Friday, May 4, 2007 A major musical hangover By Ryan Gallagher contributing writer After glancing at the top five best-selling albums of 2006, 1 got a feeling similar to when I wake up most mornings. To experience this same feeling, either take a quick glance at the charts or drink one-fifth of cheap whiskey with a roommate until two in the morning, whiche\ er sounds more appealing. I have not had the opportunity to listen to the soundtrack from "High School Musical." howev er I did notice that below its position at number one, sits Rascal Flans, Carrie Underwood. and Nickelback. Now I understand that some people enjoy coun try because they were raised in farmish/country surroundings. and that was all they knew. That's fine. However, the last time I checked. the entire country of America was not raised on the farm, so why don't We support some music that uses a little more variety. If you've heard one country song, you've heard them all. And isn't it a hit strange that country band sounds an awful lot like contraband? Chris LaFuria made me aware of this the other day and I had a good five minute guffaw. But let's put the country music aside and get down to brass tacks. In case you weren't reading to your fullest potential, the number four position was filled by Nickelhack . Nickel hack. Do not get me wrong here. I ha% c enjoyed man\ drunken nights listening to my old roommate do outstanding impressions of Nickelhack's work . But any day now. I am waiting for Ical-singedpi tarist Chad Kroeger to conic out and laugh in America's face. revealing that the iA hole propcct ti as a joke that he got rich off of. I have yet to figure out %11 - IN 2.7 million people paid good money for the hand's latest "All the Right Reasons - in 2006. To make an attempt at Top Five Best Summer Albums 1. Beach Boys - Pet Sounds 2. Bob Marley & the Wailers 3. Outkast - Southernplayalisticadillacmuzik 4. Sublime -40 oz. To Freedom s.Creedence Clearwater Revival - Down On The Corner 1/26/07 cov }limn this just leads me to believe Justin Timberlake. alwa son the radio that there are actually people out there that would classify rlr solving this mystery. I unfortunately had to sit down and listen to the hand the other night and had to turn every song off as soon as the vocals began. This doesn't mean the music was good until the singing started: it just means that I could tolerate it until my ears were bombed with a com bination of the most unbearable voice in rock music today and lyrics that actually made me laugh out loud. The fact that there's a record label out there that even gave these guys a chance disgusts me and makes me wonder if we'll ever hear music compa rable to the works of artists such as Frank Sinatra, the Beatles. Bob Dylan. the Pixies. etc. These leg ends contributed some of the finest music to the world that is continued to be exploited in entertainment to this day. their life as a constant dance party. The problem is that every form of respectable music has already been originated. so now we're in \ cluing music : just to iment it. It doesn't have to he kNorth‘: it just has to satisfy the tastes of a growing number of teens and college students. I keep getting this picture in my head that 20 ears from now. this kind of music can be consid ered classics from our generation. As far as I can tell. music is doomed from here on out, so please go out and take sonic advice from musicians and listen to something that wouldn't necessarily be found on the radio or on the charts. It would he great for yo u. Last and certainly least, we have Justin Timberlake bringing up the rear. I'm not quite sure how this happened, considering you can't go a day without hearing his voice, whether it's via radio, televi sion, nightclubs, etc. So why are people spending money to listen to this music to the fullest extent and when are they listening to it? All it is good for is dancing, if you enjoy dancing in that style, so "Lost" gets found By Scott Muska contributing writer The critically acclaimed and wildly popular tele vision show "Lost" has finally returned from a long, mid-season hiatus that dates hack to early November. The show airs Wednesday nights on ABC at 10 p.m., and has been ranked among the highest-rated shows on network television since it burst onto the primetime scene in September of 2004. "Lost - may attribute its astounding success to the fact that it is an extremely unique show. based on a brilliant idea and foundation of a plot. From this idea the show is made (and kept) interesting through great writing that includes countless obscurities and plot twists that create an inordinate amount of suspense. It is also maintained by above average acting by a cast that consists of actors and actresses that were basically unknown before the commencement of the show The general plot of "Lost . ' centers around a group of strangers that were involved in a plane crash on a remote tropical island and are stranded with no means of escape and no idea where exact ly this aforementioned island is even located. The problems that these people begin to experi ence are problems that one would expect from a group of total strangers that are stranded on a tropical island: the obtaining and rationing of food, distribution of medicine and other pos sessions left from the crash, and other trials that are often associated with being marooned. Things have since become much more sophisticated, diffi cult, and ultimately dan gerous for the inhabitants College legends and myths unmasked By Patrick Webster managing editor 2/9/07 College is a place of open and free communica tion, which leads to a sharing of ideas and knowl edge. For the most part, this serves to speed the educational process by making it easier for ev er-- one to learn. However, such open communication also has the drawback of allowing unverified and untrue information to spread even more rapidly than the real story. As a result, college campuses are often a hot spot for the spreading of myths and rumors, such as the ones below: The backwards PIN Another myth that has been floating around since at least 1998 is that entering your PIN (Personal Identification Number) backwards into an ATM or similar banking machine will alert the police and your bank that you are doing so under duress. This tale likely has its roots in a patent issued to Chicago entrepreneur Joseph Zinger, who in 1994 came up with the idea for a system installed in bank teller machines that would alert authorities when the PIN was entered backwards. This system has never been implemented by any bank, though a few states have either passed or considered legis lation that would allow banks to do so. The most famous incident related to this myth was the carjacking and murder of Kimberly Boyd, who was forced at gunpoint to withdraw all her money for the carjacker before being murdered. Her hus band Michael immediately lobbied the Georgia State Legislature to enact a law that would require banks to institute such a system. A bill was intro duced in December of 2005, but has never been voted or acted upon. Favorite Chinese dish: cat College students are always on the lookout for one thing: cheap, good food. As a result, Chinese restaurants are often popular choices on college towns for their offerings of large quantities of food for a reasonable price. Naturally, cultural xeno phobia quickly supplies a reason why the price is so reasonable. There is rarely a college student that has not heard a joke or tale about a favorite Chinese restaurant that actually serves cat meat in its dish es instead of chicken. This myth is in fact very old, with British newspapers printed as early as the 1850 s alluding to cat being on the menu in new Asian eating establishments. As exemplified by the longevity of this myth, it is very ingrained into popular culture. In 1995, this rumor spread like wildfire in the city of Chicago after a popular Chinese restaurant closed, even after weeks of advertisement that the whole national franchise was closing for business reasons. The United States Department of Health reports that no restau- P P 2/09/07 ('OM RIBt - ITO PHOTO Lost . ' begins its third season at ane time. 10 p.m.. on Wednesdays . The Behrend Beacon I of the island. Thek hake found that the island has certain MN stical and magical qualities that have influenced the inhahitants in both good and had NN a \ Inch has cis en the show a sort of science fiction tkvist and enhances the suspense and ele- meat 01 surprise. The crash \ .c..ms also hay c also that they arc not the on!) people living on the island. They live amongst another group of people that they refer to as "the others. - they are an extremely enigmatic group. For lack of a hetter term. these two groups ale waging a \\ ar against one another. The crash ictims are simply trying to silk e and get off of the island and hack to their homes, hut ''the haveothers thenr own agenda that has not yet been revealed to the audience of the show. This may he confusing, hut this is the only way to attempt to explain this extremely complex tele \ ision show. It is. however. extremely , entertain ing. There \\tll he 16 new episodes airing consec utively. and the\ started last night. If you are inter ested in watching this show hut have not seen it helore. << s\,nopsis 01' the previous episodes that have hcen ailed from all three seasons can he found on the oilicial "Lost - ehsite: Imp://ahe.go.com/pumetime/lost/index. rant, Chinese or otherwise, has ever been closed for keeping cat meat in its freezer. while it is true that dog is consumed in very few parts of Asia that have poverty-level economies and in times of famine, the use of what are consid ered pet animals in the western hemisphere as food is rare even in China and Korea. Mystery shopping Money is always on the mind of a modern col lege student. As a result. an offer that would be readily dismissed by someone who is financially secure has a way of worming itself into the mind of someone alw a \ s looking for a few extra bucks. A currently popular fraud is that of "mystery shop ping.- or being paid to go shopping and writing reports about certain places of business. While there are a few legitimate mystery shop ping jobs offered by stores themselves, the vast majority seek to separate gullible young adults from their money quickly. In short, the Federal Trade Commission advises that any mystery shop ping offer that includes the use of the prospective shopper's own money is almost certainly a fraud. This includes fees for "handling - or "training - that one must undertake before being given assign ments, and programs that promise to reimburse the shopper after certain items are purchased. An off shoot of these practices is called "reshipping," in which a victim is instructed to purchase and reship items from online auction services such as eßay and Amazon, in return for promised compensation. The good and bad offers can be difficult to dif ferentiate: oftentimes they both advertise in the same media, including newspapers, radio, and the internet. An easy way to tell if the job is on the up and up is to look at who is offering it: if Sears is looking for mystery shoppers to test its customer service. it's probably real. If, instead, some third party is offering you the opportunity and insists on certain fees or is not up front with information, it probably isn't. The roommate's suicide One common myth among many college stu dents is that the death of a roommate or similarly close friend or relative will result in the instanta neous award of a 4.0 or other high grade for the semester to the emotionally devastated student. While many educational institutions have policies in effect that will provide special consideration for a student in such a situation, such as extra time to complete work or waiving certain attendance requirements, no school, including Penn State, will award grades without the completion of the neces sary coursework. This myth is so prevalent that at least two feature films, "Dead Man on Campus" and "Dead Man's Curve," have plots that are generally based on the same premise. It has also found its way into numerous television shows, including "The Simpsons" and "Law and Order."
Significant historical Pennsylvania newspapers