“Oh my fucking god! It’s the Whistling Shrimp!”

When Mark Vignet ’11 pumped up the Shrimp for their performance “Paint By Numbers” Saturday night, he was just as excited as the first time he saw the comedy group during his freshmen orientation. Outside the dimly lit theater, audience members were waiting to take their seats at The Schwartz Center. It was show time.

Pop quiz: What do Glenn Beck and Bill Maher have in common? If you answered with, “They’re both blowhards” ... well, sure. But for the purposes of the present conversation, let’s take a look at these two from another angle. What other similarities might they bear? Well, for starters, they both host news-centered cable television programs. More to the point, they’re both famous for their “colorful” approaches to political commentary. And, most recently, they’ve both urged Americans to reject the new swine flu vaccine.

The weather chilled. Tests crept up out of nowhere. And we failed. We seriously got, like, actual Fs on the five — six? seven? a million? —VILLAINOUS prelims we took this week. But, no worries! It’s HEROIC Fall Break! Where you goin’? We’re going somewhere, anywhere, please ... just get us out of here ...

“Sorry for the confetti in the first 10 rows.” Hearing this announcement as I took my seat at the State Theatre on Friday night, I knew it was going to be in for an incredible show. The stage, decked out with three chairs and a piano, was otherwise deserted.

When I was a freshman, I had a full-fledged mega-crush on IvyGateBlog.com. I thought it — and its editors — were the funniest and hottest shit ever. I’m talking banana phone levels of hilarious. I didn’t even know Chris Beam and Nick Summers (the founders), but I had these sort of creeper-esque fantasies about going to work for them, and becoming BFFs. And then, maybe one day we would all work at Slate together. In fact, the fame-whore in me would get excited whenever one of my articles made it onto Ragtime, even though it was rarely in a positive light.

You know you’re in for an interesting show when the first song is titled “My Whole Family Thinks I’m Gay.” And Bo Burnham didn’t disappoint by leaving out anything raunchy, satirically racial or taboo.

For those of you who are unfamiliar with the YouTube sensation, Bo (short for Robert) Burnham, would be the love child of Shakespeare and ”Werid Al” Yankovic; his lyrics are filled with raunchy, yet hysterical, puns that leave the audience questioning their own morals. At the young age of 19, Bo has already established himself as an Internet cultural sensation, even garnering the attention of Judd Apatow and penning a musical for him. Bo is currently on tour promoting his self-titled album, produced by Comedy Central.

Late Sunday, as dusk descended upon Ithaca, bringing grey skies and the first whisper of an autumn chill, a moribund message appeared on the screen of our computer: “Sorry, we could not access the web page www.CornellSun.com because we cannot find the server.” Shriek — VILLAINOUS chaos ensued around us! What is the meaning in all of this — “can’t find the server”?! Has the newsroom been subjected to a VILLAINOUS Orwellian experiment, with twisted intentions to make us sleep-deprived editors face certain social, intellectual and mental doom? What would happen without technology? What could ensue besides pure catastrophe? Needless to say, it was dirty and messy and forced us to almost shut down operations across the board. Well, not quite ...

Over the last month and half, we’ve been drinking a lot, but it hasn’t been happy drinking. It’s been filled with stress, fretting over the lack of jobs and internships, and mourning the downfall of our University’s once-robust budget. But, alas! Slope Day is near — the one day where we can drink, dance and sing along to shitty music without a care in the world. We may not have our papers done. We may not have jobs. We may not have language classes, but at least we have alcohol and Asher Roth. Without further ado, Berry Patch presents the top four people we’d like to drink with on Slope Day ...

Mary Beth Grant

Judicial Administrator

Hundreds of students flooded Uris Auditorium Wednesday night for the sneak preview of Observe and Report anticipating some of the lovable Seth Rogen unfiltered and inappropriate humor. He did not disappoint. Any hopes of vulgarity, crudeness or indecency were fulfilled; as far as substance, meaning or refinement, not so much. Although the movie isn’t entirely overboard, as many students exiting the movie indicated, it absolutely crosses the line on so many levels.

Sex, drugs and tasers — one thing is for sure about Observe and Report (the second mall cop movie of 2009) Ronnie Barhardt would kick Paul Blart’s roly-poly ass.

President Barack Obama just can’t quit his Blackberry. Even though the U.S. Commander in Chief is not allowed to have a personal cell phone, Barry has bucked the trend and kept his fingers typing away on his crackberry. But closer to home, rumor has it that our very own President David Skorton also suffers from the same cell-phone related addiction. Though most administrators have decided in favor of the iPhone, Skorton has chosen the Blackberry Bold, and we hear he has a bad case of Blackberry thumb. We got a hold of his PIN (it’s 31b0c98e, btw), and contrary to popular belief, not everything the president says sounds like a polished press release. Here’s our exclusive bbm conversation with Skorton ...

Cornell Sun: Yoooo! Back from break?