Nearly everyone has a favorite teacher. I can distinctly remember two of mine, Ms. Paque and Ms. Collins. They were great educators, spinning torrents of exciting material out for their students to attempt to catch. They were pleasant and kind, but demanded extraordinary effort. At the time, it seemed a bit overwhelming, and I remember distinct moments when I was ready to quit. Of course, they were experts in encouragement as well.

Editor's note: This column contains explicit lyrics.

I was in my car the other day when "Down Rodeo" by Rage Against the Machine came on the radio. There's no doubt these guys are talented musicians, but their philosophical consistency is lacking.

There were some lines in the song that made me chuckle: "A thousand years they had the tools/ We should be taking them/ Fuck the G-ride! I want the machines that are making them."

The struggling Horned Frog basketball team will welcome another squad that has fallen on tough times, the Utah Utes, to Daniel-Meyer Coliseum tonight. Both teams have lost four of their past five games with a win over Air Force, the common denominator for both.

TCU (11-13, 3-6) topped the Falcons 65-51 Saturday in Colorado Springs behind junior guard Greg Hill's career-high 23 points. Prior to the victory, the Frogs had not won a game since they beat UT Pan-American on Jan. 20.

With a one-win lead in the Mountain West, the Lady Frogs head to Salt Lake City to face the University of Utah Utes.

TCU is currently on a 19-game home-win streak but lost their last road match to the University of New Mexico on Jan. 30.

Utah owns an 8-6 lead in the all-time series with the Frogs. TCU won their last two showdowns with the Utes including the Jan. 9 game in Daniel-Meyer Coliseum, which the Frogs won 62-41.

Clad in sophisticated rodeo wear and sitting in a spacious back room of Fort Worth's Kimbell Art Museum, Mayor Mike Moncrief looked deeply introspective as he mulled over his answers to a string of personal questions. While Crayola might describe the color of his blazer as "Texas chestnut," the rich hue was not the only stand-out aspect of the mayor's appearance that day. A single golden Stock Show & Rodeo pin resting neatly on his left lapel seemed to sum up Moncrief in perfectly simple terms: "This Thing is Legendary."

If haiku writing is one of your skills, then your poem could decorate the fleet of purple bikes some students, faculty and staff ride around campus.

Keith Whitworth, director and coordinator of the Purple Bike Program, said he started a haiku contest for students and faculty to get recognition for their work with the bike program. He also said the poems would give back to the sponsors who donated bikes by bringing attention to the program and, consequently, to the sponsors.

For months, noise associated with construction and renovation of Moudy Building South, home of the College of Communication, became a part of the class experience for students there.

John Lumpkin, director of the Schieffer School of Journalism, said that the building had been the same for decades and that the construction is part of a plan to expand the school's future opportunities, like broadcasting student newscasts outside of the university.

One big addition to the school, he said, is the new convergence center.

The World Cup is notoriously known for being Europe's version of America's Super Bowl. Competitiveness is driven to an all-time high, leading to anger, fights, riots and a fair share of injuries. What...

Barack Obama is Muslim. Trust me. I should know. Sound familiar? Similar campaigns were run during the presidential campaign in an attempt to "otherize" the current president by relating him to extremist members of Islam. If this sounds ludicrous, maybe it won't if one considers the percentage of Americans who still believe this. According to USA Today, in April 2008, the number was 10 percent, with rural Americans nearing 20 percent. Little has been done to dispel this image and thus the falsehood surely still exists.

Plans for a much sought-after parking garage on campus are ready to be approved this year, a university official said.

Vice Chancellor for Student Affairs Don Mills said an updated master plan of the university's proposed building projects, with proposed locations for a parking garage, has been submitted to the board of trustees for approval in 2010.

"I think the first phase of the master plan is generally considered five to six years, and I think there would be a parking garage in that first phase," Mills said.

D.B. Widner entered the military immediately after graduating from high school in 1982. He said he could never find the time to fit in more school. Now a senior history major, he said he plans to apply...

The recent charity to the people of Haiti after the devastating earthquake was worthy of praise but did not outweigh 200 years of neglect, a speaker for the Ministers Week said.

The Rev. Sharon Watkins kicked off Ministers Week with the annual Wells Sermon at the University Christian Church on Monday night. She focused her sermon on overcoming individual allegiances to care for all humans as children of God.

"We need to see past our false divisions and care about all God's children, before the earthquake hits," Watkins said.