Minnesota and Arizona 2023:
Day 4 - St. Paul

	Saturday, June 10, 2023: After moving the van to a better parking spot yesterday afternoon, we held to our vow to not move it from its parking spot until we were leaving campus. We had leftover cold Carbone's pizza, some milk, and ice cold Diet Cokes for breakfast, courtesy of our fancy new electric cooler.
	We headed onto the main campus just after 10 AM to do some sightseeing. We stopped to see how much Todd's memorial tree had grown, ...
	.. and then headed over to Marvin Plaza to see the Macalester College Pipe Band play. The band is comprised of students, alumni, faculty, and community members all dedicated to playing bagpipes.
	We next headed to the Ruth Stricker Dayton Campus Center to take a look around before the 11:00 AM talk that we wanted to see. On the second floor balconies on either side of the cafe, there were flags representing all of the home countries of the current Macalester students.
	It was an amazing display of the global impact of Macalester College.
	We headed downstairs to the John B. Davis Lecture Hall, stopping to admire the student postal center. So many memories, every one of them associated with the old layout of the mailboxes before the current student center was built.
	Two professors were giving a talk on their team teaching trip to Paris. One was from the French and Francophone Studies department, and the other was from the American Studies department. The course was on the emigration of African Americans to Paris during the Civil Rights era in the United States, and their trip took them to various areas of cultural significance in and around Paris. It was a fascinating talk, and both professors did a great job of fielding questions from the audience afterward.
	Our next stop was the library, were we headed upstairs and somehow ended up on the bridge walkway connecting the library and Old Main. This is a picture of Marvin Plaza with part of the library visible on the left.
	We made our way back into the library proper, and then headed up the correct stairs to the maker space on the second floor. Debbie immediately went to the LEGO table to see what pieces they had, and then quickly posed her minifig for a photo.
	On our way out, Debbie noticed that they were having a vote: Founding Day or Springfest? Oh, definitely Springfest. As she dropped her marble into the Springfest cup, the young library volunteers gave a subdued cheer since they probably were born after the last Springfest was held.
	The festivities were going strong outside the Leonard Center when we headed to the All-Class Picnic.
	The buffet line moved quickly, with barbeque sandwich fixings, ribs, mac and cheese, vegan alternatives, beans, salad, and an entire table of desserts.
	We found a spot off to the side to eat, listen to Professor McCurdy's band, and unwind for a bit. We spotted Golden Scot John from Indiana deep in conversation with his classmates, and chatted with Karen briefly.
	On the way back to Doty, we stopped at the Macalester College sign on Grand Avenue to get a picture of Debbie in her 1982 Springfest shirt.
	We had a little downtime in our room to catch up on e-mail, surf, and plan for the days coming up after we left campus.
	In the early afternoon, we headed over to Dianne and Tom's room to hang out with them for a bit. Lisa stopped by with some fruit to share, ...
	... and Debbie headed down to her room briefly to get a picture of her with with Doreen, Lisa, and Heidi.
	Around 3 PM, the long anticipated rain started, and it was a downpour. We were very happy to be inside and enjoyed watching it soak the campus. The rain also brought the temperature down by twenty degrees, which was very appreciated.
	Nancy had joined us before the rain started. We talked and ate snacks and soaked up the box fan breezes for a while until it was time to get ready for the class dinner.
	We gathered outside the Ruth Stricker Dayton Center and waited to be piped to dinner. We were stunned to learn that it was an open bar, so our drink tickets stayed in our pockets.
	Debbie posed with Dianne, Karen, and Nancy.
	Libby joined us while we were waiting, ...
	... and then Alison joined us too.
	Around 6:45 PM, the bagpipers started piping different classes to dinner in no particular order.
	At 7:05 PM, they put up the sign for the class of 1983, and then slid out a second sign with Cluster Fuss on it to indicate our cluster reunion group. We all cheered for the Fuss when we saw it.
	How cool is it that Macalester had an official sign printed up with Cluster Fuss on it?
	We headed to the Janet Wallace Fine Arts Center, ...
	... and when we headed into our dinner room, Tom asked the student who had carried the Cluster Fuss sign if we could have it. He seemed flustered by the request, but the advisor who was with him quickly gave her approval.
	Our girls had to pose with the sign ...
	... before giving it to Kevin. He is the one who originated the phrase, and he deserved to have that sign. He looked so happy once he realized that we had gotten it for him. We're guessing that it will show up at the Festival Grounds next year.
	We had a great room, with twelve tables set for eight people each.
	At our table were Dianne and Tom, Nancy, Alison, Paula, and us.
	The life-size poster of Beano from last year was taped to the wall near the back of the room, so Debbie stepped in for a photo with him.
	There were Beano Bingo cards at each table place, and we were just wondering what they were for when ...
	... our emcee for the night, Ron, stepped up to the podium.
	Debbie ran up to take his picture, and without missing a beat, he threw up a peace sign and said, "Smile for the local paper!" His opening remarks were hilarious and had everyone laughing to the point of tears.
	There was a slideshow of images taken back in the 80s as well as some newer pictures, and then Lisa explained the Beano Bingo cards. The cards were great conversation starters and encouraged mixing while waiting to join the buffet line.
	It was a Mexican-themed buffet, with fixings for tacos and burritos, ...
	... and the most delicious dessert ever. It was something cream-cheesy, and it was divine.
	TJ went to the podium to give a few remarks before turning it back over to Ron who introduced ...
	... President Rivera. We enjoyed her presentation about the importance of a Macalester education and especially how well she handled Ron's introduction.
	They started the slideshow again, and everyone ooohh'd and aaahhh'd. Debbie recognized some of Ken's pictures, including this one of the outside of Larry's Grocery, ...
	... and this one of the inside, including a rare photo of Larry himself, or at least half of him.
	Tom took this one of the dedication of Todd's tree outside the chapel back in 2014.
	There was a photo of the soccer team. Debbie's roommate Gillian is on left in the front row.
	One of Debbie's Facebook posts about The Rock made it into the slideshow.
	It was heartbreaking to see this photo of Guillermo's student ID. We lost Guillermo to COVID last year.
	Here's Debbie's pic from 1983 before a Hennepin Avenue party. That's Guillermo on the left.
	After dinner, we walked out of the hall past the bust of former President John B. Davis, and several people talked about the 2009 reunion where he had dinner with our class.
	By 9 PM, Tom and Alison were in line at the martini tent while Debbie, Dianne, Other Tom, and Nancy got a ride on a golf cart to Doty to fetch coats for everyone since it had gotten quite a bit colder after the sun went down.
	Cheers! We put our drink tickets to good use right away.
	The DJ started the music, and Debbie and Alison immediately headed to the dance floor.
	They were soon joined by Paul, ...
	... and then more as the Cluster Fuss started to arrive.
	Everyone was having a great time, especially when they started playing music from the 80s.
	Look at these two! Aren't they cute?
	The dance floor was getting quite crowded as more and more people joined in. Here are Rookie of the Year Mike and his wife, Mary Helen, ...
	... Dianne and Diane, ...
	... and Tim who took great selfies of the whole group.
	Tom was doing a great job guarding Dianne's purse! He was really enjoying his first time at a Macalester reunion and had a smile on his face all night.
	That's a totally normal number of martinis. Right? Right. Totally normal. As guardians of one of the few tables, friends used it to store their drinks while on the dance floor too.
	Everyone lost their minds with happiness when the DJ played "Music for Boys" by the Suburbs.
	Cheers! Dianne and Tom got the second round of martinis for us.
	As they got into the music of Tom's era, he got his groove on.
	When the popcorn appeared, suddenly everyone was trying to throw popcorn into Debbie's open mouth. No photos of this will be shown, but there were several successful throws.
	The tent had a disco ball! Had that been there all night?!?
	When we were all danced out, we gave our leftover drink tickets to some more recent alumni that were standing by our table and made our way out of the still completely full tent.
	There was a photo booth off to the side, so we grabbed some of the prop hats and glasses got in line. The booth took four pics in quick succession, and afterward you could get the photos air-dropped to your phone. How cool is that? Here's the collage of all four pics, ...
	... and here they are individually. One, ...
	... two, ...
	... three, ...
	... and four.
	It also printed out postcard images for each of us to keep as souveniers.
	As we walked by the bell, Debbie decided that since she had never rung it when she was a student, we should ring it now. Tom rang it twice, and there was a little cheer from some of the other people nearby.
	Oh, Turck. Maybe next time we'll get to stay in your hallowed halls.
	As we got back to our rooms, we all said goodbye. We were all leaving very early in the morning for our various destinations.
	It had been another glorious reunion, and we were so glad that Other Tom had come this time and had a great time as well.  Day 5 >