By now the world knows that the club has been broken into and vandalized. We've had considerable feedback about Vandals. Our amazing members don't have any real information about our vandals, but lots of info on the Vandals of Antiquity. Here's an excerpt of an extensive two-part email:

A shout-out to King Alaric and his hoard of visigoths!

Happy 1600th anniversity of the Sacking of Rome (to the day - as seen on BBC news - hey I can't make this stuff up!).

See BBC (old) news article here - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-11066461http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-11066461

You'll have to wait another 45 years for Geiseric and the Vandals to drop by.

PS- A quick quote or two from some Wiki pages about the fun-loving Vandals shows how misunderstood they are -

In modern usage, a "vandal" is someone who engages in senseless destruction. This usage is a result of the Vandals' sack of Rome under King Genseric in 455. The Vandals may not have been any more destructive than other invaders of ancient times, but writers who idealized Rome often blamed them for its destruction. For example, British Enlightenment poet John Dryden wrote, /Till Goths, and Vandals, a rude Northern race,/ Did all the matchless Monuments deface/.^[2]

[...]

There is, however, some debate over the severity of the Vandal sack. The sack of 455 is generally seen by historians as being more thorough than the Visigothic sack of 410 , because the Vandals plundered Rome for fourteen days whereas the Visigoths spent only three days in the city. The cause of most controversy, however, is the claim that the sack was relatively "clean", in that there was little murder and violence, and the Vandals did not burn the buildings of the city .

[...]

The term /Vandalisme/ was coined in 1794 by Henri Grégoire , bishop of Blois , to describe the destruction of artwork following the French Revolution . The term was quickly adopted across Europe. This new use of the term was important in colouring the perception of the Vandals from later Late Antiquity, popularising the pre-existing idea that they were a barbaric group with a taste for destruction. Vandals and other "barbarian " groups had long been blamed for the fall of the Roman Empire by writers and historians.^[3]

[...] From around 1540, the Swedish king had been styled, /Suecorum, Gothorum et Vandalorum Rex/: /King of the Swedes, Goths and Vendes/.^[4] Carl XVI Gustaf , dropped the title in 1973 and now styles himself simply as King of Sweden

And here's a note from one of our favorite correspondants;

Our pros are plugging a-way, in spite of the heat. They have lots and lots of very popular group lessons and league action.

Lest you miss Johanne's latest missive:

Dear Tennis Enthusiasts,

The summer heat is with us now! Mornings and evenings are really perfect for tennis.The club has quieted down a little after the June frenzy. Several members are vacationing and there is a lot of court time available. If you are around, come and vacation on the courts with us.

For all who joined the club this year as a new member or as waitlist member take advantage of the one hour lesson at half price included in your membership fees. Now is a good time to book lessons.

All the kids participating in the Outreach Program are having a great time swinging their tennis racquets. We have seen some nice progress in their strokes. We have 5 different groups coming to the club ounce a week for tennis lesson's from 12:30 p.m. to 2 p.m.

Stop by and watch them 'swing away!' They still have one week to go.

A very special thank you to all members supporting the program.

Mark the date, there is a Round Robin coming up:

- Thursday, August 19th* from 6-8pm. Sandwiches and salads will be served. Rain date Thursday, August 26th.

The calendar for August is as followed:*

MONDAYS: - Women's Night from 6 to 8 p.m. Organized women's doubles on 3 courts. To join, please contact Johanne at 617-710-9465. The cost is $8 per member and $12 per guest. Intermediate to advanced players.

TUESDAYS: - Double's Group Lesson from 10am to noon. Drills to help you add variety to your game, perfect your positioning and movement on the court. One hour of instruction followed by an hour of unsupervised play. Advanced beginners to intermediate players. To join, please contact Johanne. Cost $20

• Men's Night from 6 to 8 p.m.
  
  Organized men's doubles on 3 courts. To join, please contact Johanne.
  
  The cost is $8 per member and $12 per guest. Intermediate to advanced players.
  
  

FRIDAYS: - Double's Group Lessons from 10 a.m.to noon & 11 a.m. to 1 p.m.

Work on court positioning, shot selection, poaching and strategy. Bring your tennis game to the next level. One hour of instruction followed by an hour of unsupervised play. Space is limited so please sign-up ahead of time by contacting Rick or Johanne. Cost $20. Intermediate to advanced players.

SUNDAYS: - Pick-up Doubles on court 1.

Open to all members from 8:30 to 10:00 a.m. and open for intermediate to advanced players from 10:30 to 1:00 p.m. Players go on the court on a first come first serve basis with a rotation of players every half hour.

• - Junior's Group Lessons from 5 to 6 p.m.
  
  Drills from 5-6 p.m. for intermediate to advanced players. Cost is $17.50/per player. Open to members and non-members. Space is limited so please sign-up ahead by contacting Rick.

For private or group lessons you may contact Steve Counihan at (781) 929-7455, Rick Rose at (617) 642-3448 or Johanne Gauthier at (617) 710-9465. For all tennis activities information please e-mail Johanne at gauthierjooo@aol.com or call at (617) 710-9465. You will find the tennis activities schedule on the club's web site at: cambridgetennisclub.com; on the bulletin board at the club and copies will be made available at the front desk. Please take the time to sign-up ahead for activities because it helps us plan court reservations more efficiently leaving more courts open for members to play.

Please see the suggestion box at the front desk and let us know how we can improve your tennis experience at the CTC.

Looking forward to seeing you on the courts!

Your tennis staff,

Rick, Steve and Johanne.

We are drowned; we are stewed, basted, hammered, but we play on. We've slowed down a bit here in August. We have slow days that are, you know, kinda busy.

Tuesdays and Fridays are the busiest days. Tuesdays are crazybusy. Monday is the slowest, 'cepting Monday prime-time when there are 3 courts reserved for in-house league play and you, yes, you can't get a court. The weekends are slow. Go figure.

At 8:00 a.m. the phone is always, always busy. The action at 8:00 for reservations is frantic. Please be kind to your friendly staff member who takes your reservation calls. We're burning through staff members. Their ears are bleeding.

We seek contributions from members. Insights, jibes, cracks, questions, suggestions, remarks, jokes.

Craig Lambert wrote a must-read article for Harvard Magazine about Bruce Wright's take on the 'high set' stance and movement in tennis. Take a look: High Set The article is accompanied by a separate video demonstrating the technique. High Set Video Thanks, Craig, for sending this nifty technical riff along to us.

The book? The club directory should be in your hand, always, but the website has much of this year's info.

We are going to try out a new feature on the newspage. Let's call it The Book Blurb. The Blurb will note books not necessarily about tennis, but authored by CTC members. So, if you members have recently, or maybe not so recently, written a book that you'd like blurbed, please let us know.

Let's start with:

Our latest book to be blurbed is New Classic American Houses, a book by Dan Cooper about the architecture of Albert, Righter, and our own John Tittmann. "New Classic American Houses is an architectural page-turner brimming with creative interpretations of traditional forms."

---

Hot off the presses, a new book by Faith Moore, Celebrating a Life, Planning Memorial Services and Other Creative Remembrances. "Celebrating a Life" provides the ideas, inspiration, and how-to advice needed for creating a meaningful memorial service. Light-hearted but sensitive, this thoughtful guide covers it all."

---

While We Were Sleeping by David Hemenway.

"This book powerfully illuminates how public health works with more than sixty success stories drawn from the area of injury and violence prevention."

---

The Parents We Mean To Be: How Well-Intentioned Adults Undermine Children's Moral and Emotional Development by Rick Weissbourd.

The New Yorker review said, "In this ardent and persuasive inquiry, Weissbourd, a Harvard psychologist, warns that 'happiness-besotted' parents do children a disservice by emphasizing personal fulfillment over empathy."

---

Inside Urban Charter Schools: Promising Practices and Strategies in Five High-Performing Schools by Kay Merseth "an inspirational and practical how-to guide for school reformers."

The club directory for 2010 should be in your hands or by your side all day, every day. But, should something untoward befall you and the directory isn't handy, all of this year's information is available on the website, except for membership information.

Some useful links:

Here's a link to the espn site, with pro ranking.

And a club member (let's call him Sol) suggested a link to the International Tennis Hall of Fame in Newport, R.I. The site is rich.

We still have the tournament draws (from 2001 to 2004) available on-line (including all of the results), thanks to the Java Kid. We are re-locating the links, however.

"On the court, tennis players exchange not only ground strokes but lots of information. It's a richly interactive sport, both verbally and non-verbally. If players communicate clearly, simply, and consistently, the game will proceed more quickly, and with less fuss and misunderstanding. Here are a few guidelines that can make the game more fun, friendly, and fair for all...."

We've had some requests to run Craig Lambert's piece, sampled above, on Tennis Communication. (We'd better leave this link up on the newspage permanently.)

Take a look

at what was happening at this time last year.

The Yearbook link will take you to the last newspage from 2009. From there you can see the whole of the Persistent Archive of last year's news.

Website Note: The time and temperature icon below is a link to a Boston weather site.

Joe DeBassio, Webmaster.

Website Note II: The honey-comb icon is also a link. It takes the clicker to an archive of all the past news pages so that said clicker can read the news pages for the whole year (2009). The less-than link (<) next to the honeycomb icon will take clickers to the previous issue of this year's newspage.

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