It should come as no surprise to our faithful (and always charming) readers that we've been a bit scarce lately. Turns out that IvyGate is a great way to get a great job that takes a great amount of time and effort to do. That's where a few of us have been lately.

So here's an open call to anyone and their most attractive friends. Want to write? Let us know. Want to edit? Give us a shout. Want to design some cheeky imagery? Talk to me.

Experience is arbitrary. But we will demand that you understand teh internet, possess a cutting sense of humor, and write with a proto-David Foster Wallace voice. Seriously, otherwise, just email us if you're up for cranking out content.

IvyGate pays in beer and glory. And trust me, it flows freely.

- ACE (adam@ivygateblog.com)

Just kidding. But this is funny. Like, so funny I wanna go buy a cable knit sweater funny. (And I do not like cable knit sweaters.)

Associate professor Lionel McIntyre of Columbia's Graduate School of Architecture, Planning, and Preservation gave a female colleague a black eye at a bar on Sunday. According to the New York Post:

The professor, who is black, had been engaged in a fiery discussion about "white privilege" with Davis, who is white, and another male regular, who is also white, Friday night at 10:30 when fists started flying, patrons said...

"The punch was so loud, the kitchen workers in the back heard it over all the noise," bar back Richie Velez, 28, told The Post. "I was on my way over when he punched Camille and she fell on top of me."

Just when Morningside Heights was starting to look moderately safe, the Columbia faculty is gonna start race wars?

(ASIDE: Smarties who clicked through the link above now know that there were shots fired in Morningside Heights in July. But it's fine. Our Ivy undergrads weren't present to catch the bullets. That's for international summer school students.)

Details of McIntyre's regrets and the victim's black eye after the jump.

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Princeton freshman Diane Metcalf-Leggette is suing the university for not allowing her extra time on exams. Citing a learning disability, Metcalf-Leggette claimed that without the special concessions she might not do well on her midterms.

It's called freshman year, Diane.  Most people don't do well on their first midterms.

But really, there's a bigger issue at stake. The place for learning disabilities on campus is generally drowning in a vat of amphetamine-soaked distrust. Diagnoses are diagnoses, right? Metcalf-Leggette has a whole bunch of them. According to The Prince:

Metcalf-Leggette’s complaint asserted that she has four learning disabilities, which were diagnosed in 2003: attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), mixed-receptive-expressive language disorder, disorder of written expression and developmental coordination disorder. The conditions, according to the complaint, hinder her ability to focus, process information and communicate in writing.

So should the University trust the doctors and give this girl some help? Oh wait, they already do.

The University currently accommodates Metcalf-Leggette’s disabilities by offering her a “reduced distraction testing environment,” a limit of one exam per day and a 10-minute break each hour, the law journal reported.

Get to know the Americans with Disabilities Act and fury of testing the Tiger after the jump.

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Remember that one time you hit 'reply all' and the entire Undergraduate Assembly found out you were going to be 10 minutes late because of an emergency GYN appointment? Um, me neither.

Picture the worst email gaffe you ever made, and magnify that times a thousand, because a Cornell Business School tech consultant just made the worst email error of all time. According to Guest of A Guest, tech consultant John accidentally passed on a ridiculously steamy email exchange with his mistress Lisa (who is also a Cornell Business School employee) to the entire freaking school. They're both married. They're both so, so screwed. And they're both, um, apparently fans of tickling and tasting each other's naughty bits.

you bring me right to the edge of release, over and over and over again, yet each time I’m denied, and fiendishly tickled even more???

Pictures of these two fiendish ticklers, and the best bits of their email exchange, after the jump:

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[Knock, knock.]

Jesus! Dude! You scared the shit out of me. Come on in, though. I JUST packed a prime-ass bowl, you want in? I eviscerated the shit out of my semiotics exam, and this is due me. Big time. Seriously dude, just push that Heroic Portrait Statuary and Are Women Human? stuff off that chair and pull 'er up. Oh, and can you put that towel back? Yeah, wedge it under there. Thanks. Do you want half a pizza bagel?

Christ, I regret this R.A. gig more every day. I mean, no offense! You're OK. It just never ends, all you guys streaming in here for advice... "How do I get out of my exam?" "Should I major in linguistics?" "It burns, what do I do, it's like peeing sriracha!" It's like, solve your own damn problems!

BUT I guess it's a classic prisoner's dilemma, am I right? They don't exactly give you a discount on tuition once you hit year five, so I gotta keep you guys nice and fluffed to get that free housing. So go ahead, man, lay it on me.

What? That's your question? Are you fucking-- am I being punked? Are you punking me right now?! "I want to join the aikido team, but I'm worried about how much they're going to haze me"? Relax, friendo. Nobody hazes for shit anymore, they're all way too paranoid about the video winding up on Dateline. And besides, we all grew up in schools that banned tag, and forbade teachers from grading in red pen. We are far too sheltered and boring to inflict even halfway decent hazing. Aikido away, wussy grasshopper. (But I guess the first couple of times you hang out with those guys, it wouldn't hurt to eat a big foundation of pre-boozefest food like bacon cheeseburgers and fries.)

Now scram! I've had it! No more barging into my room! From now on, if anyone can't figure their own life out for their own damn overeducated self, they're going to have to email me at asktheivygateRA@ivygateblog.com. And they better include some clever-ass sign-off names like they do in advice columns, so I can protect the shit out of their anonymity. And they'd BETTER write! Otherwise I might probably make up the letters the first time around until enough people notice and send in real ones! I bet the topics range from all types of shit, from classes to sex to keg etiquette. (The gentleman pumps, the lady dispenses.) Wait, did they ever have an advice column in the Degrassi Grapevine? If you need me I'll be at SurfTheChannel...

Fire away!

--the IvyGate R.A.

A couple of days ago, a drunk Harvard Law grad Brian Schroeder burned down a chapel containing the remains of and memorials to unidentified 9/11 victims. Schroeder turned himself into police soon thereafter and posted the $3,000 bail Sunday night.

The remains managed to make it out unscathed thanks to some badass, apparently fireproof chambers made to protect the DNA that might one day identify the victims. The wooden benches, cards, photos, flowers, and other painfully sweet memorials, however, did not have badass, fireproof containers. They were destroyed.

Of course, Schroeder's friends and family think he's a real stand-up guy and that the incident was somewhat out of character. According to his mother:

[Brian] doesn't really have any explanation or memory of what took place. Now, he's just trying to minimize the damage to his career and make amends. You know, take responsibility and move on.

Do go on, Mrs. Schroeder...

I'm appalled and my heart goes out to [the families who had built memorials to loved ones lost in the 9/11 attacks at the E. 30 St. chapel]. Because I know it's basically like a cemetery and a memorial that's so very important. I just cannot imagine, nor can he, why he would have done that.

Bingo. Why would you do that? Seriously, dude, burning down a cemetery/memorial is not a funny prank. This is a somewhat funny, Ivy League prank. But let's go on the record and just say stop trying, Ivy League-rs. Or you will lose your job and your six-figure salary. Like Brian did.

Oh, and it might help if you stopped wearing those Ed Hardy t-shirts. That shit is made of the devil's old underwear or something.

Susan Finkelstein, a 43-old University of Pennsylvania grad student, posted an ad on Craigslist offering sex for money. Well, not exactly money. World Series tickets. They're as good as money.

According to FoxSports, the ad read:

DESPERATE BLONDE NEEDS WS TIX (Philadelphia) Diehard Phillies fan--gorgeous tall buxom blonde-- in desperate need of two World Series Tickets. Price negotiable--- I'm the creative type! Maybe we can help each other!

Well, the ad is certainly suggestive. (Who doesn't have a "gorgeous tall buxom blonde" friend, of "the creative type," "help" them out every once in a while?) But an undercover officer who replied to the ad claims that after meeting Finkelstein at a bar and having a few beers, she offered to perform explicit sexual acts. He slapped the cuffs on her, threw her in his car, and, err, took her to the big house for some punishment.

So is this an innocent he-said-"Will you..."-she-said-"If you..." situation? The Daily Pennsylvanian can explain the defense with two quotes:

“She was willing to — if she could afford it — pay money or work some type of deal to get tickets, but we completely dispute and deny that there was an offer a trade of sex for tickets,” [Finkelstein's lawyer] told KYW.

“I didn’t do anything wrong, so I’m not embarrassed about my actions,” Finkelstein told the Associated Press.

After the jump, the full on explanation (in photos) of why this lady is awesome either way.

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Last week, Georgetown sophomore Charley Cooper made national news with a job listing for a personal assistant. He's 20-years old and apparently the whole college affair all too much for him to handle on his own.

According to Vox Populi, the Georgetown Voice's blog, the original as went something like this:

As my PA you will receive an email once a day by 9:00 am with a task list for that day and a time estimate for each task. Important tasks will be bolded on the list and must be done that day (even though everything on the list should theoretically be finished on a daily basis) …

PA example tasks -Organize closet -make bed -Drop off / pick up dry cleaning -Drop me off / pick me up from work -Do laundry -Fill up gas tank -bring car for servicing -schedule appointment for haircut -Pay parking tickets -manage electronic accounts -shopping and running errands -other random tasks.

Needless to say, Georgetown is not in the Ivy League. (And neither is Mr. Cooper.) But when a student does something so god-awful douchey that the Washington Post reports on it, something must be done.

Everyone's favorite Yale student, Aleksey "So Sexy" Veyner, might've done something like this. And Mike Kopko definitely started DormAid, a service that offered maid services to Harvard dorm rooms and pissed off pretty much the entire school. But Georgetown should know better, right?

After the jump, a couple of reasons why not.

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The Boston Herald reported Sunday that SIX lab workers in Harvard Medical School's New Research Building immediately fell ill after drinking out of the hallway coffee machine. Jokes hover around most offices that that shit tastes like poison, but this coffee actually contained the deadly poison sodium azide.

But wait, there's more:

One of the victims, contacted and their identity confirmed by the Herald, said they were told by the university not to speak about the incident. Privately, however, they said they do not feel it was an accident, though they could not say why someone would target that group.

THIS HAPPENED TWO MONTHS AGO. Not only did Harvard instruct the victims to keep the incident a secret, but both the Boston Police and Harvard Police are apparently holding off on investigating it until now.

The obvious Yale parallel after the jump.

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