The Board, happily meeting at the Boat Club.
(Judy, Cora, Susanna, Murray, Rustam, (seated) Jack, Bob, Sam, Kate, Joe)
The courts are rained out this morning, but the party will go on. Yes, we will eat and drink and be merry and celebrate throwing off the chains of perfidious Albion. With any luck the skies will clear and the courts will, um, revert to their true, shining, wondrous state(s) and we'll play free, free at last, in the sunlight with, like, fireworks of the unobtrusive class and maybe a hologram of George Washington wafting over the courts. (Huh?)
".... we were only eleven or twelve miles from the sun. It was a hundred and sixteen degrees on the thermometer, and every degree was a foot long. And that was in the shade. And there wasn't no shade."
Denis Johnson
Train Dreams
So here we are boiling hot and what do we do? We play, that's what. We are advised to seek out air-conditioning and avoid outside work. Cooling centers have been made available around town. Court 1 is not a cooling center.
"Are you guys sure that you should be playing in this heat?
"Oh, it's okay: we are all doctors."
Speaking of parties:
|
The famed Fourth of July tennis jamboree is close upon us. If the party is anything like the Memorial Day Party... The courts are all open all day for round robin tennis. The club supplies someone to 'run the board,' i.e., put your name up there in a right smart and orderly fashion. We play one set or 45 minutes, whichever comes first. The club also supplies barbecue basics: dogs, burgers, soda, beer, condiments, chips, and somethings good to grill. There is a potluck part to the party. If your last name begins with the letters A-M, please bring some fruit or salad. If you last name begins with the letters N-Z, please bring some dessert. The club also supplies a wicked party spirit. We, like, party. Please come. |
Our friend and staffer, Liam, is leaving us. He's graduated from Emerson with a degree in Film Studies (Production) and he's off on a jaunt to Europe and then who knows where.
Liam has been with us for some years and has been loyal and true and a great worker and a good friend. And a really, really convivial guy. It's always been a pleasure to see him come through the gate or to find that it's him on duty at the club.
Liam may come back and work a shift or two, but when he's gone, we'll miss him all right. We will.
The club has a new member named Pierce Harman who is a professional photographer. Pierce seems to be mighty good at action shots. You can take a look at a slide show of Pierce's action shots of club members: slideshow. You might also follow the link to the section of Pierce's website to see a whole gallery of CTC pictures.
Some links of interest:
Wimbledon
The club book should be in your hands by now. The website also has updated info on activities, dates and times of events, officers and committees, etc. Thanks to Sheila Laperle for getting all this info out to us in a right quick fashion and for all her hard work on the club book. The new book includes lots of new rules which will make us all happier. You might take a look at that section on the website or in the book especially you prime-time players.
And, oh yes, the club is featuring on-line reservations through a program some of you might know from the Mt. Auburn Club, Bookings Plus. What fun, what excruciating fun! Yup, no more painful dialing and re-dialing and hoping against hope that you can get that prime-time court. You will still be able to call the clubhouse between 8:00 and 10:00 a.m. and talk to a friendly, playful staff-person who can enter your on-line reservation for you, but doing it yourself will be so much more gratifying and easier. And did we say fun? The on-line reservation system, as well as our regular phone reservations, will go live when the courts are open. Please note the link to our reservation system over there on the left in the table of contents. The link will also give you a brief tutorial on how to use on-line reservations and thereby increase your fun.
Much to our surprise and de-light, folks seem to be availing themselves of on-line reservations. As we get busier, you might try to click on at 8:00 a.m. exactly.
The calendar of activities for the month of June:
Mondays - Women's Doubles, 2 sessions, 3-5 p.m. and 6-8 p.m.
Organized women's doubles on 3 courts. To join, please contact Johanne at 617-710-9465 or by e-mail at: Johanne
Tuesdays: - Double's Group Lesson from 1-3 p.m.
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.
- Men's Doubles, 2 sessions, 3-5 p.m. and 6-8 p.m.
Organized men's doubles on 2 courts. To join, please contact Johanne.
Wednesday: - Mix and Match, noon to 2 p.m. Organized play open to all, it is a great opportunity to meet new players. Non-members are welcome so invite your friends to come along. Sign up on the bulletin board at the club or contact Johanne.
Fridays:
10:00 to 12:00 and 11:00 to 1:00. 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.
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.
- Double's Group lesson from 11 a.m to 1 p.m.
- Junior’s Group lesson from 4 to 6 p.m.
Drills from 4 to 5 p.m. for beginner to intermediate players and from 5 to 6 p.m. for intermediate to advanced players. Open to members and non- members. Space is limited so please sign-up ahead of time either on the bulletin board or by contacting Rick or Johanne.
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 : johanne.Gauthier@live.com or call at (617) 710-9465. Please take the time to sign-up ahead of time for activities because it helps us plan court reservations more efficiently leaving more courts open for members to play.
Looking forward to seeing you on the courts!
Your tennis staff,
Rick, Steve and Johanne.
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? Membership for the coming year hasn't been settled, so the book will be a while in the making. In the meantime, the website will be updated as data dribbles in.
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:
In the midst of renovating garages and ruling vast sectors of cyberspace, Bob Doyle wrote a bit of a magnum opus: Free Will: The Scandal in Philosophy by Bob Doyle. "The fundamental question of information philosophy is cosmological and ultimately metaphysical. What is the process that creates information structures in the universe?"
We have a new book by a club member, Game, Set, Match: Billie Jean King and the Revolution in Women's Sports, by club member, Susan Ware. The book is: A Publishers Weekly Top 10 Sports Book.
We have some new books from club member, Julie Baer:
Love Me Later
Julie Baer presents us with a unique book. Her fantastic artwork depicts nature and people in a special way. -- Bookreviewcafe.com
I Only Like What I Like
"CHILDREN BEWARE –will have you trying the untried, 'cause it's FUN! The collages fill you up to the eyeballs."
Take a look at: William P. Homans, Jr., A Life in Court, by Mark S. Brodin. Bill Homans was a long time member of the club with "a storied legal career." A lot of folks at the club knew and liked Bill. He could tell a story or two, couldn't he?
We want to mention 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."
The club directory is in the works and should be available soon. We usually get the information up a little bit ahead of the printed edition. Stay tuned.
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.
"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 2011. 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 (2012). The less-than link (<) next to the honeycomb icon will take clickers to the previous issue of this year's newspage.
