It was a cornellendipitous Saturday evening on East Hill; I pulled into Ithaca around seven with low-hanging wisps of cloud rolling over Connecticut Hill and into Cayuga's valley and a palpable sense of nostalgia in the misted air. Within a half hour we were crashing the Class of 2006's lightening-delayed dinner, running into long-lost friends and trying to remember the names of those who played more fleeting roles in out Cornell experience. Things learned and experienced over the weekend: -- For whatever reason, I neglected to include WVBR as a link in the list of links to the left of this page. It's now featured prominently. Apologies about that. -- The Class of 2006 succeeded in breaking a reunion attendance record, getting almost twice as many alumni to show up as my own Class of 2005 did last year. To some extent, this may reflect the success of the North Campus Residential initiative, where all freshmen bond together on North Campus during their first year. Or, perhaps they're just better than us. -- Members of the Class of 1931 in Ithaca for their 80th (!) reunion look more spry than most 80 year olds. -- A lot of people like to introduce me as the person behind this humble blog. I don't necessarily enjoy the attention, and even so, most people just stare at you blankly. Or, at best, they think you're Dear Uncle Ezra. -- But then again, apparently people know my middle name but don't know how they know it. -- With a handful of local breweries, a local distillery, and dozens of wineries, many of which are owned by Cornell alumni, you would think that the Arts Quad tent parties could do better than Bud Light and boxed wine. -- Mark Marotto '82 brought down the house in the main tent after last call with his rousing harmonica performance. -- To the rising sophomore who tried hitting on my '05 friend: you're hilarious, dude. -- By three in the morning a crowd of '06ers had invented a new game that seemed to involve beer and a running dive onto a table. I imagine some bones were broken by dawn. These are allegedly some of the nation's best and brightest, folks. -- Spotted more blazers this year than last, and received many compliments on my own. It's coming back, folks. -- To the undergraduate and his girlfriend complaining about the one hour wait for brunch at Carriage House and all of the alumni ruining their Sunday morning: one day that will be you, buddy, so be careful what you say. -- Besides, the Carriage House brunch wait wouldn't have been so garishly long if Giving Tree nee ABC Cafe didn't have to close and be converted into a horrific combination of a take-out pizza shop and bar. At least there's still Chappy and the Chanticleer to keep Ithaca real. -- And a special shout out to all of the Glee Club members who chimed in on cue (and in tune) when I started up (rather tone-deaf but) rousing renditions of 'The Yale Bulldog' and 'Itsy Bitsy'. Before you know it nobody will ever know that I wasn't actually a member of that storied student organization.
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