This last Saturday was Picnic Day, a Davis tradition that has occurred for the past 96 years. About 75,000 people flocked to the UC Davis campus to attend over 200 family friendly events ranging from an entomological petting zoo to a battle of marching bands.
Davis has lots of people with weird bikes.
Officially, Picnic Day is UC Davis' annual open house event to showcase the work the campus is doing and allow prospective students and members of the community to investigate the school.
If that sounds unexciting, you would most likely be surprised at the frenzied excitement the average student would convey to you in a description of Picnic Day. The anticipation surrounding the event in the preceding weeks rivals that leading up to Christmas. Indeed, the night before Picnic Day is often compared to Christmas Eve due to the excitement students feel.
If that sounds unexciting, you would most likely be surprised at the frenzied excitement the average student would convey to you in a description of Picnic Day. The anticipation surrounding the event in the preceding weeks rivals that leading up to Christmas. Indeed, the night before Picnic Day is often compared to Christmas Eve due to the excitement students feel.
You may be skeptical at this point. What could be so great about Picnic Day that a bunch of college students would be so excited about it? Are they really that excited by the prospect of watching wiener dog races and eating overpriced carnival food? You would be right to be skeptical about the excitement surrounding Picnic Day, because none of these things really get the students very excited. I have not yet mentioned the piece of the puzzle that makes Picnic Day such a tremendous holiday on the UC Davis campus.
Alcohol. That's the reason people get so worked up about Picnic Day. It is seen, for whatever reason, as an opportunity to drink all day and then drink all night. Why the student body chooses this one particular day to engage in such raucous behavior while leaving other weekends lifelessly sober is beyond my knowledge. And it would be inaccurate to portray this as the behavior of the entire student body. Really, I would estimate that about sixty percent of the students engage in the revelry while the other half are a bit more temperate. But it is at least a sizable enough chunk of the population that it is noticeable even among the hordes of visitors on campus.
I first encountered the joys of Picnic Day at approximately nine thirty in the morning when I went to breakfast. The unusual thing was that there was a very large line trailing out of the dining commons, which has never occurred at breakfast previously. The reason for the line became apparent once I joined the throng. Normally, there are very few people at breakfast, especially during weekends, because the vast majority of people are taking advantage of the spare time to sleep.
But not on Picnic Day.
No, the people who would usually be recovering from Friday night had gone to bed early the night before, knowing that they would most likely not be sleeping again until Sunday morning. And every minute of Picnic Day is too valuable to waste by sleeping. It is customary for thirsty students to rise around seven in the morning to begin priming their stomachs with a healthy dose of alcohol (the Graduate, a local bar, opens at 6 am to satisfy demand). As I stood in line to get into the DC, I listened as students behind me discussed what clever concoctions they had created to start the day off right. One pair of girls emerged from a dorm visibly inebriated and staggered into line with their other friends, who laughed in an uproar at the silly behavior of the two sloshed girls.
As the day went on, students would disperse throughout the city to join friends at house parties from which they would return without their good sense. It makes a particularly interesting day for the police, who made 33 arrests this Picnic Day. Some inebriates peed on storefronts while others engaged in group fights around the city.
Alcohol. That's the reason people get so worked up about Picnic Day. It is seen, for whatever reason, as an opportunity to drink all day and then drink all night. Why the student body chooses this one particular day to engage in such raucous behavior while leaving other weekends lifelessly sober is beyond my knowledge. And it would be inaccurate to portray this as the behavior of the entire student body. Really, I would estimate that about sixty percent of the students engage in the revelry while the other half are a bit more temperate. But it is at least a sizable enough chunk of the population that it is noticeable even among the hordes of visitors on campus.
I first encountered the joys of Picnic Day at approximately nine thirty in the morning when I went to breakfast. The unusual thing was that there was a very large line trailing out of the dining commons, which has never occurred at breakfast previously. The reason for the line became apparent once I joined the throng. Normally, there are very few people at breakfast, especially during weekends, because the vast majority of people are taking advantage of the spare time to sleep.
But not on Picnic Day.
No, the people who would usually be recovering from Friday night had gone to bed early the night before, knowing that they would most likely not be sleeping again until Sunday morning. And every minute of Picnic Day is too valuable to waste by sleeping. It is customary for thirsty students to rise around seven in the morning to begin priming their stomachs with a healthy dose of alcohol (the Graduate, a local bar, opens at 6 am to satisfy demand). As I stood in line to get into the DC, I listened as students behind me discussed what clever concoctions they had created to start the day off right. One pair of girls emerged from a dorm visibly inebriated and staggered into line with their other friends, who laughed in an uproar at the silly behavior of the two sloshed girls.
As the day went on, students would disperse throughout the city to join friends at house parties from which they would return without their good sense. It makes a particularly interesting day for the police, who made 33 arrests this Picnic Day. Some inebriates peed on storefronts while others engaged in group fights around the city.
This description of Picnic Day, fortunately, does not really carry over to the campus too much. The dorms definitely have their share of stumbling sots (although my honors dorm insulated me quite nicely), but most of campus is happily occupied by families who are quite content to watch their kids make tie-dye shirts. It was in that environment that I spent most of my day. I floated from parade to sheep dog exposition to A Capella performance and beyond, and the day was quite enjoyable.
So that was Picnic Day.