As I write this column Hurricane Sandy is descending on the Northeast. I hope all of our East Coast classmates came through the worst of it safe and sound.


In October I had a wonderful visit with Brigg Noyes, who was in New England exploring some opportunities for relocation (don’t let the freak hurricanes dissuade you, Brigg—we’d love to have you back in the area)! Brigg opened a private practice in counseling psychology in Salt Lake City, Utah, about four years ago. His specialty is helping men function more effectively in relationships, especially teaching them how to communicate more openly and genuinely with those people they really care about as a path to happier and more satisfactory lives. His favorite work is couples and family counseling, “as simultaneously attending to multiple thoughts, feelings and behaviors while helping everybody try to understand each other always tends to keep things exciting!” Check out Brigg’s website (designed by his talented wife, Deborah) at www.briggnoyes.com. Deborah and Brigg have three beautiful children: Aeltie, 9, Frances, 6, and Pepper, 3.


Ready for a blast from the past? I connected with Erik Vaveris recently and he shared that he has surfaced some live Skaboodah cassettes from back in the day and plans to get them digitized and posted somewhere soon. For those who don’t remember, Skaboodah was the band that Erik formed in college with talented friends and classmates Brian Eyster, Rodrigo Martinez, Luis Scheker, Andrew Bennett, Pete Jolicoeur and Pete Ellman. Erik lives in Arlington Heights, Illinois, with his wife, Jane, and their 5-year-old daughter Gwen. He works in product management for Shure, a maker of microphones and audio electronics, and occasionally plays some music, mainly playing bass. Erik, let us know when you’ve got those tracks online!


Michelle Butler took an ancestral pilgrimage with her family to Eastern Europe in the fall. She writes: “It was great! The four of us enjoyed identifying the differences and similarities between the four cities we visited, Tallin, Estonia; Riga, Latvia; Vilnius, Lithuania; and Warsaw, Poland. Each one seemed to be doing a little better than the last, and Poland was just booming. My mom joked that I looked like I belonged on the streets of Latvia or Lithuania as I look a lot like the Baltic people. We also loved the food. Lithuanian restaurants are the first places I’ve ever found that cooked food just like my grandmother!


“We were fortunate to have a University of Krakow history professor as a tour director and loved his lectures even though the history of that region is pretty dark at times. There was a decent amount of anti-Soviet feeling and still some signs of World War II’s impact in places but also a lot of booming capitalism.”


Michelle has other news to add. “After 13 fun years in the cable industry, I am leaving to become the executive director of a science society based in Bethesda, Maryland.”


After a long career with Fidelity, Tara Gulla has taken a new role with T. Rowe Price and moved to Baltimore. She writes: “I began my career in foreign institutional investing in 1995 straight from college because I really liked the people and felt there would be a lot of growth opportunity. I have had a fantastic experience and a lot of great managers, mentors and peers through the years who have helped me grow professionally.” Congratulations, and good luck with this next chapter, Tara!


Charlotte (Flower) Streidel is sleepless and happy with her twin girls Riley and Skylar, born in August in Washington, D.C. Two new Redskins fans in the world!


Keep your news coming!


—Kaja (Schuppert) Fickes, 2 Bishops Lane, Hingham, MA, 02043; kaja@alum.dartmouth.org