The Daily Pennsylvanian has finished regular daily publication for the semester. With the exception of the traditional finals issue coming out next week, we won’t be back until classes resume in January.

On behalf of The Spin and The Daily Pensylvanian, I would like to thank you, our readers, for visiting The Spin on a regular basis.

In case you didn’t know, I’ve been in charge of The Spin for the past semester. I will be leaving my position as Deputy Editorial Page Editor along with my boss and Editorial Page Editor, Evan Goldin.

It’s been a thrill to work with so many great columnists and dive into a new, online-exclusive format for DP opinion writing.

The dedicated online columnists, or “columnistas,” as I like to call them, have spent a great deal of time and effort creating content for The Spin. We hope that we have provided you, our readers, with a worthwhile online experience that makes you feel more connected to Penn, The Daily Pennsylvanian and general college life.

As The Spin has developed over the past few months, our approach has been to push the boundaries of traditional Web logs, or “blogs”. In particular, The Spin has featured a good deal of original reporting. Unlike most blogs, much of the content of The Spin is collected with the same standards for reporting as any news item in the DP.

While this approach is unorthodox for blogs, we believe that print media must integrate original reporting and the internet if the industry is to continue to grow. Our approach is gaining traction in the industry. For example, the popular left-wing political blog Huffington Post recently announced that they have hired a veteran print journalist to cover events in Washington, D.C. and produce more “original content.”

The new initiative of the Huffington Post sounds like it’s ripped from page-one of the Spin playbook. And, yes, there actually is a Spin playbook.

We expect to have a few posts up during the DP finals issue next week. Beginning in January, The Spin will feature a new editor and a new roster of columnistas.

If you are interested in joining The Spin next semester, please fill out our columnist application by December 31st. You can choose to apply as an online columnist, a print columnist or both. I encourage you to apply!

Once again, thank you for joining us this semester. I hope to see you back in January. If you have any questions or comments about the Spin, please feel free to e-mail them to me at Obenzinger@dailypennsylvanian.com.

Potential location of substance free housing in the Quad (Taylor Howard/DP)

As of last year, if you preferred to live in an environment free of, uh, certain “substances,” you were out of luck.

Then, in October, a residential program for recovering substance abusers was announced, to debut in fall of 2007.

But, believe it or not, there are Penn students that choose not to use drugs or alcohol even though they aren’t recovering addicts. And thanks to Undergraduate Assembly member and College freshman Enoch Arthur-Asmah, those students will finally have their own place to live as well. Starting next fall, Fisher-Hassenfeld College House will have a Substance Free residential program as an extension of its Healthy Living program.

I came out against the program for recovering addicts, but I can’t deny that substance free housing is a great idea. I thought the recovery program was a bad idea because it would brand the participating students as outsiders. But students in a substance free program would be there of their own accord.

Recovering addicts shouldn’t be stigmatized at all, but praised for their efforts to get their lives back on track. Still, a negative association does exist in the minds of others. But this won’t apply to students who choose to abstain from drugs and/or alcohol simply because it’s not for them.

Laura Swann, the coordinator for the Center for Students in Recovery at the University of Texas at Austin warned that students in a substance free program have less of an incentive to abstain as they might in a recovery program.

But honestly, that’s okay. Substance-free housing isn’t meant for former addicts. Addicts need professional treatment, where they can be in a structure and supportive environment uniquely designed to help them achieve their goals of sobriety. Substance free housing is to provide a welcoming environment to students who simply feel that drugs and alcohol aren’t for them.

This isn’t a drawback; it’s obvious. These are two different programs with two different goals. Rehab doesn’t necessarily belong in a college residential system, but a program to make sure that students feel comfortable with the life choices they’ve made certainly does.

I’m a prose kind of girl but, when inspiration hits, you just have to go with it. Last Saturday night, I ventured back to the scene of many of the crimes of freshman year and the best place to ever sell sliced bread: Wawa.

I’m going to claim some poetic license here. Like I said, poetry is not my strong suit but without further adieu, an ode(ish) to Wawa:

I transferred to Penn from the cultural wasteland known as Cornell University. Whenever someone asks me if anything at Cornell is better than Penn, my answer is always the same: The on-campus dining is better, Slope Day concert brings bigger name performers than Spring Fling and, other than that, everything about Penn is better than anything about Cornell.

But yesterday, when I went to pick up a transcript, I realized that wasn’t the case. Penn’s prices for transcripts are ridiculous compared to the cost of transcripts at Cornell, who sends them for free. So, I ordered 10 fresh, crisp transcripts from Cornell yesterday, and they were mailed overnight. Shipping cost: $0.

Cornell is on the other end of the spectrum from Penn, whose prices are abnormally high. To send a transcript overseas from Penn, it costs a whopping $35, whereas Cornell charges nothing for the same service. I understand that there are international shipping costs, but Penn’s price seems extremely high and doesn’t vary based on where you are sending your transcript. Sending a transcript to Montreal should not cost the same as mailing one to Mumbai.

I also wish that there was a service where one could order a transcript in person and avoid paying the ridiculous $12 in-person fee if you are willing to wait 3-5 days for your request to be processed.

Let’s not forget that not everyone can afford to throw around so much money. The high cost of transcripts may prevent students who are tight on cash from applying for additional jobs, internships, summer programs, graduate schools, fellowships or even volunteer opportunities.

With six finals periods already under my belt, I thought I would take the time to share some secrets of studying that I’ve learned along the way. The following is a list of the most important (and legal) tips and tricks, which I call - in an ode to Arrested Development - The Finals Countdown.

1. Pretending to study is not actually an effective technique. Talking to your friends in a Huntsman study room will not help you and neither will facebooking in Fine Arts. Take real breaks and do real work. After all, the motto is “Work hard, Play hard” not “Pretend to Work hard, Play in the library.”
2. Make use of free stuff. RAs and others with semester-long budgets are unloading the remainder of their money during Finals, and every one is going out of their way to prevent long falls from the top of a highrise (this isn’t Cornell). In the past I’ve seen free breakfasts, free massages, dessert study breaks and more. ABP always has free coffee at night and Houston Hall often has amazing buffet set-ups. Finals and binge eating are synonymous for many, so if you’re going to do it, do it for free.
3. Leave your books with pride. You know that pre-med who occupies a desk in your favorite study area for weeks at a time, leaving just enough behind to prevent desperate studiers from obtaining a seat? We all agree that guy’s a tool. But if you can’t beat ‘em, you’ve got to join ‘em.
4. Be prepared, but not too prepared. A few key comforts can make studying away from home much easier. Library-appropriate clothes, lots of layers (for the Tundra that is Van Pelt you might want to bring a parka), and an endless supply of Red Bull are all in order. Pillows and blankets are a little excessive but admissible. Lamps, coffeemakers, or any other appliances, however, should always be left at home.
5. Remember to breathe. It may sound cheesy, but no test is important enough to sacrifice your sanity. Besides, no one wants to be the girl gripping her cheat sheet and hyperventilating as she walks into the exam room. It really will be okay, I promise - especially if you’ve taken my above advice.

(Reuters)

it’s December 6th. let’s recap.

The election is over (unless you’re looking to 2008 like I am); The Screwdriver Mugger is still at large; Papers, papers, papers, papers, papers.

So that would pretty much leave one thing to fixate on until we pack it up and blow Penn a kiss for three weeks:

Lindsay Lohan, obviously.

Little Miss Lohan has begun attending Alcoholics Anonymous meetings, as her publicist seems eager to tell any winsome shlub with a computer and tabloid byline (especially the British). Correct me if I’m wrong, but doesn’t the “anonymous” in AA usually imply that you don’t publicize your attendance? Clearly celebridom is a galaxy far beyond my intellectual grip.

Smarminess aside, I wonder: how severe is Lohan’s “alcoholism” at the age of 20? Her publicist said she was attending AA meetings, but didn’t say she was actually an alcoholic. It’s a semantic distinction, but still. Moreover, how much worse can her drinking be than other 20-year-olds around the country?

So Lohan goes out five or six or seven nights a week, drinks too much, shows up late for work, wears oversized sunglasses to mask her “exhaustion” and hits the repeat button at 10 pm. In the eyes of some people, that seems like partying too hard. For the rest of us, that sounds like college.

I’m not a doctor, but I’m going to say for the record right here: Lindsay Lohan does not have a drinking problem–any more than the rest of us. She goes out every night because she doesn’t know what else to do with her money. There are plenty of folks like that here. Zetes, anyone?

To the average adult, she’s being irresponsible. To peers, she’s living her formidable years in much the same way the rest of us are. The differences are that she’s famous and we’re not. We have to go to class the next day and she doesn’t.

Maybe what’s necessary is an over-arching definition of alcoholism, so that we can all self-diagnose how perilous our drinking habits are. Till then we tip our cups and salute you, Lindsay.

I lived in Harnwell last year, on the 12th floor right next to the laundry room. My roommate and I had a sizable double with brand new carpets that our entire un-renovated floor was jealous of.

For more than a semester it remained a mystery why my roommate and I were fortunate enough to receive such a gift from the housing gods. But slowly the truth came out and we were less than pleased. Over the summer, prior to our arrival on campus, the floor’s laundry room literally exploded. Pipes burst and drowned the machines, and the water flowed right into our adjacent room. New carpeting and furniture were installed immediately and our R.A. was told to keep it hush hush. Our laundry room had received minimal repairs and for the remainder of the year we were scared that an eruption would occur again.

Every student living on campus is well aware of the horrors of their dormitory’s laundry room. The antiquated washers and dryers are money guzzling machines that steal your quarters and give you marginally clean and half-dry clothing. The Penn Cash swipe system remained out of commission the entire year, so every time I did laundry, an entire $10 roll of quarters would be used to do my loads.

Feeling ripped-off and angry, I decided to take matters into my own hands and follow the advice of my mischievous friends at Penn State, who to this day claim to have never spent a cent on dormitory laundry. Their method of cost cutting: Latex gloves.

They advised me to put five quarters into each of the fingers of the gloves and then insert the gloved quarters into the machine’s slots, allowing one to save their quarters before the machine swallows them. For my PSU buddies their method was flawless. I, on the other hand, was left with dirty clothes and a jammed quarter collector.

Thankfully, the Undergraduate Assembly has decided to take action against on campus laundry woes by initiating The Laundry Facilities Plan of Action, which will utilize a complaint system in hopes of improving the condition of laundry rooms. Two laundry rooms in Ware College House have been chosen to trial run the complaint system, if all goes well, the system may be implemented in all dorms across campus.

Hopefully the university is recognizing the need for more efficient washers and dryers so that students like me do not have to resort to fishy cost cutting methods that utilize items that should be reserved solely for hospitals and biology labs.

The only Webmail I’ve gotten today.

With finals just around the corner and many students waiting to hear back from employers about job opportunities, there could be no worse time for Webmail to go down.

Thank heavens we are supposed to switch to a new server (hopefully Gmail) in the Spring.

Still, who knows what important E-mails have been lost during the past few hours? How much confusion has this shut down caused? One month after we were supposed to get a new mail provider, is really there any accountability?

The new vaccine for the human papilloma virus has been heavily advertised by the mass media and remains a hot topic in women’s health discussion. But you couldn’t tell by looking at the number of vaccine recipients here on campus. Student Health Services reports only having given out 150 vaccinations against cervical cancer. The low number is somewhat disconcerting considering that undergraduates are at the outer edge of the age brackets of those eligible to receive it.

“All places administering the vaccine, following the approved licensing, offer it to females between the ages of 11-26, including females 26 years old,” said Evelyn Wiener, Director of Student Health Services. “It does not matter whether they are sexually active.”

The vaccine comes in three doses given over a six month span. Unfortunately, insurance does not cover the price of $130 per injection. Another impediment may be that even those medical providers that support the vaccine do so with hesitation since it is a new therapy.

“The vaccine offers a lot of promise in preventing the two strands most commonly linked to cervical cancer. But we have to balance the excitement with the concerns,” said Wiener. “It does not protect against other strains that could cause cervical cancer. We’ll only better know potential side affects after millions of doses have been administered.”

But precautions are associated with almost every type of medical therapy from the most minor of surgical procedures to over-the-counter medications. Thriftiness, trepidation nor laziness should stand as reasons preventing female students to at least inquire about the HPV vaccine. Remember if you wait too long, you are no longer eligible. To learn more, check out SHS’s site.

Some of the more family friendly content on Boredatvanpelt, circa last night at 2 a.m

Monday night, 8p.m.

If you’ve never been to Boredatvanpelt.com, you’re missing out. And believe me, reading yesterday’s article in the Daily Pennsylvanian just doesn’t quite cut it.

After all, I’m bored at Van Pelt right now. So I arrived at the site expecting to find about five minutes of procrastination. Unfortunately, I started to write this a half hour ago. And instead of reading an article for my psychology class on Terror Management Theory, I’m learning lots of things about everyone else that is bored at Van Pelt.

For example, someone clearly wants us to know they have “pepperoni nipples.” And someone even cooler just posted, “any hot women wanna play PS3 with me?” A tip, my friend: the answer is probably no.

New favorite post, as of 7:18 PM: “only at a f**kin ivy league [school] would we continue to type sh*t out here, instead of actually getting some ass.”

My new goal is to find someone sitting near me that is posting. Every time I shamelessly check the window for a new post to make fun of, I’m absolutely petrified that someone will think I’m “horny gal,” who is currently making plans to “do it” at the button with another anonymous poster.

The amount of information people are willing to post under the blanket of anonymity really is unbelievable. After all, would you ever write something like, “I can stroke for you” if your name was attached?

But if Boredatvanpelt.com is too tame for you, according to IvyGate, much of the Ivy League has moved onto using Craigslist’s “Casual Encounters” site to arrange meetups during this (apparently) very stressful time of year. My personal favorite? The posting for a Harvard undergraduate orgy. This poster is very careful to warn us, “This ain’t going to be some 90s dance type affair. We’re trying to keep it good looking, peps [sic].”

This might all post a vaguely pessimistic picture of romance in the Ivy League, but all is not lost. Someone has now posted twice on Boredatvanpelt.com that he wants a girl to take to dinner. Unfortunately, his posts have been sandwiched between conversations that are so inappropriate (and, I’m fairly sure, quite illegal) that I can’t repost them here. Poor guy. I hope he finds a date. I’m just not sure Boredatvanpelt.com is the best place to find it.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m off to return to the saga of the girl in a green shirt and jeans, who apparently missed her connection from a half hour ago. Although it’s looking like her study group is getting mad at her for leaving too often to hook up in the stacks.

I swear, you can’t make stuff up.