And now, a recap of my 5-Year Vassar Reunion! Due to its length, this first post will focus on Friday, June 4 with other posts coming soon.

It started on Friday when I met up with Jess Roth in Grand Central Station. While waiting for our train we consumed soup in the food court (matzo ball for me) and we saw our first Vassar people, Kate Lane and Jerry Decker – both of whom were also eating! We took the 3:12 train to Poughkeepsie and arrived a little bit after 5:00. Upon leaving the Po-town train station, we were greeted by the standard posse of Jamaican cabbies who yell “Vassar? Vassar?” One very aggressive cabbie got nine of us, including me, Jess, Jerry, Kate, Dave Giles and Tom Pyun, to cram into his van. I barely even fit as instead of sitting I was kneeling in between the seat and the door for the entire ride. But that’s all part of the Poughkeepsie Cab experience.

We were dropped off near North Lot and our group proceeded to wheel our respective luggage toward the registration in the Aula. On the way there I saw a new fountain and garden and said out loud, “Yo, what the hell is this new thing?” Then when I looked closer and saw the plaque inscription “Dedicated to the victims of September 11, 2001”, I felt very foolish and said, “Oh.”

Once arriving at the Aula, I registered and got my welcoming packet including keys to Davison 327. Several items were for sale including one clever t-shirt that said “Vassar Football. Undefeated since 1861.” I didn’t buy it though. I called Ben Horst on my cell phone and he informed me that he was hanging out in the College Center Circle so I said “See ya later” to Jess and the others and met up with Ben. We then went over to Davison so I could drop my bag off in the room. On the way we saw “Easy E” Erich Walter, Pedro Amador and some others kicking around a soccer ball in the quad. Everyone was already feeling very relaxed and comfortable! On to Davison it was and I was quite impressed with the size of 327. I learned later on that it’s one of the prime singles in the dorm and is usually taken by a House Officer. I don’t know who put the housing assignments together but they obviously know that I rate! Even better was that Ben was right across the hall from me.

We then went down to the Davison multi-purpose room where a welcoming reception was being held for our class. We were given t-shirts, steins, and beer. There would be plenty of more beer to be had over the weekend. And wine. And mixed drinks. It’s pretty obvious that they were trying to get us all drunk – possibly so we’d give them more money! Among the people I talked with at the reception were Michelle Laredo-Torres, her husband Efrain, Becky Corona, Marivel Oropeza, Nikki Ruth, Allison Harris, Colleen Fox, Annabelle the desk messenger and our friendly student assistant. That’s also when Gabe and Jen Anderson made their arrival! There were many many other people I talked with there too but I can’t be expected to remember them all. By now it was approaching 7:00 and it was time to head off to the Friday Dinner at the Walker Field House Tents.

I walked to Walker with Ben, Gabe, Jen, Shrey, Jonty Yamisha and Jonty’s wife Dina and 5-month old daughter Maydene. The baby is so cute and so well behaved! They took her to many of the events and she was always smiling and having a good time. Anyway once at Walker, we sat at various round tables. Ben and I joined Brandee and Rouslan at a table. I also spent some time sitting with Jess, Erin Condy and Carrie Schultz at another table. And with Tara Knowland and Noel Baxter (too bad that Noel's husband, Joe Bonk, couldn't make it - he was my student fellow!) Table hopping is ultimately called for in such occasions. I also had an animated conversation with Cody Kushner about baseball! It was a great buffet dinner including unlimited drinks and unlimited Vassar Devils. Those are the great desserts consisting of chocolate cake underneath vanilla ice cream, hot chocolate syrup and many toppings. The only problem was that we spent 20 bucks on our tickets and noone even bothered to check them! Easy E didn’t come to the dinner because he didn’t have a ticket. When I told him that they didn’t even check, his response was, “What a gyp!” (FYI – they made a point to definitely check tickets at the Saturday dinner) After the dinner there was a cool fireworks display and we then made our way to the College Center.

In the College Center, Sally-Anne Moringello reserved room 237 for a smaller reunion for members of the Miscelleny News Ed Board. I was never on Ed Board so I crashed! Our group was then joined by Stephen Gribbin, ADK, Stu, Stephanie Litos, Melissa Walker and Tye Wolfe. What great fun we had looking at current Misc issues and picking out all the typos and horridly written articles. They even spelled the word “Students” wrong in one of their big-fonted headlines. Sigh... Apparently the Misc people used to take lots of votes in their meetings and Litos was saying that we needed to vote on something. So we all voted that Melissa would be one of the new class notes correspondents, as the terms of me and Litos are now over and done with. We also drank beer and consumed cookies with vanilla frosting that were generously provided by S-A. Stu made a point to remind me to eat lots of cookies.

While in the College Center, I checked my e-mail on one of the many iMacs they have on the second floor and was pleasantly surprised to see that someone made VassarChat.com the default web setting. Between that and all of the VassarChat flyers that were circulated, the whole campus is bound to know about us soon!

From there it was on to the Mug! Let me tell you something. It hasn’t changed. It’s dark, loud, crowded and the floors are as sticky as ever. The sight of a bunch of alums sitting on the Mug Line was hilarious. Although the DJ played some newer songs like “Hey Ya!” and my personal favorite, “I’m a Hustler”, we also heard many of the same stuff that was played from 1995-1999. With all the noise it’s also the perfect place to have a conversation : “How’s it going?” “What?” “How are you?” “WHAT?” Despite not being able to hear very much I think I had some conversations with Austin Brown, Hayden Courtland, Graham Campbell, Amar Reganti, Nicole Zahka and others. I had thought it would be all 99ers in the Mug but there were many from 94, 89, 84, there was even one guy from the Class of 74 with a big white bushy beard and he made a real beeline to the bar! Great to see all of the diversity.

It’s now 1:30 A.M. and hunger is setting in. I had two eating goals for Reunion weekend. One was to go to the Acropolis Diner. The second was to order a chicken parm from Naps. The first was done on this night as Ben, Gabe, Jen and I set off for the Acrop. We walked there and I didn’t remember it being such a big walk! Old age setting in. Sitting right across from us were Erin, Matt Wilson and Matt’s fiancée Stephanie. So yeah, I table hopped again. Since it was technically morning, I decided to have breakfast – a scrambled egg with bacon! The best part was when our waitress mocked the owner (her boss) right in front of him. I wonder if she still had a job the next day.

After eating off the alcohol that was consumed, it was back to Davison. It’s now 2:30 A.M. By that time most of the people I knew had gone to sleep. I walked around for a while looking for some action and sure enough I found it in the shape of a loud party on the 4th Floor of Davison. But I didn’t stay too long and retired to my room and to bed at 3:30 A.M. After all, there would be a very big day tomorrow!

Stay tuned for the recap of what happened on Saturday, June 5.