» On 4/22/2024 12:05:00 AM Mountain Standard Time, Alan wrote:
What's in YOUR wallet? 

Some people have lotsa cash and/or platinum cards, black cards, or titanium cards, in their wallets. But my wallet contains - in addition to the normal collection of ID/insurance/credit cards - a few unusual items with sentimental value: treasured photos, odd licenses, a special press pass, etc. (full disclosure: actually, I carry all the scans below in a Wallet file on my phone 😉). [tap images to enlarge]

1976-77: I completed two marathons (story). This photo was taken during the first, NYC 1976, just before I lost the will to live. I still have no f*cking idea why I put myself through that again, for Boston 1977. 😉
1977: I qualified for my first FAA license as a sailplane pilot. Then I earned three other licenses, in 1978, 1981 and 1990. In 2011, the agency sent me these cool plastic cards, when they replaced the boring old paper licenses. The new design includes portraits of the Wright brothers, Orville and Wilbur, on the back. The top certificate is actually 3 Private Pilot licenses: (1) Airplane, Single Engine Land; (2) Glider, Aero Tow; and (3) Glider, Ground Launch (the round blue DoT logo/seal means I'm qualified to fly by reference to instruments). The bottom certificate is simply a Ground Instructor, Basic. They say we never forget how to ride a bicycle, due to muscle memory, which is why my right hand never forgets how to fly the control stick in a sailplane and my left hand never forgets how to fly the yoke in an airplane. But if I switch hands, my performance drops off markedly. 😉 Stories: The Last Lesson and French Equivalence.
1977: This is a Fédération Aéronautique Internationale Class A parachutist license. My skydiving logbook says I currently have 45 jumps, and I only broke my arm once, during jump 35. 😉 Story: The Thirty-One Dollar Man.
1978: Upon first arriving in Manhattan from France, I was so broke that I had to sell a pint of blood to buy a road map of the city, in order to avoid getting lost while driving a cab. Story: Hack. The cabbie job naturally led to a position on the NBC Page staff. 😉
Forty years later, the corrective lens restriction had been removed (radial keratotomy), and I had progressed from taxis to motorcycles ("L" endorsement). This plastic card is duplicated in Arizona's Mobile ID. But in the app, my head swivels from side to side. It's REALLY creepy. 😉
1989: I got my SCUBA C-card when my brother Chris invited me to go diving with him, near his home in Florida. We swam with a manatee and did a cave dive at Crystal River Springs. Later, down in the Keys (story: Deep Thoughts), I enjoyed playing with the fast-retracting Christmas tree worms (Spirobranchus giganteus), which probably inspired the Helicoradians in Avatar. One of the trip's highlights was visiting John Pennekamp Coral Reef State Park, the first undersea park in the United States, and watching a school of tarpon swim in a hypnotic spiral during the courtship ritual known as "daisy chaining."
2003: My lovely wife Anikó and I added some useful experience to our résumés, by working on a pyrotechnician team. Story: Cone of Concussion.
2006: While serving as the Online Editor for Palm Springs Life magazine, I covered some memorable events. This press credential allowed me to photograph and interview my favorite comedian, the late Tommy Smothers. R.I.P.

 
» On 4/01/2024 12:05:00 AM Mountain Standard Time, Alan wrote:
Zoomiversary #4, 03April2020 - 03April2024. 

The first ZoomFest was among four members of our Westfield [MA] High School track team. We've kept in touch over the years, but the pandemic brought us a lot closer together, in a series of semimonthly Zoom meetings. The group quickly expanded to six, and then ten, regulars, and often included special guests, like our spouses, partners, kids, pets, and even our old coach. The next get-together is this coming Friday, with participants Zooming in from Lakewood Colorado, Mesa Arizona, Philomath Oregon, Suffield Connecticut, Niwot Colorado, Fougères France, San Diego California, Virginia Beach Virginia, and Swampscott Massachusetts. Special thanks to Jim Gusek, who sparked the whole idea, and to COVID-19, for creating this unexpectedly welcome side benefit.

Remember the old TV shows from the 50s and 60s, when a group of guys would get together for Poker Night? They smoked cigars, drank beer and told dirty jokes. Well, some of us see the ZoomFest as Poker Night, without the cigars. 😉

--1968-71, top 2 rows, L-R: Jim Gusek, moi, Patrick Kamins, Michael Rood, Bert Cashman, Robert Grace, Michael Kay, Stephen FitzGerald, Bruce LaPointe, and Bill Walthall.
--5 decades later, bottom 2 rows!

Founding members of Westfield High's Cross-Country team in the Fall of 1968, L-R:
Al Baird, Coach Reign Rix, Jim Gusek, (Bob Grace), Dan Fountain, Bert Cashman, Mike Rood.

WHS Track, Spring 1969, Row-Column, Front-Back: Bert Cashman 1-1, Bob Grace 1-2,
Mike Kay 2-2, Al Baird 2-9, Bill Walthall 2-10, Steve FitzGerald 2-12, Mike Rood 3-1,
Bruce LaPointe 3-2, Jim Gusek 3-9. (Pat Kamins graduated in 1968.)

Glory Days, Friday Night Lights, Facebook posting, 05Apr2024 ZoomFest, 1969 track records

Labels: whs, z4, ZoomFest