- May 18, 2001
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This weekend my sister received her masters degree from East Tennessee State University, so my family and I all showed up for the graduation. Something like 1800 people received degrees of one sort or other, so we were in for a 3 hour snoozefest.
The only hope for a cure to this boredom came from the school of nursing. They have a long-standing reputation for being a rowdy bunch at graduations, and this year promised to be no different. When they filed into the auditorium to go to their seats, they stood out as the group that all had decorated their hats, gowns, etc., and they each were carrying a helium-filled balloon (later I learned that all the women had worn just bikinis under their gowns). As soon as they were seated, security posted a guard on either side of their group. Soon the nurses started the normal graduation things: blowing bubbles, silly string, etc. Up to this point, they had been relatively calm.
Then out came the first beach ball. Again, this was nothing really unusual for graduations, but apparently security had been told to not put up with any crap. As soon as the ball got knocked into an aisle away from the student body, the guard picked it up and took it away. This was repeated three times, all with the same result.
I guess at this point the nurses had run out of beach balls, so they had to resort to their final, most desperate option: an anatomically correct, life-sized female blowup sex doll. At first they tried to volley it around like a ball, but apparently it didn't have the appropriate bouncy properties. So they started tying their helium balloons to its ankles. There were only a few balloons at first, but after trial and error the nurses seemed to discover that the balloons didn't help the bounciness of the doll. So then they went a little crazy and tied tons of balloons to it - enough to float the thing.
Keep in mind that the auditorium was filled with thousands of people who were bored out of their skulls; you can only imagine the thunderous applause when this colossal monument to stupidity finally took its maiden flight after many failed attempts. And there it hung, upside-down in midair, gently floating towards the school's stage and all the dignitaries who had been invited from across the nation for this special occassion.
Eventually, it ran out of steam and floated down to one of the aisles, where a security guard immediately pounced on it and carried it away. Again, you can only imagine the boos that greeted this jerk from the thousands of folks who, for a brief instant, had forgotten the pain of sitting through hours of dismal boredom. It was hilarious.
I know someone who got some pictures of the whole thing - I'll have them posted as soon as possible if I can get them.
The only hope for a cure to this boredom came from the school of nursing. They have a long-standing reputation for being a rowdy bunch at graduations, and this year promised to be no different. When they filed into the auditorium to go to their seats, they stood out as the group that all had decorated their hats, gowns, etc., and they each were carrying a helium-filled balloon (later I learned that all the women had worn just bikinis under their gowns). As soon as they were seated, security posted a guard on either side of their group. Soon the nurses started the normal graduation things: blowing bubbles, silly string, etc. Up to this point, they had been relatively calm.
Then out came the first beach ball. Again, this was nothing really unusual for graduations, but apparently security had been told to not put up with any crap. As soon as the ball got knocked into an aisle away from the student body, the guard picked it up and took it away. This was repeated three times, all with the same result.
I guess at this point the nurses had run out of beach balls, so they had to resort to their final, most desperate option: an anatomically correct, life-sized female blowup sex doll. At first they tried to volley it around like a ball, but apparently it didn't have the appropriate bouncy properties. So they started tying their helium balloons to its ankles. There were only a few balloons at first, but after trial and error the nurses seemed to discover that the balloons didn't help the bounciness of the doll. So then they went a little crazy and tied tons of balloons to it - enough to float the thing.
Keep in mind that the auditorium was filled with thousands of people who were bored out of their skulls; you can only imagine the thunderous applause when this colossal monument to stupidity finally took its maiden flight after many failed attempts. And there it hung, upside-down in midair, gently floating towards the school's stage and all the dignitaries who had been invited from across the nation for this special occassion.
Eventually, it ran out of steam and floated down to one of the aisles, where a security guard immediately pounced on it and carried it away. Again, you can only imagine the boos that greeted this jerk from the thousands of folks who, for a brief instant, had forgotten the pain of sitting through hours of dismal boredom. It was hilarious.
I know someone who got some pictures of the whole thing - I'll have them posted as soon as possible if I can get them.
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