The Tribune

Think you’re on Facebook to socialize? Think again. With over 20,000 new members registering daily for the infamous friendship network, Facebook is known, first and foremost, as an efficient tool for the communicating masses. While eager stalkers interact via notes, poking and wall writing, they are also tuning into something much larger and essentially much vainer: themselves.

A few years past, one’s command of the French language had to be fairly deft to survive in Quebec for very long. McGill students, for the first weeks after arriving in Montreal, would need to assiduously commit dozens of key phrases to memory in order to obtain everyday household items, from milk to light bulbs.

I have a dirty little secret: I’ve never been to a frosh event. I’ve also never attended a McGill sports game, joined a club or even been inside a university rez. No, I’m not a hermit, or even anti-social. I’m a Montrealer. One of those cool but elusive people you meet in one of your classes then never seem to encounter again.

For stick-thin health conscious fellows, poutine is venom on a plate. However, to every other “normal” person in Canada, it is simply a mountain of fries topped with cheese curds and gravy. Poutine may be a Quebec delicacy and extremely delicious, but unfortunately, the fries-cheese-gravy aspect of poutine makes it an artery-clogging snack.

If Martha Stewart has taught me nothing else, it is to never apologize for a meal before you serve it. By all means, apologize as your guests are being carted off on stretchers by EMS, but not a moment before that lobster-lychee casserole hits the table. Thankfully, Martha Stewart’s credibility is completely shot, and thus I unabashedly forgiveness culpa, dear reader.

Canadian comedian Russell Peters performed last week at Place des Arts and caught up with the Tribune to discuss college, cheating, and being Canadian. You’re very popular with college students. What’s your favourite college experience? I never went to college.

As of late, many students have become extremely uncomfortable with the level of creepiness some online social networks, ahem, Facebook, have stooped to – going from knowing details about people you’ve never actually met in reality, to knowing the last time that person ate a meal, went to the bathroom and slept in someone else’s bed.

You gotta hear this one song, it’ll change your life, I swear, exclaims Natalie Portman’s character Sam in the 2004 indie film Garden State. While she may have been exaggerating a bit, McGill students are taking her advice rather seriously. Even with the live bands playing on the OAP stage, students everywhere are wandering around campus with little white wires dangling from their ears.

Research: Research papers are, after all, founded on research, and research implies sources. A good rule of thumb is one book for every two pages and two journal articles for every three. So for a 10-page paper, you would want at least five books and seven articles, plus as many primary sources as you can get your hands on.