The Ultimate question isn't it?

Good interview here as well:



http://www.tetongravity.com/blogs/Interview-Tempting-Fear-With-Andreas-Fransson-And-Mike-Douglas-6378877.htm



and more here on another huge line....



http://www.planetmountain.com/english/News/shownews1.lasso?l=2&keyid=40154#

United States Astronaut Hall of Fame

Day two we visited the United States Astronaut Hall of Fame. This place was very touching to me. It is a strange thing to visit a place that has such significance in our history and know that I was alive during part of it, yet too young to really remember it. It was a really neat place that we enjoyed a lot.



From Wikipedia: The United States Astronaut Hall of Fame, located just south of Titusville, Florida, honors American astronauts
and features the world's largest collection of their personal
memorabilia, focusing on those astronauts who have been inducted into
the Hall; as well as Sigma 7, the fifth manned Mercury spacecraft. It is operated as part of the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex, 6 miles (9.7km) to the east on Merritt Island.









After spending time here, we headed out for dinner and ate at the same place that Rich and Donna introduced us to. Nathan had the giant calzone again.



We headed back to our hotel, and tried to get a good night's sleep so we'd be fresh for our cruise.

Monday Mailbox: Cycling with Men vs Cycling with Women

Monday Mailbox is a weekly post dedicated to questions received over email. Here is one that taps into a popular topic:

Until now I've been cycling on my own, but I am considering club rides. I see that most cycling clubs in my area offer women's rides in addition to their regular [mixed gender] rides, with the idea that this helps women feel more comfortable. [Also,] talking to women [cyclists] I get the sense that riding with men is not such a nice experience. What are your impressions of cycling with men vs other women? Is there an advantage to women only rides?

From personal experience (as opposed to stories others tell me), I have not formed any generalised impressions of gender as tied to specific cycling behaviours.




For background: I occasionally take part in women-only club rides, as well as in mixed gender club rides. I also do lots of informal riding with 1-3 cycling buddies at a time, and the gender split there is roughly 50/50 (meaning, roughly half of my cycling buddies are men and half are women).




Among the people I ride with, I cannot say I notice a difference in riding style based on gender. Possibly this is because other differences are more prominent. For instance, there are experienced riders versus inexperienced ones. There are competitive riders versus non-competitive ones. Some riders are aggressive and take risks, while others are mellow and risk-averse. There is a category of riders who only talk about cycling while they're cycling (technique, nutrition, bikes), versus those who talk about anything but (philosophy, politics, gossip). I can think of other classification systems before gender starts to seem relevant.




As far as advantages to women-only rides... As I understand it, the assumptions there are that: (1) women enjoy the opportunity to socialise with other women, and (2) women feel less self-conscious without men around. If this applies to you, then that would certainly be the advantage. However, it does not apply to all women, including myself. Men don't inherently make me nervous, and women don't inherently put me at ease, it's really more about the individual. I'll join a women's ride if I want to ride that day, but not because it's a women's-only ride.




Judging by how often this topic comes up, I recognise it as a serious issue and don't mean to be dismissive. For women who, for whatever reason, feel uncomfortable riding with men, women-only club rides are a valuable resource. In that sense, I am glad that more of them are appearing all over.




But me, I'll ride with anyone. As long as they ride predictably and I can keep up. Conversation optional.

The Restaurant

My cousin, John called this morning. He is buying a restaurant. This is just another part of the endless loop running through my family. When my father first got married, his father black balled him in the Greek community because my dad dared to marry a non Greek. Papou hoped he'd give up, but stubbornness also runs in our family. My dad got work at the Macomb Deli (where the Zebra Room is now) right across the street from where his parents lived. Every day, his mother would go over there trying to convince him to reconsider his marriage. She offered him trips to Greece and money. She proposed sending him back to G.W.U. Then, when all else failed, she cried. Nothing worked. My father didn't particularly like the restaurant biz, but that was what he knew. He was nineteen years old with a baby on the way. The jobs he had before were picking up balls at a driving range, selling The Saturday Evening Post, and being a busboy for his father's restaurant, Macomb Cafeteria.

Later, the golf ball experience may have helped my dad get work picking up hangers off the floor for the Hecht Company, but the $15 a week was not cutting it for him. Finally one of the black balling Greeks, Steve Demas, broke down and he became a helper on a laundry truck. Eventually he was promoted to Service Manager, and got to drive a Ford coupe with the words QUICK SERVICE LAUNDRY lettered in gold on the door. By then he was 21, and he had two kids. My Papou broke down and rented him a road house called the Hollywood Inn out in Camp Springs, Md. They could live there cheaply enough, but the catch was he had to run the restaurant. By day, he worked for Quick Service and put flyers on people's cars advertising chicken dinners at the Hollywood Inn. On the weekends, he fried the chickens.

During World War Two, Papou talked my dad into running Churchhill's Bar and Grill with my Aunt Catherine and Uncle Mimi who had just arrived from Greece. Churchill's was where Cactus Cantina is now. If you go there you can see the old glass door where my mother used to sit at the cash register It was open from 6 a.m. til 2 a.m., and they all lived upstairs. My dad had to work the night shift until Uncle Mimi learned how to mix a cocktail. At the end of the war, they were able to sell Churchill's and buy their own linen service- Modern Linen. Soon my brother and all three of my cousins were drafted to go work there. They hated it. Everybody hated it, except for my uncle and my father who thought it was a piece of cake compared to running Churchill's.

Many years later, after my uncle died and my father retired, Modern Linen was sold and my cousins and brother all chose different trades. One became a teacher. One went into pest control, and one has passed on. But now years and years later, my cousin has decided to buy a restaurant. I can't wait to go.

Scottish Mixed and Black Diamond gear?

Dave McLeod and Andy Turner repeated the Smith- Marshall routes from that famous week in 1960 this year. More of Andy on the first ascent of "The Secret". Same climb Ueli flashes in the Petzl video and one of the most difficult modern Scottish test pieces. A little love for the Black Diamond fans in there as well :) There are 4 of the Smith-Marshall routes on videos by Hot Aches Productions @ you-tube with a full length feature coming in the fall. Observatory Buttress, The Great Chimney, Minus 3 and Pigott's are all on you-tube. Worth a look if you want to see what the "state of the art" on mixed, a full fifty years ago, in 1960.

The Great Chimney (IV,5) 6th February 1960
Minus Three Gully (IV,5) 7th February 1960
Smith's Route (V,5) 8th February 1960
Observatory Buttress (V,4) 9th February 1960
Point Five Gully (V,5) 10th February 1960
Piggot's Route (V,6) 12th February 1960
Orion Direct (V,5) 13th February 1960

"In one legendary week on Ben Nevis in 1960 Jimmy Marshall and Robin Smith advanced Scottish winter climbing a full ten years. On consecutive days they climbed six first winter ascents, including the mini Alpine-route Orion Face Direct (V, 5), while also making the second ascent of Point Five Gully (V, 5) for good measure. The fact they achieved all this by cutting steps up the snow and ice appears, from the remove of the 21st century, to be almost unbelievable. Marshall’s skill was such that he could lead routes almost faster than some of his talented seconds could follow."


Jimmy Marshall the winter of


http://hotaches.blogspot.com/

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XuobO54od7Y&feature=player_Rew

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eOX0MfGO4ws&feature=player-Rew


Andy Turner on "The Secret"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_LjRLqXfNuo&feature=player-Rew

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=me2AYufFqKs&feature=player-Rew

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H5BwTHyMJGs&feature=player-Rew

Greetings from California – Again!

It was a roundabout route, but I made it back to California on June 5th and have been visiting with my first cousin, David, who lives in Southern California. The last time I saw Dave was in the spring of 1992 when the company I worked for sent me to Los Angeles for some computer training. He said I don't come to see him very often! But I've seen him every year I've been to California since he moved out here! Anyway, it has been great seeing Dave again after all these years!


And now, I'm going to Jamboree! I'm so excited that I'll be able to meet some of my fellow genea-bloggers. Of course I'm planning to attend "a few" of the sessions too! It's not my first conference but it will be my first Jamboree. I remember last year wishing I could be there. It looked like everyone was having so much fun and I'll admit to being a little envious, but not this year 'cause I'll be there!

After Jamboree, I'll play “ketchup” with a few posts on where I was during the last week of May and the first week of June... Coral Pink Sand Dunes (again!), the North Rim of the Grand Canyon, Lee's Ferry, Lake Powell. No big adventures though; mostly just taking is easy.

What a Delight They Are!

Today at The Library, I met the You Go Genealogy Girls! They are delightful ladies, fun to talk with, and boy do they have some stories to tell... I saw Ruby at one of the microfilm scanner stations and thought she looked familiar (I did know they were coming here – after all, I do read their blog). So I went up to her and asked if she was one of the YGGG. (Thank goodness she was, I sure would have felt silly if she hadn't been.) We had a nice conversation then a few minutes later she brought Cheri over. To make a long story short, we snagged someone at the microfilm readers to take a photo of the four of us. The one the lady took with my camera was way out of focus but I think Carol has a good shot of all of us that she will post soon. [added May 27th - photo posted by Carol. Very good.]





Cheri Hopkins YGGG#2 and Ruby Coleman YGGG#1

Taking a tip from Carol, I decided to scan microfilm images of estate and probate records for several ancestors today. Back in the late 1980s I had taken a research trip to Ohio and had photocopied the “important” papers (those naming heirs) but that was it. I was able to find the estate records for three ancestors and scanned them. I'm hoping to get some clues from the names of the people who purchased some of the goods from the estates. And it's nice to have copies of all of the information from the estates.



There's still another week left! And I'm still hoping for that “Happy Dance” moment!