The Homecoming Donut Toss

Today was the TTU Homecoming Parade, which means it was time for the annual Piepmeier tradition: The Homecoming Donut Toss. I can't remember how this tradition started, but it's an excellent mixture of bizarre performance art and very good family entertainment. The Homecoming Parade passes right in front of my parents' house, so we invite over everybody we know, we all eat pounds and pounds of delicious brunch food, and then when the parade starts, we lob hundreds of donuts at the floats and the Homecoming Court. This year my dad got 10 dozen donuts, and some of the guests brought more.

Dad has developed a series of rules that go along with the donut toss. The first rule is, No throwing donuts at people. Only underhand tossing is allowed. Here is my dad demonstrating the proper toss, with Mike O'Mara catching.

Here are some photos that will give you a sense of what it feels like to be in the midst of the donut toss.

For this one, Kevin ran across the street, so you're looking at my parents' house here.

Rule #5 of the Donut Toss is, hide the donuts from the roving bands of fraternity brothers. This is what it looks like when the fraternity boys run up to the donut toss.

Benya had a very good time at the parade. We all got excited about tossing the donuts and didn't always pay attention to what was happening at waist level, which means that several times Benya was able to snag donuts from people's hands.


Kevin O'Mara was the official documentarian of this year's Homecoming Donut Toss. He is a kick-ass photographer. To see the rest of of the pictures from today (and many more), visit his Flickr page. There, you can also see a picture of me in our childhood climbing tree.