In my work, I am constantly paying attention to the names of institutions of higher learning. Over the years I have concluded that there are certain colleges whose names aren’t quite right, and would benefit from some readjustment:
*Denison University should rename itself Denisovan University, in honor of our lost hominid cousins, the Denisovans.
*The College of Wooster should rename itself the College of Woofter, in honor of a guy with whom I went to high school.
*Purdue University should rename itself Perdue University, for, well, chicken reasons. (And isn’t that what most people think already?)
*Baylor University should rename itself Balrog University, in honor of the evil creature from The Lord of the Rings. Furthermore, “Baylor” sounds like “baleful”, and a balrog is nothing if not baleful. Indeed, “baleful” is one of those early Dungeons & Dragons-type words, like “ilk” and “denizen”, calling to mind the game’s very early days, when the name “balrog” was given to a Dungeons & Dragons monster, before it had to be renamed for copyright reasons.
it is even rumored that if you say “baleful Balrog” five times, the ghost of E. Gary Gygax will appear to award you 100,000 experience points, and/or exile you to the Slaad-Infested realm of Limbo.
