In preparing for the directorship position, it has come to my attention that LPL has single-handedly produced over 35% of all planetary science PhD's. This is a feat of which the department can be singularly proud, but it has seemingly had some unforseen effects.

Given the current overabundance of truly skilled planetary professionals compared to the number of positions available in geochemistry and related fields, an alliance of planetary science departments has begun an embargo of LPL graduates. While we recognize the right of these departments to hire less-qualified Caltech and Washington University students to keep them off the streets, we see no reason that superbly-trained-and-educated persons should be discriminated against simply because we have produced 13,017 PhD's in the last 20 years.

Therefore, we have no choice but to offer employment to some of our former graduate students here at LPL. I personally obtained funding for these positions by beating the pants off of William Hartmann at poker. While these upstanding young investigators deserve their own offices, there is no room in the new or old buildings for them. Of course, we cannot ask these distinguished doctors to share offices with current graduate students. Thus, we will be asking all faculty who do not share an office to help house these would-be-Urey-Prize-winners for a short time interval (geologically speaking). We have already been approved funding for the new addition to LPL, and construction will begin on 10 April. The air handler will be out until 1997.

Thank you for your support and understanding. Our reunion will begin over the next several days. Please check your door to see who your new officemate is.