Page 2/The Battalion/Thursday, January 21, 1988 Gucci checkbooks and serious banks A Chicago bank has hired a crea ture named Gucci to design arty new checks and check books. Gucci, who is fa mous for design ing women’s shoes and purses, has created checks with swans, dai- s i e s , m i s t - Mike JRo^ko^ shrouded trees, rippling water, a sun rise and even a seagull against a laven der background. Gucci is not the hairy- chested type. The bank thinks this will attract new customers. Maybe it will, but I won’t be one of them. Banks should be serious. My attitude toward them is the same as that of Mrs. Grobnik, who was Slats Grobnik’s mother. “A good bank, ” she always said, “should look like a jail, except the bank’s walls should be thicker/’ Whenever she made a deposit — and she never made withdrawals — Mrs. Grobnik would walk around the lobby to see if they had hired any new guards. If she found one, she would ask him: “Are you a good shot?” They always said yes, so she’d ask: “How many people have you shot?” If they hadn’t shot anybody, she would go to the chief cashier and ask why they were hiring inexperienced people. Sometimes she would purposely in clude a half-dollar in her deposit. If the cashier didn’t bite it, she would tri umphantly report him to the vice presi dent. Once in a while, she would set the alarm clock for 1 a.m. Then she’d get up and walk to the bank and rap on the door. When the night guard peered out, she’d say: “Remember, no sleeping.” After using the same bank for 24 years, she abruptly closed her account and put her money somewhere else. The reason was that a cashier had grown a mustache. “The next thing,” she said, “is he will take my money and run away to Las Ve- gas. I’m sure that Mrs. Grobnik would not have felt comfortable with Gucci’s checkbooks. In fact, she never in her life used a checkbook. She thought that any body who would put their money in a bank, then immediately spend a nickel writing a check to get some of it out, should be put away by his relatives for his own good. Copyright 1987, Tribune Media Services, Inc. Mail Call An ignored holiday EDITOR: It has long amazed me that even the finest institutions in our great nation have difficulty recognizing certain important events and the appropriate way of honoring those events. Occasionally, the event to be honored is a person’s life. If this person were influential enough, a day is recognized as a national holiday. Not too long ago a man of great influence received a national holiday in his name. Tfiis man spent his life working for the good of the people of this nation, not just one minority, as many people try to see his work. If his ac complishments were not of the caliber to be celebrated, would there be a na tional holiday in his name? On January 18, 1988, classes began for the spring semester here at Texas A&M. I realize that the low number of minority students on this campus al lowed the majority to overlook this important day. I was in shock at the ac tions of this honorable, tradition-filled university. Why do w r e not observe the day that honors a man that did so much for not only blacks but for all people that are oppressed? I beg this university not to overlook the birthday of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. anymore. Denial of this and any other national holidays is a disgrace to this or any other institution that follows the same policy. J. Frank Hernandez ’91 Editor’s note: In Wednesday’s Battalion, a letter was credited to Perry A. Lis ter II. The name should have read Perry A. Liston II. Letters to the editor should not exceed 300 words in length. The editorial staff reserves the right to edit letters for style and length, but will make every effort to maintain the author’s intent. Each letter must be signed and must include the classification, address and telephone number of the writer. The Battalion (USPS 045 360) Member of Texas Press Association Southwest Journalism Conference The Battalion Editorial Board Sue Krenek, Editor Daniel A. LaBry, Managing Editor Mark Nair, Opinion Page Editor Amy Couvillon, City Editor Robbyn L. Lister and Becky Weisenfels, News Editors Loyd Brumfield, Sports Editor Sam B. Myers, Photo Editor Editorial Policy The Battalion is a non-profit, self-supporting newspaper operated as a community service to Texas A&M and Bryan-College Station. Opinions expressed in The Battalion are those of the editorial board or the author, and do not nec essarily represent the opinions of Texas A&M admin istrators, faculty or the Board of Regents. The Battalion also serves as a laboratory newspa per for students in reporting, ediung and photogra phy classes within the Department of Journalism. The Battalion is published Monday through Fri day during Texas A&M regular semesters, except for holiday and examination periods. Mail subscriptions are $17.44 per semester. $34.62 pier school year and $36.44 pier full year. Advertising rates furnished on request. Our address: The Battalion, 230 Reed McDonald, Texas A&M University, College Station, TX 77843- 1111. Second class postage paid at College Station, TX 77843. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to The Bat talion, 216 Reed McDonald, Texas A&M University, College Station TX 77843-4111. Opinion Mrs. Grobnik finally stopped dealing with banks entirely when she found out that they loaned money. She had always thought they just stored it away. It was her opinion that anybody who bor rowed money did so because they didn’t have enough of their own, which means they were bums. And she didn’t want to trust her money to an institution that would loan it out to bums. I’m not quite as conservative as Mrs. Grobnik about such matters, but the business of the Gucci checks would make me nervous. For one thing, his name isn’t just plain Gucci. No Italian mother is going to send a boy into the world with no more of a handle than “Gucci.” Would an Italian priest baptize a baby as plain “Gucci?” Yet, when I called the bank and asked them what Gucci’s full name was, they said they didn’t know. Maybe being just Gucci is enough for the fashion circles in New York, but a bank ought to get a guy’s full name be fore they do any kind of business with him. If they hire somebody who goes around saying, “I am Gucci,” they might decide to lend money to people who walk in and say, “I am Smith — give me a thou.” I am not opposed to adding a little art to checks. But it should be something se rious. When a person writes a check he shouldn’t think about daisies, seagulls, rippling waters, sunrises, trees and other pleasant things. He is spending money, and he should think dark thoughts. If there are going to be daises on the check, they should be surrounding a gravestone with his name on it. If there are going to be rippling waters, a hand should be sticking out of the water. If there is a tree, it should have a noosed rope attached to a limb. I’d like to see checkbooks with pic tures of a turnip, with a drop or two of blood oozing out of it. Many men would like checks for their wives that would bear a drawing of a widow in black, sitting at a lawyer’s desk, with the lawyer saying: “Well, you can always sell the furniture.” Or maybe a bleak, rickety old build ing with a sign over the door that says: “Poor House.” Married men could use personalized checks with a snappy slogan across the top. Maybe something like: “Bartender: Please don’t cash this. Signed, His chil dren.” Black Americans are, as close as they*re gonna get to the ideal of equality Enter an action code NO' Th‘ cl<> H bee: lOtlier n affile fiov Const n ossjmd ‘ He . R< ill, [mcl " rive to R ilonMi i •om Ros aftE- Bss S U£ nali Hie losed mi ninth ectjtm o Hirom .nonths,! You know it will happen sometime. If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again, right? So you cross your fin gers and keep try ing. And trying. And trying. Seven, eight, nine times . . . still you can’t give up. Minutes are tick- ing away. 1 he suspense has tied your stomach into a square knot. The tip of your right index finger is numb, your Tracy Staton left hand is cramped, and your bottom lip is almost bitten through. But it’s im possible to stop. You can’t do it. You long to hear the electronic musical sound of a voice saying the magic words: Welcome to the Texas A&M Univer sity System. Enter an action code — NOW. You know it’s a fantasy of Utopian proportions. But the lust of a student desperate for classes has claimed you. At night you dream about picking up the phone, dialing it, and reaching the registration system on the FIRST TRY. You attempt to remain calm, fearing your friends will laugh when you con fess your fantasies. Then they catch the dial-a-class disease (scientifically termed subphonal educatological coursic syn drome). One of your more outgoing chums has an add/drop party — BYOCP (bring your own cordless phone). The thought of an orgy of students all dialing 260- 3213 at once overwhelms you. You choose to spend a quiet evening at home, just you, your Snoopy telephone, and a registration booklet. The hostess calls you the next day and admits that the party was “uncontrollably wild.” “But someone got through!” she ex claims triumphantly. “Too bad all the classes were full. We were all excited anyway, though.” Panic grips your throat. You can barely finish the conversation. It had never crossed your mind that the ulti mate object of your quest — adding twelve hours to your meager course load of a one-hour P.E. class — might be beyond your reach once you began your electronic conversation with Mr. Com puter. You thought he held the keys to the universe, or at least to class rosters. You leave your dorm in a daze. You ask everyone you meet if they are en rolled in more than three hours. Four out of five students surveyed recom mended executing Mr. Computer for withholding class hours from needy scholars. You don’t believe it. Someone is play ing a cruel joke on you for skipping the phone fest. So you go back to your room and resume dialing. After a half-hour of strenuous but ton-pushing, you hear a ringing noise when you finish dialing the number. You almost drop the receiver. You fum ble for your schedule book, shakily in put your student LD. number and make your first course request. The class you have requested is full. No other sections of this class are avail able. Please enter your next request — rtow. You enter your next selection. Mr. Computer seems to chuckle spitef ully as he repeats: The class you have requested is full. No other sections of this class are avail able. Please enter your next request — NOW. You awake f rom unconsciousness several minutes later, the gnawed and mutilated phone cord between your teeth. “It’s true!” you scream. “I’ll never be able to get twelve hours! I might as well drop my P.E. class too! AUGGGHHHHHH!!!!” Then Devious Plan sticks his head out of a tiny niche in your brain. “Hey, I’ve got a better idea,” he says. “What?” you ask, your finger already poised to drop your class. “Let’s sneak into registration head quarters and strangle Mr. Computer. Everyone already thinks he should be executed, anyway. We’ll be doing stu dents a favor.” You raise your eyebrows. “Hmmmm.” You unhook your phone cr stuf f it surreptitiously into youi§| shirt. Glancing furtively down's of your dorm, you steal outside: to look normal. 1 he closer vou get to the Pavi§MAUS more excited vou become. CaujiGov. H wave of anticipation, you breahchnosii run. Devious Plan gives vou a ’-H' while you jog. st; rism m Isn t a university s purposetiwB-j| 1C mil knowledge t<> its students''! ret-o u tells you. “Aren’t you just like ill o¥a pi sumer of any product, and tl>t|® m