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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (Oct. 3, 1986)
4 4IIVJ um a/\ 4 a/v\ ‘Suep qo ‘also reaQ You’re having a crisis. You just can’t handle this any longer. It’s time to ap peal to that higher author ity — the omniscient, om nipresent one. You’ll have to bypass your roommate, your professor, your dean, the counseling serv ice, your parents and your pastor. “Abby! Ann! Miss Man ners! Dr. Ruth! Uncle Leonard!” Uncle Leonard? There is no Uncle Leonard. And for a very good reason. There are some pretty good advice columns around. That is, if longev ity means that an advice column is good then cer tainly Dear Abby and Ann Landers are great. Oh sure, Dr. Ruth talks about the oldest problems in the world but her fame is fairly newly-won. And she’s so blasted squeaky that I really can’t take her seriously. Miss Manners is my personal favorite. Of course, I only get to check her out once a week be cause I think that’s as of ten as she’s locally pub lished. You’d never guess, but old Judith Martin, the real Miss Manners, has guided me, just a normal kind of guy, through more poten tially explosive social, din ing and relationship situa tions than any normal guy should be expected to deal with. Hey, haven’t we all been a victim of circum stance sometime or an other? An ill-timed remark at a party? Whether to use that three-tined fork on the crab and the oysters? And my gosh! What to do when you realize that you’ve gone through al most an entire date with shaving cream behind your ears, your fly half way down or (aaarrrgh) an errant nosehair. A per- sjikoii 14. fiuu Suimp pa^oajjiad \ anfc>iui pa4 xa si sin \ y u+ui UU114 non U uasi[ -eujinof /YvoflaA,, /“ibs ubo nofi ueq} ja^sej pue siad jo pupj inon puij ipnoA iqBiuo} /'uBiqii aq; 04 pcaq noA ji 4x3q; pue diqsjejoqos -ui ajam non ji mofq ajpueq 04 ajqe aq 04 4qSno ueuuqsaxj son can’t be expected to resolve these situations unassisted. Enter the advice col umnist. The few omni scient, omnipresent ones who prepared for their field by staying in college for 10 years or more and finally escaped with a gen eral studies degree. These people are uniquely qual ified to salvage your life. They know everything. But why are there so few? And why no Uncle Leonard? The answer is pretty simple. You folks out there, believe it or not, take your advice columns pretty seriously. Oh come on, I know how many of you tear through important news like the Daniloff release or the tax reform bill to get to Ann’s or Abby’s daily tid bit of wisdom. You take the sugges tions in an advice column too seriously and then sue the paper when the ad vice doesn’t work out. And what’s worse is that sometimes you win. In this day of million- dollar liability settlements, we at The Battalion can’t afford to take the risk. But what if it were pos sible to have an Uncle Leonard advice column? Somebody local you could turn to in time of need. What would it be like? Let’s see. But first, this warning. Don’t take this seriously. Do not try to use any of the advice advanced in this column. And more important, don’t try to give any ad vice your of own, espe cially when it concerns relationships. That’s the best advice, since Uncle Leonard can only be sued. You, on the other hand, can be taken by an angry follower of your ad vice to north Bryan and chained to a stop sign by your underwear. Remember, Uncle Leonard’s a pro. He’s highly trained in BS. Dear Uncle Leonard, My girlfriend of nine months came over to the dorm room the other day and embarrassed me in front of my roommate by saying, “Rolf, you’re a nice guy and everything ... and I really do like you a lot ... but I think we should date other peo ple.” I’m hurtin’ and my roommate is insensitive to this devastation that I’m going through. What will I do? Sign me Rolf. Dear Ralph, I’ve got to refer you to page 241 of “Uncle Leon ard’s Manual on Dating Strategy and Relationship Warfare.” Chapter 21 clearly states, “Use of the wom-out phrase ‘I really like you a lot, but let’s date other people’ or any variation thereon in tended to conceal the real intent (which is to dump somebody’s hiney and so end the relationship) is forbidden, taboo, don’t use it, not never. Only a spineless wimp would say that.” Come on Ralph. Get with it, buddy! You’re in the throes of a bust-up. Your emotional survival alarms should have gone off days before all this happened to you. You should have taken your ex aside and said quietly, “Hey Beula, I really like you and everything, but I think we need to date other people. ” And about your room mate? Stuff an old gym sock in his mouth for not leaving the room while you got flushed. Dear Uncle Leonard, I’m a freshman girl and thought that I had been so careful about the guys I had been going out with. Now, I find that I’m inex tricably entangled in a love triangle. What, oh what can I do to be rid of my rival and get Zack to marry me? Sign me Darla. Dear Mario, Your problem is a di mensional one. A love tri angle is nothing these days. It’s a two-dimensio nal thing that even a
