The University of Texas at Dallas: Land of Enchantment!

If you know anyone considering an education at UTD, look them in the eye and with a British accent say, "On second thought, don't go to UTD . . . tis a silly place."

Why? A few photos may suffice:
First,















Behold the UTD geyser. . . .or hot spring. We're not sure what it is yet, but for close to a year we have watched this utility box go from a steaming block of cement, to what is now a bubbling, frothing mess. It has resulted in an alluvial flood plain that has shut down a significant chunk of sidewalk (get ready this is a theme we shall return to), and required the instillation of wooden bridges to traverse the muddy mess.

Secondly,














Ladies and Gentlemen, you might be mistaken into thinking that you are looking at a new project. Don't be. They claim this is to be a new campus "mall", on par with the national mall in D.C. Yet, after a year and a half of pardoning their progress, it appears that the trustees of my school are really just fascinated by dirt. It appears to be an ideological fixation to clear their campus' beautiful dirt of all that cursed greenery as far as the eye can see. We are a science school after all, so what could be more scientific than recreating the moon here on the earth? Progressive no?

As previously stated, moonism here at UTD has the annoying side effect of consuming all sidewalks. Therefore to transport oneself from one building to an adjacent one, requires a 15 km journey for every 5 meters that separate the buildings. Thus since the student center is 50 meters from the library, to proceed from one to the other requires no less that 150 km of hiking, (otherwise known as 93 miles). The amazing thing about such statistics is that UTD is confined to 3.5 square km of land. How, you might be wondering, is it possible to force 150 km treks across a campus that barely spans 3.5 km? . . . . Yeah. I get that question a lot, and I always respond the same way: "What else do you expect all these Nobel laureates to do with their time?"

Go science!

Lastly, the bathrooms.


















To make the kids with gender issues feel more comfortable, UTD has installed gender-ambiguous toilets. Is it a urinal or a pot? No one knows. Therefore whatever confusion you may be feeling, science loves you anyway. Woosh.

Honorable mention:
- The new native forest at campus entrance. Have a 20-ft drainage ditch messing with your campus' aesthetic? Just replace ugly with . . . ugly BUT environmentally sound!

- The sidewalks that are lined by construction worker Port-a-Potties. If your day isn't crappy enough, just try to breath while walking down the only functioning sidewalk on campus.

- The mermaid (google image "UTD NSERL"). The only visually non-depressing object on campus, which one must be a research graduate student to even walk into. Confirming the UTD motto, "If it looks good, you're not allowed."

- If you wikipedia UTD, they refer to the campus architectural style as "Brutalism" . . . a shoe that fits.