Sig Tau Old Guard Newsletter

Get the Jump on Fall Alumni Weekend!

Fellow Old Fartsâ€¦Oppsâ€¦ Old Guards!

Our active member list is growing! A few more members have responded to mailed copies of the last newsletter and have forwarded their email addresses. Near the end of this newsletter is a directory of active and inactive members that you can print out and save. Hopefully our active list will continue to grow.

By now everyone should have recuperated from Spring Alumni Weekend â€œ04. As you can see from â€œTales of Alumni Weekendâ€ in our last newsletter, a great time was had by all. Now get off your asses and start thinking ahead to Fall Alumni Weekend â€™04. The date is Saturday, October 2, 2004 which is also Homecoming Weekend. Since Days Inn at Geneseo always sells out for Homecoming, it would be wise to reserve a room NOW. There are only about 20 rooms available as of this week. In a few weeks they will all be gone! The Inn is clean, very convenient and quite reasonable in price (approx. $74 plus tax which includes continental breakfast). If you should decide you canâ€™t attend you can cancel your reservation without penalty (before 6 PM on date of arrival). So make a reservation on the Days Inn website or call directly at 1-585-243-0500 NOW and save yourself a headache later!

The Sig Taus have not yet finalized their plans for that day. Stay tuned for the schedule. We will most likely plan another cocktail party and dinner at the Big Tree Inn.

Please email Chuck at ccuratal@rochester.rr.com and let him know if you plan to attend. Heâ€™d like to have an approximate idea of numbers so he can assist the Sig Taus in planning and for reserving dinner reservations at the Big Tree Inn. He realizes plans change but he needs a number to work with.

Day at the Races

A Day at the Races which is scheduled for Thursday, August 26 has been put on hold. Jack Sheehan is recuperating from prostate surgery. His pathology report was excellent and doctors are confident of a full recovery. Jack wants to make sure he is fully recovered before he decides to have a house party after the races. When the decision is made and if Jack and Kathe decide to host the event we will update you with Special Bulletins on how to purchase tickets, reserve hotel rooms, etc.

Email from Pat Pallend: â€œIs this guy serious?â€

Chuck,

Iâ€™d be remiss if I failed to contact you to let you know that I have received the most recent Sig Tau Old Guard Newsletter. It is fun to read and Iâ€™m glad to see some of you can still get together to celebrate many of those wonderful and cherished memories from when we were young â€¦ and when giants walked the earth and sheep were nervous.

Iâ€™ve looked at the fraternity website and viewed pictures of the most recent gathering and I must say that all you guys look really f---ing old and really badâ€”which is why I am an unlikely candidate for any future reunions. I have no desire to hang out with a bunch of ancient bastards, the sight of which, no doubt, will scare away any younger (around the age of 40), good looking and lascivious females. I know that when I look in the mirror each morning I donâ€™t see anyone who resembles any of the old farts pictured on the site.

To be perfectly truthful, even if I lived closer to Geneseo, and I suspect that a bunch of folks still do, Iâ€™d have absolutely no desire to spend a weekend drinking beer. Beer is responsible in older men for hair loss, flatulence and incomplete erections and I ainâ€™t gonna go there! How you guys can possibly expose yourselves (no pun intended- and then again maybe so) to such a risk is beyond me.

I hope I have made my position clear regarding future weekend debauchery (this kind of activity will take years off your life) and will close by indicating that future contract from anyone who is or claims to have been â€œhappy-go-lucky, bare-assed and freeâ€ will be met with silence.

Pat Pallend

The answer isâ€¦â€¦â€¦â€¦â€¦â€¦..

Chuck,

I was certain youâ€™d get the joke. Hell yes, print it. I hope everyone appreciates the intended humor. but let them figure it out and letâ€™s see who gets it and who doesnâ€™t. If they donâ€™t, fâ€”k â€˜em if they canâ€™t take a joke.

So many years have gone byâ€”it hardly seems possible. Iâ€™ve often times wondered about what has become of all those young men we once were and hope, by and large, life has been kind to all.

Iâ€™m down here in the Southland (Fairburn, Georgia) hanging out in shorts and golf shirt most of the time, drinking beer and still smiling at the young girlsâ€¦and every once in a while some of them will smile back. Iâ€™d be glad to be kept informed about futures events as well as being kept up to date on what remains of the â€œold guardâ€.

It has been my experience, over the years, that â€œyou canâ€™t go home againâ€ but there was something about this most recent communication that touched a nerve, I guess. Iâ€™ve spent so much of my life being a hard-nosed bastardâ€”Iâ€™m rather surprised. It must be a combination of old age, hair loss, flatulence and incomplete erections.

All the best,
Pat

Mini-Bio: Pat Pallendâ€™s Life In His Own Words*

There is a classic Edith Piaf song entitled â€œNon Je Ne Regrette Rienâ€ which pretty effectively sums up my life. If I had to do it all over again it might be that Iâ€™d make some changes here and there, but as we donâ€™t get that second opportunity thereâ€™s no use in giving it any thought. Itâ€™s been so many yearsâ€¦so many people, places and experiences. Life is, after all, about the journey and not the destination.

So hereâ€™s the journey as best I can remember. Read it at your peril. Left Geneseo in the late sixties and began what has proven to be a life long commitment in seeking the whereabouts of Maria Whatshername who was famous for saying, â€œHi Frosh, want a blowjob?â€ Iâ€™m sure youâ€™ll remember her; even you married guys who have assured your wives that there has never been anyone else in your life.

Anyway, the search led me to the US Army, Special Services, with time on active duty devoted to concrete, tomatoes, termination with extreme prejudice, running covert ops between Retsof, Piffard, Cambodia and the good old Republic of Vietnam. I still love the smell of napalm in the morning. Also served as Liaison Non-Commissioned Officer to the all volunteer â€œcomfort womenâ€ brigade, staffed mostly by dropouts from various SUNY colleges with the occasional Vassar type thrown in, which looked after the welfare of all our boys.

I returned to Continental USA and assigned lifeguard/sailing/SCUBA duties, teaching water survival skills Us Air Force/US Naval personnel as well as the breaststroke to officerâ€™s wives. Married, just before Expiration of Term of Service and am certain I can safely say Iâ€™m probably the only one of us with a best man serving a life sentence, with no parole, for murder (know who he whacked and whyâ€”I knew the guy too. He didnâ€™t deserve to die but did so nonetheless) plus a groomsman who has finally completed his time for attempted murder. Wish â€œbest manâ€ had whacked my former wife years ago thus saving me much aggravation as well as big bucks. It really would have made him a â€œbest manâ€.

Returned to civilian life and secured a position on the faculty of Dollars College, Dudley, Massachusetts. Required to teach 12 hours each week and maintain office hours for 3 hours each week. This left ample opportunity for drinking, carousing, general lewd and lascivious behavior with the female Dean of Students. I was noted, in those days, for dazzling my 8:00 AM freshman literature class with scintillating interpretations of Warren G. Hardingâ€™s â€œTreatise on the Water Buffaloâ€ complete with hand puppet activity, lantern slides and a ferocious hangover. The aforementioned lewd and lascivious behavior cost the voluptuous Dean and yours truly, our positions. In retrospect, it really wasnâ€™t so much the behavior as it was the photographs someone had taken as we cavorted in the faculty lounge after hours. They did get my good side, however.

Shortly thereafter, I served as head coach for Lacrosse program, St. Salacious College, Worcester, Massachusetts. With an incredibly inept group of athletes, combined with my even more incredible and inept ability as a coach, we managed to lose every game that season including one to a team composed entirely of geriatric types from the local nursing home. We couldnâ€™t even stop the old lady with the walker from scoring.

St. Salacious, a private Catholic college, was a delight in those days. The nuns had finally shed their habits and young women were abundant within the study body. Indeed when the Mother Superior suggested that a certain young lady might serve as assistant trainer for the lacrosse team, I felt obliged to at least give her a chance. Mother Superior arranged for a meeting in her suite in the convent and when I arrived I discovered the Mother Superior in a superior position with the young lady in question. Mother had lost one habit and gained another. Needless to say, upon being invited to interview the young lady, I did my best while Mother Superior assisted as well as supported the effortâ€”depending upon who was doing what to whom and when. As you might have guessed this ultimately led to yet again another dismissal. I am not to be pitied, however, as this time there was videotape rather than just photographs. I have a copy and if any of you come up with the right price Iâ€™ll send it to you. I think youâ€™ll find it money well spent.

Moving right along with customary arthritic abandon, spent some time out of country for various assignments in and around southern portions of the former Soviet Union. No Maria. Upon returning I found myself in New York City at loose ends. This period of time, in the late 1970â€™s and early 1980s, convinced me that sufficient time had gone by for me to finally pursue my true passionâ€”acting. I had an immediate and incredible bit of good luck and found myself with my first big role on â€œGuiding Lightâ€. I appeared as a dead body in a hospital scene. No line, no close up, no groupies and a career launched.

I went on to make regular/sporadic appearances on â€œAll My Childrenâ€, â€œThe Doctorsâ€, â€œOne Life to Liveâ€ as well as in motion pictures. The list is endless but I do recall serving as Paul Newmanâ€™s stand-in-during â€œFort Apache, The Bronxâ€ (he was looking real bad in those days). In addition I acted/directed in many local and regional stage plays and continued to perform for the silver screen wearing nothing but a Lone Ranger mask and black, executive-length socks in a number of films shot in motel rooms in Newark, New Jersey, for which I still receive royalties. I thought I had a brief glimpse of Maria during this time but almost everybody was masked and I simply couldnâ€™t be sure.

Having exhausted my minimal talent and fraying the nerves of agents, casting directors and fellow performers I found myself peddling wine for these guys who pretended to be gentlemen while I pretended I believed them. I ended up, once again, in Massachusetts, where I served happily for a number of years carrying around bags of money intended to help promote various â€œbrandsâ€. This activity in fact, helped promote several guys I know direct to the slammer. I guess this may be regarded by some as illegalâ€”all I know is if I wasnâ€™t going to do it someone else would, besides, the money was good, there was a new car every year, an expense account that wouldnâ€™t quite and you got to eat and hang out in places with guys who would have been perfect casting for â€œThe Godfatherâ€. Women loved you--not for you but for what they thought you were and could buy. I forgot all about Mariaâ€”didnâ€™t need her at that time anyway. It wasnâ€™t a business conducive to strong marriages or relationships and certainly wasnâ€™t to mine, but damn, it was lots of fun.

Once again a brief interlude on assignment to Central America before becoming involved in the trade show business, which will bring you right up to the present. I believe Noriega is still in jail. Iâ€™ve heard Maria may be there as well but plausible deniability is the watchword of the day. So your guess is as good as mine.

Back in Boston this time and with Cahners Expositions (ultimately Reed Exhibitions) where I was involved in producing and managing a number of trade shows in a variety of industries, most notably the Left Handed Lithuanian Dentists from Duluth Annual Convention. Moved to Atlanta â€œcause I canâ€™t stand the cold.â€ Maria is not here either guys.

I ended up as Vice President, Trade Shows for an association in Atlanta. Produced and managed association events until about five years ago when the association went broke for the second time under the watchful eyes of a disinterested Board of Directors and the less than straightforward CEO who manipulated everything. Corporate scandal ainâ€™t nothinâ€™ new boys. No jail time for anybody including me.

Divorcedâ€”not gonnaâ€™ do the marriage thing again. Although it is possible my next wife hasnâ€™t been born yet. Children are grownâ€”son 23 and a daughter 21â€”obviously got started late but glad to have them. Best thing I ever did. We all do great together with what little time we have together. Heâ€™s a corporal USMC, and the real dealâ€”did the initial breach in the most recent war in Iraqâ€”shot at, artilleried at, friendly- fired at and all missedâ€”returned stateside last August and we got to spend some little time togetherâ€”new alcohol intake records set during that visitâ€”unfortunately scheduled to return to Iraq before this year is out.

My daughter is in Philadelphia at presentâ€”actress, waitress, world traveler, several language, charming as the day is long, world-class pain in the ass, stubborn as the old man (works for me from time to timeâ€”I either end up firing her or she quits) absolutely beautifulâ€”you gottaâ€™ see her up close. Iâ€™m fortunate and extremely proud of both. He is my heart and she is my soul.

I am active in nothing other than making a living, drinking beer, playing golf and romancing various waitresses at the golf club and member of the Frisbeeterian Church. We believe that when you die your soul is tossed, Frisbee like, on the roof of your house and it stays there foreverâ€”unless a strong wind blows if off or the house burns downâ€”in which case youâ€™ve just got to start all over again. Maria is out there somewhere.
I hope you are all well. All the best, Pat pjp@fairburn.com *The names of some places and people have been changed to protect the guilty.