Spring is here, which means its time to start using the Quad again. The muddy puddles of winter are finally gone! As overjoyed as I am that I can once more diagonally tread across the grass in suede shoes, I can’t help but feel a little uneasy about using the Quad during the spring.

Sure, the sunshine and warm temperatures make the Quad appear as a kind of springtime oasis away from suffocating classrooms devoid of light. But the Quad also has a seedy underbelly that only appears when temperatures hit 75. Just wait until you hear about the dark side of the Quad, a place that leads to drug use, sex, violence and under-the-table money deals!

I’ve been told by inside sources that the Quad can make thousands of people dependent on drugs. I don’t have allergies though, so I don’t know the exact degree of addiction. But I’ve been told by the sufferers it’s pretty bad. Once that grass starts growing and that wacky Davis flora begins to bloom, the hell begins. Allergies can turn our once happy well-adjusted friends into allergic pill-poppers who continue to complain all the time about their watery eyes, their runny noses. Friends don’t let their allergic friends go anywhere near the Quad.

People with allergies aren’t the only ones who are suffering. Although this event happens more often by the Arboretum, it also happens on the Quad, in full view of bystanders: duck rape. If you haven’t seen a duck rape yet, trust me, it’s pretty horrifying. The poor female ducks of the UC Davis campus get gang-banged by a multitude of male ducks. Even though I’ve witnessed it countless times, I’m still shocked to see all those Donalds and Daffys doing that to those poor Daisys. Every time I witness a duck rape, I want to call the crisis line at the Sexual Assault and Domestic Violence Center. Then I remember that they only cover actual emergencies. Someone needs to do something though. These male ducks don’t realize that Quack means No.

But then I feel a little torn in my crusade against these atrocities that happen on the Quad. Without these horrible actions, we wouldn’t have baby ducks. Adorable baby ducks are our nation’s greatest resource. If we gave a baby duck to every world leader, there would be no more war. I think if scientists looked hard enough, they would discover that baby duck’s cuteness could cure cancer. Baby ducks are a panacea for everything. Baby ducks are so great that they… wait, I’m supposed to be writing about the underbelly of the Quad. Sorry about that, my mind kind of drifts when I start thinking about baby ducks. They’re just too adorable. Seriously, I could watch them waddle around for an hour. Stop it, Rachel. I must overcome the power of the baby ducks to finish the column…

What is the only danger on the Quad that poses a greater threat to our moral fiber than allergies and duck rape? That’s right, Frisbee players. The sun comes out and the Frisbee players suddenly appear in gangs. I don’t know where these people come from and how they’re actually organized enough to play a game of Frisbee, but they’re there. And once they’re out there playing, I can’t walk on the Quad for fear of getting hit in the head by a renegade disc.

Seriously, who are these people that bring a Frisbee in their backpacks to school everyday? I’ve got this theory that the Frisbee players aren’t actually playing Frisbee for fun. I’m pretty sure that the university hires people to play Frisbee so when high schoolers and parents are going on a tour of the campus, the people on tour see the happy coeds playing Frisbee on the Quad. When parents see how wholesome the Quad Frisbee players are, they tell their children, You’re going to UC Davis, Junior. I don’t even know how much money UC Davis is raking in from those Frisbee players.

RACHEL SKYTT plans to write an exposé about acorn hoarding. If you know any squirrels with inside information, tell them to e-mail raskytt@ucdavis.edu.

Yeah, so like, I met this guy at the bookstore when I was going there to buy books for my classes. He was pretty tall and, I’m not sure, but he looked sort of Asian, you know? Like he was half or something. You could sort of tell. You know what I mean?

Anyway, he was in the English section and he asked me what class I was taking and I was like, UWP 1, and he was like, You an English major? and I was like, No, I have to take it because it’s required, and he was like, Ah, I see, and I was like, Yeah, I don’t really like reading. Apparently he didn’t like that because he gave me this look, and I was like, Sorry? but I didn’t really say that.

Apparently he was an English major but I didn’t know that until later, when we were in line to buy our books. We were both waiting in line and I was like, You have a lot of books, and he was like, Yup, and I was like, Apparently I just have to buy these two, and he was like, I see that.

Apparently something faraway was interesting because he was looking in a different direction and so I was like, What’s your major? and he said English. I was like, Just English? and he was like, Yup. Just English, and I was like, What are you going to do after graduation? because it’s like, what do English majors do? You know? But anyway he was all like, I’m going to maintain my current lifestyle with prostitution, and for a second I was thinking like, Uhhh, this is SO awkward. Like, I wasn’t really sure if he was serious or not, because he was acting all serious and after he said it he just kept looking at the cash registers, so I wasn’t really sure. I don’t really know how to explain it. It was just sort of hard to tell. You know what I mean?

And so then after that I took a magazine and started perusing it for something funny to read. Apparently there was some stuff about politics and some other long articles but I just skipped those because I wanted something funny to read and nothing too serious. The line was moving so slow that after like a minute the guy was like, I thought you didn’t read, and I was like, Oh, just perusing some magazines.

Then he was like, Just so you know. The main definition of the word ‘peruse’ is to read thoroughly, not to browse. When he said that I was thinking like, Wow, this guy is such an asshole, but instead I was like, Do you work for the library or something? The guy was like, I write for the newspaper, but mainly I just read books, and so I was like, What kind of books? and he was like, Mostly fiction. Novels. Short stories. I thought that was kind of weird so I was like, Are all novels fiction? and he was like, Yup, and I was kind of mad at that point so I was like, I don’t see what’s the point about reading about something if it’s not real.

And then I said something else that I was thinking about for a while but I didn’t feel like saying until then, and so I was all like, By the way, you talk slow.

But apparently it was funny because he laughed and afterwards he was like, It’s better than the alternative, and I was like, What’s that? and he was like, Can I ask you a question? and I was like, What? and he was like, Do you think when you talk? and I was like, What do you mean? and he was like, If you listened to yourself when you spoke, you would learn something.

Before I could say anything he apparently had an idea because he said, I have an idea. Do me a favor and read the paper on Monday, on page two. I was like, You’re writing something just for me? and he was like, Absolutely not. Many people have the same problem.

Then the bookstore clerk was like, Next! and the guy began to walk away, so very quickly I was like, What do you mean about a problem? So then the guy turned and he was like, The problem is you sound like a fool. Then he threw his head back and laughed for like an hour before he bought his books and left.

So like, yeah. Total asshole. And you know what? I tried to read his column on Monday and guess what? It was so boring. Like so boring. So like, yeah.

KOJI FRAHM’s columns have appeared in The Bedpan and The Celibate’s Guide to Pregnancy. He can be reached at kcfrahm@ucdavis.edu. This is his first novel.