The injuries occured when people from a group described as "Humor Junkies" started searching frantically for the column. Many suffered paper cuts and one individual walked into a wall.
"These people apparently thought that the comics section could be used as a humor supliment," said Student Health Services worker Anne Jeffries. "They then suffered from Mal Humor Induced Boredom (MHIB)."
Jeffries said that the symptoms of MHIB include:
1) Paying attention in class instead of reading John's column.
2) Thinking decidedly unfunny thoughts.
3) Foolishly seeking humor from other sources.
As a result of the MHIB injuries sustained by many members of the UMR campus, Miner office was flooded with letters from a devout group of people called "Humor Junkies." This group is not thought to be dangerous, but as editor Amy Jones was quoted as saying, "We're not taking any chances."
The Humor Junkies are led by Miner humor columnist John Johnson. The group was apparently founded when Johnson started writing articles that made people laugh.
"I was on a major Mountain Dew high. I was tripping hard core," said John of the fateful day that he began writing his now famous columns. "The words just sort of leaked out all over the place. Either that or I wet my pants..."
Johnson then noticed that he had developed a minor (no pun intended) following of readers. These people then became Humor Junkies.
While the group is described as "generally dangerous only to themselves," recent events have caused many to reconsider how seriously this group should be taken.
"It doesn't take much to set these people off," said FBI agent Dan Mancuso. "I'm really scared to see what would happen if these people had to go more than two weeks without a column."
This concern among many government agencies, as well and the Miner, stems from the tendancy for Humor Junkies to become enraged when they don't get their articles on time.
"Who knows what I might do if I couldn't read John's column each week," explained Junkie Rachel Johns, "I might end up doing something potentially fatal like watching Bob Sagat do stand-up comedy."
The Miner sent out apologies to many of the outraged Humor Junkies to try and supress their rage. They said that precautions will be taken in the future to ensure that people get their weekly allotment of humor in order to prevent rioting on the UMR campus.
Because as Amy Jones put it, "Rioting would be bad."