Monday, April 10, 2006

"Sometimes a cigar isn't just a cigar..."

You know, like the Fleming cannon, which was just stolen back this morning by a group of Techers consisting of 23 current students and 7 alums, according to the official press release. Does this mean that the PR people were counting Flems? Some showering may be necessary...

Also, Fleming has created an official website for this part of the prank. Wow, there is even some informally Flem-counting on this page. Of course, the numbers aren't specific, so I guess they don't have to shower themselves. (Or are Flems allowed to count other Flems?) There should also be some more info on the Caltech vs. MIT website at some point. (There is a small amount of info there right now.)

By the way, there is an amusing picture on the front of today's Tech. Part of it reminds me of the picture with Jim Murdoch and the Fleming cannon. Shudder! (And I was on the Tech team responsible for printing that atrocity...)

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Well done! I wonder who the alums were... Nobody in the pictures looked particularly familiar, but it's hard to be sure.

As I recall, the trick when counting is to include oneself (first). Not much help to all you non-Flems, of course. :-)

Mason said...

The alums were most likely graduate students (or at least predominantly grad students) and after your time (and my time for that matter, although I obviously know fewer Flems than you do...hmmm, I wonder how many I actually know?).

There are some new links at the Fleming cannon site. There is a description of the events of the cannon's return (which I may have just not noticed before; I only now had a chance to look at the site in detail) and a link to a 4/11 LA Times article.