Peace Work
These aren’t easy times for peace-loving people. We’re approaching the one-year anniversary of the terrorist attacks on our soil. The U.S. military is rebounding from the massive assaults it made on Al Qaeda strongholds in Afghanistan. And President Bush is readying the nation for what appears to be round two of the Bush clan’s grudge…
Lars Murdock and Oliver Oates, co-owners of Ahli Baba
As students return to the University of Vermont, lugging around all those weighty textbooks has got to result in some ravenous appetites. That’s what Lars Murdock and Oliver Oates are counting on, at any rate. They’re the entrepreneurs behind Ahli Baba’s Kabob Shop, a retrofitted white van that parks daily on University Place in front…
Reel Ville
My slasher-movie moment, on the first day of the Montréal World Film Festival, took place when the hotel elevator stopped on the fourth floor en route to the lobby. I stepped in and discovered that the only other occupant was Brian DePalma. This is the man who made Dressed to Kill, mind you. Remember what…
Learning Curves: Local students fess up about their summer internships
Chris Kirkpatrick got a whipped-cream pie in the face. Sayler Bardsley had to dress in a horse costume. Paul Zannelli reveled in being board —that’s snowboard — for three months. All three were among legions of local college students who opted for internships rather than vacations this summer. Frolicking on a beach would have been…
Nosh Around the Clock: A student guide to eating after hours
College isn’t just about lectures and libraries. The most memorable lessons of these crucial years are likely to be those learned far from the classroom. Sitting up late with one’s buds, huddled over the books, or whatever, expands a student’s mind and also produces… the munchies. Finding food while the sun shines is usually a…
An Officer and a Gentleman: Norwich prof Michel Kabay takes on computer security
Major Michel Kabay, a professor at Norwich University in Northfield, is just the sort of person you’d expect to find in a military uniform. He’s meticulous in speech and conservative in dress, and his socks and shoes are all the same color: black. He says he’s never worn his hair long or owned a lick…
Staying the Course? Bashing Bush at the back of the class
It has long been our tradition at Seven Days, toward the end of summer, to pore over college catalogs and select the courses we’d take if we only had the time… and tuition. What we did take were liberties with the actual definitions of the course titles, and what fractious fun it was! But these…
The Om Team: Burlington High School footballers add yoga to the game plan
It’s unlikely the god Shiva was pondering pigskin when he “invented” yoga 5000 years ago. Historically, Eastern enlightenment and American football haven’t exactly shared the same bench. But the postures spelled out in the Upanishads are wholly compatible with athletics. So compatible, in fact, that the football team at Burlington High School is supplementing its…
Plagiarism 101: How schools are dealing with a rising cheat wave
Cheaters come in many forms: The tough-cookie, future chairwoman-of-the-board material, who raised her chin and kept eye contact when I confronted her about the paper she’d knit together from three essays on the Web. The shell-shocked freshman who complained, “I only copied from the book ’cause I thought you’d be a harder grader.” The one…
Sextracurricular Activities: A blow-by-blow report on campus promiscuity
College is the best four years of your life, they say. And for good reason: College is fornication central. Take hordes of horny, inexperienced kids, thrust them onto some campus far removed from their parents, strip away all responsibility, and what’s going to go down? Hordes of horny, inexperienced freshmen — on each other. College…
Governor Jim Douglas?
The times are indeed a-changin’ and, so far in the 21st century, no one can make a good case as yet that they’re changing for the better. Take the new trend in American politics in which the second-highest vote-getter on Election Day ends up the winner. George W. Bush pulled that one off in grand…
Reich and Wrong
I was surprised and moved by the enthusiastic response to my last column about the Reichstag fire, Hitler’s finances and the role of big business in keeping the Third Reich afloat for 12 years. It’s not often that I get stopped in a supermarket and thanked for something I’ve written. Normally, when people see me…
