School spirit causes otherwise normal people to do interesting things. A seemingly mild mannered computer engineering major might spend an hour perfecting his chest paint, while a quiet English major scrunges for a foam finger and a bevy of philosophy majors spend an evening making insulting T-shirts.
After four years of watching people embarass themselves, I wondered: Why?
So when I saw three girls huddled together wearing red and white tulle tutus shoved over their grey sweatpants at a tailgate at the end of Randall Court, my interest was piqued. It's rare to see girls showing their Badger pride in such a feminine and flirty manner while still maintaining some dignity.
""We made these last night,"" said Nicole Zabel, a UW senior, as she modeled the red and white creations. ""It makes you want to dance before a game. What's a better way to show your Badger pride than to dance your little heart out?"" She did a little jig.
""We wanted something that would draw attention to us for our last season of football,"" her roommate UW senior Angie Kalz said as she laughed at Zabel. The third tutu, UW senior Heidi Severtson, was embroiled with an intense beer pong game and could not be reached for comment.
From the reaction the girls were getting from the sea of red and white T-shirted students, their attention-grabbing ploy was working. They had spent the morning on the receiving end of high fives, thumbs ups, slurred catcalls and bad jokes. At least there had been some free beer to make up for it.
""One woman came up to me and asked if I was the football fairy, and this one guy kept asking me what you call a ballerina with one leg,"" Zabel said.
She paused.
""A one-one. Get it?""
The tutus are made from tulle and ribbons, held together with staples and look like they will fall apart if a strong wind blew through Camp Randall. The girls have plans to embellish them with ribbons and sequins for future games and might stitch them together, because, well, that might add to their ""longevity.""
""So far today, I've gotten about 12, 13 comments,"" Kalz said. ""Most of them are things like: ‘wow, that's hot;' ‘I love your skirt, good choice;' ‘I wish I would have thought of that.' Nothing too remarkable. This one was my absolute favorite: ‘I was going to wear my tutu today, but I didn't. Next game, next game.' And it was from a guy.""
I followed Kalz as she walked to another tailgate, just to see firsthand what would happen. Old ladies smiled, little girls stared jealously, little boys stared in disgust and somewhere someone slurrily shouted some combination of ""tutu,"" ""awesome,"" and ""way cool.""
""Oh my god I love your tutu!"" a girl yelled from a porch.
We parted half an hour later, and the game passed without any subsequent tutu sightings. I was a little shocked; it seemed that three attractive girls in crazy outfits were ripe for the JumboTron picking. It wasn't until I was walking down Breese Terrace that the rustle of tulle caught my eye again.
""The women's bathroom was really supportive,"" they told me. ""Everyone was giving us compliments and tips on how to keep the tutu out of the toilet.""
The mood suddenly turned somber. It was their last first gameday, after all.
""I'm sad it's our last year,"" a member of the tutu troupe, said. ""But I know we'll all meet up and I'll be doing beer bongs in that tutu at the age of 55.""
So much for dignity.
