We hope you survived your first week of syllabus scanning, Sakai navigating and book buying relatively unscathed.
As our beloved drop-add period ends, and as professors start to sound more like the teacher from Charlie Brown, we're given the gift that is our first Gators weekend.
So soak up the time in the never-ending swamp of rain and slush that is Gainesville, Gators! As Mother Nature gets all sassy and refuses to relent with her rain and gloom as she does every August in Gainesville, we can't help but be a little excited as the Editorial Board presents you with your very own This-Will-Be-Your-Only-Ray-Of-Sunshine-Until-November-Because-It-Never-Stops-Raining-Here-Ever edition of
Darts & Laurels
And as we talk about a ray of sunshine, we have to admit we weren't on everyone's good side this week.
After a computer error (seriously, not our fault) left a very unfortunate error on our front page earlier this week comparing sisters of a certain sorority to, let's just say, a certain gardening tool, we are more than mortified with ourselves. But, as we said Thursday, accidents happen. So for our front-page nightmare of a typo, we're throwing a You-Sure-You-Kiss-Your-Mother-With-That-Mouth-No-But-Seriously-We're-Really-Sorry DART at The Independent Florida Alligator.
Some things are harder to move on from than others.
This week marks the 20th anniversary of the start of Danny Rolling's murders that rocked Gainesville and UF before some of you were even born. Leaving five people dead and forever marring the lives of the the victims' families, Rolling left a hideous trail of grief that remains two decades later.
For viciously killing and ruining the lives of countless people, we're aiming a posthumous Nothing-Will-Ever-Make-What-You-Did-Right-In-This-World DART right at The Gainesville Ripper's heart because two decades later, a permanent memorial on 34th Street Wall and yearly memorials will never bring our fellow Gators and Gainesville residents back.
Conversely, we realize the state of Florida put its game face on when it brought a little justice to the victims' families and decided to sentence Rolling to death. For showing the nation and the world we do not mess with serial killers sneaking about and killing our students, we're giving a That's-How-We-Do-It-In-Florida-But-We-Really-Wish-He-Hadn't-Killed-Anyone-In-The-First-Place LAUREL to the State of Florida for catching and then sentencing Danny Rolling.
Not as serious as placing Gainesville in a state of looming fear, Gainesville was faced with another pesky criminal this summer.
The Skimmer Scammer, as he has become known, plagued Gainesville gas stations with intricate devices that steal your personal information from credit card swipes at the pump. Luckily, officials in Orange County have found a man they believe to be the notoriously annoying Skimmer Scammer.
For putting Gainesville in a state of fear to ever go back to the gas station and for just being plain annoying, the Department of Darts and Laurels is stealing your information from your credit card and handing you back a We-Hope-Someone-Charges-Thousands-Of-Dollars-Worth-Of-Zoobooks-On-Your-Own-Credit-Card DART to the Skimmer Scammer.
See, Gators? Wasn't that a ray of sunshine in your wet and rainy week? Seriously, though, enjoy your first weekend in Gainesville. We'll see you on Monday.
