Sigma Phi Epsilon - University of Colorado

SIGMA PHI EPSILON I t was the best of times and the worst of times. A draw beer from any of the many bars in town was still 10 cents. The house was full of entertaining, bright, and even cool people. But, there was still the press of studies and computers were not yet on the scene and long-distance calls were costly. I'll also mention that in an informal poll taken during this time, only two brothers could claim any firsthand acquaintance with cannabis. I will let the reader choose whether this is a "Best" or a "Worst." I am writing from a distance of some 60 years and some details are fuzzy, but not to worry, I will invent stuff to fill in my mental blanks and change the names so that there is plausible deniability should any of those involved wish to feign total ignorance. It is maybe 1961, and for some reason Little Richard ended up with a hamster. Whether she was neurotic at the time of her entry into the Colorado Alpha scene is irrelevant as she most definitely was when she left it. Her given name, Silly Shit, pretty much says it all. Someone had discovered that if you put your thumb over the opening on a bottle of after- shave and shook it violently and then held a lighter close to the opening and released your thumb, you had a micro flame thrower. Flames would shoot out perhaps two inches with a fresh bottle. It was only a matter of time before people taking a study break thought, Hey! Let's show this to Silly Shit! And they did, and she would bounce off the walls of her cage and burrow through the litter at high speed. She should have known better but she did not. I was living in the cellar, so I was observing from a safe distance. I have no idea how long this went on, but ignoring the fact that one time was excessive. I am at a loss for the proper descriptor for what the extent of this actually was. Lonnie somehow ended up with Elmer, a male hamster, about the same time. Elmer's life was a bit more relaxed than Ms. Silly's, although their paths did cross. Lonnie and Elmer opened my eyes to many aspects of hamsters that somehow had escaped me when my younger brother had one a few years earlier. Lonnie showed me how if you took an LP album cover and put Elmer on it and then slightly inclined it and moved it in a horizontal circular motion, Elmer would try to climb to the top but as the cover was slick there was no traction and he would stay in one place and continue to move all four feet as if he was going somewhere. This also acted as a laxative and he would poop at a constant rate that would roll down the LP cover and accumulate on Lonnie's lap. Lonnie thought this was hilarious. I remember clearly Lonnie sitting on the floor cross-legged manipulating the LP cover and grinning and laughing as the feces mounded up on his lap. Lonnie was pre-med so it is not as if he was not bright. It must have been a pre-med thing. Eventually, people thought maybe we could raise hamsters, so one evening in the second floor bathroom, Elmer met Ms. Silly. He ignored her and poked around her cage looking for food. One of the biology majors suggested that if he would mount, her instinct would take over. When it became apparent that he did not understand the concept of "mount" he was introduced to the concept. Ms. Silly did understand and was very accommodating. Elmer did not and climbed off. An art major said Elmer needed some pornography and quickly drew some passable hamster pornography. Elmer sniffed it and ignored it. Well, we thought, he doesn't know its pornography. The bunch from Southern California had been to Tijuana and knew a thing or two about porno, so quickly drew masks on the faces of the hamsters in the drawings so they could not be recognized just like in the Tijuana movies. Elmer still didn't get it. What followed next was some "physical therapy." I will allow the reader to fill in the clinical details and only mention that there is more to that than one might think and it didn't work either. Elmer taught me two more things: hamsters love cheese slices and their cheek pouches will get unbelievably big after one slice. The same thing is true with peanut butter, except when they attempt to eat the peanut butter in their pouches they choke and die. So, once again we were down to one hamster. Ms. Silly remained with us for a while longer and managed to create deep divisions in the house, but that is another story. A Tale of Two Hamsters Part 1 By Leslie Garlinghouse James Kastor '68 resides in Kingsley, Mich., in the summer and fall and Nevada or Florida in the winter. Email: strongwin44@yahoo.com Harry Grass '70 launched a property management company in 2015 in his new hometown of Astoria, Ore., which is at the confluence of the mighty Columbia River and the Pacific Ocean. That followed his 25 years of employment as a management executive at Visual Products Corporation at its Denver/ Colorado Springs/Cheyenne operation. Harry is the vice president of Clatsop County Rental Owners Association and supports an array of local charities in the North Coast community. He lives with his wife and they have two grown children. Their daughter is in Dallas and supports sales and operations at a national packaging and fulfillment company and their son is an M.D. doing family practice in both Ronan and Missoula, Mont. Their granddaughter attends college in the Amarillo area and is working to support her college expenses. Email: hgstoria@gmail.com Jim Andrews '76 is retired and moved to San Marcos, Texas, from California. Email: jamesbandrews1@gmail.com Gert Van Moorsel '82 was promoted to be the vice president of design and construction for Aspen Skiing Company Hospitality Group. He is responsible for the design development and delivery of the company's growing hospitality portfolio. Gert enjoys getting together with his SigEp brothers to ski, hike, and climb. He lives with his wife, Mindi, in Aspen, Colo. Email: gvanmoorsel@aspensnowmass.com Jonathan Wimmer '97 is running restaurants in the Great Smoky Mountains in Tennessee. He and his wife, Kelly, have three children, James, Oscar, and Eloise. They live in Sevierville, Tenn. Jonathan still stays in touch with brothers Brian Williams '96 and Brad Listi '97.

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