Just go to Harvard and stop blocking the bike path
BY ANNABEL MARSHALL — almarshall@ucdavis.edu
I’m not here to fashion-bash nor trend-defend. I have a simple question. People here who wear clothes emblazoned with other schools’ names on them: Do you know where you attend college? It’s UC Davis. UC, like “you see”. Juicy without the “j”. Davis as in “Daviscardia,” the famous genus of moths. That’s an easy trick to help you remember.
I see a lot of confused people on campus every day who don’t seem to remember where they go to school. I know you mumble the “D” in UCD when you talk to your Ivy League friends, but this is not Los Angeles. They have fewer cows. But probably the same amount of Machete Men.
That’s why whenever I see someone wearing merch from a better school, I yell, “No!” and spell out “University of California, Davis” with my arms. Yes, including the comma. Unfortunately, I often get confused and start doing the YMCA, which really sends mixed signals. At this point, the person has usually just walked past me, and locals start offering me coins for what they assume is an interpretive dance performance. Obviously, I take them, but it’s not what I wanted.
Look, I’m not saying that Princeton (average graduate income $72,700) is in any way better than UC Davis (average graduate income $42,600). I would never imply that there is any noteworthy difference between Brown (5.4% acceptance rate) and UC Davis (49% acceptance rate). Columbia (ranked No. 2 by U.S. News) has literally nothing on UCD (ranked No. 38). I know this because at least twice a quarter, a professor who went to Stanford tells me not to worry about the fact that I’m not at Stanford, even though I had expressed no worries about not being at Stanford. I was just asking about the syllabus. Please grade my Week 3 midterm. Please.
I’m just saying if you want to wear a UPenn hoodie on your way to failing a psychology midterm, please incorporate a sense of irony. Also maybe don’t, because UPenn merch is mostly ugly.
Think of your peers. I have very poor spatial awareness and directionality, so I might get confused and think I’ve walked to Pennsylvania instead of the CoHo. And you don’t know me like that, but being in Pennsylvania is actually my nightmare.
Having a sibling who went to that school is not a valid excuse. You are your own person, even though your mom calls their name, your other sibling’s name and the dog’s name before she remembers who you are. Having a parent who went there is definitely not an excuse and not because I’m bitter about not having an Ivy League legacy.
From now on, I will only be accepting the following:
One: fictional schools and companies. But let’s get some deep cuts going. Yeah, Dunder Mifflin and Greendale Community College are cool. But what about South Central Louisiana State University from Adam Sandler’s 1998 smash-miss, “The Waterboy”? A 33% on Rotten Tomatoes, y’all. And how come I’m not seeing more references to the lost-but-not-forgotten UC, UC Sunnydale of “Buffy the Vampire Slayer”? I think it’s near Santa Barbara. Less UCLA, more ULA (University of Los Angeles, “The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air”).
Two: misprints. Give me Harvart. Yail. Stanfart. That’s something we can all get behind. This could bring the nation back together, honestly. Congress would get so much more done if they spelled it “Cogeress”. Just a suggestion.
Three: UC Davis merch! Where did your Davis pride go? Did it leave when you tried to make an advising appointment and they had nothing available for the next two months? Or when a Unitrans driver made full eye contact with you as you were running toward the bus stop and drove away one minute before the scheduled time? Yeah, me too. Just because I’m doing the YMCA at a full sprint doesn’t mean I don’t deserve to ride the bus.
Written by: Annabel Marshall — almarshall@ucdavis.edu
Disclaimer: (This article is humor and/or satire, and its content is purely fictional. The story and the names of “sources” are fictionalized.)
