Recycled paper

Thursday, December 1, 2011 www.theplainsman.com Vol. 118, Issue 14, 18 PagesA Spirit thAt iS Not AfrAid

The Auburn Plainsman

Elizabeth BonnerStaff WrItEr

Don’t worry—the stone eagles perched atop the gates at toomer’s Corner didn’t fly away.

the statues were sent to Wash-ington, D.C., Nov. 11 for repairs and restoration by preservation special-ists at The Lathan Company, which is headquartered in Mobile.

among the statues’ damage was something no one expected: a coat of red paint under the surface of both eagles.

Lathan Company artisans discovered the paint while cleaning them last week.

“apparently the paint is an aerosol type and confined to the breast and front of the eagles,” said Jerry Lathan, founder and CEO of The Lathan Com-pany. “It is (on) both statues and will require a great deal more work on our

part to remove.” the company has no information

regarding who painted the eagles or when.

“The guy I talked to at the Univer-sity has been there 20-something years, and he didn’t know anything about it,” Lathan said. “It looks like it

happened a long time ago, definitely at least 30 years.

“I’m still waiting on my guys to do a little bit more, but short of sending it to some CSI lab, we probably won’t find out what happened.”

The eagles were donated by Wil-liam C. “red” Sugg, a 1931 auburn graduate, but they weren’t placed on the gates until later.

“The gates were a gift of the class of 1917,” said Hal Smith, a volunteer for Special Collections and archives and 1984 auburn graduate. “Origi-nally the gates were crowned with a couple of spheres.

“In the 1960 Glom the gates still had the spheres. In the 1965 Glom the eagles were there, so I think it’s safe to say they were placed some-

InsIde Campus » A1 | Community » A5 | Opinions » A7 | Classifieds » A8 | Sports » B1 | Intrigue » B5

Marching band seeks new home

Rebecca cRoomes / assistant Photo editoR

head drum major daniel Johnson and the marching band performing at the ole miss game.

robert E. LeeaSSIStaNt CaMPUS EDItOr

The band has new uniforms and all-silver-plated brass instruments, but lacks a practice facility to hold it all.

the marching band has a new fundraising campaign in place to raise money for a new state-of-the-art practice facility.

The new band pavilion, adjacent to the football field, was construct-ed this summer with a $1 million grant from the College of Liberal arts. While the structure fits most of the members, it doesn’t allow for effective outdoor practice, said Di-rector of Bands richard Good.

“right now if nasty weath-er comes up, there’s no shelter for band students,” Good said “Most schools have big enough facilities to play in. We can’t play indoors

right now, and if it rains practice has to get canceled.”

The University will match half of the funds raised by the band for the project.

“auburn University bands are a source of pride and enthusiasm for the auburn family,” said Presi-dent Jay Gogue. “They’ve outgrown Goodwin Hall, and I know they’re excited for a new home to rehearse and prepare for their amazing per-formances.”

the band’s current facility in Goodwin was built to house 250 members, but the band now stands at 380 members..

“We need to raise about $5.5 to $6 million, and the overall price stands around $11 million,” Good said.

Practicality also plays a role in the marching band’s needs, said

Head Drum Major Daniel Johnson, as they currently have no central location to house all of their equip-ment, members and directors.

“It really would do more than I can say for the program,” Johnson said. “a new facility would mean a lot to us.”

On gameday the band walks more than a mile from Goodwin to Jordan-Hare Stadium, and some students are forced to keep small instruments in their car because of the lack of time and storage space, Good said.

“What it might be is just people don’t understand everything we do,” Johnson said. “a lot goes into it.”

the band moved to a bigger practice field two years ago when the University built the parking

anna Claire ConradStaff WrItEr

The 4-1-1 is that Project redirec-tory is under way for another year in Opelika.

Opelika City Schools are partici-pating in a Keep Opelika Beautiful ini-tiative from Nov. 15 to Dec. 15 called Project redirectory, in which stu-dents collect old phone books to be recycled and turned into other usable materials.

“Project redirectory is a competi-tion among the Opelika City Schools, grades K through 8th, to see which school can collect the most used phone books,” said tipi Miller, direc-tor of Keep Opelika Beautiful. “adding the competition factor is what makes this initiative so successful.”

She said this will be the project’s sixth year.

“It is the schools’ job to collect and count the phone books,” Miller said. “Once the directories are submitted, the City of Opelika Solid Waste De-partment will transport them to a re-cycling facility.

“There, the phone books will be re-cycled into insulation material, gro-

Old phone books put to new use

Lane JonesStaff WrItEr

If you dream of walking in a winter wonderland, go no farther than the streets of downtown Opelika.

Opelika’s Victorian front Porch tour offers walking and driving tours through city streets adorned with elaborate Christmas displays.

“the Victorian front Porch tour is a self-guided neighborhood tour in which all of the homes on the street are decorated with life-sized papier-mache figures, whether it is Santas, families, angels or elves,” said robyn Bridges, auburn-Opelika tourism Bu-reau communications director. “any-thing related to Christmas, you will see.”

The displays will be on the porch-es of neighborhood homes along 8th and 9th streets of historic downtown Opelika. The streets are open for driv-ing Wednesday through friday, as well as on Sunday.

“On Saturday they close the streets, and it is for walking tours only,” Bridg-es said. “They also feature live enter-tainment with costume, carolers and various things like that to enhance the night.”

This year will be downtown Ope-

Porch tour brings Santa’s village to life

Toomer’s concrete eagles missing from pedestals

AU Alert addresses delays, changesMegan SmithWrItEr

Some new features are being add-ed to the aU alert system.

The original aU alert was imple-mented in November 2007 and re-lied on text messages and email to notify students of campus safety con-cerns. Now, aU alert can be followed on twitter and facebook, and voice command-capable phones have been integrated into the system.

there are also sirens and voice alarms in several buildings on campus.

“We’re also working out a desktop alerting system,” said Susan McCallis-ter, director of public safety and infor-mation and education at the Univer-sity. “anyone who loads it will have it pop up when aU alert is activated.”

Once texts are sent by aU alert’s vendor, High Ground Solutions, it is up to the student’s phone service to get the texts through. However, Mc-Callister said cellphone towers are affected any time a storm is passing through the area.

“a storm can cause delays, or peo-ple contacting each other to make sure they are OK could inherently create delays in the system,” McCal-lister said.

When tornadoes hit auburn Nov. 16, students complained they did not receive an aU alert until the tornado warning had expired or after they had already been ushered into a shelter on campus.

“It is the nature of this type of alert-ing system,” McCallister said. “You can’t contact 30,000 people in a small geographic area at the same time. There are limitations.”

McCallister said there is an anal-ysis performed after each alert, and the vendor has identified a few things that went wrong with the tornado watch alerts.

“The vendor made a few changes, and they did not think it would have this impact on the alerts,” McCallis-ter said. “It was an unintended con-sequence, but we did have a number of people who reported getting them very promptly.”

McCallister said another problem is that students enter their parent’s

contRibuted

holiday choo-choo train rides around downtown opelika.

contRibuted

a rendering of the what the band wants their future practice facility to look like.

Rebecca cRoomes / assistant Photo editoR

the toomer’s concrete eagles were removed from their pedestals for repair.

TWEET US!@TheAUPlainsmanKnow someone interesting in the community? Have a strong opinion on an issue? follow our twitter page and tell us what you think.

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Tornadoupdate

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We’ll see you next yearUnfortunately, this is the last print issue of the Plainsman this semester, but the news doesn’t stop here. Visit the Plainsman twitter, facebook and website over the break to stay informed.

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Campus A2 The Auburn Plainsman Thursday, December 1, 2011

AUBIE NEEDS YOUR VOTE!

Vote for Aubie by texting “Aubie” to 785-27 or by Voting online At

www.cApitAlonebowl.com

number first rather than their own.

“The first number needs to be the student’s cell number because they go out first,” Mc-Callister said. “The numbers are randomized for all facul-ty, staff and students. The sys-tem randomly contacts a first batch, then a second batch.”

Kiersten Wones, junior in Spanish and English, said she was already in a shelter when her alert came.

“We were having lunch in the Student Center when a tor-nado warning came over the

loudspeaker,” Wones said. “We got up to leave to go to Haley, but they told everyone to go to the first floor and we ended up in a back hallway by the ser-vice elevator.”

Wones received her AU Alert five minutes before the warning expired, but said it is nice to have a system in place regardless.

“I’ve gotten an AU Alert once every few months over the past few years,” Wones said. “I usually know about whatever it is before I get them, but it is really helpful to know when things are over. I like that follow-up messages are sent.”

time in the early 1960s.”Auburn decided to send

both eagles for touch-ups. “With some carving tools

we’re going to restore some of the detailing that was on them (where) you can see some of the weathered fea-tures now,” Lathan said.

Lathan said the statues are carved of white marble that is

not suitable to sit outside for many years.

“They’re not going to live forever in a weathering envi-ronment,” Lathan said. “My suggestion to Auburn is that we have some kind of cam-

paign to replace them.”Whether or not Auburn

plans to take Lathan’s ad-vice and replace the eagles in the future, the statues are ex-pected to be back in place by Christmas.

lika’s 16th year hosting the event.

“It’s a fun time to be out and about in that area and historic neighborhood,” Bridges said. “There are people here who make sure the figures always look their best and that there’s new enhancements every year.”

One of those people is Di-ann Cullinan, coordinator of the front porch tours.

When the original direc-tor left Opelika five years ago, Cullinan was chosen as the re-placement.

“They needed someone to keep the event going because the city loved it so much,” Cul-linan said. “They contacted me because I’m an artist and

person that could keep the display in good condition.”

The front porch displays began with only a couple of homes, but as interest grew the event expanded to include 60 homes and 10 city blocks.

“People began to say, ‘Oh, I like that! Let’s put one on my porch!’ And it just grew,” Cul-linan said. “The whole neigh-borhood just got involved.”

Cullinan said the city ex-pects more than 10,000 visi-tors this year.

“It brings people in from all over the country, not just this area,” Cullinan said.

“It has been written up in Better Homes and Gardens and Southern Living. The Tourism Bureau has ranked this one of its top tourism events.”

cery bags and other paper products, such as paper tow-els or more phone books.”

Miller said the school that collects the most used phone books will receive a $1,000 prize.

“The second-place win-ner will receive $700, and the third-place winner will re-

ceive $500,” Miller said. “All Opelika City Schools that par-ticipate in this project will re-ceive $100. We encourage the schools to use the money to-ward promoting environmen-tal awareness and causes.”

Becky Brown, Opelika City Schools public relations co-ordinator, said this is healthy competition for Opelika youth.

“The benefit of this compe-tition is that we recycle all of these old phone books as op-posed to them being thrown away and ending up in a land-fill,” Brown said.

Brown said Project Redirec-tory also teaches students the importance of recycling and respecting the environment.

“The kids get really into this project,” Brown said. “The

competitive nature of Project Redirectory is a direct factor of its success, but behind that is the students wanting to be more conscientious about the environment.”

For more information on Project Redirectory or where to drop off old phone books, contact Miller at 334-749-4970 or Brown at 334-745-9700.

AU Alert» From A1

Phone book» From A1

toUr» From A1

eAgles» From A1

deck and Office of Information Technology building, but have still had setbacks in their abili-ty to practice.

“In order to continue to move forward, we need to pro-vide students with an ade-quate facility,” said Corey Spur-lin, marching band director.

“This new facility is ex-

tremely important. It’s an ur-gent need.”

Spurlin also said the band is a University class that students have to register for.

“Every class should have a place to meet indoors,” he said.

Other universities in the SEC, such as LSU, recent-ly built a new facility and The University of Alabama has a fundraiser for a new facility as well.

bAnd» From A1

Nov. 25 — South College StreetBurglary of residence reported. $200

Nov. 25 — East Longleaf DriveBurglary of residence reported. Three gold bracelets and two blank checks

Nov. 25 — Lee Road 137Burglary of residence reported. One compound bow, one laptop computer and two iPod speakers

Nov. 26 — Lee Road 191Auto theft reported. One license plate

Nov. 26 — East Samford AvenueTheft of property reported. One gold oval locket

Nov. 26 — South College StreetTheft of property reported. One valour twill sofa slipcover

Nov. 26 — US Highway 280 WestTheft of property reported. One 10-channel sound mixing board and two 10” speakers

Nov. 26 — South Ross StreetAuto theft reported. Silver Honda

Nov. 26 — North Gay StreetBreaking and entering of a vehicle reported. One GPS, one computer bag, one laptop, one Playstaion 3, one video game and one Nook

Nov. 26 — Summertrees DriveBurglary of residence reported. Four-teen various guns, 40 rare silver and

gold coins, two strong boxes and one Nintendo

Nov. 26 — East Samford Avenue Breaking and entering of a vehicle reported. One camera, one GPS and one shaving kit bag

Nov. 26 — Shug Jordan ParkwayBurglary of residence reported. One John Deere gator

Nov. 26 — Wire Rd. Auto theft reported. Black Ford Ranger

— Reports provided by Auburn Department of Public Safety

Crime rePorts for nov. 25 – nov. 26, 2011dUi Arrests in the City of AUbUrn nov. 26 – nov. 27, 2011

■ William C. Smith, 19, of MontgomeryMary Lane at Hams Avenue Nov. 26, 3:55 a.m.

■ Kerstien L. Peake, 20, of WetumpkaE. Glenn Avenue Nov. 26, 6:08 a.m.

■ Joshua R. Montee, 20, of MontgomeryN. Gay Street at Shelton Mill Road Nov. 26, 7:38 a.m.

■ Joshua L. Lamb, 23, of EvansvilleShug Jordan Parkway Nov. 27, 1:58 a.m.

■ John T. Piazza, 18, of CincinnatiS. Donahue Drive at Lem Morrison Road

—Arrests provided by Auburn Department of Public Safety

Thursday, December 1, 2011 The Auburn Plainsman Campus A3

Sarah CookWriTer

instead of hitting the beach for vacation, some students hit the streets during school breaks to give back and impact communities in a positive way.

Originally founded under impact, Alternative Student Breaks is pushing to be its own student organization recog-nized by the Student Govern-ment Association.

ASB, which belongs to the national alternative breaks or-ganization Break Away, began in spring 2008 to offer students the opportunity to participate in community service projects during academic breaks.

The alternative break move-ment began at Vanderbilt Uni-versity in 1996, said ASB advis-er Tim King, and Vanderbilt’s group does between 30 and 40 alternative breaks each year.

“in 10 years, i would love to

see us doing that many trips each year,” King said.

Trip locations are usually centered on one issue, such as affordable housing construc-tion or community develop-ment, said Hamp Price, senior in biomedical sciences and ASB director.

“We have site leaders for each trip, and they are the ones who are planning it,” Price said. “We’ve sort of trained them to find an issue that they are pas-sionate about and plan the trip based on that issue.”

ASB has four trips planned over winter break and five planned for spring break.

“The other trip that we have in January is during Martin Lu-ther King weekend,” said Kylie Hastings, junior in mathemat-ics education and assistant di-rector of publicity. “They’re go-ing to be working with home-lessness and urban poverty is-

sues in Atlanta.”Price said his interest in ASB

began when he heard about the organization through friends while he was an impact project coordinator.

“After participating in ASB one year, i knew i’d be interest-ed in participating again, and so i said i would lead a trip,” Price said.

in an effort to increase awareness about ASB, Price said he and other students in-volved in the program have been trying to publicize the or-ganization more.

Along with local trips, ASB also travels abroad for service projects.

“Our three international lo-cations are Costa rica, Do-minican republic and ecua-dor right now,” Price said. “Our ecuador trip is in the winter.”

Hastings said students trav-eling to ecuador will be work-

ing on community develop-ment and building a church in the area.

Price said one of his favorite memories while on an ASB trip was when his group was in-volved in a slight fender-bend-er in Costa rica.

“We had to wait for help on the side of the road for two hours,” Price said. “But every-one was so positive and con-tent to be sitting there instead of hiking to a waterfall or play-ing with kids or building a house.”

Price said that was when he saw what a great group of peo-ple he was with and how much he loved ASB.

“You come together, for the most part, as complete strang-ers, but then you become re-ally close in the common goal of service,” Price said. “i’ve met some of my best friends through this program.”

ASB takes no winter breakContributed

Meredith blaylock, senior in nursing, is part of a three-person jump rope team during a spring 2011 service trip to Costa rica.

elizabeth SegarraWriTer

Thanks to the Delta Sigma Theta sorority, an Auburn fam-ily was able to enjoy an unex-pected meal this Thanksgiving holiday.

Delta Sigma Theta is a com-munity service-based sorori-ty on campus, and by Novem-ber it had collected more than 75 pounds of food for one Au-burn family.

“One sister in our sorority volunteers at J.F. Drake Mid-dle School,” said Kara White, senior in biomedical scienc-es and member of Delta Sigma Theta. “She found out from a school counselor that one stu-dent at the middle school has a household with 11 people.”

The sisters decided to col-lect food for the Jones family in honor of Thanksgiving, and it marked the first time Del-ta Sigma Theta has collected food for a family as a service project.

in order to collect as much food as possible, the group used many different advertis-ing strategies, including set-ting up a table on the Con-course to tell passing students about the food drive, post-ing fliers and broadcasting ra-dio advertisements through WeGL.

“We also advertised our ser-vice project on Facebook and Twitter,” said Jasmine Shaw, senior in human development and family studies and sorori-ty treasurer.

The food collection was not limited to students, howev-er. Delta Sigma Theta also col-lected food from Auburn lo-cals, holding a “Donation Day” the first Wednesday of every month.

White also said they re-ceived help from Johnny Green, pastor at Cross roads Community Church.

Green told his parishioners about the project, and the sis-ters were able to make collec-tions at the church on dona-tion days.

The sisters delivered the food to the Jones family Nov. 15.

White said the Jones family knew they would benefit from this service project, but what they didn’t know was how much food had been collected for them.

“When they saw how much food we collected, they were amazed,” White said.

Delta Sigma Theta plans to continue with organizing ser-vice projects for this family in the future.

“We want to redo their house, like ‘extreme Make-over,’” White said.

She also said they feel espe-cially connected to this family because a sorority member of-ten volunteers with one of the Jones children.

“Delta Sigma Theta will do any community service, but serving local people in Auburn is most important to us,” Shaw said.

Family surprised with free meal

Hayley BlairASSOCiATe CAMPUS eDiTOr

Students may want to pay more attention to those mil-itary recruiters pacing the Concourse.

As the armed forces con-tinue to tighten recruiting standards, more college grad-uates are being sought out to join the military.

“We need intelligent peo-ple,” said Jason Long, recruit-er for the National Guard. “The days of people joining the military to get out of trou-ble or because they had no other option … are over. We need more educated people and a higher quality soldier. College graduates are exactly what we’re looking for.”

Students may be intimidat-ed by the prospect of pursu-ing a military career after fo-cusing on other professional goals, but Long said it might be an ideal option for those

with overwhelming student loans.

Once a student joins the military, it’s possible to have $50,000 worth of loans repaid by the government, and most college graduates who do well on the military’s aptitude test, the Armed Services Vocation-al Aptitude Battery, can be commissioned as officers.

Long said many students don’t take this path, however.

“if a student hasn’t come into the rOTC program al-ready, it’s a little harder to get a college student to come into the military,” Long said. “it’s unfortunate because that’s really what we’re looking for. We’re looking for educated people, and right now there’s a shortage of officers in Ala-bama’s National Guard.”

ron Burgess, assistant ad-missions officer for rOTC, said only about 3 percent of Auburn’s student population

is enrolled in rOTC.“You’re not joining the mili-

tary when you do rOTC,” Bur-gess said. “it’s a path to be-coming an officer. You com-plete the requirements to commission as an officer while you complete the re-quirements for your degree. That’s much different from enlisting or joining.”

A.J. Wilkins, junior in com-puter engineering, isn’t in rOTC, but has decided to en-list in the Air Force.

“it was something i’d been debating since about the 11th grade or so,” Wilkins said. “it’s not a decision you can make on a whim. it can affect your present, it can affect your fu-ture. They can call you any time to take you away from college. it just depends.”

Wilkins is a member of the reserves and has not yet re-ceived a call to action, but he’s become a kind of “weekend

warrior,” training and working for the military on set week-ends each month.

“One of the main reasons i did it was that i’d really been wanting to serve my country for a while, and i couldn’t put it off any longer,” Wilkins said. “i had that desire in my heart and my head to do it.”

Burgess said the military is a good option for students, but they must make sure they are dedicated to fulfilling their duties before joining.

“Many have a misconcep-tion about what it means to serve and what you’re going to do and where you’re go-ing to go when you’re serv-ing in the military,” Burgess said. “There’s also many who would like to do it who, when they register for rOTC, don’t want to do what it takes to be an officer. There are also those who wish to serve their coun-try in a different way.”

Military recruiting shifts to graduatesMaria iaMpietro / photo editor

recruiters on South College can help students register for military aptitude tests and learn requirements for joining the armed forces.

SUNDAY MONDAY TUESDAY WEDNESDAY THURSDAY FRIDAY SATURDAY11 171615141312

AlTERNATIvE STUDENT BREAkS: SATURDAY, DEc. 10 – SUNDAY, DEc. 18

Helping Children with Special Needs - Kissimmee, FloridaAssisting the elderly - Savannah, GeorgiaAffordable Housing Construction - Punta Gorda, Florida

Community Development (construction, literacy, teaching english, etc.) - Quito, ecuador

Anna Claire ConradSTAFF WriTer

The process behind re-placing a dean is more in-tricate than students may think.

“Auburn has had several deans replaced in the past few years for various rea-sons, such as the previous dean retiring, being fired or simply moving on,” said Nor-man Godwin, associate dean of academic affairs in the College of Business.

Godwin said a college in need of a new dean will ad-vertise the open position.

“Normally, a search com-mittee is formed within the college consisting of staff representatives, faculty members, student represen-tatives from the undergrad-uate and graduate curricu-lums,” Godwin said. “We try to get a wide representation of the folks that the dean will work with.”

Godwin said a search firm is often employed to help lo-cate candidates.

“We are the consultants of this process,” said William Funk, founder and president of r. William Funk & Associ-ates. “We present the Univer-sity’s search committee with candidates, after which it is the committee’s responsibil-ity to evaluate the pool and ultimately recommend three or four persons to report to the University for further in-terviews and to meet all of their constituents. The pro-vost and the president will make the final decision from there.”

Funk said his firm has a longstanding relationship with Auburn, and it played a role in selecting the new pro-vost and new deans for col-leges including the College of engineering and the College of Architecture.

“A good amount of deans have stepped down in recent years because the instabili-ty the University faced with grounding a new president before Dr. Gogue came into the picture is no longer pres-ent,” Funk said. “Many of the older deans felt it was their

responsibility to stay around until stability was reached. Now that the University has Dr. Gogue, these older deans have decided to retire or, in some cases, return to the classroom.”

Godwin said two types of interviews take place.

“The first interview is sometimes called the ‘air-port interview,’ which is when the search committee flies in candidates and meets with them at a hotel or at the airport to conduct the first round of interviews,” God-win said. “From that pool the committee chooses a couple candidates to invite to cam-pus for public interviews.”

Godwin said the second round of interviews usually lasts one full day.

“This is when the candi-dates basically meet every-one they will potentially be working with,” Godwin said. “From there we make a sug-gestion to the president and the provost as to who’s best for the position.”

Godwin said many deans continue the work and proj-ects of their predecessor.

“As long as we find the work to be applicable to our office and to the University, we will continue a previous dean’s work,” Godwin said. “However, if the new dean decides to drop a particular project and begin a new ini-tiative, he or she may do so.”

Godwin also said stu-dents’ opinions and con-cerns are crucial to the search process and to the fo-cus the new dean’s work will take.

Staff cycle ends with new deans

“Many of the older deans felt it was their responsibility to stay around until stability was reached.”

—William Funk PreSiDeNT, r. WiLLiAM

FUNK & ASSOCiATeS

Campus A4 The Auburn Plainsman Thursday, December 1, 2011

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Sloane HudsonWriTer

Professor. Business owner. Wife and mother.

Mandy Harrelson, profes-sor in the College of Business, exemplifies what it is to be a multi-tasker.

Harrelson, an Auburn alumna, was presented with an opportunity to open her own branch of Northwestern Mutual, a Fortune 500 compa-ny that provides financial ad-vice.

Northwestern Mutual prides itself on representa-tives establishing close rela-tionships with their clients.

Harrelson interviewed for a representative job in Mont-gomery, but was presented with a different opportunity.

“The nearest office is in Montgomery, so when i inter-viewed there they wanted me to commute,” Harrelson said. “The problem there is, it’s so relationship-based. Thankful-ly, the district director really believed in me and had faith that i could start an office in Opelika.”

Harrelson opened the Ope-lika branch in June 2005 the day after she returned home from her honeymoon.

Business owner is not the only role Harrelson plays on a daily basis, as she is also a pro-fessor of finance at Auburn.

After receiving a call from John Jahera, dean of the fi-nance department, Harrel-son decided to give teaching a chance.

“i was hesitant because i had never taught before, and he said, ‘Well, you’ve always tutored our students, and the other professors think very highly of you and would like for you to come on,’” Harrel-son said.

Harrelson said balancing the many responsibilities she has with two jobs isn’t always easy, but she has found a way to manage her time.

“Balancing the two at first was a struggle,” Harrelson said, “but now that i’ve got-ten used to it, i can manage the two quite nicely because i teach the same class. Sure,

there are tweaks i have to make, but i don’t have to pre-pare for an entirely separate class.”

Levale Speigner, finan-cial assistant at the Opelika branch, enjoys working with Harrelson because of her com-mitment to both of her titles.

“She handles balancing the two very well,” Speigner said. “She does a great job balanc-ing taking care of our needs as a rep as well as handle her cli-ents and her workload.”

According to Matthew Dix-on, another financial assis-tant at the firm, Harrelson has struck the perfect balance in managing her time with the many different people that need her attention.

“One good thing is that she only has classes in the morn-ing and has the afternoon to focus on things here,” Dix-on said. “She’s got a husband, child, students, co-workers—all these people to look after, and she does a great job with that.

“As an educator, she wants to be sure (the students) are learning financial stability.”

This is a lesson Harrelson said she considers extreme-ly important for her students to learn.

“i do have a passion for the idea that everyone, no matter

what your degree is, needs to know basic finance,” Harrel-son said. “Our society is not very financially savvy in basic saving skills.”

Harrelson tells her students that they shouldn’t expect to be in the same financial po-sition as their parents upon graduation.

Harrelson also said one ad-vantage of being both a finan-cial adviser and a professor is that she is able to apply real-

world situations to the class-room.

“i’ ll use examples from my clients at NM—obviously without using their names—but i can use their situations and ask students how they should structure their in-come,” Harrelson said.

“if i can get five students to think about budgeting and saving by the time they grad-uate, i’ve done something im-pactful.”

Professor juggles teaching, business

Sloane HudsonWriTer

Auburn University is team-ing up with Southern Union State Community College to offer a Graduate equivalen-cy Diploma for students who have not received their high school diploma.

The GeD program was ex-tended to Auburn’s campus Nov. 17.

“What we have done here is extended Southern Union’s program onto the Auburn campus in order to provide that service to the greater Au-burn and Opelika area,” said James Witte of Auburn’s adult education program.

Witte said individuals will meet on campus in Wallace Hall to receive GeD instruc-tion and testing, and partici-pants will also be eligible for workforce development train-ing including resume writing and job interviewing skills.

“When someone completes the GeD, they are perfectly eli-gible to enter either work skills programs or the academic programs at Southern Union,” Witte said. “Or for that mat-ter, with their complete test-ing out of the way they can en-ter Auburn University with the GeD.”

Classes will be available Thursday evenings and will be led by Southern Union instruc-tor Georgia Love.

Witte said individuals en-tering the program are first given a placement test.

“if your placement score

says you need to develop math skills, but your english skills are very good, you will min-imize time studying english and focus on the math skills,” Witte said.

“everyone in the GeD pro-gram has an individualized program of study. The object is to bring you in, find out where you need help, get you trained in that area and graduate.”

Derika Griffin, director of adult education at Southern Union, said it is perfect timing to extend the program to Au-burn’s campus.

“We have excellent candi-dates throughout the Auburn area, and the objective is to el-evate their educational status,” Griffin said.

royrickers Cook, assistant vice president for Universi-ty Outreach, said the more instruction an individual re-ceives, the better off he or she will be.

“receiving your GeD will put a person in the position to have a better quality of life,” Cook said. “Overall, it’s ex-tremely important that we emphasize helping with these needs.”

Cook said Auburn is proud to support individuals who wish to participate in the GeD program.

“if you have individuals who have not finished high school, but have enough courage and interest to go and pursue the GeD equivalent, then it is im-perative that we support that,” Cook said.

Congratulations and best wishes to

Katie & Carson December 31, 2011!

Congratulations and best wishes to

Katie & Carson December 31, 2011!

Alex SAger / ASSociAte Photo editor

harrelson’s branch of Northwestern Mutual is located in an office building in downtown opelika.

Auburn offers GED program

Alex SAger / ASSociAte Photo editor

harrelson spends time in her opelika business office and some time in the classroom. harrelson said she has learned to balance both.

Thursday, December 1, 2011 www.theplainsman.com Community

Community A5

Campus, community unite for the holidaysKristen OliverWriter

Auburn is ringing in the hol-iday season with hot choc-olate, caroling and one big Christmas tree.

Student Government As-sociation and University Pro-gram Council are co-spon-soring a holiday celebration Thursday at 6:30 p.m. on Sam-ford Lawn.

“We will be lighting the hol-iday tree,” said Olivia Hutchin-son, junior in public relations and SGA director of the holi-day celebration. “it’s actually a stationary tree that’s on Sam-

ford Lawn all year long. it’s near the corner of College and Thach.”

The tree lighting will be the highlight of this year’s holiday celebration.

“i love the way Auburn is decorated for Christmas ev-ery year,” said Sara Vaughan, junior in early childhood edu-cation. “A lot of people will go take pictures in front of the tree with their friends.”

Auburn Mayor Bill Ham will join the community to light the tree.

“He does a big ‘War eagle,’ and on the ‘Hey!’ the tree lights

up,” Hutchinson said. “it’s a cool little moment.”

Other aspects of the cele-bration include keynote speak-ers, music and children’s activ-ities.

“We’re having children’s choirs come from the sur-rounding elementary schools,” said rachel McKinnon, unde-clared sophomore and SGA as-sistant director of the celebra-tion. “They’re going to come up and sing four songs during the program.”

the Auburn University choirs and AU Cappella will sing several popular Christ-

mas carols, and Hutchinson said there will be entertain-ment for people of all ages at the lighting.

“We’ll have a couple differ-ent tables set up at the event and free hot chocolate, apple cider and cookies,” Hutchin-son said. “We’ll also have a ta-ble where kids can write letters to Santa.”

Hutchinson said she’s hop-ing to involve the communi-ty even more this year. Many stores downtown will stay open past closing, and the Ho-tel at Auburn University will reveal its gingerbread village

after the event.The celebration will also be

an opportunity for people to

give back to the community.“the biggest thing about

the event is collecting toys for toys for tots,” Hutchin-son said. “Those toys have to be new and unwrapped. Any-one is welcome to bring them, whether community mem-bers, students, faculty, anyone.”

SGA President Kirby tur-nage and UPC President Anne Smead will both speak at the event.

“While they’re speaking, we are lighting a unity candle,” Hutchinson said, “so every-

“It’s a moment of unity of all of the Auburn Family, Auburn community, students, faculty—everyone at the event being one.”

—Olivia Hutchinson HOLiDAy CeLeBrAtiOn DireCtOr

» See Holidays, A6

Bluegrass band rings in the holiday seasonLane JonesStAff Writer

it’s going to be a blue Christmas in Opelika—bluegrass that is.

As part of “Christmas in a rail-road town,” downtown Opelika is hosting the Bluegrass Christmas Concert at transformations Life Center Dec. 9 from 6–9 p.m.

“there’ll be some traditional Christmas carols being played by a four-man bluegrass band,” said Ann Stroud, concert coordinator. “it will be a free way for the commu-nity to start celebrating for Christ-mas. ‘Christmas in a railroad town’ is a traditional Opelika event, but this is the first time we’re having the band here.”

the Bluegrass Christmas Con-cert features the local band Wire-Grass.

“We wanted a name that was fairly local,” said Philip Stroud, WireGrass banjo player and Ann’s husband. “the Wiregrass is a lit-tle south of here. We were thinking about calling ourselves Grassahol-ics Anonymous, but that wouldn’t work with the kids.”

through his wife’s work with transformations, Philip and his band were contacted to perform at the event.

“transformations asked us to do this because they’re a new and up-coming business,” Philip said. “A psychologist owns it, and she pro-motes well-being. We promote what she loves, and that’s music. She could probably have had any group come in there to perform, but i think the kind of music we play is really upbeat, foot-stomping, high energy and loud.”

The band formed when three of its members who worked together were asked to play some carols at an office party. Philip said this con-cert will take them back to those roots.

“When we play at transfor-mations this time, we’ll be play-

ing Christmas music, which is real fun,” Philip said. “Between the songs we’ll be doing hardcore bluegrass. We’re usually real high-energy, and of course we’ll take requests.”

Ken Prestridge, the band’s gui-tarist and lead singer, said the mu-sic selection will combine bluegrass classics and holiday favorites with Opelika’s history as a railroad town.

“About a third of them will be Christmas carols, a third will be bluegrass instrumentals, and a third will be bluegrass vocals,” Pre-stridge said. “Going with the theme that was suggested, we’re doing a lot of train songs.”

As the wife of a member and a transformations employee, Ann has the responsibility of both host-ing and promoting the event.

“i think downtown Opelika is taking on a new flavor than what we are used to around here,” Ann said. “i hope it’s a nice beginning to the Christmas season and that peo-ple can come to see what down-town Opelika has to offer.”

Philip encouraged college stu-dents to attend the concert for an authentic bluegrass experience.

“if they haven’t heard this mu-sic, when it’s played in front of their face they’ll fall in love with it,” Phil-ip said. “if college kids come to see us, they are more than welcome to sing along or play along if they have a guitar. i don’t mind jamming.”

City cleans up after tornado

Alison McferrinneWS eDitOr

Auburn and Opelika residents are still putting the pieces back togeth-er after the nov. 16 tornado, and local officials say cleanup is progressing.

“When the tornadoes hit we actu-ally had people in the field very close to that location where the storm hit,” said Auburn Public Works direc-tor and city engineer Jeffrey ramsey. “And so we were really able to mobi-lize very quickly.”

ramsey said city workers were evaluating the damage within 15 minutes, and the roads were cleared within three to four hours.

Kathrine raines, Lee County emergency Management Agency di-rector, said they also began coordi-

nating efforts to help those impacted almost immediately after the storms came through.

“What we do here is coordinate the response of the community,” raines said. “if anyone has any needs—any kind of assistance that they’re look-ing for, whether it be in cutting trees or whatever they need—if they would please call 2-1-1, we have had some offers from some faith-based groups to help people.”

raines said the efforts by the red Cross and the Salvation Army were fantastic.

“We didn’t have enough people to even open shelters, so the red Cross was placing them in hotels,” raines said. “They were also helping some (renters) find … another place to rent.”

ramsey said about 1,000 trees were downed by the storms, and approxi-mately 237 structures were damaged.

Exotic pets provide hobby and legacy

KAte Jones / IntrIgue edItor

two tornadoes touched down in Auburn nov. 16, damaging approximately 237 structures, like this home on elkins drive. the storms also downed about 1,000 trees. Auburn Public Works estimates another 2–3 weeks until all debris is cleared.

nIcK BoWmAn / oPInIons edItor

Petz unleashed, located on south college street next to Winn-dixie, offers the commu-nity another option besides cats and dogs, such as liz-ards, birds, bunnies and rats.

» See Tornado, A6

Cleanup progressing as expected

Guidelines for debris removal

• Debrisshouldbeplacedatthecurbnolaterthan6a.m.onregu-largarbagedays.

• Nohouseholdgarbage,hazard-ouswasteorotherunacceptablewasteshouldbemixedinwithdebris.

• Debrisshouldnotbeplacedintheroadway,onoraroundstormdrains,nearutilitylines,onutilityboxesoronvacantlots.

• Limbsandotherdebrisshouldbenolongerthan5feet.

• Separateallwooddebris,includ-inglimbsandgrassclippings,frommetalitems.

• Formoreinformation,calltheCityofAuburnEnvironmentalServicesDepartmentat334-501-3080.

“We were thinking about calling ourselves grassaholics Anonymous, but that wouldn’t work with the kids.”

—Philip StroudWireGrASS BAnJO PLAyer

nick BowmanOPiniOnS eDitOr

“The biggest problem with most pet stores is it’s about money, and that’s the last thing it should be about.”

for Stacy Hall and her fam-ily, owning and operating Petz Unleashed on South Col-lege Street next to Winn-Dixie is a tough hobby, not a tough job.

“it’s been fun,” Hall said. “But it isn’t easy. it’s 80–90 hours a week, because even when you leave you don’t leave it. you can’t take a va-cation.

“every animal in here has to be fed. Christmas Day peo-ple are opening gifts. Christ-mas Day i’m in here feeding animals.”

Hall and her husband Kyle are Auburn natives who wanted to have something they could leave behind for

their children. They said one of the ways to do that was to go in a different route from most other pet stores.

“We wanted a communi-ty-type store,” Stacy said. “We wanted a place where peo-ple can come in and just hang out.”

“it’s a lot like a petting zoo,” Kyle said. “This is a place peo-ple can come in and pick up and handle the animals.”

Shawna Ware, owner of a ball python and a corn snake and a resident of Beauregard, said she goes to the store to buy mice.

“They’re always so helpful,” Ware said. “A few weeks back i had some trouble with my corn snake, and i went to Pet-Co, and they couldn’t figure it out. They told me to try this place and i did. They fixed my little guy up right away.”

Petz Unleashed sells bun-

nies, guinea pigs, rats and mice, birds, snakes, lizards, turtles, spiders, scorpions, centipedes and freshwater and saltwater fish.

Stacy said the strang-est—and scariest—animal to come through their door was a crocodile monitor.

“He was about 5-and-a-half feet,” she said. “They’re arbo-real, so his claws were so long that him just walking on you splits your arms open. We had to redo a cage specifically to have him in it.”

the Halls said they want to expand, and the way to do that is to be helpful.

“We do enjoy it, we love it, but it’s stressful,” Stacy said. “We’re very cautious of where our animals come from. We like to get everything private-ly bred.

“you’re not promoting the same thing everyone else

is promoting. you don’t get them in the store and get them sold and make a quick buck.”

She said the best example is a pair of sun conures that have been in the store for 14 months.

“When we sell those, we’ll have lost a lot of money on them,” Stacy said.

Kyle said he started spend-ing time at the store with its previous owners, and when he found out they wanted to sell, he was willing to buy. When the Halls took over the store, policies changed dras-tically.

“We have an open door policy,” Stacy said. “the hu-mane society has enough is-sues and enough going on without people dumping snakes on them. We’re a lit-tle better equipped for things like that.”

Community A6 The Auburn Plainsman Thursday, December 1, 2011

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one in the audience will have a candle to light. It’s a mo-ment of unity of all of the Au-burn Family, Auburn commu-nity, students, faculty—every-one at the event being one at

that moment in time.”McKinnon said she likes be-

ing able to celebrate Christ-mas in Auburn.

“It’s been a blast, and I love Christmas time,” she said. “It’s my favorite season. It’s just fun to get to plan stuff for it, espe-cially being in Auburn because

usually Christmas is kind of an at-home thing. Having it here, too, has been great.”

Vaughan also said she en-joys celebrating the holidays at school.

“Celebrating Christmas here makes Auburn feel more like home.”

Holidays» From A5

The public works department focuses on removing debris that residents place on streets outside of homes.

“It could be as much as three or four weeks before everybody gets everything moved to the right-of-way, and then we can haul it off,” Ramsey said.

Power outages were anoth-er aspect of the storm’s dam-age.

“A number of power poles were broken, (and) a number of trees were on power lines and brought the lines down,” said Mike Jordan, external af-

fairs manager for Alabama Power Company, Southern Di-vision.

He said the tornado, along with the accompanying straight-line winds, resulted in the loss of power for about 12,000 people in the area.

“Because we were able to get more crews in, it allowed us to restore the power much faster than we would have oth-erwise,” Jordan said.

The more localized damage meant crews in other areas of the state could assist the Au-burn and Montgomery areas.

“Most everyone had power by 4 o’clock that next morn-ing,” he said.

Raines said some people

may have thought the tornado sirens were the regular week-ly tests.

“We never test the sirens on Wednesday when there’s any threatening weather,” Raines said. “But this is the first time that I’m aware of that we have ever had a real tornado warn-ing that close to Wednesday at noon.”

Raines also said people shouldn’t rely on the sirens as their primary alert system.

“The outdoor warning si-rens are actually not meant to warn people in their homes,” Raines said. “We strongly en-courage people to have a NOAA weather radio in their home.”

Tornado» From A5

Meredith HallWRITeR

Other than Aubie, Trey Johnston may be the most rec-ognized tiger in Auburn.

The owner and CeO of J&M Bookstore has deep roots in this city and its traditions.

“My mother fainted (when she was pregnant) with me on Toomer’s Corner, and she was revived by the lemonade,” Johnston said.

So began the life of an Au-burn celebrity.

A product of the Auburn

school system, Johnston said he remembers the strong con-nection he had to the Univer-sity even before he entered Auburn’s College of Busi-ness. Playing sports in middle school and high school, John-ston said he felt he was repre-senting more than just his am-ateur team.

“When you’re a kid grow-ing up in Auburn, you’re a part of the University whether you want it or not,” Johnston said. “You better take on the chal-lenge.”

even though Johnston ex-pressed an interest in busi-ness, he never anticipated car-rying on the family trade.

“It’s kind of a wonderful story,” Johnston said. “I nev-er thought when I was going to Auburn that I’d be working in the college bookstore my whole life.”

every home football game includes the tradition of hand-

ing out stickers at J&M. “It’s so crowded in the store

on gameday,” Johnston said. “I wanted people to have some-thing from J&M.”

Johnston has handed out free stickers to fans for almost 25 years.

Another famous J&M tradi-tion, the tiger growl, arose ac-cidentally.

“It wasn’t any marketing ge-nius,” Johnston said.

After shooting several failed takes for a commercial, John-ston let out a frustrated growl at the camera, and, as almost everyone in Auburn knows, the growl stuck.

“I would have to describe Trey as ‘double-e’: energy and enthusiasm,” said Kevin Mc-Nally, sales representative for Under Armour and Johnston’s friend of 26 years. “To me, he’s a true Auburn man.”

J&M Bookstore has been helping students with all their

college necessities since 1953. Johnston’s father, George John-ston, and Paul Malone built the business based on custom-er service, and Trey carries on his father’s mantra: “Service your customer, boy.”

“No matter if you’re a cus-tomer or you do business with him, he makes you feel like family,” McNally said.

Matthew Berube, freshman in engineering, said going to J&M was his first experience with a college bookstore.

“everyone at J&M was real-ly pleasant and tried to get me the best deal,” Berube said. “I didn’t feel hurried.”

Aside from helping stu-dents in the bookstore, John-ston enjoys golfing, spending time with his family and be-ing active in the community. He’s served on numerous com-mittees and boards in Auburn and as president of the Auburn Chamber of Commerce.

Trey’s passion for football and the Auburn community has kept J&M going strong.

“It keeps me young,” he said.

“I enjoy working with the stu-dents and the personal rela-tionships I have with the reps and the customers.”

Johnston runs ‘tiger of a bookstore’

Maria iaMpietro / photo editor

trey Johnston carries on an auburn tradition in J&M Bookstore, which was started by his father, George Johnston, and paul Malone.

Thursday, December 1, 2011 www.theplainsman.com Community

Opinions

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PolicyThe opinions of The Auburn Plainsman staff are restricted to these pages. These unsigned editorials are the majori-ty opinion of the 9-member editorial board and are the of-ficial opinion of the newspaper. The opinions expressed in columns and letters represent the views and opinions of their individual authors and do not necessarily reflect the Auburn University student body, faculty, administration or Board of Trustees.

SubmissionsThe Auburn Plainsman welcomes letters from students as well as from faculty, administrators, alumni and those not affiliated with the University. Letters must be submitted be-fore 4:30 p.m. on the Monday for publication. Letters must include the author’s name, address and phone number for verification, though the name of the author may be with-held upon request. Submission may be edited for gram-mar and/or length.

The Editorial Board

A7

Miranda DollarhideEDitOr

Liz Conn MAnAging EDitOr

Alison McFerrinnEwS EDitOr

Chelsea HarveyCAMpuS EDitOr

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Christina SanteeSpOrtS EDitOr

nick BowmanOpiniOnS EDitOr

nik MarkopoulosCOpy EDitOr

Maria iampietropHOtO EDitOr

Our View

The Plainsman Poll

Vote at theplainsman.com

Fans must accept BCS, like it or not

The BCS is flawed. There’s no deny-ing that.

At the same time, the BCS is also exactly what college football needs.

Let’s be honest. Auburn’s fans are still hurt by being cheated out of the 2004 Orange Bowl, which was that year’s national championship game. rightfully so, but it’s nothing to hold a grudge over.

The BCS, which was put in place in 1998, has been slowly ridiculed more and more each year.

yes, teams have been cheated out of games, but the positives have out-weighed the negatives.

More times than not, the correct two teams have played for the Coach-es’ trophy.

However, yet again, there’s an ar-gument over who should play in the 2011 BCS national Championship game.

if LSu defeats georgia, they de-serve a spot. the discussion of the second team in the game is when things get sticky. That’s where the ma-jor flaw in the BCS is created.

Every college football fan in Amer-ica has an opinion on who it should be, including the voters. with that said, everyone is biased, including the voters. it’s impossible to watch a college football game and not cheer for either team in the slightest way.

Considering that, if a voter wants a rematch of LSu and Alabama for the national championship, he or she can make that happen.

the same problem occurs with preseason polls, which is another flaw.

The reason Auburn played in the 2004 Sugar Bowl and not against uSC for the Orange Bowl is because voters didn’t expect the team to be as good as it was. How about that? Auburn is better than expected and is rewarded by being left out of a possible nation-al championship.

A playoff won’t solve the problem either. in fact, it would only continue the current problem on a larger scale.

Despite every team in a playoff having a chance to win a champion-ship, the problem would occur when multiple teams on the in-and-out line have the same record. who’s in and who’s out? That creates the exact same problem as deciding who plays for the national championship.

while the BCS is the way to go, having a rematch between two SEC west teams would be a terrible move.

no, it’s not because one of the teams didn’t win the conference—or their own division for that matter. it’s because the country has already seen them play. remember “The game of the Century?”

it was boring, lackluster, long and low-scoring. Do you get the point? no one outside of the SEC cares to see them play again. not to mention, most fans of other conferences hate the SEC.

LSu won when Alabama had its shot at home against the Bayou Ben-gals. instead, show the nation how the so-called best conference in America fares against a team who av-erages the second-most points per game. yes, that’s Oklahoma State.

Accepting the BCS as the easiest and best method for football should be as easy for fans as accepting a loss. you may not like it, but it’s not chang-ing. Stick your chest out and accept it like a man.

Or, to stick to the cliché, it is what it is.

Thicken your skin, America

Christmas will always be a

religious holiday. However, there has emerged a commercial interpretation of it …”

—Abby Anderson“CHriStMAS VS. HOLiDAyS,” B5

“QuoTe of The Week

Fans shock with rival’s treatment

Does being greeted by a cheery “Merry Christmas!” offend you? if it does, you need to change your perspective.

A person wishing you a Mer-ry Christmas is only wishing you well. They’re taking a religion-spe-cific holiday that calls for charity and brotherly love and applying it to everyone in a warm, welcom-ing way.

they’re not trying to convert.they’re not trying to oppress. They’re just being cheery.

we should appreciate a “Mer-ry Christmas” in the same way we-should appreciate a “Happy Ha-nukkah” or a “Happy ramadan.” A person is sharing his or her culture with you in a welcoming way.

As such, the “Merry Christmas” vs. “Happy Holidays” debate needs to end.

A business using the happy holi-days greeting does so because they want to avoid the hassle of an of-fended customer. we respect that decision, but we also respect the decision of individuals to avoid stores that don’t share their val-ues.

However, all of the irritation and arguing can end with every-one growing up and acknowledg-ing that religious-based greetings aren’t offensive.

to go a step further, religious-based parties or decorations in schools aren’t a state endorsement of religion.

the yearly Christmas party doesn’t communicate to children that they need to be Christian. it also doesn’t trample on any other religion.

A school is a place of education, and a fourth-grade class can take a break from social studies and division for a day to learn about Christmas, Hannukah and any other holiday.

we believe Christmas, celebrat-ed religiously or secularly, is an American holiday. it is a piece of American culture. it’s something that we, as a nation and a people, can celebrate together.

it’s fine to disagree—we respect that—but it’s not fine to attempt to take Christmas out of our cul-ture and our schools.

would we erase the history of

our country because we don’t like it? we are not a secular people. nearly 80 percent of this nation believes in a god.

to take every shred of faith from schools to the point of drowning out the echoes of Christmas with a “winter party” is foolish. it does not do our culture justice.

Believe it or not, there is an American culture of which Chris-tianity is a part. Like it or not, Christian values were a part of the founding of our nation. The princi-ples that guided our Founding Fa-thers have guided Christians for 2,000 years.

to atheist parents, the occa-sional atheist child and to follow-ers of other religions, a cookies-and-cake party with a jolly, over-weight, bearded guy handing out gifts for no reason should sound like a fun event.

Because Christmas has be-come more and more disassoci-ated from the celebration of Jesus’ birth, “Merry Christmas” should be viewed more as an expression of goodwill and charity than a statement of religious belief.

Alabama fanbase takes state rivalry too far

god, help this state.My brother and i are exact op-

posites. He is older—i am younger. He likes vanilla—i adore almost ev-erything covered in chocolate. i go to Auburn—he graduated from the university of Alabama in tuscalo-osa, and Bama, in case you haven’t heard, is on its way to a possible 14th national championship.

Oh, you have heard that? A lot? you’re reminded of it every day?

i don’t think i’m the only one who knew Auburn wasn’t going to be spectacular this season, but hey, we did leaps and bounds better than i expected, and i only know the bare minimum to get me through a game.

So i say “war Eagle” anyway. we’ll get them next year. But what i can’t stand is drowning in the tide … the fans of the Crimson tide that is.

Hours after the iron Bowl, i looked up the latest story on al.com. From this endeavor i now know the majority of people on that site are registered under a username with ‘bama,’ ‘tide,’ ‘bear’ or ‘Saban’, or some combination of the four.

what made my stomach churn was the seven (yes, seven) pages of comments disparaging Auburn.

Online comment sections as a whole make me want to pursue a lifestyle in the woods that Thoreau would put into a novel, but i am still amazed at how people simply drop the label of ‘human’ and let their ab-solute worst come out over a game.

i’m not saying Alabama doesn’t deserve to do well at football—it’s kind of their thing.

i’m also well aware of Auburn’s contingency of obnoxious fans. i

was even appalled to learn some were comparing the toomer’s poi-sonings to the tuscaloosa tornado.

But i’m talking about a normal day, if there is such a thing anymore.

you’d think after everything that’s happened we could all just shake hands and say, “good game.”

no. it’s never that simple. it’s as if after a Bama victo-

ry in the iron Bowl that the uni-verse is now realigned after some great wrong had occurred. Or as if a crime had been committed and justice had been served with every houndstooth hat thrown on high. But cheering when the other team’s man is lying on the field in pain? you guys have no shame.

i was absolutely disgusted watch-ing the ESpn documentary on the iron Bowl, especially at how much time they spent playing phone calls to the paul Finebaum Show. it’s amazing to hear how many people completely devote themselves to a

school they never went to. wait, i forgot. Anytime a smudge

might appear on the spotless record of the Bama nation, i’m supposed to remember that this is not how true, classy Bama fans are in real life.

really? For one thing, i’m so sick of the

word ‘classy’ i could spit. Secondly, if i’m to believe all these

people aren’t what true Bama fans are about, i’m beginning to think Alabama has no true fans at all. not surprising. Look what happens when you lose one game—you’re ready to punt the kicker out of the state, pun intended.

So what is it to you? A game? A university? Or your only source of pride?

yes, i believe in Auburn, and love it. whether we win or lose, i’d rath-er be a student cheering on a team that’s part of a family, than a fan cheering on a coach whose name is only one letter away from the devil’s.

Brandon MillerSpOrtS@tHEpLAinSMAn.COM

The 2011 iron Bowl is in the books. My team won, which is always good; but that’s not what i want to talk about.

i want to talk about the Auburn fans and faithful that my wife and i encountered at the game on Satur-day. This was our first iron Bowl at Auburn and also the first iron Bowl we’ve attended since the punt-Bama-punt iron Bowl of 1972.

yes, i’m sure you remember how that one ended.

we were students at u of A back then, and like most everyone on, or close to, campus, we were totally con-sumed by the Alabama-Auburn rival-ry. it was intense, it was hostile, it was loud, it was everywhere and it...

read the rest on-line at www.the-

plainsman.com

rebecca CroomespHOtO@tHEpLAinSMAn.COM

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Community A8 The Auburn Plainsman Thursday, December 1, 2011

Thursday, December 1, 2011 www.theplainsman.com Sports

Christina SanteeSportS EDitor

As defending champions, Auburn was intent to give the new season its all.

The tigers started out strong—overpowering opponents like Utah State and Mississippi State by the skin of their teeth.

However, as the season continued on to offer more lethal opponents, their luck ran out—and fast.

Auburn is in the process of re-building. They’re a young team that needs to accumulate experience.

They did that in 2011. it’ll take a few more years before

Auburn reaches a seasoned status again, but the outcome will be well worth the wait.

“i think that becomes more evi-dent when you take the time to re-ally re-evaluate over a long period of time everything that you are doing which will be done at Auburn, and we will know more then,” said coach Gene Chizik.

“Like i said, we are going to keep growing. We got a lot of experience this year for a lot of guys that will be invaluable moving forward, and we are just going to continue to grow.”

Auburn’s first season loss to Clem-

son was only the beginning of the ti-gers’ struggles. Auburn suffered loss after loss, falling to No. 6 Arkansas, No. 1 LSU, No. 12 Georgia and recent-ly No. 2 Alabama.

“it’s been a lot of ups and downs this season for 12 games, and we’ve had some really good things occur in our 12-game season, and we’ve had some disappointments,” Chizik said.

Despite that fact, there are no sore losers here. There’s always next year, and Chizik is well aware of that.

“it’s my job as the head coach at Auburn to make sure that this pro-gram continues on the right path, and that will happen here,” Chizik said. “We will continue to grow as a football team, no question about it.

“We will continue to move for-ward, and we are going to figure out what is next for us as a team, but more importantly, we are going to make sure as a program right now (we’re) moving in the right direction, which again, i am very sure that’s go-ing to happen.

“Again, we had our moments, and we did most of the classic things you do in a football game against a great football team that allow you not to win.

“But, they played hard, and they

kept fighting in there until the end, and that is what we expected them to do.

“So again, our goal from here is to make sure we grow and continue on a path that we know the Auburn football program is going to stay on.”

it was obvious that the tigers suf-

fered from a poor defensive front and unorganized offense—things Chizik will ensure aren’t 2012 issues.

“i think that a lot of the teams that we struggled against obviously were extremely good defensively,” he said.

Miranda DollarhideEDitor

When brothers Jordan and Matt Lee first picked up a fishing rod at age 6, they were hooked.

Now, Jordan, tournament director, and Matt, president, are members of Auburn’s Bass Sports club, and they show no sign of reeling it in anytime soon.

“We’ve been around the lake our whole lives, so (our parents) kind of put a rod and reel in our hand,” Matt said. “A lot of people who fish do be-cause their grandparents or mom and dad fish. ours do occasional-ly, but we picked up the bug on our own.”

it’s that bug that persuaded Jor-dan to attend Auburn.

“He saw college fishing on tV,” Matt said. “They had Alabama and Auburn and all that, so he went to a tournament weigh-in that Auburn was at, and he got hooked on it. He said, ‘That is what i want to do.’”

Shortly after Jordan arrived at Auburn, Matt decided to follow his brother.

“He came here, and i saw where he was fishing at Auburn,” Matt said. “that’s all i started to care about once i got out of high school, so i said, ‘i want to be there and do that, too.’”

Bass fishing has become a way of life for the Lee brothers, both com-mitting themselves to executive po-

sitions in the club and encouraging others to try it.

“the bass team is just a learn-ing experience, and it is for every-body,” Matt said. “the good thing about it is any level person can come out. There are people who have nev-er fished bass before and they just want to come learn something, and it’s a good opportunity for them to get involved in the club. And the good thing is you don’t have to have a boat.”

Even though they encourage all

skill levels to participate, Matt and Jordan said fishing is a time commit-ment that involves preparation.

“it is kind of like hunting,” Jor-dan said. “You don’t just kill a deer. if you want to go hunting, you won’t just get into a stand and kill one. You have a lot of preparation. That’s how fishing is. it’s more in-depth with tournament fishing because we don’t just go out there in the boat and have fun. it’s hard work.”

Matt said bass club members spend most of their time fishing in

tournaments. they compete in five qualifier

tournaments in the fall, which de-termine their rankings in the club. in the spring they compete in bigger tournaments outside of the state.

“We have the national champion-ship that Jordan and i are going to in April to Lake Murray, S.C.,” Matt said. “That’s for the FLW National Cham-pionship.”

FLW outdoors and Bass Anglers

Sports Men’s basketball travels to Big East» PagE B3

B1Women’s basketball to face Temple away» PagE B2

Spirits are still high after 7–5 season

robert e. lee / ASSIStANt CAMPUS eDItorthe Auburn defense tackles Alabama wide reciever Duron Carter Saturday.

robert e. lee / ASSIStANt CAMPUS eDItorAubie gets the crowd of Auburn students in Jordan-Hare Stadium pumped up at Saturday’s Iron bowl against the University of Alabama.

Despite a less-than-perfect season, fellow Tigers remain loyal and hopeful for redemption in 2012

» See TIGERS, B2

Auburn brothers bond through bass fishing

» See fIShInG, B2

Swim, dive team aims to impress Bianca SewardWritEr

The swim and dive team aims to keep its strong season afloat at this weekend’s Georgia invitational in Athens.

The invitational will match the ti-gers against strong swim programs such as Georgia, University of Cali-fornia at Berkley and indiana Uni-versity during a pivotal period in Au-burn’s season: immediately after the U.S. swimming winter nationals and a week before the diving winter na-tionals.

Brett Hawke, the men’s and wom-en’s swimming and diving coach, said at this invitational Auburn will focus on solidifying its SEC championship team.

“Although we are traveling and competing as a team, we will be using this invitational to get a better look at our middle swimmers,” Hawke said. “At this point in the season we know who our top swimmers are, but it’s now time to understand where the others stand.”

Diving coach Jeffrey Shaffer said the team is feeling confident after its successful meet at the Georgia tech invitational Nov. 18–20.

“This is a perfect opportunity for us to improve on our scores and dives, which is what we are always aiming to do,” Shaffer said. “Competing away gives us a chance to compete in a dif-ferent environment, which is key to performing strong dives consistently.”

Shaffer said this weekend’s meet will give the team a good look at what it will be up against in Janu-ary when it returns to Athens for the Georgia Diving invitational following the Dec. 15–22 U.S. winter nationals.

Vennie Dantin, senior diver, said she believes Auburn’s team has sever-al advantages over the other schools competing based on its focus and

Final stages of Q-schooltest TigersColeman McDowellASSoCiAtE SportS EDitor

the Auburn men’s golf program has had five former athletes advance to the final round of the pGA tour Qualifying tournament, more com-monly referred to as “Q-School.”

Will Claxton, reid Edstrom and Lee Williams advanced from a tour-nament at redstone Golf Club in Humble, texas, and Jimmy Brandt and Glenn Northcutt qualified at Hombre Golf Club in panama City Beach, Fla.

Williams had the most dramat-ic day of the five finalists, carding six birdies on the back nine and making the cut line by two strokes. Williams’ 66 vaulted him from 29th into the top 10 and into the Q-School final stage for the first time since 2006.

this system dates back to 1965, and since 2009 the process has in-volved four stages. The prequalifying stage consists of five tournaments held in September at various warm-weather courses in the United States. Nearly 40 players advance to the first stage from each tournament.

The first stage has 13 tournaments in october. The player pool has the winners from the prequalifying stage, along with players who were exempt-ed from the opening round.

the top 25 in each tournament then advance to the second stage. Ex-emptions are in play here as well, and the top 20 golfers from each of the six November tournaments advance.

This year’s final qualifying stage is Wednesday through Monday at pGA West in La Quinta, Calif. roughly the top 30 players in that final tourna-ment receive full exempt status on the pGA for the following year.

MArIA IAMPIetro / PHoto eDItorMatt lee (left), president of bass fishing team and Jordan lee (right), tournament director, pose by their boat.

» See SwIm, B2

Sports B2 The Auburn Plainsman Thursday, December 1, 2011

For Event Information: www.auburn.edu/UPC

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Graham CarrWriTer

The Auburn women’s bas-ketball team will have re-venge on its mind when it takes on Temple University in Philadelphia Saturday.

The Tigers will step away from the friendly confines of Auburn Arena—where they hold a 3–0 record—for the third time this season and at-tempt to improve their 1–1 record on the road.

The Tigers will try to avenge their loss to the Owls in Auburn last year.

Auburn led by as many as seven points late in the game, but Temple hit a 3-point shot with just over a minute left to take the lead, holding on to win 62–61.

Coach Nell Fortner said while Auburn’s record so far this season is respectable, she is not content with the way the team has played.

“i am a coach, so no,” Fort-ner said. “i am never satis-fied, and i always want us to be better. We still have a long way to go.”

Junior forward Blanche Al-verson is the leading return-ing scorer from the game

against Temple. Alverson said she believes

this year’s Tigers have a long way to go until they can be considered an elite team, but they are making progress to-ward achieving that goal.

“i think we are getting bet-ter each game,” Alverson said. “We were a little sloppy in the second half of (University of South Carolina) Upstate.

“We have to cut that out and play a full game for 40 minutes. That is what we have to work on to get better.”

The Owls are led by Kristen McCarthy and Shey Peddy at 13.5 and 13.3 average points per game, respectively.

Alverson and sophomore guard Camille Glymph have led Auburn in scoring in ev-ery game except the first against Mercer.

Auburn is hoping the hot

shooting of freshman guard Hasina Muhammad contin-ues. Muhammad has scored double digits in four of her first five games as a Tiger.

Muhammad said her suc-cess comes from being her-self and attacking the goal, adding that her coaches have told her to hover around the rim to make plays.

Muhammad believes she still has a lot of work to do to become a better all-around player, though.

“i still need to work on my rebounding and on-the-ball defense,” Muhammad said.

Temple has a 2–4 record this season, with all of their losses coming on the road. They have only lost two games at home the past two seasons.

The Owls won their first two games against the Uni-versity of Miami (Ohio) and Northeastern University, but then lost their past four games to Ohio State, North-ern illinois, Texas A&M and St. John’s University.

Auburn has outscored op-ponents such as Mercer, Bel-mont, George Washington and USC Upstate.

alex sager / associate photo editorJunior guard Najat oaurdad weaves through University of south carolina Upstate defenders in au-burn’s 75–34 rout of the spartans sunday.

Tigers seek third away victory

swim» From B1

Sportsman Society, or BASS, are the two main tournament circuits for bass anglers.

To prepare for a tourna-ment, Jordan said the club tries to practice at the lake where they will compete, but there are restrictions on when they can fish.

“For different tournaments there are off-limits periods at different times,” Jordan said.

For their last tournament, members were able to practice a week and a half before the event began.

Matt and Jordan must con-sider all the nuances of the lake during practice.

“it’s like a crazy puzzle you have to put together,” Matt said. “Anything changes—wind direction, sun, clouds, the way the water is moving or not. We spend a lot of time out

there before the cutoff day try-ing to get our best shot.”

For anglers, preparation doesn’t always lead to success.

“You can put in a week for a tournament, and the day of tournament a cold front or anything can happen,” Jor-dan said. “Your boat can break down.

“You try to prepare for weather conditions coming up because that matters a lot this time of year and in the spring. You have all these factors in your head while you prepare for tournament.”

if the weather isn’t enough to consider, finding where the fish are is its own battle.

Matt said 20 percent of the lake will have 90 percent of the fish, and even then, the big fish live in only 5 percent.

Jordan and Matt must catch and keep five 12-inch live fish to qualify for a win.

“Different tournaments

have different penalties for dead fish,” Matt said. “So it’s half a pound for every dead fish you have. in the summer-time, it is really hard to keep them alive, but now when the water is colder they stay alive longer. “

Auburn will only be able to send one boat with two an-glers to big tournaments. in other tournaments the club sends 10 boats.

“in our fall classic you can send as many boats as you want,” Matt said. “There is just no limit to how many boats you can bring.”

Matt said when he com-petes with his brother, his drive to win is greater.

“We’re competitive,” Matt said. “We want to beat each other worse than anything, but were pretty good buddies.”

Matt and Jordan said they hope to win enough to start of-fering fishing scholarships.

fishing» From B1

persistent practice on the ba-sics.

“Having a solid base and fundamental skills is extreme-ly important for consisten-cy,” Dantin said. “i think coach Shaffer has done such a great job of enforcing basic skills in our practice, and this is ex-tremely important for diving consistently.”

Shaffer said he’s confident in the team’s ability to per-form well at the upcoming in-vitational and specifically ex-cited about the debut of two

new dives: a back three and a half pike by sophomore John Santeiu and a back two and a half pike by freshman Shanna Schuelein.

“i have been preparing for this dive since the beginning of the semester, but i didn’t even do it until right before Thanks-giving break,” Schuelein said. “i am nervous, but i’m also excit-ed to perform a new dive in a meet.”

Hawke said he believes the invitational will benefit the team because of the chance to watch the current NCAA men’s champions from the Universi-ty of California at Berkley. He

hopes it will give them an edge seeing an opponent perform.

“We don’t usually get to see California until the NCAAs, so this will be a good opportunity to see them compete and see how we are in comparison,” Hawke said.

Despite the Georgia invita-tional falling between the two winter nationals, Hawke said he is confident this will not negatively impact Auburn’s performance.

“We have been well pre-pared for this invitational for over a month now,” Hawke said. “everyone is ready to go out and swim fast.”

“i don’t think there is any ques-tion about that. We did the classic things that make you struggle on offense when you can’t run the ball effectively, consistently.

“i don’t think we protected the quarterback as well as we

needed to, and then when we did protect the quarterback, i don’t feel like we were very consistent in throwing the ball and completing balls and not dropping balls.

“it just seemed like we didn’t get in any kind of rhythm as an offense, and, again, tradition-ally we have played really good offense here, but we struggled.

There is no question about it, so i think it was all of the above.”

Auburn will likely advance to a bowl game, but it has not yet been set in stone.

Several sports blogs have predicted Auburn will travel to Atlanta to participate in the Chick-fil-A Bowl or the Gator Bowl in Jacksonville, Fla.

tigers» From B1

“i think we’re getting better each game.”

—Blanche AlversonJUNiOr FOrWArD

Thursday, December 1, 2011 The Auburn Plainsman Sports B3

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Barbee disappointed in play as team travels to Big EastBrandon MillerAssisTAnT sPorTs EDiTor

After starting the season 4–0 for the first time since 2006, the men’s basketball team will take its perfect re-cord on the road Friday.

Although Auburn will face the seton Hall Pirates in the annual Big East-sEC Chal-lenge undefeated, coach Tony Barbee has expressed disap-pointment in the Tigers’ de-fense.

“Until we start to enjoy play-ing hard and playing tough and playing nasty, we’re going to look sluggish,” Barbee said. “We think it’s about trying to outscore people. That’s not go-ing to do anything but get you beat.”

Despite Auburn’s 72–59 vic-tory, Barbee said the team isn’t where he’d like it to be heading into its first away game.

“Happy we won,” Barbee said, “but we’ve got a long way to get better.”

Barbee recognized some players’ defensive struggles by name, including sophomore guard Chris Denson, who led Auburn with 17 points Mon-day.

“Yeah, he has the ability to score and slash and throw the ball in the hole,” Barbee said. “But he’s not bringing it defen-sively.”

Auburn went on a 20–2 run to go into hafltime with a 44–25 lead before the second-half defensive struggles began.

Barbee also noted Auburn’s lackluster performance in the paint, especially rebounding.

“our big guys got their tails kicked,” Barbee said. “My start-ing (center) got his first re-bound with a minute to go in the game. That’s not going to get it.”

Freshman center Willy

Kouassi was the only player Barbee said played with the in-tensity that he wants to see in his team.

“He plays with that mean-ness and that toughness and that desire,” Barbee said. “He has no clue what he’s doing out there. All that other stuff, we’ll teach him. it’s going to be a work in progress.”

Auburn’s trip to new Jer-sey will mark the first of four games in the Big East-sEC Challenge.

Despite being a preseason pick to finish 14th the 16-team Big East and after finishing 7–11 in conference play last year, seton Hall currently has a 5–1 record, including a 69–54 victory over 2011 Final Four contender Virginia Common-wealth University.

seton Hall’s lone loss on the year came against northwest-ern 80–73 in the champion-

ship game of the Charleston Classic.

seton Hall has three players who possess talent the Tigers have not seen this year.

The Pirates are led by for-ward Herb Pope, who is aver-aging a double-double on the season with 20.5 points and 11.7 rebounds per game.

He is also shooting 51 per-cent from the field and 41.7 percent from 3-point range.

Also, guard Jordan The-dore and forward Fuquan Ed-win are averaging 17.5 and 14.8 points for the Pirates, re-spectively.

Auburn’s game against se-ton Hall will be on EsPnU, and tip-off is set for 8 p.m.

“We’re not playing to our full potential,” said junior guard Frankie sullivan. “We’re going backwards right now. We’re not satisfied at all with our-selves.”

christen harned / assistant photo editor

sophomore forward allen payne shoots over an arkansas-pine Bluff defender Monday in the tigers’ 72–59 victory.

Sports B4 The Auburn Plainsman Thursday, December 1, 2011

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Intramurals give students opportunity to have a ballbrandon millerAssisTAnT sPorTs EDiTor

returning after winter break isn’t just about buying new books and starting new classes—it’s also a time to be-come active in spring intramu-ral sports.

“From January to rough-ly the first week of March, we will be in full swing for intra-mural basketball,” said nicho-las Head, student coordinator of recreational services. “Then, from March right around the week before spring break un-til we leave for summer school will be softball and co-rec soc-cer.”

There is not an official schedule made for the spring semester, and Head said the sign-up process typically takes a week.

After a captains meeting that explains the basic rules of the sport, sign-up days take place shortly afterward, Head said.

in the following days, the leagues’ schedules are made and released online. From there, referees are trained for a week, and the season begins.

Head said basketball is the second-most popular sport of-fered year-round, trailing only flag football. The season starts in the first few weeks of spring semester.

“(Basketball) teams will be guaranteed four or five games per season,” he said. “There are different leagues you can sign up for. our men’s league has novice, intermediate and ad-vanced.”

Despite having soccer avail-able during the fall, Head said it’s so popular in Auburn they wanted to have a league in the spring as well.

“it’s played eight-on-eight, and our fields are a little bit

smaller than regulation,” Head said. “it’s four guys and four girls on the field at a time. What we see a lot is teams that played men’s and women’s in the fall kind of join up forces for the spring.”

softball sign-ups take place the same time as co-rec soccer, Head said.

“i would say out of our sports, it’s the most enjoy-able because it’s the most laid back,” Head said. “Even though its right when we come back from spring break and partic-ipation may drop off some, it’s still a lot more laid back than basketball or football. They have fun.”

For students who haven’t been to the intramural fields recently, they will notice a dif-ference when softball begins: the permanent backstops that have been in place for years are now gone.

“They went ahead and pulled those up,” Head said. “And we are actually purchas-ing portable backstops that we will put at different points in the field.”

Head said the movable backstops will make the field more playable and will help players avoid standing water or any other inconvenience.

Head also said Auburn of-fers three other sports in the spring which don’t have a full season.

“Those are basically tourna-ment or other events that we have sign-ups for.”

Bowling will take place from January to March.

“We open it up to less teams because it’s one of those things that we do off campus at the Auburn bowling alley,” he said. “We have specified times that the bowling alley lets us bowl.”

swimming and diving is a

one- or two-day tournament hosted at the Martin Aquatics Center, Head said.

Participants can sign up for diving and event relays. The re-lays vary depending on what the swimming and diving cen-ter decides to offer.

Head said Auburn’s golf tournament at indian Pines last year had a great turnout. This year’s tournament is in late April, a week before finals.

“it’s a two-player scramble,” Head said. “Anyone that wants to sign up can get spirit points for his or her fraternity or so-rority, or you can sign up indi-vidually.”

Head did mention there is a fee, but golfers get 18 holes and a cart.

Despite providing the same sports since 2002, when Head started working with intramu-ral sports, he said they have tried offering new sports over the years.

in the past, ultimate Fris-bee and kickball tournaments were offered.

“We actually offered a small basketball league this year for the first time ever,” Head said. “We saw the demand for it, and it seemed like something we could do.

“We’ve gotten surveys back that said, ‘We would love to see spring football.’ right now, we’re looking at what is re-turned with the survey. People want more and games, but it’s difficult sometimes because you are limited to what you can do.”

Head said the easiest way for students to voice opinions regarding sports they wish to be made available is to simply tell the department.

“We want to offer more,” Head said. “And we’re looking to offer more.”

Coleman mCDowell / assoCiate sports eDitorplainsman adviser John Carvalho interviews espn analyst Kirk Herbstreit before the iron Bowl.

As i walked into the Au-burn University Hotel last Fri-day, my mind was empty.

Just two hours earlier, i had received an email from Jeremy Henderson, editor-in-chief of The War Eagle reader, asking me if i wanted to cover a “Col-lege GameDay media thing.” it took me two seconds to jump at the offer.

Walking into the hotel flanked by a television report-er from Huntsville and Plains-man adviser John Carvalho, i expected to be fighting for a spot in the room.

instead, we gently knocked on the door and entered to the surprised looks of the Game-Day crew.

if Carvalho hadn’t been standing beside me, i would have quietly shut the door and hoped they’d forget about the whole thing.

instead, we spent the next hour interviewing some of the

most well-known figures in college football broadcasting.

First up was David Pollack. As a former star player for Georgia, i already didn’t like him. After talking with him for a few minutes, i actually had a reason not to like him.

“i’m pretty confident,” he said. “in my head, i think i’m right all the time anyway, so i just kind of spew off and start talking anyway. i don’t really think about things too much. i just pop off at the mouth.”

Pollack doesn’t quite get it. someone who does under-stand the business, however, is Erin Andrews.

Even though she was in a hurry to catch the LsU-Arkan-sas game, she patiently talked with us about her career.

“i deal with some of the toughest coaches and ath-letes to deal with in the na-tion,” she said. “They under-stand how much i work and how hard i work, so in the end they’re a lot easier to work with.”

After Andrews, Fowler and Herbie shuttled in and out during the game’s commer-

cial breaks. Fowler spoke about the

perception that EsPn targets certain programs to bring them down.

“How is it good for the busi-ness of EsPn if ohio state or Miami or UsC is on proba-tion? it’s not.”

once Fowler left, we brought in Herbstreit for the final round.

Herbstreit was down-to-earth and spoke about the special traditions at colleges such as Auburn.

“You’ve got former players and alumni that come back and they bring their kids and teach them about their school and their traditions,” Herbst-reit said.

once he disappeared into the meeting room in favor of the top-3 sEC matchup, we were done.

Walking out with only Car-valho this time, i breathed a sigh of relief. After being scared out of my mind for the past hour, i gazed back at the hotel as we crossed College street and thought, “That was awesome.”

One-on-one with GameDayColeman McDowellsPorTs@THEPLAinsMAn.CoM

IntrigueThursday, December 1, 2011 www.theplainsman.com Intrigue

Christmas decorations» Page B6

Uses for peppermint» Page B7

B5

Christen harned / assistant Photo editor

Cydney Lawson, sophomore in english, is the author of “Wingless,” the first book in her three-part series.

Melody KitchensOnlIne eDItOr

Cydney lawson wasn’t planning on being a published author.

“I’ve been writing stories since I was little,” said lawson, sophomore in english. “eventually it got to the point of thinking specific scenes and writing them down. It wouldn’t really go anywhere until my current book.”

lawson’s book, “Wingless,” was published in March 2011, and it is the first in her soon-to-be-finished trilogy.

lawson said she remembers as a young girl sitting with her grand-father at his computer and coming up with stories to go along with pic-tures.

“She’s got so many stories in her head, and there’s so much talent that is just about to blossom,” said Alonzo Smith, lawson’s grandfa-ther.

lawson began writing “Wing-less” her senior year of high school after committing to paper a recur-ring image from her imagination.

“this girl was falling from the sky and landing on this boy’s lawn,” lawson said. “He had to figure out who she was, where she came from and what she wanted. It kind of just took off from there.”

After completing “Wingless,” lawson said she let friends and family read it, as she did with her previous works.

“All of the characters are very much their own person, and you can connect with their personal-ities,” said Alex McPeak, a friend who’s read many of lawson’s short stories. “It keeps you hooked on the book.”

lawson said family and friends encouraged her to publish “Wing-less,” so she began sending man-uscripts to nearly 100 publishing houses. Her story was selected by publisher Simon and Schuster.

“I was really excited, but then it turns out they started trying to change things, not just editing,” lawson said. “I was kind of put off by that.”

not wanting to change her story, lawson decided to self-publish, for-matting the book herself and find-ing a cover artist and editor.

“It was a lot harder than I thought it was going to be, but it was some-thing that was really important to me to keep the story the exact same as it was,” lawson said.

“Displaced,” the sequel to “Wing-less,” will be published next month.

“the first book was a lot easi-er because I could go wherever my imagination took me,” lawson said. “This second book I had to focus on the details of the first one. It’s a lot harder because I have to discipline myself into writing the same people with the same goals.”

lawson is now working on the fi-nal book of the trilogy.

“I hope this last one will be 40 times better than the first one,” lawson said. “I just hope to keep ex-panding what I love to do so much.”

Smith is also excited about his granddaughter’s blossoming talent.

“It’s just the tip of the iceberg,” Smith said. “It has made me very proud seeing where she started and seeing where she’s coming . The best is still yet to come.”

“Wingless” can be found on ama-zon.com, barnesandnoble.com and createspace.com.

Author soars with first published book

Five pit stops on the road to finish finals

GETTING STARTED

1. Print out PowerPoint slides or handouts

2. Consolidate notes and handouts into one area

3. Write down dates and times of exams

STUDY SNACKS

1. Trail mix with

almonds and

dried fruit

2. Tuna

3. Fresh fruit

4. Light popcorn

5. Sunflower

seeds

STUDY TUNES

1. Classical (Yo-Yo Ma, Bocelli, Liszt, Brahms)

2. Christmas (Michael Buble, Charlie Brown, Glee)

3. Indie, Folk (Bon Iver, Fleet Foxes, Mumford & Sons)

PLACES TO STUDY

1. Auburn Public Library

2. Top floor of Student Center (open 24 hours)

3. Daylight Donuts (open 24 hours)

4. Outside: Samford Lawn, Cater Lawn

STUDY BREAKS

1. See a movie on

Stimlus Tuesday at

Carmike Winsong

2. Grab frozen

yogurt with friends

3. Light exercise

through campus

Christmas vs. holidays debate gets heatedraye MayASSOCIAte IntrIgue eDItOr

With the Christmas season fast ap-proaching, it's time to remember not only the cheer it brings, but also the controversy.

In the coming weeks businesses across the united States will choose between using the words “holiday” and “Christmas” for their storefront displays and seasonal sales in the spirit of political correctness.

Abby Anderson, sophomore in zo-ology, said she is apathetic toward the use or disuse of the word “Christ-mas” in advertising.

“I don't particularly care if adver-tisers acknowledge Christmas or not,” Anderson said. “I imagine (they)

view Christmas as a marketing tool and will most likely cater to the re-quests of the consumers.”

Anderson said she thinks more people in the South are offended when “Christmas” is replaced.

“I believe it definitely is a religious thing,” Anderson said. “The same peo-ple who complain about advertisers neglecting the word ‘Christmas’ have issues with ‘under god’ being left out of the Pledge of Allegiance.”

Cara Mcelroy, also a sophomore in zoology, shares Anderson's senti-ments.

“especially in the state we live in, a lot of people seem to be angered by the way Christ is being taken from Christmas,” Mcelroy said. “I don't

think that that's the perspective we should have on it.”

Mcelroy said using a nonreligious phrase like “Happy Holidays” is not a denunciation of religion, but many in the South take it that way.

“look at the way people reacted to Obama's thanksgiving address,” Mcelroy said. “Many people were up in arms because he celebrated com-munity, gratefulness and together-ness and not specifically the Chris-tian god.”

Anderson and Mcelroy both said that while Christmas is obviously a Christian holiday, it isn't only reli-gious people who celebrate it.

“Christmas will always be a reli-gious holiday,” Anderson said. “How-

ever, there has emerged a commer-cial interpretation of (it) which dom-inates popular culture.”

Mcelroy said she thinks both re-ligious and nonreligious people cel-ebrate Christmas as both a spiritual and commercial holiday.

“let's be real, everyone in America celebrates Christmas,” Mcelroy said. “I'm fairly agnostic, but that doesn't mean I don't celebrate Christmas as a time to celebrate the relationships I have with people I love and revel in the Christmas spirit.”

though it is a spiritual holiday, Mcelroy said, it isn't strictly a reli-gious holiday.

“I am all for people using this as a chance to embrace their religion, but

that's like asking if Sunday is a holy day,” Mcelroy said. “It might be the Sabbath for some, but that doesn't make it a worldwide holy day.”

Mcelroy said Christmas has be-come increasingly secular, but she doesn't feel that takes away from it.

“I love giving and getting Christ-mas gifts, and I think the saddest day of my life was when I grew up enough to admit to myself that Santa wasn’t real,” Mcelroy said.

“I can realize that advertisers are playing on my emotions to create dollar signs, but it’s the thought that counts, and my motives are to cel-ebrate those who are important to

» See Controversy, B6

HAnUKKAH: sunset dec. 20 through sunset dec. 28.

Celebrating rededication of holy temple

eight-day festival of lights

Families exchange gifts each night and light the menorah

not a sabbath holiday, so there is no obligation to refrain

from activities prohibited on the sabbath.

FestIvUs: dec. 23

Celebrating the holidays without pressures and

commercialism

“Festivus for the rest of us”

airing of Grievances, Feats of strength

Made popular by the ‘90s show “seinfeld.”

DATE:

WHAT IT IS:

AKA:

RITUALS:

FACT:

DATE:

WHAT IT IS:

AKA:

RITUALS:

FACT:

Additional December Celebrations

Intrigue B6 The Auburn Plainsman Thursday, December 1, 2011

Chicken AlfredoLasagna

Kerry’s recipe of the week

Ingredients:2 chicken breasts, cooked12 lasagna noodles3 tablespoons butter3 tablespoons flour1 quart half and half8 ounces Parmesan cheese, grated ¼ cup fresh parsley, chopped¼ cup fresh basil, choppedsalt and pepper, to taste12 ounces mozzarella cheese

Directions:Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease a deep 9” x 13” casserole dish.Shred the cooked chicken breasts into small pieces and set aside. Cook the lasagna noodles until al den-te, according to the directions on the box. Heat a me-dium sauce pan over medium heat. Melt the but-ter and whisk in the flour to form a roux. Whisk for 2 minutes, or until roux turns tan in color. Slowly whisk in the half and half, stirring constantly to keep the roux from lumping. When the sauce is thick, add the Parmesan cheese, parsley, basil, salt and pepper. Whisk to combine and set aside. Place enough Alfre-do sauce on the bottom of the casserole dish to coat the bottom. Lay three noodles down. Add 1/4 of the sauce, 1/3 of the chicken and 1/4 of the mozzarel-la cheese. Repeat this process 2 more times. Top the last layer with the remaining 3 lasagna noodles, Alfre-do sauce and mozzarella cheese. Bake for 35–40 min-utes.

Serves: 8Contributed by Kerry Fannon

Do you have a nickname?Rasmanian Devil

What’s your favorite color?Hunter green

Where did you go to high school?Oak Mountain

What’s your favorite band?Right now, Cage the Elephant

What is your favorite book?“The Perks of Being a Wallflower”

What is your favorite food?Eggs Benedict

What is your favorite alcohol-ic drink?Long Island Iced Tea

Name something random about yourself.I love jazz.

Joe RandomMichael Rasmussen

senior, English──

me.”As far as the wording goes,

McElroy said both militantly

religious people and atheists need to calm down.

“‘Merry Christmas’ and ‘Happy Holidays’ are indis-tinguishable in my mind,” she said.

McElroy said instead of fo-cusing on political correctness this season, people should fo-cus on the meaningful things the holidays celebrate.

“I think the important thing

to note is whether you set up a menorah or a nativity scene or a nonaffiliated fir tree, we’re all basking in the joy of a holiday spirit and the magic of believ-ing in mankind.”

Controversy» From B6

Rebecca CroomesASSISTAnT PHoTo EDIToR

Before the Halloween can-dy was put on sale, boutiques in Auburn were getting ready for the holidays.

Storefronts along South College Street and Magno-lia Avenue began to look a lot like Christmas when oc-tober rolled around. Win-dows were decorated with trees, wreaths and lights lin-ing downtown.

While customers are shopping for gifts at places like The Villager, Moxii and Wrapsody, owners say shop-pers can buy home decora-tions not found at big box stores.

“Just about everything we have is handmade by Amer-ican artists,” said Ingrid Brown, owner of The Villag-er. “So we try not to be dictat-ed by what’s going on in the marketplace.”

The Villager began stock-ing up on 2011 holiday items even before the new year.

“We pick a year in advance what we want our themes to be, so it’s not based on what the marketplace themes are,” Brown said.

The small business wastes no time in getting ready for the holidays.

“We actually put it out for football season because a lot of our customers come into town for football season,” Brown said. “So probably, I’d say, end of September.”

Brown said handpicking her products directly from the artists gives The Villager an edge over other stores.

People looking to pur-chase other festive décor have been visiting Wrapsody for things like wreaths and

lawn ornaments. Amanda Martin from At-

lanta has been buying her holiday items in Auburn the past five years.

“I just think they have a good variety and just neat stuff—stuff you don’t find if you go to the department store,” Martin said.

Kendall Clark, senior in interior design and Wrapso-dy employee, said the store carries something for every style, from traditional orna-ments in reds and greens to lake-style decorations, which have a handmade look and are usually painted on tin and garnished with flowers.

“We have a very large va-riety,” Clark said. “Anything you really want, I think Wrapsody has it.”

Like other boutiques, Clark said Wrapsody pre-pares for the holiday rush early by ordering products the January before.

“Literally, it’s a year-long process,” Clark said.

She said ornaments this holiday season are trending back to a traditional, home-made look.

But Auburn-themed deco-rations are never out of style at The Villager, Brown said.

“This year the Toomer’s oak ornament is one that’s really popular,” she said.

With football traffic and downtown Auburn’s Blue Friday adding customers to the busy holiday season, Clark said sales have been consistent.

“We do well,” Clark said. “I mean, obviously on the weekends with gameday it’s a lot bigger sales, but we still have people come in for gift towels or Dirty Santa gifts.”

Rebecca cRoomes / assistant Photo editoR

auburn-themed ornaments, especially those related to toomer’s oaks, are popular ornaments this holiday season.

Unique decor provides edge

Rebecca cRoomes / assistant Photo editoR

shops like the Villager, moxii and Wrapsody offer decorations not found at larger stores.

Elizabeth BonnerStaff WritEr

it’s that time of year again—time to take those overlooked peppermints that sit on res-taurant countertops and in waiting rooms all year and turn them into sensational holiday treats that are the ob-ject of attention for everyone’s taste buds.

from September’s first gust of wind, Starbucks customers anxiously await the arrival of the festive red-and-white hol-iday cup and peppermint cof-fees.

“at Christmastime we pro-mote something called the Peppermint Mocha,” said Nan-cy Weathers, assistant man-ager at Starbucks’ tiger town branch. “My new thing is the Peppermint Brownie Cake Pop. it looks like a sucker, but it’s actually icing-covered cake.”

retail stores also stock up on peppermint items during the holiday season.

World Market sells all things peppermint this time of year, including peppermint choco-late, peppermint bark, syrup, s’mores, Peeps marshmallows, cupcake mix, lotion, coffee, tea, hot chocolate and even a peppermint gift set that in-cludes miniatures of some of these treats in a peppermint-

shaped cup complete with a candy cane.

“There are all kinds of little things you can put together, from food to lotions,” said Eli-za turner, stock supervisor at World Market in tiger town.

Even with all of these op-tions, some of the best Christ-mas peppermint treats are the homemade ones.

Kerry fannon, senior in nu-trition and dietetics and con-tributor of the recipe of the Week, said there are sever-al holiday peppermint recipes that are easy for college stu-dents to make.

“Peppermint and choco-late kind of mix,” fannon said. “i guess the most tradition-al peppermint dessert would probably be peppermint bark.”

fannon also suggested some more innovative indul-gences.

“You can use candy canes to stir hot chocolate,” fannon said. “it kind of tastes like a peppermint patty.

“You could use peppermint extract to add to vanilla icing just to jazz it up a little bit. Put that over cupcakes or a regu-lar cake.”

fannon agreed that a con-nection between peppermint and Christmastime exists.

“i think it’s just kind of a tradition thing,” fannon said. “People celebrate the holidays in so many different ways, but that’s one of those foundation kind of things that’s always around. it’s seen everywhere, so that’s kind of cool.”

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Thursday, December 1, 2011 the auburn Plainsman Intrigue B7

food & Home B7

Raye May / associate intRigue editoRPeppermint can be used in many holiday-themed foods.

It’s the time for mint

Top five holiday albums on iTunes

1. Christmas MICHAEL BUBLE

2. Glee: The Christmas Album, Vol. 2 GLEE CAST

3. Noel JOSH GROBAN

4. Under the Mistletoe JUSTIN BIEBER

5. Number 1’s: Christmas VARIOUS ARTISTS

The Auburn PlainsmanCongratulates the graduates

& wishes everyone a happy holiday season!

Congratulates the graduates & wishes everyone a

happy holiday season!

Congratulates the graduates & wishes everyone a

happy holiday season!

Snag these popular albums to fill your home with holiday cheer

Intrigue B8 The Auburn Plainsman Thursday, December 1, 2011