STATE COLLEGE, PA-- What would you sacrifice to save a cheap ballpoint pen? Would you be willing to suffer public embarrassment? Would you risk contracting a bacterial infection? Chen Li Wen (graduate - mathematics) faced these questions yesterday afternoon during a mishap in the Osmond Laboratory men's room.

             Eyewitnesses claim that Wen had just finished his business and was about to flush the urinal when tragedy struck. His pen slid out of his shirt pocket and splashed down in the cavernous, antiquated urinal.

	Chen Li Wen poses with dirty hands in pockets shortly after the embarassing urinal incident at Osmond Lab.

             "I almost laughed out loud," said Victor Wislikviak (junior - physics). "But if I would have laughed, that would have made it seem like I'd been watching that guy take a leak, and hee hee hee," he added with a dorky chuckle.

             The situation became more gruesome as Wen tried to ameliorate his predicament. In a Trainspottingesque scene, he dove into the urinal and grabbed his befouled pen, a blue Bic Fine Point he had recently bought at McClanahan's for $0.39.

             "It was a reflex [to grab my pen]," claimed Wen. "It was like if I had dropped one of my chopsticks in a bowl of wonton soup. I had no control."

             He proceeded to calmly towel off the pen and walk out of the bathroom without confrontation.

             Students are advised not to borrow any writing instruments from strangers, especially if the writing instruments smell like urine.