Does This Mean The Paper Is Middle-Aged Now?

By: Ross Preston

This may come as a shock to many, but I would like to offer the controversial opinion that 10/10 is fucking awesome. And not just for all the obvious reasons, either. We've all heard about the idea of a progressive party, what rescue dogs look like, where to go for the campus shot (Mears Cottage at 10:15, of course!), but what I think cannot be forgotten is the lore of 10/10, how it has its own unique story and buzz words. The parties that rival 10/10 are much simpler ideas. Block Party is when the police close off High Street on Friday of Finals Week so a beer truck can be unveiled in front of Football house. “Disco” is disco…at Harris. In short, 10/10 is more interpretive than the other heavyweights. There are many different ways to celebrate 10/10, and non-Grinnellians wouldn't have a clue what it was without someone explaining it to them. One could quite logically interpret it as the number “ten,” repeated twice.

This weekend, I will definitely be celebrating ten repeated twice. But as I write this Backpage and you read it (bear with me, I'm still getting used to the idea that people actually read the Backpage), I will also be celebrating ten repeated fice. That is to say, ten repeated five times. Five times ten. Fifty. Fifty issues of the B&S at Grinnell. Definitely grounds for celebrating ten repeated twice.

I know that was a roundabout way of saying, “Hey everybody, this is our 50th issue, so we got a bunch of our past editors to write articles for us, and stuff.” But then again, using 10/10 to introduce the B&S – i.e. using the most alternative and outrageous expression of “campus unity” that we have to introduce (what I hope to be) the most alternative and outrageous expression of campus thought that we have – only seems fitting. I don't mean to suggest that the B&S can compete with 10/10 in any way; after all, one involves reading and the other involves drinking. Maybe we shouldn't even be mentioned in the same drunken, smoke-filled breath as 10/10.

But just like a stumbling first-year going down the stairs to Gardner, we've come a long way. You have to admit, there was at least one semi-not bad thing to come out of the Bush Administration. The B&S may come out on seemingly random, unpredictable Fridays and smell like urine, but the campus has been putting up with us for over 6 years, which should mean we're getting tenure and finally getting that preferred salary we've been dreaming of since grad school. Unless Russell Crowe's character from “A Beautiful Mind” is grabbing all of the issues for an elaborate new formula of some kind, I've gathered that a good amount of students, faculty, and staff are currently reading the B&S, an amount that was certainly lower my first year.

I'm proud of the progress the paper has made, and “50th issue” at least sounds kind of important. For a publication that runs only 4 times a semester, I think it's an achievement to have lasted this long. If you've already read through the issue, you may have learned that Nick Lloyd '04 and Aron Szapiro '04 started the B&S their senior year, so the paper could not have survived without the contributions of students who had little or no knowledge of its existence prior to stepping on campus. Many students go to college knowing they want to work for the college newspaper, but few know they want to write satire for a school publication. It's more often something that you fall into, which explains the births and subsequent deaths of many different humor/alternative publications at Grinnell, or any other school. Humor publications represent what is funny in the minds of students at that moment. Wouldn't it be a little weird if we were approaching the 100th year anniversary of The Malteaser, the humor publication Joe Rosenfield '25 wrote for when he was an undergraduate? Maybe it's simply the case that every generation or era of Grinnell students needs its own humor publications, and for this reason, I would never suggest that the B&S will be around forever. For us to ever celebrate a 100th issue, new writers will not only have to be funny but also excited about the paper.

And even though friends of mine know I rarely root for anything, I really hope they will be.