Jan/Feb 2005

Due to the inevitable time delay between when I write this column and when you read it, I am currently enjoying a beautiful fall day here in Chicago, while some of you will have snow (and possibly lots of it) on the ground when you read it. Think warm thoughts and read about the latest adventures of your classmates!

Eunny Carl Cook (eun@ecomhawaii.com) writes of a number of visitors to her home on the beautiful island of Maui. Rachel LavemanManne and her husband Eric visited Eunny in April 2003 while on their honeymoon and enjoyed the surf. Katie Fallon won a free trip anywhere and chose to visit Maui--and Eunny--and also learned to surf. A number of other Cornellians have also visited and joined, as Eunny called it, the "Maui Surf Club"! When not entertaining guests, Eunny is teaching money management seminars through Mass Mutual at U. of Hawaii,Maui.

Moving up on the job ladder is Oliver Delgado, who was recently promoted to regional director of SCORE!'s New York, New Jersey, and Philadelphia centers. SCORE!, a division of Kaplan Inc., announced that Oliver will be managing the performance of 20 of SCORE!'s after-school centers for children in grades K-10. Also having career success is Cristian Castillo-Davis (cid1@cornell.edu). Having graduated from Harvard U. in Fall 2003 with a PhD in organismic and evolutionary biology, Cristian founded Gene Merge Inc. to promote and sell his genomic software and database for analysis of genetic data. He is also doing a second post-doc in the Dept. of Statistics at Harvard. His education and entrepreneurial work has taken him to many countries and prestigious universities to present on his work.He has also been published in numerous scientific journals, including Science, Genome Research, and Molecular Biology and Evolution. Congratulations to both Oliver and Cristian on all of their hard work!

As usual, we wanted to update you on all of the weddings taking place around the country. Thanks to the New York Times for the following three updates.Wedding bells chimed for Douglas Cullen and Rachel Nelson on May 25, 2003. The couple was married in Washington, DC, and resides in New York City, where Doug is a senior sales executive at Video Network Communications. Also tying the knot in 2003 were Catherine Vuong and Bobby Lee. They exchanged vows on June 15 in Tarrytown, NY. StefanMarcus joined his partner Jonas Karp for a commitment ceremony on May 31, 2003 in New York City. The couple both work in Manhattan, where Stefan is an analyst with Morgan Stanley and Jonas is an associate at the law firm of Brown Raysman Millstein Felder & Steiner.

Celebrating a fall union were Chris Braceland (cbraceland@hotmail.com) and his bride Christine Aman on October 4, 2003. They were joined by a number of Cornellians, including classmate Andrew Cahalane. Chris and Christine ran into fellow Cornellian and honeymooner Dan Bilzor '95 while in Hawaii.Venturing to Kauai, HI, for their August 2003 wedding were Mei Lee Gallagher (mgalla39@yahoo.com) and Doug Purvis.Mei Lee and Doug live in Chandler, AZ, where Mei Lee works for Amersham Biosciences and is working on her master's in bioengineering at Arizona State U. Doug is an engineering manager at Motorola and also a master's student at ASU in materials science. Despite their busy work and educational schedules, they still have time to enjoy leisure activities, such as scuba diving, snowboarding, hiking, and spending time with their two dogs. Their chihuahua Petey won third place out of 100 other chihuahuas in the 2003 Chandler Cinco de Mayo races.Way to go, Petey!

This past June 26 saw Kristin Perkins (kpskis@hotmail.com) tie the knot with Nick Mesires in Jenkintown, PA. Of course, whenever two Cornellians join together in matrimony, you get a crazy reception full of classmates! Contributing to the festivities were groomsman Andy Fitzpatrick and his wife Jeni (Orendorff), both MBA '03, groomsman Dave Tipton and his wife Donna (Paribello), JoelWeiman and Erica Shingara, Scott Zuchorski,Matt Sabanosh, Wendy Miller, Allison Dubois, and James and Maria Zavala Trujillo. After a honeymoon in Greece, Kristin and Nick returned to Boston to continue their studies for their PhDs in biomedical sciences at Boston U. School of Medicine and Tufts U. School of Medicine, respectively. Suzann Gallagher married Rich Jaekel on July 3, 2004 in Las Vegas. Suzann mentioned that Nicky Hilton confirmed their good taste by choosing the same wedding chapel a few weeks later. They currently live in Virginia Beach, and Suzann has met up with Chari Howard and Christine Horak in Washington, DC, where they both work.

Finally, on a personal note, I want to congratulate my husband (and classmate) Josh Carter on completing his first marathon. Josh ran the Chicago Marathon on October 10, 2004.While I think he has gone crazy, he is already talking about trying more marathons in the future.

Send updates! Stories about you, your kids, your pets. Your favorite Cornell spot.What do you really miss sometimes? (Mmmm . . . Hot Truck.) What do you hope you never see/do again? (Organic Chemistry!) We'll take it all!--Sarah Deardorff Carter, sjd5@cornell.edu; and Erica Broennle Nelson, ejb4@cornell.edu. Class website: http:classof97. alumni.cornell.edu.