Drexel’s Non-Discriminating Elevator

As you can tell from this sign on an elevator at a Drexel parking garage at 34th and Market, fat people are also allowed to ride.

Drexel Kids Outsmart Underwear Co.

Victoria’s Secret recently held a promotion asking students to vote for what school should be added to its line of collegiate products. Apparently, the company decided to screw market research and just let the people decide!

Well, whoops! Some thoughtful future engineer at Drexel made a script that moved Drexel from 1,000 votes to 5.2 million.

“We figured out what happens when you click and we made a computer do that hundreds and hundreds of times without showing anything,” [co-conspirator Tim] Plunkett said.

Plunkett explained that the script was written out of boredom.

“We thought it was amusing to see the reactions of the people in the group [on Facebook], which were primarily sorority girls … they thought they had organized it very well and were accomplishing this on their own, which was hilarious to us. It was mostly just because we thought it was humorous that people were getting excited that we were winning,” Plunkett said. [...]

A student from Texas Tech University also tried doing the same thing. However, he was using Windows and running the script on one computer, while Plunkett was using Linux and running it on 30 computers, according to Plunkett.

“Other schools tried to do the same thing, but we just did it better,” Plunkett said.

In what might show the strength of its engineering school, Drexel remains in first on the website. I kind of doubt we’ll be seeing Drexel-themed underwear anytime soon, though.

Hilariously, Bob Jones University is in 12th.

Students fool ‘PINK’ poll [The Triangle]

I Am A Drexel Dictionary

Whoo! Did youse all enjoy my Twittering? Well, apparently Twitter is down right now so even if you were interested in my thoughts on an early-season college basketball game you might not have been able to hear them. Only from me can you get wisdom like, “Academic inquiry: Have Drexel’s girls gotten hotter in the last ~4 years?” and “Penn kid: ‘Hey number zero, is that how many points you’ve scored?’ Me: ‘Hey number forty-two, is that how many points you’ve scored? Oh wait¹.’”

This was the first time Penn played Drexel at Drexel in 87 years. usually the two teams just play at Penn’s Palestra (aka the best place to watch a basketball game ever). Drexel’s gym, the DAC, actually has banners for the winner of the school’s annual intramural basketball league and is not the best place to watch a basketball game ever.

Here’s what happened at the Penn-Drexel game today: 745,000 foul calls, 45 billion missed free throws, a couple okay rollouts and horrible chants from everyone. Despite also giving up 40 offensive rebounds (or so), Penn had a chance to tie the game with three free throws with 2 seconds left. Naturally, the team missed the first one. But Penn actually almost hit a turnaround jumper at the horn on the offensive board; it missed, sparing us overtime.

The best part of the whole game was the trophy for winning the Battle of 33rd Street (apparently) as well as this definition which was on a poster all over the gym:

That’s from Samuel Johnson’s, right? I can only assume, with how poetic it is and all.

¹ This was actually “Oh shit” in the Twitter version, but I changed it for my mom. In real life I sorta just went “OshhHH,” the all-purpose non-vulgar interjection expressing humor.

Drexel Staff Baffled By Obvious Jocelyn Kirsch Lie

Don’t worry, I haven’t forgotten about our girl Jocelyn Kirsch, the female half of the Bonnie & Clyde of Identity Fraud. Today’s Daily News points to a story from a recent Drexel Triangle article with this fun tale: Jocelyn Kirsch allegedly claimed to be an adjunct professor at Drexel.

The Drexel paper says Kirsch pretended to be an adjunct in order to get a free parking pass and use University computers at Drexel’s Language and Communication Center.

Kirsch, known around the language office for her revealing clothes and long dark hair walked to the front desk and asked for a pass last year while taking a placement test. When asked if she was a professor she claimed to be an adjunct and was granted the pass. “I was very convinced,” said one staff member who wished to remain anonymous.

Kirsch used the pass for two weeks, the paper says, but doesn’t say why she stopped. Now they apparently “grill” people asking for passes. Actually, here Kirsch just sounds kinda awesome. Compared to Alycia Lane, I think she’s Katherine Drexel.

Bonnie & Clyde Leave Town; City Continues Enthrallment

A reader emailed me to complain I was spending too much time focusing on the media’s obsession with Jocelyn “Bonnie” Kirsch of the 2007 Bloodless Bonnie & Clyde duo (which also features Edward Anderton, who nobody knows anything about).

Yesterday, the pair both left the city to return to their home states. Anderton (who?) is home on the west coast in Washington, while Kirsch is back home in North Carolina.

But back to the actual crime: Police allege Kirsch and Anderton stole the identities of several people — five so far, according to NBC 10 — banking at least $100,000. Police say they may have installed spyware on their neighbors’ computers; a discussion I had with not one but two separate Foodery clerks came to the conclusion they totally made a ton of amateurish mistakes.

When police raided their Rittenhouse apartment, they allegedly found a ton of fake IDs and, most hilariously, a 2005 Daily Pennsylvanian article about how bouncers spot fake IDs. The cops also found Kirsch’s iPhoto directory (or whatever) and released a ton of photos to the press to make the story sexier.

More on this later today — hopefully I can dump everything in “bonnieandclyde.txt” on my desktop on the blog today — but the main story is definitely that Facebook group “SHE GOIN’ TO JAAAAAAAAIL!!!! (and THAT’S hilarious)” is back up. Wow, Drexel girls are way mean. Rawr.

Oh, yeah, and that other Jocelyn Kirsch Facebook group has photos of her from elementary school. Ahh, okay.

Obamarama Stronger Than The Ron Paulcalypse

Temple English professor Sue Wells watched last month’s Democratic debate at Drexel, and the Temple News‘ blog asked whose supporters had the best cheers. The winner, of course, was Barack Obama:

According to Wells, the most creative chants came out of the Obama camp. Such gems as “1,2,3,4, let Obama end the war, 5,6,7,8, Obama is our candidate.”

Among the losers were Joe Biden (”Let’s go Joe!”) and none other than Ron Paul, whose supporters could only muster up this: “Roooon Paaauuuulll!” That’s it? Come on, the Ron Paul supporters accused me of working for Rupert Murdoch. They can do better than just Ron Paul’s name.

Geeze, just adapt the “Be Aggressive” chant: “We, the people, we, we, the people.” Actually, that’s kind of perfect. Man, the free market can work wonders!

Update: Ron Paul comment flood! The things people have posted don’t quite work as chants, though. “Say yes to Dr. No” is a good slogan, but hard to chant. “Ron Paul Revolution — Bring back the constitution” doesn’t scan, but I suppose it’s okay. (Adding “The” in front of Ron Paul would work, though.) And while “Stop the war in Iraq!, No war on Iran!” is something I’d agree with, it doesn’t even rhyme at all! Geeze. Ron Paul wants to be president and his supporters don’t even have a good rhyming slogan?

Bonus Update: Oh, there is a rap song, though! Oh, it is amazing. It rivals I Like Ike, You Like Ike, Everybody Likes Ike (For President), honest. But not even Ike’s campaign ad called the previous president a “cokehead retard.” Ahh.

Also good: “Hillary Clinton is big money Pimpin’.”

Temple professor: Obama fans are better poets [Broad & Cecil]

Presidential Candidates Discuss UFOs

Even though Mike Gravel was banned from last night’s debate — more on this later — there was plenty of wackiness to go around. For example: This question about UFOs! Apparently Shirley MacLaine, the godmother of Dennis Kucinich’s daughter, wrote in her new book Kucinich told her he saw a UFO.

Then Barack Obama refused to have any fun with Tim Russert although everybody laughed at him because he’s good looking and charming. Hooray for democracy!

Rendell Helps Kid Get Debate Ticket, Kinda

Drexel’s newspaper, The Triangle, has created a special blog just for tonight’s Drexel Democratic Debate (3D). The Blogspot blog has a number of stories posted already, including a story headlined “Chris Matthews talks to Drexel students.” (The Chris Matthews?)

It also has the story of some freshman who put on a sign saying he wanted to go to the debate.

And, then he passed Ed Rendell, who was looking for a photo op or something. “Just remind me that you are the guy with the sign- I’ll remember,” the blog quotes Rendell telling Drexel freshman Tyler Piecara.

But, uh, it doesn’t seem like Ed did anything, since apparently the dean of students is getting Piecara and four of his friends in to the debate. Rendell will probably not even be at the debate, as he’ll be off hosting an Eagles debate show at Chickie’s and Pete’s.

Chris Matthews talks to Drexel Students [Drexel Debate]
Freshman gets creative, gets debate ticket [Drexel Debate]
[via Daily Examiner]

Local University Loses All Credibility

On Saturday, the Inquirer ran an article about Drexel’s new Second Life campus. Drexel’s new Second Life campus! I brushed it off, figuring either the citizens of the tech or Philadelphia blogosphere (shoot me) would have made fun of it immediately and so I didn’t have any obligation to post over the weekend making fun of it.

Then what do I see when I wake up this morning and search? Nothing! Somebody saying he was jealous of the move! Somebody else calling it interesting! And a blog post titled “Depression on Drexel Island” — oh, yeah, the campus is called “Drexel Island” — is actually about students learning about depression in a virtual classroom! Intentionally!

Need I mention this is about how Drexel opened a campus in fucking Second Life, home of the flying penis?

More »

Drexel Beefs Up Security 200-Fold

As you can tell from the above photo, Drexel’s new security team is based on the Legend of Zelda method of security, where if you get close enough to the statue it comes to life and attacks you. It’s a little harsh, sure, but Dragon Force was deemed necessary to keep the campus safe.

Drexel’s original plan was to contact Dr. Wily and ask for a team of super-robots to station around the campus, but was vetoed at the last minute due to Wily’s occasional plans to take over the world.

Drexel Improving Campus Security With DragonForce [CBS 3]