The long haired store owner introduced the hairless Caballo Blanco.  While an underproduced slideshow played on the wall, Micah True retold the story that lead up to the first race with the Raramiru (Tarahumaru is the grossly mispronounced interpretation heard by the early Conquistadors).  Leadville 100 tales, lead to Copper Canyon tales which lead to....well, you know the story.  Pics of a more hairy Caballo, Barefoot Ted, Scott, the crazy kids and the fleet footed Raramiru colored the room.

The book is a tall tale...like Paul Bunyan and Babe.  Micah was an understated, though confident, story teller - kinda reminded me of somebody.  Micah wanted to talk about culture and simple living, the audience asked him about shoes.  When the questions were done, Micah slipped out the back....like a shy Raramiru.

Micah makes a living as a hiking guide in Copper Canyon, we're invited.

Character is everything.........read on.

Happy Birthday John Wooden, former Boilermaker great turns 99 years young.  The greatest American coach in any sport is celebrating his 99th birthday this week.   John Wooden was born on October 14th, 1910.  He was a three-time all American at Purdue, and led Purdue to the 1932 National Championships as a player.

  Here are some of Coach Wooden's most famous quotes:

1.--You can't live a perfect day without doing something for someone who will never be able to repay you. 

2.--Winning takes talent, to repeat takes character. 

3.--There are many things that are essential to arriving at true peace of mind, and one of the most important is faith, which cannot be acquired without prayer.

4.--The worst thing about new books is that they keep us from reading the old ones.

5.--The main ingredient of stardom is the rest of the team.

6.--Talent is God given. Be humble. Fame is man-given. Be grateful. Conceit is self-given. Be careful.

7.--Success is peace of mind which is a direct result of self-satisfaction in knowing you did your best to become the best you are capable of becoming.

8.--Never mistake activity for achievement. 

9.--It's what you learn after you know it all that counts. 

10.--It's not so important who starts the game but who finishes it. 

11.--If you don't have time to do it right, when will you have time to do it over?

12.--Don't let what you cannot do interfere with what you can do. 

13.--Be more concerned with your character than your reputation, because your character is what you really are, while your reputation is merely what others think you are.

14.--Ability is a poor man's wealth.

15.--I'd rather have a lot of talent and a little experience than a lot of experience and a little talent.

No wonder that he is considered the greatest American sports coach of all time?

Happy Birthday Coach.

Thanks John Wooden, I needed to hear these.

Chaser

     The Precious Birdlegs Gazette        

D. H. Lawrence wrote that “every year you pass an anniversary unaware: the
anniversary of your own death.”  From Deep Survival;Who Lives, Who Dies, and Why,  by Laurence Gonzalez.

    Sure, we do it in our ordinary lives, too- you can get killed on your  lunch break- but we do that blindly.  In our adventures, we engage fate  deliberately.  We choose a relentless and indefatigable opponent, while others pretend to be safe.  We feel that our experiences are much more  real, while seeing the masses as deluded in their complacency. 

When  well-trained people are fetched off by fate during a well-planned and  thoughtful expedition, there is no more ignominy in it than when an  ordinary Joe gets hit by a bus.  No one says "He shouldn't have been  walking there."  But a climber named Karl Iwen, unfamiliar with Three Fingered Jack, a volcanic mountain in Oregon, which he was descending,  left his companions, left the trail, left his ice ax strapped to his pack,  and ventured out onto the snow, where he treated his companions to a  spectacular show as he slid into the couloir and did a 600-foot Peter Pan.  Karl did not die doing what he loved.  He died of poor impulse control, or  what I call "the rapture of the shallow."

     The perfect adventure shouldn't be that much more hazardous in a real  sense than ordinary life, for that invisible rope that holds us here can always break.  We can live a life of bored caution and die of cancer.  Better to take the adventure, minimize the risks, get the information, and  then go forward in the knowledge that we've done everything we can.

    No, some people would rather not see it, but the bull is there for all of  us.  Some of us choose to pass the cape in front of its horns.  To live  life is to risk it.  And when you feel the rush of air and catch the stink of hot breath in your face, you enter the secret order of those who have
 seen their own death close up.  It makes us live that much more intensely.  So intense is it for some that it seals their fate; once they've tasted  it, they just can't stop. And in their cases, perhaps we have to accept  that the light that burns brightest burns half as long.

     I do adhere to what my daughter Amelia calls the Gutter Theory of Life.  It goes like  this:  You don't want to be lying in the gutter, having been run down by a
 bus, the last bit of your life ebbing away, and be thinking, "I should  have taken that rafting trip..." or, "I should have learned to surf..."  or, "I should have flown upside down- with smoke!"

     Pete Conrad was the third man to walk on the moon.  He died in a  motorcycle accident on an ordinary day.  It took him a while to die as he  went to the hospital.  I wonder what he was thinking.  I hope it was:  I
 did it all.  I took a risk.

 Laurence Gonzalez, from Deep Survival