I don't think we overlapped, Cindy. But I was there for four years after I graduated, so we may very well have passed each other in the street (or on campus, since I spent quite a lot of time there after graduating).

I always wonder which Buffistas knew each other before they were either Buffistas or active on Salon's TT. The Bronzers knew each other, obviously. I know Sean, Emily, MM and Aimee knew each other. Obviously flea and Nutty knew each other. Amy Parker and connie knew each other. I think Daniel and askye knew each other somewhere else.

In so many ways, it's like fifty countries

That's why I asked about states. But I see from your post that it's even more complicated than that.

most US college students are paying large sums of money to attend college

Here, too. Well, not as much as in the USA, of course, but it's still quite a large sum of money. That's what the protest is all about, in fact.

Also, in America it's a lot easier to vote with your feet and transfer to another college if you don't like where you are.

And even more, colleges and universities are a mix of state-run (like where my dad works) and private (where I attended school), and funding the schools seek can also be a mix.

To have a strike I think you need a tipping point of students (and possibly faculty) to shut things down comprehensively. In the 60s/70s there were quite a few campus-wide strikes in the US (especially in the North -- I can definitely remember one at Columbia) related to the war and on-campus military recruiting. This has been hushed up a lot in the popular imagination/memory as the work of hippies, so people are surprised to find out it ever happened.

Community gardens are a wonderful thing. Allyson's sounds lovely.

I didn't read the article, but bacon 14 times a week sounds like a LOT of bacon to me. Although I'm confused as to how it causes COPD.

Also there were sit-ins, demonstrations, and yes, even strikes at Berkeley when I was there. But we had a reputation to keep up.

And there are so many private institutions in addition to generally funded state institutions.

I am so peeved by the fact that I STILL can't get the wireless to work on my desktop. I'm noticing that I'm even less patient for day-to-day frustrations than usual.

Also, I have a paper to write on Mary Oliver and her influence on my poetry. Problem is I have no poetry written to show the influence and she doesn't really influence my poetry so much as I really enjoy her poems.

Errrgh. I made Noah and Grace's respiratory therapist laugh yesterday, but now I think he wants revenge.

in America it's a lot easier to vote with your feet and transfer to another college if you don't like where you are

Oh, of course. Here the options are much more limited, considering how small a country we are, in comparison.

You guys make such interesting points! It's so fascinating to me to see how much I'm taking for granted, when in fact it's only the result of the place and time in which the events occur.

we may very well have passed each other in the street

This reminds me of a story I like: once, a few years ago, I was sitting on the stairs in the physics building here in the university with my friend E (who studied at a different department). We were talking, when my brother (who went to the same university) passed by, with a friend of his, M. I didn't know M, other than recognizing his face, so I said a polite hello. My brother didn't know E, again, other than in recognizing her face, so he said a polite hello. E and M didn't exchange a single word.

A year later, an acquaintance of my E's mother, who turned out to be M's aunt, played the match-maker and introduced them. The got married, have two adorable daughters, and the only people who remember that once upon a time they passed each other in some building, are my brother and myself.

I knew Ellen S. in college, and it was a complete coincidence to meet her at b.org.

My acquaintance coincidence was Zoe. She knew one of my college roommates.