A Classic View

Fog rolls through the Golden Gate.

Kitty in a Case

Willey cat crawled into Lee's guitar case the other day while lee was practicing.

Phend-Fisher Family Reunion Ledger (1930)

The 21st Annual Reunion of the Phend Fisher families was held at Raymond Phends home north of Elkhart Sunday Aug 31st 1930

Dinner at noon followed by business session. The meeting was called to order by Harold Phend President. Sec. report was read and approved and bills allowed. It was voted upon to have a place committee to decide the place to meet next year 1931, Place committee was elected as follows.
Raymond Phend
Will Phend
Reuben Pletcher
Place committee to have power to chang[e] time from last Sunday of Aug; But suggested to keep time as near as possible to present time of reunion

Memorial report
J J Phend Oct 10th 1929 age 70
Chris Phend Sep 3rd 1929 [age] 78
Molly Phend April 8th 1930 [age] 77
James Phend [age] 10 mo.
Geraldine Lusher May 9th 1930 [age] 17
John Slear Jan 18th 1930 [age] 87



[page 2]
Births.
Robert Eugene son of Paul Phend [still living, date omitted for posting although it is in the image]
William Henry son of Victor Phend [still living, date omitted for posting although it is in the image]

Election of officers
Pres. Henry Phend.
Vice. Pres. Will Phend.
Sec. & Treas. Reuben Pletcher.

Entertaining Committee, Barton Thornton chairman to appoint his own help.
Memorial and Birth reporter, Surelda Thornton

Treasury report.
Bal. On hand 6.31
Bills Presented 4.90 [balance] 1.41
Offering 2.64 [balance] 4.05

Program
Instrumental Solo - Mrs. Hartman
Reading - Mrs. Barton Thornton
Song - Paul and Harry Pletcher, Richard Thornton
Solo - Barton Thornton
Piano Solo - Richard Thornton

There were 65 members pres. Meeting was closed by President. After which a social time with games and contests were enjoyed.

Reuben Pletcher Sec.

Rockies climbs..?

"Josh Wharton following a pitch in the upper gully section of Infinite Patience. Sustained grade 3 and mixed up to M5 for at least 300 m"




Photo courtesy of Gripped, Josh Wharton and Chris Alstrin




Nice write up here:



http://gripped.com//08/sections/articles/rockies-lessons-from-novice-to-intermediate/

Reading Bill Strickland's Ten Points

A little while back, someone suggested that I read Bill Strickland's Ten Points, and before I knew it I was interacting with Bill Strickland himself and he sent me a copy. When the book arrived, the cover alone induced a pre-emptive sense of nostalgia. A cyclist walking his bike into the fading sun, beneath the overhanging trees, as if savouring the sweet devastation of defeat. Of course this would be on the cover of Bill Strickland's memoir.



Bill Strickland is the editor of Bicycling Magazine. He lives in Pennsylvania. He races for Kapelmuur Independent. And he writes, a lot. Articles for various cycling and sometimes non-cycling magazines, a few books, blog posts. The first time I read something by him was maybe in Rouleur a year ago, and then I began following him online. I remember it initially surprised me that a person who wrote like Bill Strickland was the editor of Bicycling. Those guys are all about nutrition and training and race coverage and roadbike reviews. Strickland's writing is evocative and sensual and self-consciously sentimental. And that's just on his instagram account.



Ten Points is an unconventional memoir. It's inextricably tied to bicycle racing, but is not really about it. Bicycling is more of a metaphor, an explanation, a case study in magical thinking. At the start of the book, the author tells his little daughter that he will score 10 points during a single racing season, then proceeds to participate in criterium races and fail spectacularly week after week.



But this plot line merely serves as a trajectory for the real story - a story of surviving childhood abuse, emerging damaged, then wondering for the rest of your life whether you're human or a piece of garbage. In adulthood, the author considers himself cursed, a monster. He struggles to stay in control, but the past haunts him and he worries about being a fit parent and husband. He believes that cycling keeps the monster in him at bay. And winning 10 points for his daughter might just have the power to lift the curse entirely.



Reading the memoir and trying to process it as such, I must admit that I found the 10 points theme to be overbearing and at times distracting. The writing is good. Bill Strickland excels at creating a visceral sense of understanding between himself and the reader. Repeatedly I found myself lost in his past, in his life, in his very sensations. In contrast to this, the overarching storyline of the 10 points feels forced, packaged. Like maybe the author had written the book differently, and then some editor swooped in and tried to make it more marketable for those who like the "top 10 ways to tackle hills" types of articles. I don't know how else to explain it.



Could the story have been told without the 10 points theme being so overt? I honestly think that it could. The book is really a rich collection of snippets, flashbacks to various incidents in the writer's life, and there are other ways in which these could have been tied together. The narrative style is jewel-like, seductive, while somehow also managing to come across as sparse and reserved. It is part American Gothic, part John Updike, but replete with its own, uniquely Stricklandian, characteristics.



In a way Ten Points reads more like a novel than a memoir, and some characters feel more believable than others. The incidents from the past, despite how dramatic some of them are, read as believable, as do the parts about racing. But in the present-day dialogue with the wife and daughter, the things they say are sometimes too well-phrased, too conveniently meaningful. In those instances I could practically feel the author trying to wrangle them into the 10 points plot.



At his best, Bill Strickland is the sort of natural storyteller who can engage an audience with a description of an Idaho cornfield. He can stir the reader into alternating states of wistfulness and fear within a single paragraph. He is a master of subtle foreshadowing. I want more of all that, less meta-narrative.



Writing about this book, I find myself wishing I hadn't interacted with the author prior. Because now I am hyper-aware of him as a real person and nervous about how he will feel reading this. But maybe that's arrogant. After all, who the heck am I and what does it matter what I think. I am describing the book as a reader, not as a critic. And I continue to follow Bill Strickland's writing with interest.

Erupting Aurora over Devil Fish Lake

This was the first "good" shot that I made of the Aurora on July 15, . This moment occurred at just after midnight after we had already been watching the sky for about two hours. My friends were starting to think that maybe we weren't going to see a sky full of active lights that night, they thought that maybe a faint glow was all we were going to get. I told them to be patient, it's not even midnight yet. Sure enough, just after midnight the sky erupted with lights. Once you've seen how quickly the aurora can erupt and fill the sky, it's a vision that never leaves your mind. It is a phenomena that makes you feel both insignificant in the universe and grand all at the same time. On the one hand you feel incredibly tiny, realizing that the source of these lights came all the way from the sun. On the other hand, when the lights are this active they seem so low in the sky that you can almost touch them... in a way almost touching the sun itself. Any way you look at it or ponder it, it certainly is one of nature's most breathtaking sights!

The Straw Brothers

Alex:









Just say for example you were from Colorado and youhad dual U.S. - Australian Citizenship.

Then imagine you were fanatical about snow boarding and climbing.

And your older brother was too.

Take into account that Colorado has aguably some of the best powder in the world and is not such a shabby place for climbing either.



Then lets just say you chose to live most of your life in Brisbane.

Either there's a girl I don't know about, or he's running from the law.

Eric: As above, but 3 years older.


Good choice boys?


Eric:













..The Straw Brothers taketo "Black Leather Dungarees" at Coolumand find out all about the hype, the pump, and the pure excitment of one of the Cave's best and highest.


















..










Alex on "the slab" section of the route. Not a slab. Just not as crazy steep.







Whether youclaim to be a boulderer or a boarder, you are going to need a beanie.

Otherwise who's going to believe you?






Climbers, don't just dream about being as cool as these guys, do what I do- copy their look.

Get the "Climber Beanie", hand made from un-dyedAlpaca and Merino wool, atRed Phoenix Emporium




Or at least click on the link to seethe boys represent Red Phoenix,the uber cool, cult style outfitters to the very chic.










Good choice boys.

jj