WEDNESDAY, JULY 9, 2003
NEWS
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN = 11
HOUSING
Residence hall deals with uninvited guests
By Brandon Baker bbaker@kansan.com kansan staff writer
They scurry, love cheese and live in Hashinger Hall. They are also 1 inch tall.
Hashinger has a few new guests staying in the residence hall this summer—mice.
The number of mice has not been confirmed, but maintenance crews set out sticky traps, sheets of paper with glue facing up, to catch them last week.
Charloette Goodman, Custodial Supervisor, said in her 17 years of employment with the University of Kansas, the first mouse she had seen was caught by a sticky trap last week.
Kelly Payton, Olympia, Wash., senior, said the traps had not stopped all the mice.
"I saw one run right over the sticky trap," Payton said. She said the running joke was to put in notices in the maintenance box every night the mice were seen.
Goodman said maintenance received two notices and was dealing with the situation. Hashinger staff members filed the notices with maintenance. Payton, an employee working Hashinger's front desk, said she thought the new guests came from the theater in Hashinger.
Payton did an experiment in her residence hall room with a bag of chips last week to determine the existence of mice in her room. When she returned to the unwatched bag, a little hole was chewed through the bag. Payton didn't spot the
culprit, but she suspects her furry little foes were behind it.
"I've been watching them very closely over the last couple of weeks," Payton said.
The food served in Hashinger should be safe though, said Peggy Robinson, maintenance technician.
"I would eat from the kitchen, and I do," Robinson said.
She has worked in the basement of the 41-year-old building for more than seven years and has never seen a mouse.
Cory Xenos, Louisburg senior, said she had seen the mice in Hashinger and they were the one thing she was afraid of. She ran away from the last mouse she saw in Louisburg.
"They're small and move really quickly and could carry diseases," Xenos said. "I don't want to have to deal with that."
Ken Stoner, director of student housing, said mice had occasionally visited residence halls during the winter or when their habitat was displaced. Stoner said the construction of the new student recreation center could be a cause of the Hashinger sightings.
"It happens from time to time and we deal with it," Stoner said.
— Edited by Annie Bernethy
HEALTH
Man regains consciousness after being in coma since 1984
MOUNTAIN VIEW, Ark. — A man regained consciousness after spending 19 years in a coma as the result of a car crash, greeting his mother who was waiting at his bedside.
His father, Jerry Wallis, said his son uttered his first word June 12, was able to talk a little a day later and has improved ever since.
Terry Wallis, 39, had been at a hospital since the July 1984 crash.
Terry's wife, Sandi, said her husband
was riding with a friend when their car left the road and plunged into a creek. Terry and his friend were found the next day underneath a bridge.
Wallis' daughter, Amber, was born shortly before the accident. She is now 19 and Terry has said he wanted to walk again, for her. He is a quadriplegic as a result of the crash.
The friend was dead and Terry was comatose.
The Associated Press