Glory Days Pregame Show

In true Project Manager fashion, John Offered up some Lessons Learned after the weekend.

So this weekend is the 90th anniversary weekend for Sigma Tau Gamma fraternity being founded on the campus of what is now known as Truman State University. This matters to me because I went to Truman State and was in fact a Sig Tau. Depending on where you live you may have never heard of the school, and if you've never heard of the school, chances are you haven't heard of the fraternity.  We aren't very big nationally (as evidenced by the 15 minutes it takes the website to load up) compared to some other houses. In Kirksville, however, we were the first and have always been one of the biggest houses on campus. I'll spare you all quite a bit of intra-fraternity chest beating here and just say... nothing (which is exactly what they would have taught us to say had we believed in hazing, which we didn't, because hazing is wrong).

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="500" caption="This was the only picture I could find from college."][/caption]

It's been ten years since I've been in Kirksville, and I'm sure a lot has changed (more with my friends and me than with the town, sadly). As I'm beginning to show my maturity and professionalism, I'm going to break the potential for this weekend down with a SWOT Analysis.

Strengths

• I haven't seen a lot of these guys in a long time. Can't wait to catch up and hear how fatherhood has changed the life of the guy who once put a Chevette in the basement of a house or how the guy who used to put vodka in a beer bong is now a doctor.


• I can now afford good beer (which I couldn't do in college). Of course, I'll still be buying Natural Light to remember the good old days, so the strength here is that I'll save some money. I may even spring for bottles.


• I can also afford cabs and hotel rooms now. No more long walks home.

Weaknesses

• I'm fairly certain I'm not cut out for rolling out of bed at 10 am to pull a beer out of the fridge and keep that pace going until 4 am anymore. I'm actually 100 % I'm not. I'm just hoping I don't have one of those terrible drinking days where I take a nap half way through and wake up with a headache just in time for everyone to need taken care of.


• I'm not sure I'm still properly inoculated against whatever strain of e. coli is residing on the TV room couch in the old fraternity house.


• Speaking of a weakened immune system -- and this is tough for a man as pretty as I am to admit -- but in the midst of a month-long battle with Poison Ivy, I'm not looking my best. Some patches are still visible, and I've literally put back on the 15 or 20 solid pounds I've taken off and kept off since college.

Opportunities 

• Kirksville has a super cheap standard of living. In college it wasn't uncommon for 10 of us to be at a bar for 6 hours and have a tab in the $12-$15 range.


• It's entirely possible that some of the 30-40 somethings that travel back up with me will wake up on Sunday morning with rugburns their foreheads. Can't wait to see them try to explain that away at work on Monday.


• If I play my cards right, I can order a George (with Ranch on Sourdough, of course) to eat while in town and take a couple of frozen Ronzas home to share with the kids. I do miss you Pagliai's.

Threats

• I'm hoping for their sake that the bartenders we had when I was up there have moved on. I'm guessing this will mean our bar tabs will be a little more accurate than they used to be when I'd sneak into the kitchen and make everyone sandwiches for the after-party on our way out.


• Last time I visited Kirksville was for a court date I had to attend because the second-to-last time I visited I took one step outside of a bar with a drink still in my hand. Ten years later I may just let the next one go to warrant.

Conclusion

While there are some potential pitfalls, I am really looking forward to seeing some old friends, drinking some beer, and feeling just plumb-god awful on the way home this weekend. My college experiences (almost all of which involved my brothers) are some of my favorites, and it'll be nice to refresh some of those memories.

Here's to thinking we look like this.



When we really look like this.