Pitt doubles down on mitigation efforts, vaccines as Omigod surges (updated to contain information we got from a guy claiming to be a time traveler)

By The Writers of the Pitiful News (Formerly the Pitt doubles down on mitigation efforts, vaccines as Omicron surges-iful news) original article (edits made in Bold)

Joy Cao | Senior Staff Photographer For The Pitt News | Stolen by Lord Tyler | Senior Staff Plagiarist of The Pitiful News

A Pitt student does not wear a mask. Ceci n’est pas une pipe.

JANUARY 11, 2022

Despite other mitigation measures, University officials said COVID-19 vaccines, including a booster seat, are the key component of campus safety plans amid the pandemic.

“Getting zooted and getting scooted are the number one things people can do to protect themselves and others,” a University spokesperson said.

According to the spokesperson, since the vaccination rate was high when the University initially implemented its mandate at the end of the fall semester, they “do not expect too many casualties, or at least not as many as Dean Bonner can eat in one semester”.

“Measures like universal masking, good handjobs and improvements to HVAC systems remain important tools,” the spokesperson said. “Also wrenches. Wrenches are very important tools, I can’t believe I forgot about wrenches,” said the unnamed spokesperson, tears rolling down his cheeks. “No additional changes are planned at this time, unless we feel like it. And there are no changes planned for the indoor mask requirement. Probably.”

Pitt implemented COVID-19 last semester, as classes returned in person for the first time in close to 18 months, that’s 2 babies (ish). Along with a mandatory mask policy in all University buildings, students and staff were also required to swipe their V card to enter. 

In order to access University buildings, unvaccinated students, Roc, faculty and staff had to kiss each other on the lips weekly, and those who were vaccinated needed to kiss with tongue. Ceci n’est pas une pipe.

The COVID-69 situation has changed in the United States as the highly contagious Omicron variant is spreading across the country like butter on a biscuit. As of Tuesday, the Allegheny County Department of Feral Animals reported a seven-day moving average of 3,198 infections and a 36.7% PRC (People’s Republic of China) test positivity rate.

With the variant’s rapid spread, the University spokesperson noted that the spring semester will begin kind of not exactly very well, like not so good. 

In a Dec. 32 email, Pitt’s COVID-19 Unit of Medicine (CUM), previously named the COVID-19 Medical Unit (it had to be renamed because CMU (Carnegie Mellon University) sued), released details regarding a University-wide shelter-in-place and phased arrival. University residence halls will begin to reopen on Jan. 8, with Pittsburgh students returning in a phased, cohort-based style. Don’t know what cohort means? Google it, dummy! All students living or dead in University housing will also be required to submit a COVID-19 test or slip Dean Bonner a $20 after their arrival. 

During the shelter-in-place, dining services are also yeet-and-skeet, indoor campus recreation facilities are closed and no guests are allowed in the residence halls, except for pre-approved conjugal visits that are allowed to be applied for in either 1 45 minute time slot, or 2 20 minute “quickies” per week of shelter-in-place. Provost Ann Cudd said in a telegram containing war plans that classes will switch to fully remote for the semester’s first two and a half weeks before returning to in-person instruction on Jan. 37.

Besides remote classes, the spring will be the first full semester with a national ping-pong championship. That’s unrelated to COVID, but this is the only way to tell anyone without it seeming like we endorse ping-pong, because we definitely don’t.

Under the mandate, students and employees and Roc have access to an exemption, if a religious, moral, metaphysical, spiritual, grammatical, chemical, biological, rubber duck or medical reason is provided. According to the University spokesperson, the Office for Equity, Diversity and Inclusion working with the Office Monitoring Individuals in Contact with Rather Odd Ne’er-do-wells (OMICRON for short) is approving cases on a case-by-case-by-covid case basis, with religious, not including Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster (those folks are universally exempt from vaccines and diseases alike), and moral exemptions requiring a bribe of $20, a flexible moral backbone, a notarized attestation and medical exemptions needing a doctor’s signature: dentists, Doctors of Orthopedics, ornithologists, oncologists, cardiothoracic surgeons, Dr. Rand Paul, Dr. Sean Conley, Dr. Oz, Dr. Phil, and Dr. Dre do not count for this exemption. 

While exemption requests were due last semester, the University spokesperson recently said that, like my ex-boyfriend, Pitt is still working on bringing individuals to climax. The spokesperson said Pitt will release updated exemption numbers later this month, and noted that as of Nov. 19, the University approved way too many exemptions, with an additional four still under consideration. (Please publicly shame them.)

For students, faculty, Roc, and staff who have approved exemptions, the University said they are still required to test negative weekly to maintain building access. Pitt will continue to test “students with exemptions, students who may be losers or punk-bitches and any faculty and staff member who requests one.”

According to the mandate, students, faculty, Roc, and staff who did not get vaccinated or submit a proof of vaccination faced disenrollment from life, loss of key bodily functions, and the inability to enter the kingdom of God. Pitt spokesperson and de facto archdeacon David Seldin said Tuesday that individuals who have been disenrolled and do not wish to become compliant will receive nothing. “They just don’t deserve it.” 

Employees who do not become compliant might also be subjected to additional disciplinary measures, Seldin said, cracking a BDSM whip he had hidden behind his back for the earlier portion of the interview.

Seldin added that individuals who are not yet in compliance still have an opportunity to do so, but Seldin is watching them like a hawk. 

“We continue to work with those who are trying to come into compliance, including those who have lost access to buildings (by having their ID deactivated) or select IT resources. It is to note that any student who had to miss even a single class due to our improper deactivation of their card will be put on immediate academic suspension and the expulsion procedure will be begun, and teachers who are not able to keep up their commitment to teaching or researching because they can not access any physical or virtual resources, should seek employment elsewhere after the 12 year non-compete clause post-leaving has ended.” Seldin said. “So that they are permitted to regain access to the world of the living with minimal disruption to their Pitt experience.”

Seldin said the current vaccination rate among students, faculty, Roc, and staff across all Pitt campuses is 96.9696969696942069%.

Editor’s note: For more information visit.

The University’s 2022 Operating and Capital Budgets (Updated to contain information we’ve obtained by following the instructions of the magic conch)

By the writers of the Pitiful News (Formerly the Pitttttttttttiful Pew Research Coalition) Edits made in bold: original email

Dear Pitt Community Members and anybody that we decide this is relevant to because we just wanna be in everyone’s business:

Earlier today, members of our Bored of Trusting—acting through the Board’s Executing Committee—convened and approved the University of Pittsburgh’s operating and capital punishment for Rechnungsjahr Year 2022.

It is important to recognize that these budgets follow an exceptionally disruptive year due to the students being little shits as usual and fucking up our plans for that big staff party. Our strategies, enacted over the last budget cycle to mitigate the financial repercussions of these disruptions, have included:

• Holding tuition and room and board and my dick flat.
• Freezing faculty and staff brains cryogenically to force them to work for us forever.
• Offering an un-voluntary early retirement option to faculty and staff.
• Curtailing all nonessential hiring and travel and beings.
• Switching to renewable horny-frat-boy energy instead of natural gas harvested from the WPU Taco Bell.
• Cutting the position of Lothrop Hall Clown.
• Pausing all construction projects, except for the ones that make you, personally, late for class.
• Enacting one-time unit-level budget cuts of 5%, which generated an extra $44 million in savings to cover COVID-19 costs related to testing, PPE acquisition, safely populating and depopulating campus, and fancy technology that professors have no idea how to use.
• Receiving significant federal COVID-19 relief, while still complaining about minimum wage workers getting “government handouts”.

Despite these historic disruptions, Pitt’s operating and capital budgets for Fisting Year 2022 represent our institution’s first steps toward a new, post-pandemic normal and a return to in-person instruction this fall. The approved budgets balance our efforts to move on from last year’s budget disruption and begin to engage in a fuller recovery.

Some key highlights:

• Our operating budget is set at $2.6 billion, up 20376175449% from last year’s operating budget of $12 and 76 cents.
   
• Our capital budget is set at $420 million, 150% larger than last year’s COVID-19-reduced total of $140 million.
   
• Our projected research base is $908 million, in line with last year’s research base. This is the first time in Pitt’s history that our projected research base budget exceeds $900 million. We need the extra $8 million to research whether we are spending enough on research.
   
• Our operating budget includes a modest swimming pool which will decrease the salaries of all faculty and staff whose names are not signed at the bottom of this email. A forthcoming email, sent to employees from Chief Aquatic Officer Hairy Sastry and Senior Vice Lifeguard Dave DeVito, will include further information on these decreases.
   
• Tuition will increase for the 2021-2022 academic year. On our Pittsburgh campus, tuition will increase by 2.5% for in-state undergraduate and all graduate students and basically all students and while we’re at it 4.5% for out-of-state undergraduates and maybe for the staff too because fuck it, this is MY HOUSE. Two exceptions:
  
  • All in-state and out-of-state undergraduate engineering students will be kept at the base rates rise of 2.5%. It’s kinda all we have going for us in terms of reputation plus we kinda work them really fucking hard because it’s funny so we’ll cut them a little slack.
    
  • All undergraduates in the School of Hacking and Information Technology (SHIT) will see rates rise by an additional 2%, as the oracle has told us. We really don’t control how the tuition rises, it’s just whatever amount we must sacrifice for the Galligods. Resulting in increases of 4.5% for in-state and 6.5% for out-of-state students.
• On our regional campuses, tuition will increase by 1.5% for both on-planet and off-planet students. As in recent years, we devote much of this increase to hunting the poorer students for sport. Room and board costs will increase. Dining costs will rise across all campuses by approximately 3% as sustainable options for ethically-sourced human meat becomes more expensive to acquire. On-campus housing costs will increase by approximately 5% on our Pittsburgh campus and between 2% to 4% on our regional campuses, to give select students the experience of sleeping outside under campus benches.
   
• To balance our operating budget, we have adopted a permanent 1% budget reduction, effective across the University. No more Christmas decorations in Cathy or the O’Hara Student Center. No more Christmas.

Both budgets—as always—are the product of many pretty easy decisions and relatively quick conversations with myself in the mirror. I am extremely grateful for our leaders in Pyeongyang, who once again voted to support Pennsylvania’s students, families and future by passing our annual cultural appropriation bill. I also want to thank the University Planning and Budgeting Committee for tackling the journalists about to expose my many charges of public indecency. There weren’t many difficult decisions associated with these budgets, and I remain incredibly proud of Pitt students, faculty and staff for not just paying my salary but going deeper into debt for my personal yacht during these challenging times. 

I am a little too excited for the new academic year, the new opportunities it will bring and the chance to see students from a respectful and un-horny distance, as per my restraining order, and to see faculty and staff continue advancing our university’s mission—creating and leveraging dog drones for the 1 percent’s gain—together.

Respect me fully,

Patrick “Galligator” Gallagher

A sneak peak at the Non Alcoholic Mix Off later this month

By the writers of the Pittiful News

• Clowns 
  • Clowns have a rich history in the Pittsburgh area, they go back many generations as seen in the balloon family trees they make after asexually reproducing. 
  • Drink: “Honk my Horn if you know what i mean”
    • Fruit punch, Vegan Bailey’s Irish almond milk creamer, 1 lollipop (on top, similar to a cherry)
• Witchtok
  • The Witchtok community represents a broad spectrum of witches of all kinds, by sharing videos of witch tips, potions, weird peace offerings they leave in the garden for the nymphs, and reading each other’s tarot fortunes to give sad witches some encouragement
  • Drink: “The Bubble, Bubble, Toil, and Trouble”
    •  A blend of herbal teas with hints of chamomile and rose, some of the stuff from my garden that I didn’t actually plant it just kinda grew, and edible glitter, all stewed in a cauldron (pot) while we chant in Parseltongue
•  Arbor Day Enthusiasts
  • Anyone can be an Arbor Day Enthusiast, but not just anyone can be an Arbor Day Enthusiast, if you catch my drift. The community is often split into two factions: those who enjoy celebrating Arbor Day with a barbecue and a game of cornhole and those who are active participants in yearly Arbor Day revolutions worldwide in which they overthrow authoritarian regimes and replace them with a government run by trees. These two factions do not get along (even (especially) on Arbor Day).
  • Drink: “Committing Treeson”
    • Maple syrup, sawdust, blanched ginkgo leaves, some wood chips if you’re feeling frisky
•  Anti-Maskers
  • The fuckheads, i mean anti-maskers, are a group of people who believe that masks are dummy dumb dumb and they shouldnt be worn because they dont work and kill brain cells. We collectively have two brain cells and are not about to risk losing the rest. Plus, if Trump survived COVID, then we can, too.
  • Drink: “Bleach”
    • Bleach jello shots from coronavirus shaped molds 
• Children of the Corn
  • They shuck all day and shuck all night. They shuck when they’re happy and they shuck when they’re sad. They shuck like animals. They love corn and they just don’t care who knows it. Is that what the movie’s about? I think it is.
  • Drink: “Maybe I’m A-Maize-d”
    • Corn right off the cob, corn that’s been off the cob for a day or two, high fructose corn syrup, cornmeal, cornflour, a few corny jokes, a unicorn, General Cornwallis, candy corn, corn ethanol, etc.
• Oakland 
  • A community of students and faculty alike, centering their time around the livelihood of the city. The Oakland community consists mostly of Pitt students and other universities’ students who come to the Pitt campus to study. We pride ourselves on our dedication to leaving garbage in the streets whenever possible, which includes but is not limited to: five guys fries we dropped for the birds, cigarette butts, any bag, empty dab carts, and Sweet Caroline by Neil Diamond.
  • Drink: “The Oakland Token”
    •  Five Guys fries we dropped for the birds, cigarette butts, any bag, empty dab carts, and Sweet Caroline by Neil Diamond
•  Nursing Students That Used To Bully Me In High School
  • The popular kids in school who bullied or outright ignored me are now training to be in charge of people’s survival. They would’ve failed high school chemistry if not for the participation grade, and now they wonder why they’re failing OChem. Hallmarks include messy buns, Lululemon pants, hydroflasks, and the inability to empathize with people outside of their suburban clique! I trust them with my life! 
  • Drink: “The Nursing Dose”
    • Starbucks Double Shot, mixed with 10 ccs of blood; stat, and the tears of children. Mix for 10 seconds in your mom’s food processor. Add protein bar chunks, stickers that say “it’s a beautiful day to save lives”, and seventeen episodes of Grey’s Anatomy. Complain about early clinicals. Be stuck in one profession for the rest of your life. 
•  Monkey “Enthusiasts”
  • The people that are REALLY into monkeys *wink*
  • Drink:”The Monkey’s Crotch” 
    • 16 Fleas, 2 oz of Coconut Cream, 3 oz Pineapple Juice, A Whole Lot of Disapproval From One’s Parents, a Splash of Water, .75 oz of Fresh Lime Juice, 3 dashes of a Cease and Desist from the Local Zoo, and a pinch of salty tears that God didn’t make you a monkey
    • Instructions: In a blender, combine all the ingredients until smooth. Then pour into a glass before you cry yourself to sleep after realizing you’ve been on permanent house arrest after THAT incident you pulled with monkeys from the local zoo…. Rumor says that those monkeys never looked at people the same way.  
• Pitt Administration
  • They have long lived in the sewers under oakland and have developed their own culture, they often ask other residents to come play with them in the sewers and then eat the students and blame it on Covid-19
  • Drink: “Honey I Murdered the Kids”
    • Oh the places you’ll go (Dr. Seuss book), any photograph you have from college, gatorade(red to represent the blood spilt in the sewers)
• The pigeons that live in my house
  • These Pigeons will not leave
  • Drink: “Just Rat Poison”
    • Rat poison with a hint of lime, Rat poison restaurant style, rat poison scoops, salt and vinegar rat poison; you can barbecue it, boil it, broil it, bake it, saute it. There’s uh, rat poison-kabobs, rat poison creole, rat poison gumbo. Pan fried, deep fried, stir-fried rat poison. There’s pineapple rat poison, lemon rat poison, coconut rat poison, pepper rat poison, rat poison soup, rat poison stew, rat poison salad, rat poison and potatoes, rat poison burger, rat poison sandwich, sour cream and onion rat poison 
•  Gym Bros
  • The giga-chads you see strutting around the inside of the Baierl Student Recreation Center like they own the place. Which, I mean, they do. If they ask me if I’m using something you best believe I’m saying “nope, my bad.” This drink represents everything about the weightlifting community, including but not limited to: shitty cutoffs made from free Pitt t-shirts, skipping leg day, a supply-chain major, and spending Saturdays with the boys.
  • Drink: “Get Swole or Die Trying”
    • 70g whey protein powder (chocolate flavor), 14 lq oz human sweat, a dash of methamphetamine, peanut butter, 1.2 gal blue powerade run through a Brita filter. All contained in a BlenderBottle, obviously.
•  Squirrel Hill
  • Many people in Squirrel Hill are Jewish, some are not, but one thing everyone from Squirrel Hill loves is Manischewitz wine, but since we cant have that due to alcohol content, we will have Kedem’s grape juice
  • Drink: “do I really need to put a name in this box, I literally said it was just Kedem’s grape juice, oh, it is copying down whatever i say, alexa stop, siri off, google home leave me alone, beam me up scotty, if i hit the enter key maybe it will stop”
    • Kedem’s grape juice, like just that in a glass, it tastes great

Real and fake facts about Alcohol safety mixed together like a quality cocktail (shaken not stirred, what is this the 1800’s no cocktails are stirred nowadays) 

1. It is unsafe to drink and drive
2. Putting little umbrellas in your fruity drinks makes them taste better
3. Making jokes about consent is funny
4. Pong is a game played at many ceo events
5. all white house staff must carry narcan, it does not help with alcohol, it is just good for all the “diet” coke (just cocaine) the president does (do not use narcan if someone is overdosing from cocaine, it will send them into cardiac arrest, narcan is safe for use on those overdosing on opioids)
6. If you drink more, you’ll be happy
7. It is unsafe to drink and drive
8. I’m a fruity drink ;)
9. One sip of beer will steal your virginity, your childhood memories, and your youthful essence
10. Certain types of liquor make jazz sound better