Attribution: Richard Hurd, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons
By Bill Stokes
Kickass, the doorstop dog, joins the keeper in rejoicing at a human-involved, weather-related event that is not only understandable but worthy of cheers: that, of course, being the afternoon collapse of the overloaded pier at the UW Lake Mendota Memorial Union Terrace whereby a horde of students were unceremoniously dunked in the lake in the middle of a blazing hot afternoon.
Nobody was seriously hurt–one TV station showed a coed’s bloody toe–and informed its viewers that the pier was to be removed today.
On a personal note, the keeper’s son Rick reported that during his brief long-ago employment with the UW he helped install the seasonal pier, but he claims no credit for yesterday’s timely student dunk.
The keeper imagines that as the event joins UW lore, the number of students who will claim they were on the collapsing pier will grow into the hundreds if not the thousands, and it will outdo the Mifflin Street riots as a UW identity item:
“Grandpa, tell us again about that afternoon back in 2023 when you were eyeballing grandma in her bikini and the pier dumped you both in the lake.”
Photo by Bill Stokes