PHOENIX ÷ Late nights will get a little later for Arizona's imbibers now that Gov. Janet Napolitano signed a bill yesterday to push last call to 2 a.m.

Because the bill does not have an emergency clause, which would make it effective immediately, it will take 90 days after the end of the legislative session to take effect.

With no sign of a quick end to the current session, there is no telling when that might be. [Read article]

Despite record-breaking attendance the first two days, poor weather and the timing of Easter were likely the reasons Spring Fling's total attendance dropped for the fourth year in a row.

But clubs raked in more money than last year.

Spring Fling attendance peaked in 2000 with about 41,000 people and has dropped every year since.

This year, 28,000 people attended the four-day event; 6,500 of those who visited the carnival were UA students. [Read article]

Residents of Arizona-Sonora Residence Hall are steaming after enduring 23 fire alarms this academic year, the most of any UA residence hall.

Sgt. Eugene Mejia, UAPD spokesman, said the alarms have gone off two to three times each month since August.

"They have either been tests, false alarms or drills that were not reported and we responded to," he said.

Maggie Haley, an undeclared freshman, said she no longer has patience for the drills. [Read article]

About 30 people, including a UA employee and three UA students, rallied at Sabino Canyon yesterday afternoon to demand the release of the mountain lion captured Friday by the Arizona Game and Fish Department.

The protesters piled into the Sabino Canyon Recreation Area Visitor Center, demanding to speak to Larry Raley, the district ranger of the Santa Catalina Ranger District of the Coronado National Forest. [Read article]

Some of Arizona's top high school scholars answered their phones to a surprise earlier this spring ÷ Provost George Davis was recruiting them to the UA.

Davis phoned 22 high school seniors who, if they attend an Arizona university, will be designated winners of the Flinn Scholarship, a prestigious award that covers all school-related expenses and multiple trips abroad.

The scholars can choose to attend the UA, Arizona State University or Northern Arizona University, and Davis' phone calls were an attempt to lure as many of them to Tucson as possible. [Read article]

Freshman sees purple rabbits, doesn't read the Daily Wildcat

Wildcat: Hi, I'm Claire from the Daily Wildcat and you're on the spot.

Beller: What's that?

Wildcat: God! Nobody reads anymore. How do you get through college without being able to read?

Beller: I guess you don't. · I just don't read the Wildcat.

Wildcat: Boo! Shame on you. Well, it's a column where I talk to people and make them look stupid. Well, they make themselves look dumb. · But yeah, that sums up my version of "On the Spot." [Read article]

Things you always never wanted to know

UA alum wins Yale Series poetry competition

Local poet and UA alumnus Richard Siken is the winner of the 2004 Yale Series of Younger Poets competition. The judge, U.S. poet laureate Louise GlŸck, selected Siken's manuscript "Crush" to be published by the Yale University Press April 2005.

Born in New York City and raised in Arizona, Siken received a master's degree in poetry in 1994 from the UA. He is co-founder and editor of the acclaimed literary magazine Spork. His poems have appeared in The Iowa Review, Conjunctions, Indiana Review and Chelsea. [Read article]