activated their tractor beam. They captured the salt shaker leaving SWIL powerless (to mount a counter assault - I). (Moan, moan! Make her stop! - all those present in the room). Two flags appeared from the Death Meteorite and the Imperials signaled in semaphore "Surrender or you'll never salt your eggs again!" Everyone stared at the meteorite in confusion until Joel3PO started tapping something out in Morse code on the table. He then realizes that nobody knew Morse code either, and wrote on the board, "Wait! That's semaphore code. I'm fluent in over 6 million forms of communication, none of them verbal." What could SWIL possibly do? To never salt their eggs again was a fate worse than POG, but they couldn't surrender to this evil menace! They needed someone to deactivate the tractor beam. They had a volunteer. (In SWIL? A volunteer? -R) egolubi1 Kenobi said that she would enter the Death Meteorite, deactivate the tractor beam, and give us a fighting chance. A moment's applause occured, and then that moment was gone and a different one was happening. (Deep, huh? -R) egolubi1 took up her thoksaber, and headed directly into the Death Meteorite. Then, after hitting her head on it, she opened the door and headed into it again. "I wonder how long it'll take her," said some unimportant minor character. His/her/its question was soon answered when the salt shaker came flying out of the Death Meteorite. And there was much rejoicing. (Yay. -I)(slurp -A) Suddenly, a group of Rebels showed up in Room 4. Fred Sidewalk-walker tried to shoo them away, but they would have none of it. "This is my show!" he cried. "I wanna blow up this thing." Paying him no heed, the Rebels walked up to the Death Meteorite, and launched a miniature missile directly into its core. Moments later, the entire Death Meteorite exploded. "Great shot! That was 1 in 7!" cried the recurring unimportant character. Fred Sidewalk-walker was furious, and decided to vent his rage on the Rebels who had stolen his glory. As he chased them out of Sharples, the rest of the group went into... SWILbusiness: Submit to BEM. But you could've guessed that, right? The Valentine's Day Massacre isn't complete with out you. Do your country right! President Carter wants YOU to take part in the Massacre! (There happen to be a lot of things that President Carter wants us to take part in. Some of them involve deposing Russian Premiers. -A) Submit to BEM. Duh. We want to do the annual SPAM drop again. We need ideas. Current ideas are: Spam cannon Spam taste test (the REST of the college tastes!) Spam skeet shoot Spam attatched to balloons All other ideas should present themselves to the office of the SWIL presidents (orifice of the presidents? -A) or at SWIL meeting .MEB ot itmbuS This week's movie is Nausicaa. Next week is The Mouse That Roared. (Let's do the Time Warp again! -R) SWILcon T-shirt designs were presented. One had a large keg, the other had two guys drinking. Votes were taken. Many liked the keg for the program, many liked the two guys drinking for T-shirt, many liked keg for T-shirt. No decision was made. (How very SWIL.... -I) SWILcon Jedi question: Jedi is the first night. Can we get a theatre? No one volunteered to take care of this. SWILcon: Panels. Possibly wooden, maybe plastic if we can't afford real wood. SWILcon: Jeff Menges will speak on Graphics in the Computer Age. Otavia proved her sentience: The OED is cool. Sentience comes from sentire, meaning to feel; that which feels or is feeling Otavia fell at puckers and felt pain. She can also tell a fork from a spoon. A SWIL vote was taken, she is now deemed sentient. Unfortunately, DESPITE this, she read The Bridge of Tae. Ouch, ouch, ouch. Did we mention you should submit to BEM? Good. Just checking. Non-SWILbusiness: Empire will happen. B5 is on Wednesdays at 7:30. There will be a Prisonerathon the first weekend after break. Submit to BEM citizen. If you do not submit to BEM, you may be used as reactor sheilding. Are you happy? A Tendons List, (2/1/97): Achilles Paris Otavia "uncreative quote" Propper Alice "Posesser of the crazy cool boots" Unger Kira "social coordinater" Goetschius Tim "Fa la la la la" Handley [then he writes some musical notes, like your presidents could ACTUALLY type that in over email. I mean, seriously -- we can conquer small asian countries in a single bound, but there ARE limits to everything. -I.] Jeremy "Hot, blue, and righteous" Dilatush Josh Miller, a hanger-on Fred Bush, a coat hanger Larry "Never Volunteering Again" Miller David "Irrelevant" Phillips Andrea "Lots of Designs" Hall Anna "" Hess [Okay, REALLY folks, this is too much -- a picture of a TURTLE? C'mon..... we're NOT omnipotent. (We're not? Damn. I have a phone call I have to make. -R) We appreciate you thinking that, we really do, but it's becoming rather obnoxious... -I.] Chaos "what's wrong with you people?" golubitsky Megan "Be nice to me. I gave blood today." Hallam Megan "But you didn't give any to ME!" Powell Amy "I am NOT a live boat" Swift Joel "I am here -- momentarily" McNary Kendra "Oh, no, the GERMANS are mad at me" Eshleman jere7my "Boba Fett in Star Wars? Yee-ha!" tho?rpe ---Abort, Retry, Ignore