University of Nebraska Omaha - Tomahawk / Gateway Yearbook (Omaha, NE)

Page 11 text:

Here, There, and Everywhere, It's Smilin' Faces . . . PERHAPS it's true that smilin' faces, sometimes they don't tell the truth, just as the song says. Undisputed though it may be, the Truth remains that these faces have been around midwesterners since early summer. The fad is dying, some say. The campus and its students have been smiled to death in the form of purses, playing cards, tee-shirts, puppets, pillows, necklaces, rings, and almost anything merchandised in our local stores. KOIL displays the likeness on their Good Guy Hitline survey sheets and on their Have a Happy Day bumper stickers. King's Food Host and Hinky Dinky both use the symbol locally to develop their own institutional advertising. Smiling face stickers and buttons have been a big seller. Even campus ministers the Rev. Leonard Barry and the Rev. Dave Kehret can be seen walking around campus with the glowing faces pinned to their lapels. On rare occasions the bootstrappers have been known to replace the America, Love It or Leave It sticker on their briefcases with a smiling face or two. I'm sick of the faces, said junior Rosemary Hilgert. They're plastic and they demand a plastic response. Many other students predict that the seeming smiles will smother in their hypocracy. Despite the supposed artificial picture painted by these smiles, the fact is that these happy little faces have proven to be actually useful for a number of UNO students. I use them in student teaching, replied senior Paulette Connor. Paulette instructs eleven mentally retarded children in the Westgate Cottages for her student teaching assignment. I have a smiling face puppet I use there for teaching language arts, she continued, and I use the stickers to put on the good papers my students turn in. The buttons and stickers are also used in hospitals where many UNO students work to help boost patient morale. Whether or not the happy faces contribute to the cause of happiness around them or simply provide a commercial vehicle for new and successful products — it's not known. But the response that they've received certainly indicates a desire for some type of happiness. Perhaps it's just that warm feeling people like to experience upon seeing a real smiling face. •

Page 10 text:

CAFETERIA FILLS THE VOID FOR THE OUT ■BUT- 'IN' GROUP THROUGH the process of elimin- ation many students find them- selves out of place, out of step, with their contemporaries and seek shelter with the other odd- men-out on campus who are too sophisti- cated, or too level-headed, or too much out of line with the rigid formal types to socialize in the regular meeting places in the Milo Bail Student Center. The Cafeteria is full of individuals who find others who are also individuals and the familiar camping game goes on in that room just like the rest. The eating place is a meeting place. Among the regulars are graduate students, drama majors, a large contingent of stu- dent government people and foreign stu- dents who find people who will honestly take the time to talk with them. Near the partition between the Na- palm Hall and the Cafeteria are some Boots who sit quietly and amaze pretty young things with the stories of their world travels. Often an earnest studier will find his $17 text book under a pile of the kitchen's famous bean soup. Mixed with the mess of hungry eds and coeds are people with food far from their minds. But, due to the crowding around lunch time, they may find food in their laps. Near the window there are several graduate teaching assistants who try their best to look beaten by their overloaded work schedules. If you look close enough you can see the pleasure in their eyes as awkward undergraduates pass by. A wily gleam strikes them as they remember the time they too tripped and dumped edibles on readables. Perhaps there are more of the astute species of the campus types in the Cafe- teria. When the kitchen line closes down and the famished are fed, the crowd begins to clear and those remaining are cracking books and bending backs. The pity of all this is found on the unkind walls. Missing are the honors one reaps from hard studying. On the wall a student will find only this missive: Please Bus Your Own Trays. •

Page 12 text:

Rhythm in the Room IT'S 7:03 a.m. Perhaps it's Tuesday morning . . . maybe it's Wednesday. A young neophyte with a shiny quarter in his hand, sleepy eyes, and two Greek letters across his red tee-shirt approaches the luminous blue- black computer next to the east wall of the Room. He drops the money in and the mon- strous machine fills the Room with music and mood. The computer has just been programmed for the next ten minutes. Meanwhile, UNO's only roomies enter and take their programmed posi- tions at their appropriate tables: card tables, talk tables, cram tables. When the ten minutes has elapsed, a brightly clad black student leaves his table, quarter in hand, and punches up his favorite music to move by. And so, the Room has again been programmed for the next ten. A few minutes before a class starts many of the roomies have left and the Room takes on a momentary quiet. All of a sudden, some roomie gets desperate. She doesn't know how to act. She doesn't know whether to chew her bubblegum with soul or simply in regular bubblegum fashion. She doesn't know whether to shuffle her cards in time to Led Zeppelin, the Jackson Five, or the Undisputed Truth. Her need to be programmed is so great she grabs a quarter from her purse and rushes over to the machine and picks out a few soothing tunes. Some roomies take turns programming their computer. Most just sit and let others do it for them. The programming process continues until 1:00 p.m. when the thoughtful DJ's from KRNO con- scientiously take over the job until 5:00 p.m. as the roomies slowly drift away. Until 7:03 tomorrow, the computer stands semi-silent and waits for the roomies to return. Have you ever wondered what won- drous soul programs the jukebox in the Room? It's a certain Mr. Leonard Weiland, better known in the Yellow 10