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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (March 24, 1988)
§• Editor's Note: This attention!! page will be used each week as a forum for you, our readers. We encourage you to submit any original work that would be suitable for publication in At Ease. Opinions expressed on the attention!! page are those of the author, and do not necessarily represent the opinions of The Battalion, Texas A&M administrators, faculty or the Board of Regents. Pictures for the attention!! page should be black-and-white shots that are unique either in content angle or technique. Columns, essays or poems should be no longer than 500 words and should be either printed or typed. Don't forget to put your name and phone number on anything you send us. Then just drop it off at The Battalion, Room 216 of the Reed McDonald Building. Be sure to specify that it is for At Ease. Texas A&M through burnt orange glasses One of my classmates at University of Texas, who later graduated from Texas A&M in veterinary medicine, says that he is successful because he has a UT education and an A&M degree. Another friend, an Aggie who went to UT law school insists that it is the other way around. There is no resolution of this issue in the present millennium. I came to Bryan on business and to do some research. There is truly a difference between A&M and the 40 acres in Austin. Just navigating to College Station is problematical. My instructions seemed simple enough. “College Station is half way between Old Dime Box and North Zulch, so turn left at Bastrop and right when you cross the Brazos River. ” That part was easy. But getting from the motel to the A&M campus and finding things wasn’t. Crossing University Drive in the morning rush is an exercise that separates the quick and the dead, and no doubt has a stabilizing effect on the student population. I was looking for the Systems Building, and asked a likely student who promptly denied any knowledge of such a place. (For his information and others, the Systems Building houses the Chancellor’s office. You know, the guy who oversees the entire Texas A&M University System of which Texas A&M University is only one part.) 1 worked my way through a pair of female cadets, (who I took to be meter maids until I put my glasses on), to the Graduate Studies Office where the secretary knew the answer to my where question if not the what. Finished with business, I sought out the library, but decided to shortcut the process and not ask students. I approached an elderly man beside a PP truck (the initials must have stood for the department of Pidgeon Potties judging by what we were standing in). “Yassuh,” he said. “Rat ovah there,” and he was “rat as rain. ” The library stashes books by two (or maybe more) index systems. In the card file under subjects, I located a “Modem Military History — 1776 to 1918” listing. Thus enlightened, I proceeded to the indicated area. On the way through the stacks, I noticed a yard long set of imposing red volumes that I took to be scientific research classics. I picked one out of the middle. “The American Perfumer & Essential Oil Review, Mar 1912 - Feb 1913, TP 983 Al,5.” No doubt nuclear physics in disguise. Not finding what I wanted among the Cavalry Journals, etc, I sought out the history department. Once again I went straight to the source of infinite wisdopn. “Yassuh, rat ovah there,” pointing the Harrington Building with the microwave dish on the roof. I presumed that the faculty and staff were not missing any episodes of the contemporary history soaps. I was foiled again, neither the professor nor either of his lackeys were on hand or beatable. I stopped a student and inquired the way to McDonalds and instantly received precise directions. I departed the pleasant campus of Texas A&M no wiser, which I understand is traditional, and skipped smartly across University Drive again. On the way back to the motel I noticed a gathering in the parking lot of the Skaggs Alpha Beta store and took it to be the Business Fraternity’s luncheon, brown-bagged on the tailgates of several pickup tmeks. Still seeking knowledge, I visited a couple of book stores and after nearly strangling among the racks of t-shirts and other implementia of apparel, I found one with books for sale. On my way south toward Houston on Texas Avenue, I noticed one last reminder oif Texas A&M. It was a sign in the back window of a car that said, “You are living proof that Aggies are natural bom leaders. You are following one. ” I could only guess that his mother and father were Toyotas, too. This week's attention!! column was submitted by Allan E. Turner, a 1964 graduate of the University of Texas. Page 2/At Ease/Thursday, March 24,19^88