Memories of Kappa Sigma Alumni and Friends

In the evening was the first rush function of the semester, the 'Round the World Party. The Pres Suite was Canada -- the door read, "Wanted: Traveling Companion(s) for a trip to Canada, duration dependent on the world situation." We had it set up with snow geese, Canadian maps, etc., and were dressed in tie-dyed attire; we played the acoustic guitar and -- instead of marking each guest's "passport" -- we burned holes in it with matches, as if it were a draft card. The Swamp was Beirut; the attic was Italy; the Lounge was "Dr. Hivort's World of Proctology," where they served chilled wine (lemonade), bird excrement (dip) and human excrement (a pecan roll or something). A fun time was had by all. By the way, the drink served in Canada was called Holliman, after the reporter in the Al-Rashid hotel in Baghdad. Its contents: 4 parts hot chocolate mix, 2 parts instant coffeee, one part Dutch chocolate mint.

In the later evening, there was a game of "Mau," the current Sinfonian card game of choice. To explain it briefly:
1) Its rules are like those of Uno, except that when you draw because you can't play, you can't then play the card you took.
2) Aces reverse direction of play.
3) Twos are "skip" cards.
4) Sevens are "draw two" cards; but if a 7 is played by the player who would ordinarily draw two it passes to the next player to draw four, increasing exponentially until someone doesn't have a seven.
5) Any card that is a spade must be announced.
6) No swearing.
7) No asking of questions.
8) The "Mau master" is able to add or subtract rules at any time. If he notes a rules infraction, he calls "Point of Order!" This is in effect until he says "End point of order."
9) Nobody shall do the mau-master's job for him.
10) No looking at your cards during a "point of order."
11) At any rules infraction the mau-master may give one or more cards to the infractor.
12) Any player may state that the mau-master has broken one of his own rules.
13) The card-earning infractions also include "taking too long," "playing out of order," "general stupidity," or anything else the mau-master thinks up.
14) When someone has only one card, he/she must say "Mau."
15) When someone runs out of cards the phrase is "Mau-mau."
Oh, and 16) Jacks are wild-cards.
It's one hectic game.

Common additional rules used by most Mau Mastes at Valpo included stating "I am a great, grey slug" whenever playing a three, bowing to the Mau Master when certain cards are played, saying "Thank you sir, may I have another" whenever the Mau Master gave the player an extra card (this request would often be granted for as long as the Mau Master felt like handing out cards), and giving cards to the last person to suspend a hand from the edge of the table by a thumb whenever certain cards were played.

Paul Wolf's unbelievably devious mind cooked the whole thing up. The deal was that we would hit the house at about 3:00 in the morning, after all the actives had gone to bed. We completely filled the first floor of the house with long-lasting, industrial strength aircraft emergency foam, the kind that you put on airport runways when you need to bring in a plane whose landing gear are stuck closed. Bro. Wolf had every cotton-picken' detail down cold: Duct tape over the outlets to avoid shorts, covering the baby grand with protective plastic, moving all the furniture outdoors, kidnapping Chuck the engineer if necessary, who frequently stayed up studying at ridiculous hours like 3:00 am [but it wasn't necessary, fortunately!], greasing the stairwell from the 2nd floor so that half-asleep actives would have the opportunity to descend the stairs on their butts instead of their feet [and some of them did], slightly unscrewing all the light bulbs so they wouldn't work, booby-trapping the door to the second floor, etc. etc. Every one of us in the pledge class was issued a precise, minute-by-minute hit list of stuff to do to assure that the evil plan would go off without a snag.

The raid was a total success: Not a one of the actives woke up until the dasterdly deed was done. What a hoot. Next day half of campus (and 100% of the music department!) drove or walked by on Lincolnway to see the piles and piles of aircraft foam swept out on the front and side lawns... It was there for days before the last of it dissolved in a rainstorm, by which time Ed Eich our Pledgemaster had decided that it was just about time for our induction! And of course, there never were any plans 1,2,3,4..., etc. Only "10". To make it more mysterious, of course... That's Paul Wolf for you.

I do remember this story which may be remembered by someone else.

The second edition rulebooks for Advanced Dungeons and Dragons had just come out, and Jeff Grahams was running a huge game with what seems to have been twenty people, mostly brothers and a few girlfriends, in the living room. Eric McCollum was playing a paladin, was the party caller, and was also getting all the attention. Tom Thress (a.k.a. "Nigel") and I were both playing bards and decided that perhaps we should assassinate Eric's character. Even though we didn't do it, Jeff Graham's Girlfriend, (a very nice person, was her name Amy? [Ed. note: Kim, a.k.a. Kimmer]) got really mad at Tom and me, and gave us both the cold shoulder for about two weeks. Since Tom was in the Presidential Suite (which had the walls was painted bright "Jim Huston Green" at the time,) with Jeff and Kent Shepler, this was more of an issue for Tom than me.

Phi Mule
In the mid 80's, a Phi Mule consisted of 3 1/3 shots of various drinks--whiskey, vodka, rum, 1/3 shot of vermouth, plus a twist of bitters. (According to Eric McCollum & Bryan Reagan) In the late 1980's/early 90's, the official recipe was for a 3 1/2 shot drink--whiskey, vodka, either gin or vermouth (drinker's choice), 1/2 shot of rum, and a splash of bitters. (According to Adam Zabell & Rob Christie) I have also heard it described as 4 1/2-shot drink--whiskey, vodka, rum, gin, 1/2 shot of vermouth, plus a "liberal sprinkling" of bitters. There was an ongoing contest in the mid 1980's & early 1990's among the members of Kappa Sigma and Iota chapters involving these drinks; the rules were as follows: One Phi Mule is downed every fifteen minutes, until the drinker decides he's had enough, at which point he must not vomit for 24 hours afterwards, or forfeit his tally. The man who downed the most, wins. By the time the tradition had all but died out due to most of each chapter being non-drinkers, the all-time record (6) was held by an Iotian, set sometime circa 1989; A Kappa Sigman (Dave Bauder) downed 7 sometime in the next year or so, but couldn't hold it and got sick, thus forfeiting.

Brotherhood Shot
Recipe: Fill a double shot glass with 1/3 Tequila, 1/3 Kahlua, and 1/3 Grenadine (the last poured over a spoon so that it does not mix with the Kahlua). The glass will then be Red (Grenadine), Black (Kahlua), and Gold (Tequila) from top to bottom. (I'm told the flavor of the Grenadine overpowers everything else, though, so it's value would seem to be more for show than as a mixed drink.)

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