This is a satirical article and is not meant to be taken seriously. It does not reflect the opinions of The Spectator or UW-Eau Claire.

In an otherwise slow news week, a local graduating fourth-year student has set out to make his own news. 

At approximately 9:30 a.m. on Monday, Harry Fake, a fourth-year fictitious studies student, walked into The Spectator office to submit a news tip. 

Fake’s news tip turned into a roughly two-hour-long rant about UW-Eau Claire and the city as a whole that staff writers in the office did not understand. 

According to Heather Madeup, a first-year staff writer, Fake seemed like he was heavily concussed. 

“He sort of stumbled in here rambling about a smoothie place at Hilltop,” Madeup said. “Like I wish there was a block meal thing to get huge smoothies at Hilltop, but that’s not the world we live in, he definitely seemed really out of it and confused.”

Eric Notreal, a second-year staff writer, said that Fake seemed to be describing an alternate Eau Claire that — while seemed familiar — wasn’t quite right. 

“He kept talking about there being lower-campus dorms and that Governors Hall was supposed to be renovated,” Notreal said. “He also kept ranting about a waffle place on Water Street — it all sounded nice but obviously he was just having some weird Mandela Effect thing going on.” 

According to Madeup and Notreal, Fake also tried to show them proof that the UW-Eau Claire Facebook meme page used to be funny and a lively community, however, both staff writers politely refused and tried to end the conversation as soon as possible. 

 According to Notreal, Fake then accused The Spectator of dropping off. 

“He wasn’t a fan of us trying to end the conversation so he just started complaining that all we do are oat milk reviews and sports columns written by people who don’t know about sports,” Notreal said. “Then he kept talking about the good old days when The Spectator got people fired.” 

Notreal said Fake kept talking about some Cologne guy who resigned as vice-chancellor and when asked if he meant Olga Diaz, former vice-chancellor of equity, diversity and inclusion and student affairs, Fake would ignore them and keep ranting about the Cologne guy. 

Second-year copy editor for The Spectator, Elizabeth Anonymous, aimed to follow up with the seemingly confused Fake. 

“He just seemed to be so confident that what he was saying was correct,” Anonymous said. “So I had to track him down to get more comments.” 

When asked for comment, Fake continued to rant about things that didn’t make sense to the underclass staffers. 

“He went off on a tangent about the football team being racist,” Anonymous said. “Then he started talking about Phillips Hall being on fire, I tried to tell him that Phillips Hall is sinking into the ground, but he just kept saying ‘it was on fire.’ I don’t think I got through to him.” 

According to Anonymous, she just hopes that Fake finds a healthy outlet to vent his frustrations. 

“He just seemed to get more and more bewildered when I said there’s no way that’s a thing,” Anonymous said. “It was just kind of sad watching him grow more frantic trying to tell me stories that obviously never happened.” 

Former student Alex Nonexistent said that what Fake is going through is a common occurrence. 

“I went through the same thing when I graduated two years ago,” Nonexistent said. “For some reason, nobody remembered Garfield Avenue went all the way through lower campus and State Street was closed for half a year.”

Nonexistent said that they get together with a group of former UW-Eau Claire students every Thursday at 6:30 p.m. at The Joynt who do remember the same things about UW-Eau Claire. 

“It’s just a really great group of people who remember the same things as I do,” Nonexistent said. “We also meet at 6:30 p.m. which is great because it means I can be in bed by 9 p.m.” 

According to Nonexistent, any recent UW-Eau Claire graduate is welcome to join their group at the Joynt to reminisce about the UW-Eau Claire of yesteryear.  

“It’s sad that there’s no other resource for confused graduates except for our small group of UW-Eau Claire grads,” Nonexistent said. “UW-Eau Claire should do more to help students transition from 18-year-old kids to 22-year-olds who need Tums and won’t shut up about the old antique place on Barstow Street.” 

Adams can be reached at [email protected].