HALLOWGEN President
Alex Bartholomees Vice President
Arturo Compean Jr. Advisor
Belle Walston Virtual Manager
Joshua Hale Treasurer
Officers
Grant Graywolf Events Manager
Kem Hosoya Events Manager
John Powers Secretary
Ty Hanson Parliamentarian
Brandon Zupan Officer
Contributors
anon
Keolailani Rose
Brandon Zupan
Ashcat Chuck
Nathan Chuf
82589933
Alex Bartholomees
Grant Graywolf
Evan K.
Alex Walheim
HALLOWGEN
Saturno
Ezra Neighbors
Cat
Belle Walston
Amari Wulf leskylentils
Anna Roberts
The furry fandom has been a lifelong interest of mine, though most of my engagement has been relegated to online spaces. When I came to UT, I noticed how many others shared my interest in animal characters. Longhorn Furries began in fall 2021, started by these eager students who came out of COVID lockdowns looking to socialize in-person. At first, attending social events with other furries was novel, but the people I’ve met through the organization have developed into my close friends and support network.
This zine is a physical record of our first years as a club and what we can make together. I chose “Academia” as our theme to represent how everyone brings their own scholarly backgrounds to the organization. It delights me to see programmers create electronic fursuit parts, educators participate in the management of the club, and social scientists critically examine aspects of furry subculture. A diverse membership also means that students are encouraged to learn from each other and practice new skills. It sounds silly, but it’s true—these connections wouldn’t happen without cartoon animals!
Thank you to everyone who contributed to the zine or bought a copy. The art and writing in this book is introspective, playful, and representative of the community we’ve established. I hope you feel as proud of it as I do!
Belle Walston Virtual Manager, Editor-in-Chief
How Do You Teach Birds to Dance?
By ChuckAnd you wouldn’t believe it, the damn door was locked! Marsh Harrier and Mocking Bird swapped looks so quick their beaks clicked together. Bird flitted through his keys. Nope. Nope. Not that one. Nope. Those polite grey feathers of his started impolitely lifting. “Well, now see this has got to be a sign.”
“A sign you’re a bum T.A.,” Harrier said raptor-stern, despite the fluttering in her chest. Her dreams of ornithology school were not about to fly off for TD 302T: Intro to Tap Dancing. Especially not because some songbird forgot his key. “Can’t there be some other way?”
“There’s only one transcript in the whole university,” Bird said as he tried forcing his finger-feather through the keyhole. “I just don’t get it, Harrier, you love this class!”
“I’m no good at it. I can’t even do a shuffle with how big my feet are,” Harrier didn’t even need to mention the holes the class had pecked into her GPA. She cringed as a miniature reel of all her dancing mistakes unraveled in her mind. Some birds aren’t cut from the same flock, she’d told herself.
“I was a chicken too about it, when I first started,” Bird mockchirped a harrier’s whistle. “Are you absolutely sure you want to drop it?”
“Positive. What’s the hold up?” She craned her neck to look beneath the door. Why’d she wait till the night-of to drop? She knew why, deep down, but the “deep down” didn’t help her grades any. “I think I’m gonna kick it down.”
“Kick it?!? Don’t kick it! Are you…!” But his protests came too late. With the force of a falcon, Harrier punched through the door, just shy of the handle. She screeched a little with shocked satisfaction. Yank. Perfect! Yank. Only. Yank. Oh. She hadn’t thought about how she’d get her foot out. “Professor Penguin will have our tail feathers for this…”
“You forgot the key, egg-head.” Her tightly preened feathers untidied as she struggled to free herself.
“I will say that that was some stunning technique. Have you been practicing your bell kick?”
Harrier’s heart soared at this. She had, and she was proud it had shown. Shown a little too well. Yank. “Help me out, birdbrain.” Bird obliged.
“If you came to Office Hours, I could help you out,” he said as he tried to persuade the door to release its prisoner. Yank. “At the very least show up to one. If all you do is study boring medicine, your feathers will turn white. Just show up to one.”
“I don’t have the time,” Harrier huffed. Yank. “I’m not here to learn tap dancing.” Yank. She kicked the door in frustration. “What is this thing made out of, superglue?”
“Try a bell kick!” Harrier’s yellow eyes snapped onto her hapless T.A. “No, I’m serious. Give it a go.” Harrier cringed again. Even if it was just in front of her T.A., anxiety crept up her talons. She hadn’t the time to perfect it. Maybe that was part of her eagerness to migrate from that class. Who’s to say. “Come on.” She kicked. Then she fell backwards, onto her wings, and sprawled like a stunned turtle. At least she was a free bird. Bird shoved his wing through the door and unlocked it.
“Right! Get the--!” Bird already had the transcript in his wings. But there was a clever look on his face. A smug one. “What’s that about?”
“Well?”
“Well what?” Harrier snorted.
“Aren’t you gonna say I’m right, and stay in the class?” Bird hopped like a bouncy ball. Harrier snatched the transcript.
“Heck no! I’m dropping this class even more now!” She started hobbling to the door. Bird dashed in front of her, chirping like mad.
“What? What was that for then?”
“Well, now it’s perfectly clear to me,” Harrier clicked her talons in a half-hearted shuffle. “I can dance and I can study. No need for them to be the same thing, if they don’t fly together.” Bird cawed and tweeted but no argument came out of his beak. “Well, I was here for my piece of paper and I got it. So long, Bird!” And Harrier flew off.
A Galaxy Behind Schedule
By Alex Walheim“Open the door, Pip!” Apollo yelled as he frantically ran towards the ship.
“I’m trying, but there appears to by a system malfunction with the automated…”
“Go downstairs and open it yourself!” Apollo shouted as the dust storm got closer.
“On it!” Pip responded.
The ship came into view, but the door still appeared to be shut.
“Pip, I need that door open NOW!”
Apollo heard a reply, but it was too scrambled to make out. As soon as he made it to the ship, the door swung open, revealing Pip inside. Pip immediately proceeded to grab Apollo’s paw and violently throw him into the ship and then slamming the door.
“You didn’t have to pull me THAT hard,” Apollo said to Pip as they both rushed upstairs to the cockpit.
“Sorry, I’ll be sure to recalibrate my strength settings later,” Pip responded. “Are the samples safe?”
“Yes, they’re in my bag,” Apollo replied as he fastened his seat belt. “Engage the launch sequence! We need to hurry!” As the dust storm raged outside, he could hear bits of hail pounding the exterior shell.
“All systems are go!” Pip excitedly announced. “Engaging thrusters!”
Apollo was lurched back into his seat as the ship rapidly ascended. Within a few minutes, the rapid vibration stopped. Apollo breathed a sigh of relief as they had successfully exited Oomblar’s atmosphere. His fur was caked in dirt, but he was happy to be back inside the Galaxy Howler. “Set the coordinates to Earth, Pip. We’re going home.”
“Already did! Entering hyperspeed!” Pip exclaimed.
Even if they were overly enthusiastic, Apollo was happy to have a protogen as a lab partner. Pip really understood how to navigate the ship’s software and operating system on a detailed level.
“Soooo, how many samples were you able to grab?” Pip asked. “Any shiny ones?”
“I got about 30 Berenic rocks of mixed compositions,” Apollo replied. “Nothing too fancy.”
“30?” Pip had a mischievous look on his face panel. “What if we kept some for ourselves? Maybe we could sell them.”
“No! We need all of these for the project,” Apollo retorted. “Besides, they’re probably worthless anyways.”
“What about that yellow one?” Pip asked.
“What are you talking about?” Apollo then looked behind him to see that one of the rocks in the transparent bag did indeed have a faint yellow glow to it. That was odd.
Suddenly, a deafening rumble shook the whole ship, triggering the emergency alarm.
“Pip! What’s going on?” Apollo nervously asked.
“I don’t know. Let me disengage hyperspeed to see what’s going on.”
As soon as they stopped, they noticed that were surrounded by five or so sketchy-looking ships.
Apollo immediately recognized them. “Reptilian space pirates from Landax. These guys are trouble.”
A message then entered the ship’s communications system. “Hand us over your cargo, and we might spare you and your lousy ship!”
Apollo knew better. Reptilians always acted tough but they were no match for his superior combat skills. After all, he always had the high score on the school simulators.
“Pip, fire the homing missiles and engage thrusters.” Apollo whispered.
“What are you doing? You’re going to get us killed!” Pip nervously responded.
“No. I’m going to get us to class on time.”
“Alright, but you’re on the hook this time for engine repairs.” Pip reluctantly launched the missiles and then maxed out the speed. “I hope you know what you’re doing.”
Apollo maneuvered the ship downwards as the missiles hit the pirate vessels. Upon impact, they could hear frantic shouting. “Earth scum! Our generous peace offer has expired! Your foolishness will cost you dearly! Prepare to die!”
But it was too late. Apollo could see fumes piling up from the Reptilians’ ships in the distance as he sped away. What was it that those jerks could have possibly wanted?
Pip was clearly shaken up. “I almost short-circuited back there! I told you how much I hate flying in the Erun Sector.”
“Do you want to pass this class or not?” Apollo retorted. “Nobody else would have even thought about getting samples from Oomblar. Besides, it was a fun way to make Interplanetary Geology a bit less boring.”
“I’d rather be bored than constantly overloading my GPU from stress,” Pip replied.
After they entered Earth’s atmosphere and landed the Galaxy Howler in the school parking lot, Apollo and Pip hurried over to the lecture hall, carrying their bag of samples with them.
As they approached the classroom, they noticed a small note had been taped to the door.
“Dear class, I regret to inform you that class is cancelled today. I have been coughing up hairballs all day and am thus unable to teach. Class will resume next week, and the sample assignment is now optional extra credit. Sincerely, Professor Yarnsworth.”
“Well that was a waste of time,” Apollo said dejectedly. “All that for a bunch of stupid rocks.”
“Maybe not,” Pip said as they curiously examined the bag. “That yellow glow-y one is glowing stronger now.”
Apollo noticed it too. He had never seen or heard of anything like this radiant stone. “Maybe we should take a closer at it.” This must have been what the Reptilians were after. If it was that important to them, then it must be incredibly valuable – or dangerous.
The Integrating Factor (as understood by someone who took Calculus II)
Say there’s a differential equation with a dependent variable, y, multiplied only with functions of the independent variable, x, and y can’t be separated out to solve like a homogenous differential equation:
Well, assuming that y is only raised to the first power in the expression above, there is a way to solve it. The first step would be to move the function multiplied by y to the other side of the equation like so:
This is called a linear differential equation.
The derivative of the product two functions of x, u and v, can be expressed as the following:
This can be leveraged by multiplying the entire linear equation by another function called mu:
Both sides can be integrated, and the equation can be solved to find the function represented by mew.
The above could be a shorthand formula for figuring out what mew is, depending on whether circumstances allow for it or not
The function has been found! However, in this generic example, mew can substitute as a placeholder for the function for the remainder of solving the equation. The left side of the equation can be expressed as the derivative of a product of functions, leaving the right side relatively unchanged:
The next step would be to integrate both sides:
Then, isolate y by dividing by mew:
All of this is to say that although symbols have drifted into specific uses in mathematics, whichever symbols are used where doesn’t really matter as long as they’re used consistently and correctly for the entirety of any one given solution.
A collection of 22 original works by club members about their experiences as students!
Cover artworks by leskylentils