BACK TO THE SWILNEWS: PART II A POST VACATION NEWS (11/1/91) The reunion went on as scheduled the first weekend of break. Turnout was not overly high, but those who were there seemed to have a good time. Hopefully it will be done again in a few years, the 15th anniversary of SWIL is coming up before too long. (This is a hint for the freshlings and sophomores.) One thing from the reunion is not over with. The order for reunion t-shirts was not placed beforehand after all. The absolute final deadline for orders is this Saturday. Furthermore, if you've every seen any of the old SWIL t-shirts around campus and thought, "Gee, I wish I had one of those" now is your chance! We are doing reprints! Sign-ups for all shirts will be available at the meeting this Saturday. The SWIL Halloween party will be this Saturday. Talk to Deb Holtzman for details. This is a private party, so she's collecting $2/person to pay for food and such. Three years ago there was a student-run science fiction course. Several people have decided that it would be a good thing to do it again for the spring semester. A proposal has to be worked out within the next month, so there will be a meeting for all interested people this Saturday immediately after the SWIL meeting. If you're interested, but can't make to meeting, talk to Jeff Hildebrand or Josh Smith. (Who seem to be the ringleaders at this point.) PhilCon is just about two weeks away. If you haven't registered yet, it's probably too late to do so in advance. However memberships are always available at the door, so don't despair if you missed the deadline. I'm trying to get a list of who is going so we can plan transportation. If you haven't already told me that you're going, please do so. Also if any of you have a car let me know if you're willing to transport people. (It's a drive of about 15 miles and takes 30-40 minutes.) A quick reminder. The SMOS will be resuming his rightful place as power behind the throne in a few months. Elections for a new figurehead, er, president will be held at the December 7th meeting. If you want to vote, but haven't become a non-member yet, you still have time. Review: "Forward the Foundation," by Isaac Asimov (review by Jed Hartman '90). This is "the first Foundation novella in forty-one years!" Which is irrelevant, since (a) there've been three Foundation NOVELS in the past few years; and (b) this is actually the first fifth (!) of a NEW Foundation novel. Now, I heartily dislike nearly everything I've read of Asimov's during the last ten years; given that, I was surprised that this story was fairly readable. Asimov does a good job of further tying together his Robot future history and his Foundation one, with enough exposition to let me follow the story (though I read the Foundation trilogy over ten years ago and haven't read any of the recent novels), but not so much that it got annoying. The dialogue is mediocre, the plot is fairly predictable, and the generalizations and lack of imagination in his future society are annoying; but the characterization is mostly quite solid, and I found the story not nearly as much of a chore to read as I expected. If you like Asimov, you'll probably love this story; if you don't, you might like this anyway. We've acquired a whole bunch of new non-members since the last SWILnews. In fact at the reunion meeting, Special Rule #4 was brought out. It states that the president may dismember anyone at any time. It was used to dismember jere7my's calculator, the mysterious 48 SX. We have a whole slew of attendance lists here. Attendance from the meeting 10/12: David "I'm Number One! I'm Number One! I'm Num-Awk!" R, Geoff Noer "I didn't know I had to add a quote (added later), Cherry "But I like my arms the way they are" Anderson, Bruce "From a _different_ college in upstate New York" Hahne, Helene "I _have_ been dismembered! I do exist! Even if I haven't been at SWIL meetings so far this year" Muller-Landau, Jacob "Given any number of people, you can always throw them out the window" Mattison, Neil "My hash browns are completely congealed, and I'm kinda getting into it" Banas, Nao "Ain't that the elephant's knees?" Parkhurst, Peter "kvetch, kvetch, kvetch. Sharples sucks. Kvetch, kvetch, whine." Wong, Andrea "How many things can I spill today?" Hall, Josh "Sleigher" Burdick, Jen "We are a hedge" Setlow, Peter "Martian Linguists are lost in the salt shaker. Help!" Wagner, Dan "Too silly, start over!" Levi, Dave "I'm no dinosaur; I'm an early mammal!" Szent-Gyorgyi '83, Melissa "Plucking fish scales from between my teeth" Shaner, Dan "they're dismembering me" Wells, Robert "The blood, the guts! I love it!" Richardson, Jonathan Rapkin, David "I'm twenty! I'm twenty! I'm num-aw nuts." Auer, jere7my "snugglebunnies?" tho?rpe, Pete Setlow '64 and Barbara (If only they had this in the 60s!), Luke "Hanes... Phbbt" Hankins, Melissa "'That dog's face reminds me of mine'-Doug Watson" Running, Mike "Pretending to be someone who looks vaguely like me but preppier and without hair (of the facial type) he wrote, self-referentially while attempting the longest-ever quote in the middle of his name" Rothbart, "Deb Franciscan sleepy" what?, Josh "Understudy/Assassin/Sniveler/Deuce/Loser" Smith Attendance from the 10/19/91 meeting: Joshua "Brevity" Mackay- Smith, Melissa "oh, surprise, she's sitting next to Joshua" Shaner, Eric "O" Nute, Jen "official hitter of Jeremy" Setlow, Peter "crunchberries" Wong, David "Spoon!" Randall, Deb "NEH grr hiss oh! hi!" Sam, Charles "Carrying 1/4 of a gallon" Deily, Jonathan Rapkin, Avigdor Zylberknopt, Nao "a hedgehog rampant or" Parkhurst, Stephen "Hey! That's MY achievement" Sample, K R James, Susan Ruff "It's a ruff life", Chris "Boomerang Reaper" Cobb, Topher "not Cobbie's better half" LeRoy, Peter "Elwood & Jake Rock" Wagner, Laura "Pearls of Wisdom" A., Andy "Swine of biblical references" Perry, Jessica "Wig out!" Hines, Josh "Visionary/Mirror" Smith, Jason "No, I'm not here, just making a cameo before I go to the airport" Greenwood, Melissa "The baby has a little twist that may surprise you" Running, Sherry "I haven't had my coffee yet" Levi, Dan Levi Do I have the shortest name?, DianAnaid, Deb "First on this page but not on this one" Holtzman, Dave "Duly Elected Self- Proclaimed Gang of Four" Szent-Gyorgyi '83, Syllabus Master of SWILdom