Table Talk

Missing tooth, or not.. . on Monday, I attended the 3rd annual "Lunch with a Blogger" at one of Carbondale's fine restaurants with Chancellor Walter Wendler, Mayor Brad Cole and radio news guy Tom 'Cap' Miller. Since I mostly listened to these leading figures discuss the hot topics of the day, chewing their words with my Houli-burger, no one seemed to notice my infirmity.

Will he run again? When will he announce? The Mayor wasn't saying, though my own guess of July 4 got a "good idea" from the waitress.

Naturally, the Chancellor's pet project, Saluki Way came up -- in particular the opposition being expressed in some quarters to the amount of money budgeted for athletics. As I munched a forkful of slaw, Cole recalled the days when SIU Professor Jerry Handler headed up a movement to abolish football altogether.

Before our food was served, the Chancellor sketched a drawing for the Mayor to show him what he meant -- which this blog was able to obtain through the Freedom of Paper Napkin Act before the table was cleared.

Since our talk was mostly 'off the record', I can not say just what the drawing shows, but since it's of an academic nature, a multiple choice could work. Does the drawing depict . . . a) Where the football stadium will eventually be moved for Saluki Way? b) How he managed to evade a mob of hostile students who had congregated in Anthony Hall? or c) Directions to Global Gourmet on Jackson St., next door to the Longbranch Coffee House.

Cole, who once served as Student Body President at SIU, had some good advice for the Chancellor, concerning his interaction with Student Government, which Walter seemed to take to heart. Will he follow through? Time will tell. But if censured outgoing SB President Nate Brown had listened to his hoary-headed predecessor's advice earlier in the semester, things may have turned out differently for him.

What advice did Cole bestow? To paraphrase: make students feel they are important players in the process; and let the students act accordingly.

Driving back toward campus with the man in charge, I asked Walter Wendler what I could do to help the cause of Saluki Way. His answer: "Tell the truth."

The truth is, I support Saluki Way.