Diadeloso 2012

I told you guys yesterday about Baylor's Diadeloso tradition (lovingly referred to as Dia), where the university gives students a Thursday off in April to "enjoy the outdoors" and give a "break from classes." It started out as a May Day celebration in 1934 and became Diadeloso 1966, where it has been a day of drunken debauchery ever since.

Generally, the on-campus stuff is awesome. Baylor focuses on family friendly events such as tug-of-war contests, 5x5 basketball, campus golf, dog shows, a really poorly named "Throw the snitch in Quiddich" game (dude, everybody knows you catch the snitch, not throw it), etc.

This year, there were camel rides too!

I met up with Tamara, my favorite Zumba/dance partner (and one of the most hilarious people/bloggers I know), to meet up with her and her 18mo. old daughter Lillie. Lillie clearly gets her dance skills from her mom; she was shakin' it with the best of 'em the whole morning! Lillie also got to ride a horse, which she held onto all by herself. Tamara says it's all that practice riding four wheelers.

It was a gorgeous Texas day (don't worry, I wore sunscreen).

Off-campus, however, was a little different. I accidentally drove by last year and it was so heavily congested with intoxicated pedestrians that I made sure to walk this year. I wish I would have brought my big camera (I just had my iPhone) so that you could see the sheer number of people that were there. This is just a photo of one house on this block, but imagine this number of people times 10 (and I think that's an underestimation). Last year, they were in the streets as well, but the police presence was more noticeable this year and they made sure students stayed out of the middle of the street.

This photo also doesn't accurately represent how loud it is, as each house usually has a band or DJ with speakers blaring music and poor banter to anybody within a half-mile radius.

Notice all the ridiculous neon tank tops? Nothing says college like matching t-shirts.

There was one larger party that was completely crazy, complete with beer throwing, nakedness, and a lot of drunk people. We went long enough to document with our iPhones, but didn't stay much longer because nothing makes you feel old like counting how many people will regret their decisions the day after.

And again, these are just small portions of the parties. According to police reports (there's a video too), five people were taken to the hospital for alcohol poisoning, and those are just the people who the police were called for (my guess is the number is at least twice that). I understand that people party in college (I went to college too, friends, I've seen it first hand), but what I don't get is why the police wait until 4:30PM to "break up" the parties when there's clearly underage drinking, public intoxication, and open containers everywhere. I did see at least four people within a 10-minute period get an MIP or open container ticket, so I'm sure they were out, but considering Baylor hired 25+ off-duty police officers to patrol, I'm surprised the party lasted for as long as it did.

Clearly, I've become old.

You can check out more Dia party pics by clicking here, here, and here, or more on-campus Dia pics here.

So that's Dia, for all that didn't know. Did your university have anything like Dia where people made poor decisions in large groups?!