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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (Nov. 22, 1994)
i November 22, By Alv; lay* November 22, 1994 u viKje a lEp DKlMHlNt WITH UK F^nu-'l? W T sec UHV u AtlC S° .1C.D . Lmc FAlriclJ SOVJ .huh? lips fri} Agg ie life The Battalion • Page 3 golice reveal best excuses for student speeding Hichele Brinkmann Battalion 5y Bra J’.ll, (U Fvrtt, ). n n(, ^ A 1 ', »Y (jRI aura Weigel was not paying attention to how fast she was driving. She looked in her rearview mirror and saw the lights be gin to flash. A police officer asked Weigel had an excuse for exceeding the speed limit. ~#old the officer she had a midterm exam she in a hurry to take. ie officer wrote her the ticket; he had heard one before. eigel, a sophomore economics major, said she rue speed demon. eigel said she exceeds the speed limit by such ge amount that she has never been able to defensive driving. have had seven tickets and got out of the ,h,” Weigel said. “The speed limit was 55 and going much faster. I told the officer I had iruise control set on 65 so there was no way I [going as fast as he clocked me, which was a to- e because I don’t have cruise control. It ik him as funny so he let me go.” eigel has even had officers threaten to take ojail. )ne time I was doing 108 mph and was weav- hrough traffic on the highway,” she said. “I lulled over and the officer threatened to throw njail, but he ended up writing me up for going i a 55 instead of 108. Officers lie as much as 1/v 'eigel said none of her excuses worked, even if LIMIT 65 (TRUCK (1 LIMIT 55 rruPit,3TyPlD/4TUf», .TUPlDjSTUPlO'^l were true. jh p^G. r . A ^vJHV'Wi[ tany college students have used these excuses a plethora of others in an effort to get out of ding tickets. t least that is what University, College Station Bryan police officers say. hese were some of the most common excuses :e officers said they hear on a daily basis: being late for a test, a class, work, or turning in an application • having to go to the bathroom • broken speedometer • feminine problems University Police Officer Jay Wendell said one of his favorites was, “You’re just a campus police offi cer, you can’t stop me.” Wendell said UPD commonly hears University- related excuses. UPD Officer Thomas Armstrong said the best ex cuse he has heard was, “I was speeding because I was trying to stay away from y’all.” Contrary to what most students believe, UPD of ficers can pull over cars off campus. Bryan Police Officer Dennis Crain said he has been on the Bryan police force for six years and has heard his share of excuses. “One young lady told me that the new tires on her car made it run faster,” Crain said. “That was one of the funniest I have heard.” Crain said most people try to get out of speeding STUDENT LIMIT o ‘How- tickets. “About 75 percent give excuses,” he said, ever, most do not work.” Crain said people do occasionally admit they have no reason for speeding but it is a rare occasion. Crain said he remembers one occasion in which he let a woman go without giving her a ticket. “One woman went to pieces,” Crain said. “She was bawling, it was just a tragic day for her. So I got soft hearted and told her to go on down the road.” Most officers, however, said they do not fall for the “crying” trick. BPD Officer Kenneth Meadors said people give excuses about 90 percent of the time they are pulled over, but said he lets them go about 5 percent of the time. The funniest excuse Meadors said he has heard was from a soldier. “This soldier said he was on call and was in a hurry because he was about to be air-dropped over a city in South America,” Meadors said. “He got a ticket.” Heather Hunt, a junior elementary education ma jor, said she considers herself lucky because she has never been issued a ticket in the six times she has been pulled over in College Station. “Most of the officers think I am drunk when they pull me over,” Hunt said. “They make me get out of the car and take sobriety tests. After they realize I am not drunk they always let me go.” Mark McGoon, a sophomore elementary educa tion major, said he has used one of those common ex cuses listed above and it worked. “I got out of one ticket because I said I had new tires and the speedometer was off,” McGoon said. “Once in a blue moon I can get out of a ticket.” McGoon said he has even made up medical emer gencies from time to time. “I know that sounds terrible,” he said. “They did n’t work, they wrote the tickets.” Wendell said that despite almost every person’s attempt to offer an excuse, there really is no excuse for endangering lives. Most police departments set standards for police officers to follow when deciding whether to let a per son go or not, Wendell said. An officer is not supposed to let anyone go with out a valid excuse such as a medical emergency, he said. Meadors said students should realize that most excuses, even the most original and humorous, do not work. “People who admit they are speeding have a bet ter chance of being let go than those who offer excus es,” Meadors said. Most officers agreed students should save their creative ideas for the classroom and not for their Quatn Prince’s ‘Black Album’ finally sees the light of day r score lesday 11/29 igher score PLAI ASS 1 pm) -9 pm) pm) pm) DISCOUNT 845-163] Prince By Rob Clark The Battalion Prince “The Black Album” Warner Bros. Records ★ ★★★ 1/2 (out of five) Yes, it is finally here. The most mysterious album made in recent musical history is available for the first time for a limited time (from Nov. 22 to Jan. 27) on CD. And where there’s mystery and weirdness in music, of course there’s Prince. “The Black Album” was creat ed in 1987 by His Royal Badness. The album was widely regarded as a vicious X-rated tirade by Prince, and anticipation was high for its release. But December release plans were scrapped at the last minute and the spiritual “Lovesexy” al bum was released instead. But a few “Black Album” copies leaked out, and it became the biggest bootlegged album ever. Prices paid for vinyl copies of the album soared to $11,000. In a 1990 Rolling Stone inter view, Prince explained his rea sons behind pulling the album. “I was very angry a lot of the time back then,” he said, “and that was reflected in that album. I suddenly realized that we can die at any moment and we’d be judged by the last thing we left behind. I didn’t want that an gry, bitter thing to be the last thing. I learned from that al bum, but I don’t want to go back.” Luckily for us. Prince has fi nally changed his mind. This anger is what makes the album so stunning. There is no sugary pop-flavored “Kiss” or “Raspberry Beret” on the album. Instead it is raw, hard as hell and, yes, very angry. Simply put, it is Prince at his best. His career has been on a downward spiral since “Lovesexy” bombed with record buyers. “The Black Album” shows the sheer bril liance of Prince before he mud dled things up with movie bombs (“Graffi ti Bridge”) and changing his name to an unpronounceable symbol. The album shows off the grit tiest, grunkiest funk Prince has ever made. P-Funk has nothin’ on Prince when it comes to “Le Grind,” and “Dead On It.” The fact that the album is coming out seven years later shows the difference in musical perceptions. “The Black Album” was considered too racy for radio play, and extremely controver sial. By today’s standards, it’s really not that bad. But the sexual audacity and surprising violence preceded the growth of gangsta rap, and dissed it be fore it even be came popular. Prince rips rap with a scathing dis missal on “Dead On It,” saying “The only good rapper is one that’s dead — on it . . . See the rappers prob lem usually stems from be ing tone deaf/ Pack the house and try to sing / There won’t be no one left.” And Prince busts any rappers’ bravado with “My bed’s a coffin / Dracula ain’t got sh-t on me . . .I’m badder than the wicked witch.” This hard sound is even more amplified on “Bob George,” a dis turbing tale of a jealous boyfriend discovering his wom an’s affairs. But Prince manages to poke fun at himself, when the boyfriend realizes the man she is cheating with happens to man age a musician named Prince. “Who? Prince? That skinny motherf—ker with the high voice? Please,” Prince says The customary sexual themes of Prince’s music come out on “Cindy C.,” a begging for Cindy Crawford to “play with me.” It even reaches the point of “I’m sure you’re intelligent / a wizard of math and all that sh-t but I’m entirely more interested in flying your kite tonight.” Well, no one ever said Prince was chivalrous. Rounding the album out is “Rockhard in a Funky Place,” an other overtly sexual song with an irresistible drum beat and sax break. No holds barred on this one as it is extremely explicit. Prince is in the midst of the biggest slump of his career. Re cent songs like “The Most Beau tiful Girl in the World” prove he is still marketable, but lacking in the usual Princely quality. He’ll never top “Purple Rain” or “Sign O’ the Times,” but “The Black Album” gives us a look back at the man whose musical genius reshaped music as we know it. Perhaps a look back will prompt a look forward, and Prince will find his way once again. students, faculty joining forces to increase community recycling ef Opinion editor , Photo editor sports editor ielife editor itephanie Dube, Ana"® md Kari Whitley am, Tiffany Moore, SW lameron, Blake Grig#' daley Stavinoha ler, Stewart Doreen anti on, Erin Hill, Jeremy asr, Elizabeth Preston, Margaret Claughton —^ ie Battalion Just off of Highway 6, fittingly rrounded by flowers and trees, the Texas A&M Recycling inter. This large warehouse, once ed by Texas Instruments, is frounded by large bins filled to ebrim with newspapers, alu- inum cans and old phone books liting to be sorted. Busy work- dash in and out pushing ®vy containers loaded with pa- akley slle Oleson jring the fall and spring pt University holidays 31 lege Station, TX 77840. nald Building, Texas A&M University in the . Editorial offices are in ?wsroom phone numb®' 'sement by The Battalia 11 tified advertising, call ' are 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. , vt student to pick up 3 10 per school year and Express, call 845-2611 Inside, Joe Sanchez sits be nd an old wooden desk sur- ttnded by recycling posters and ndscape paintings, frantically nulling phone call after phone U. “Yes sir, I’ve pooled my re- lUrces and I’m improvising to "® : lyou more containers,” he po- fely pipes into the phone. Sanchez is the recycling coor- Hiator for the recycling center, Mch handles all of A&M’s recy- itg needs. He and his staff of Udent workers gather recy cle materials from buildings over campus as well as the facilities located through- tt the community. “Out of the 300-plus buildings campus we regularly pick up Dm 158 of them,” he said. Ihere are also a lot of different A&M offices scattered around Bryan—College Station and we pick them up as well.” Last year, Sanchez and his crew picked up 431 tons of recy clable paper and cardboard from A&M. The recycling center’s newsletter said 7,327 trees were saved because of this effort. But plain paper is not the only product the recycling cen ter works with. Among the ma terials collected are aluminum cans, toner cartridges, colored paper, newsprint, computer pa per and phone books. In fact, phone books were the focus for a recent recycling drive. On Nov. 15, named Texas Recycles Day by Gov. Ann Richards, the Texas A&M Recy cling Center, along with city de partments and other community organizations, sponsored a com munity-wide phone book recy cling drive. The result was more than 20 tons of phone books donated to be recycled, a significant im provement from the previous years’ 3 tons. Sanchez said this success is due to the teamwork exhibited by the community. “From everybody on campus and in the community, the coop eration has been phenomenal,” he said. Sanchez said the center has formed a coalition of sorts with the cities of Bryan and College Station, Brazos Beautiful and Brazos Valley Solid Waste Man agement. These organizations help pro mote community awareness and gather materials to be recycled. Other organizations such as Bryan Iron and Metal and the Sunbright Paper Company help process the materials after they have been collected. “We have major cooperation going on just to keep this facility going,” Sanchez said. Students and faculty from A&M have also done their share of contributing to the communi ty’s environmental health. Dr. Roy Hartman, professor of engineering and technology, has helped further the A&M’s recy cling efforts by forming the Cen ter for Recycling and Waste Man agement . Faculty members and stu dents work to create recycling awareness through seminars and other projects. “We put on seminars with var ious speakers addressing topics like EPA regulations or environ mental shopping such as how to buy environmentally-benign products,” he said. Research done by the Center for Recycling and Waste Manage ment has developed many things including a way to make frisbees from milk jugs. One frisbee is made of three recycled milk jugs. The environ mental frisbees were used as in centive gifts at the phone book drive. Although the recycling center and its counterparts have con tributed significantly to the envi ronmental effort, both Hartman and Sanchez would like to see even more. Hartman believes if more offi cials advocate the recycling process, it will become more ef fectively practiced. “I’d like to have top manage ment of the University really en dorse recycling and the purchas ing of recycled content goods,” Hartman said. Sanchez is working with city officials and other environmental chairs to increase the types of materials recycled. Cardboard boxes are one re source Sanchez hates to see wasted. “When students move, they use so many boxes,” he said. “It breaks my heart to see them go into the landfill.” Efforts are also under way to develop effective recycling for dormitories on the A&M campus as well as recycling strategies for apartment complexes. Tim Moog/THF Battalion The Texas A&M Recycling Center recently picked up 20 tons of phone books for recycling, up from 3 tons collected last year.