The searchlights outside Rec Hall drew their beams across the overcast evening sky. A giant yellow inflatable dancer shimmied back and forth as jets of air shot out its fingertips. The kickoff of the 2001 Interfraternity Council/Panhellenic Dance Marathon had almost arrived.

Friday, 6 p.m.

Inside, final preparations were underway. The floor looked like a honeycomb — the yellow-shirted moralers mingling around the clusters of white-shirted dancers sitting on the floor, getting their last bit of rest before the marathon began. The bleachers were bustling with spectators, awaiting the moment when the dancers would finally leap to their feet. Homemade signs of encouragement for the students on the floor shared wall space with the printed logos of Thon's corporate sponsors.

After a medley of movie dance clips and performances by the Penn State Dance Team and NOMMO, the overall committee chairs got their introductions. They dashed onto the stage like a football team, giving hugs and high-fives all around.

Walt Breuninger, Thon overall chair, addressed the crowd, especially the dancers. "Because of you, the child whose dream is simply to be able to go to school and play with her friends and not be sick is going to have that dream come true," he said. "Because of you and everybody who's worked so hard this year to put this event together, all these kids and all their families are going to have the most fun weekend that they can imagine."

After a countdown at 7:05 p.m., Thon 2001 was off and dancing. Within minutes, the first balls of the evening bounced over the heads of everyone on the floor.

Friday, 7:30 p.m.

Thon dancers traditionally create their own "vanity plates" in the form of slogans pasted across their T-shirt backs. This year was no exception. The various rear-facing phrases alluded to the Four Diamonds cause, the children with cancer, the 48 hours, current pop songs and movies, or just some innuendo:

"Will Dance 4 $$"

"Rock 4 The Kids"

"Building Hope"

"Inthonmiac"

"It Wasn't Me"

"Devon's Angels"

"Massage My ARHS"

The back of Merritt Swallow's shirt read "Dancin' 4 Liz," referring to the name of the child her sorority — Theta Kappa Pi — sponsored. Merritt (junior-chemical engineering) is a childhood cancer survivor herself, who just happened to turn 21 Thursday.

Merritt said she woke up at 9 Friday morning, thus her weekend without sleep will have been even longer than the typical 50-plus hours. In some of the first moments of the marathon, she was spinning around, passing out stickers to decorate the shirts of her nearby friends.

She and her dancing partner, Doston Kish (junior-turfgrass science), wore pink leis, bandanas and buttons — "Go Pink or Go Home" — to indicate their team for a new facet of Thon organized by the morale committee this year.

The different color teams earned points based on their members' participation in games and activities during "theme hours" throughout the event, said Dan Heist, Thon morale chair. The winning team's name will be engraved on the "Reach Within" plaque. Dan hopes the competition will become a yearly tradition.

An assortment of unofficial Thon traditions started to appear in the early hours. The Four Diamonds children, their siblings and students alike picked up squirt guns and started sending streams of water in everyone's direction. But most dancers and visitors to the floor at Rec Hall don't appear to mind getting doused a bit, or otherwise, batting away an approaching ball. Several play circles formed, while some people threw balls between the floor and the bleachers.

Friday, 8:20 p.m.

After a run-through with all the morale captains, Anne Cohen (sophomore-communications) — "Captain Tabasco" — and some assistants took the stage to teach the 2001 Thon line dance. The usual mix of Penn State and pop culture references represented a look back at what has happened since last February. Anne taught the motions and lyrics by section, building up to the whole. Most of the people in Rec Hall joined in the lessons.

One stanza baffled many dancers at first: "Subway series / Subway diet / Chad got pregnant / What a riot!"

Anne asked, "How many people don't know who 'Chad' is?" Lots of hands went up.

By 9:30, the dancers had most of the routine — and the references — down.

Friday, 11 p.m.

Plywood benches tall enough for the dancers to eat standing up were carried out, and people queued up for food. Local band Poptart Monkeys provided some live music, but many on the floor appeared annoyed when the band turned up the volume and the main Rec Hall lights suddenly went out for a while. Dancers and moralers took advantage of some downtime to visit with family and friends at the orange-fence barrier between the floor and the bleachers.

At 11:20, everyone got a chance to prove they still remembered the line dance moves, and then moralers set up tables for the first "theme hour," dedicated to Las Vegas. Classic movies clips from films about "Sin City, USA" flashed across the overhead screens and an Elvis impersonator came out. There was a "chapel of love," karaoke and hula hoop contests, and fake-money casino games.

Merritt paused from the action to give an update on how the marathon was going for her. Several of her fellow sorority members were on duty with various committees at the time. She said she ran into them coming back from the bathroom and accepted lots of hugs.

Merritt, who used to lead fitness classes at Penn State, didn't struggle with the line dance too much. "I knew it right from the start," she said with a smile. "I'm a fast learner." However, she did agree that the routine felt harder than last year's: "They're trying to make us stretch."

She didn't get a few of the references in the line dance, but she was proud to point out that she did figure out the pregnant chad allusion before most people.

Her parents were scheduled to arrive mid-Saturday, bearing promised birthday gifts. In the meantime, she said she was playing with some of the children.

"I tried to teach one how to hula-hoop but he was so little," she said. "It would hit the ground right away."

Merritt was also eyeing the "chapel of love," where the school mascot posed for photo ops. "I think I want to get married to the Nittany Lion. I don't know who's receptive to that, but we'll see."

In her waist pack, Merritt was equipped with just the bare essentials — a CD player, hair brush, camera, and a stuffed green frog she received for her birthday.

As Friday silently turned into Saturday, Merritt said she was feeling great and wasn't desperate for too many distractions: "I don't need toys yet. I'm still too wired."

Saturday, 11 a.m.

Outside Rec Hall, the weather was partly sunny and brisk with off-and-on flurries. The higher-numbered dancers were taking their second round of "Bathroom Breaks." They run through a gauntlet of other cheering students, take a running dive onto a long slide sprinkled with baby powder, and get a brief massage from a pack of friendly hands. Meanwhile, "Toucan Sam" roamed the floor, helping to pass out bite-size Rice Krispie Treats.

On stage, four mop-topped singers in black suits with British-sounding accents rocked out to classics that were first popular before Thon was even around.

"The Beatles" — really a tribute band called "Beatlemania Now" — offered many of the parents who were on hand a trip down memory lane, not to mention "Penny Lane." The current resurgence of interest in the '60s superstars' music was evident as people of all ages jived together to such appropriate numbers as "A Hard Day's Night" and "All You Need Is Love."