Person or persons unknown ("the Non-Existent Action Committee Promoting Green Space") spread turf — grass, the growing-in-the-ground kind — in Poets Pub in Carl Pollock Hall on Friday. Angelo Alaimo grabbed this picture before yesterday's cleanup and a return to your regularly scheduled indoor floor.

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Transcript seal stolen from Needles Hall

The University of Waterloo Police, aided by the Waterloo Regional Police forensic unit, are investigating the theft of two devices for stamping official papers: an embosser for the university's official seal, and a stamp used by a Commissioner of Oaths.

The theft occurred as the result of a break-in in the registrar's offices in Needles Hall last Thursday evening.

“The seal in question is not used on Waterloo's diplomas, so the integrity of the university's diplomas or degrees is not in question,” says a statement issued last night by UW's communications director, Martin Van Nierop. “The stolen seal is used for verifying the authenticity of documents or transcripts, and a Commissioner of Oaths stamp is used to make affidavits a sworn document.

“The university believes the impact will be slight, given steps that have been taken after the break-in including changes to procedures so officials can distinguish authentic Waterloo university documents issued since Thursday.

“Universities and colleges across Canada have been alerted and now have this information should they question the authenticity of a Waterloo document. Police across Canada and customs officials have also been advised.”

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Town hall questions, GO buses, and more

I was away for a couple of extra days around the long weekend, and returned (on a cold and frosty morning) to find lots of things I needed to catch up with. Among them: the “College Sustainability Report Card 2010”, issued by somebody called the Sustainable Endowments Institute and covering more than 300 American and Canadian institutions. Canadian campuses are “getting greener”, said some of the resulting publicity, although UW was near the bottom of the pack with a D-plus rating. “There’s just one problem,” the Waterloo Region Record reported. “The people at UW never filled out the questionnaire.” The communications director, Martin Van Nierop, again: “They sent us the form, and at the time there was nobody available to fill it in, so a decision was made not to participate.” He said UW gets dozens of similar surveys a year, and it would take “thousands of man-hours” to answer them all.” He added that it’s “frustrating” to see the poor grade, since Waterloo is “among Canada’s leaders in saving energy”.

One of the things I’m supposed to be doing this week is screening and sorting the questions that are sent in by staff and faculty members for the “town hall” meeting with UW’s president and vice-presidents next week. Questions should come to townhall@ uwaterloo.ca — only a modest number so far, if you don’t count the messages about can’t-miss investments and body part enlargement (hence the need for “screening”). The meeting is scheduled for Tuesday, from 3:00 to 4:30, in the Humanities Theatre. Agenda items, as listed in the invitation that was sent to all faculty and staff, include “Meet Feridun” (that’s Feridun Hamdullahpur, who started September 1 as vice-president, academic, and provost); an update on the Sixth Decade plan; and some words about UW’s “positioning and identity” project. “Recognizing the importance of this meeting,” said the invitation, “we encourage participation from all faculty and staff members.”

David Hammond of the UW department of health studies and gerontology was in the national headlines yesterday after a paper appeared in the Canadian Medical Association Journal concluding that a major Canadian tobacco company deliberately destroyed documents about the deadly effects of cigarettes 17 years ago. "He said it wasn't the team's intention to judge Imperial Tobacco, but after the review of the documents it was impossible not to," the CBC reported. It quoted Hammond: "Not only did they not reveal these studies but they destroyed them. It's very difficult to write this review from any other angle. What was the evidence they were so worried about being uncovered?" The documents were destroyed in 1992 on orders from the parent company, British American Tobacco in the United Kingdom, but copies have come to light in the course of litigation in the United States about liability for smokers' deaths. Hammond is the lead author of the paper, which reports that "British American Tobacco had collected evidence that cigarette smoke was carcinogenic and addictive. The evidence that Imperial Tobacco sought to destroy had important implications for government regulation of tobacco."

As we wake up these days to below-freezing temperatures and the resulting frost on roofs and windshields, there are other reasons as well to be thinking about the winter term that’s eleven weeks away. Undergraduate students who are scheduled to be on campus next term, January to April, have online “appointments” this week during which they can use the Quest system to sign up for winter courses. “When you sign into your enrollment session for the winter 2010 term,” a memo from the registrar’s office reminds them, “you'll see courses scheduled for you as a result of your pre-enrollment selections (see View My Pre-Enrollment Results in Quest), or course selections done for you by your school or department. You'll still be able to add, drop, or swap courses to finalize your winter schedule. For additional important deadlines, visit the Important Dates web page. If you're no longer continuing your studies at the University of Waterloo, let us know by sending an email to registrar@ uwaterloo.ca (please include your full name, ID number, and faculty of last attendance).” Anybody who misses this week’s appointment, or didn’t have an appointment scheduled, or has second thoughts, can take advantage of “open enrolment” starting October 19.

Details are starting to be available about the GO Transit bus service that will connect Kitchener-Waterloo to the Greater Toronto Area (or make K-W part of the GTA) beginning October 31. Says a news release issued by GO yesterday: “On weekdays, regular trips will run eastbound and westbound, serving the University of Waterloo, Wilfrid Laurier University, the Kitchener Bus Terminal, Cambridge SmartCentres, the Aberfoyle GO park and ride lot, a new Milton park and ride lot at Hwy. 401 and RRNo.25, and Square One GO Bus Terminal. Additional trips in the rush hours will offer connecting service at Milton GO Station to GO Train trips to and from Union Station. The new service will run on weekends and holidays as well, with trips serving the Milton park and ride lot and Square One (not Milton GO Station). For specific train and bus schedule information, please pick up a new schedule. The public can also call 416.869.3200, 1.888.GET ON GO (438.6646), or 1.800.387.3652 TTY, or check the Schedules section at gotransit.com.”

The residences are currently accepting applications for don positions for the spring term. • Keaton Hartigan, sociology student and goalie for the hockey Warriors, was male “athlete of the week” not only for UW’s athletics department but for Ontario University Athletics as a whole, after making 46 saves against Western on Friday night. • Josef Twerd, a custodian in UW’s plant operations department since 1996, retired officially as of October 1.

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DJ scrounges vinyl, and here's the result

Render, the UW art gallery, has something special going tonight, with a follow-up on Saturday. “This past spring,” a news release says, “Render commissioned artist and DJ Chris Flanagan to produce a new work, and the results will be launched at two related, but distinct, events. Flanagan has created a new musical score in response to recordings found in the many junk shops and thrift stores around the region, places to which he is consistently drawn to feed his voracious appetite for vintage and obscure vinyl.”

Says the artist: “One of the businesses that seems to be thriving in this climate are the thrift stores which pepper the townscape. It was these that originally brought me to the region several years ago, on the never ending quest for strange and obscure vinyl records. As a collector and DJ for over 10 years, music subcultures and record ephemera have permeated my installation practice. For this project, I’m composing a soundtrack for Cambridge built entirely from samples taken from vinyl records sourced from the City’s many thrift stores. This will not be a ‘mixtape’ of various songs but rather entirely new compositions based on reworking snippets of hundreds of hours of music. These albums, the source material for this new score, are the aural refuse of the town’s inhabitants which bore witness to the drama of their lives over many years."

The Render announcement goes on: “Flanagan's new score has been pressed as a limited edition vinyl record and surreptitiously returned to the thrift stores in which the original albums were found (for those unwilling to scrounge through thrift store milk crates, the record will also be available for sale in limited quantities at both events). Both events will include additional visual and installation components.”

Phase one, tonight, runs from 8 to 11 p.m. at the main gallery space in East Campus Hall, where those on hand can hear Flanagan's score and experience an evening of music DJ'd by the artist. “Join us again on Saturday,” writes Render’s Barbara Hobot, “from 7 to 9 p.m. in the atrium of the School of Architecture, Cambridge, for the official record release. The festivities will continue at the Black Badger Pub on Water Street until we shut the place down.”

CAR

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