November 15, 2010 Spokesman

Posted by Chuck Brockway 
on Nov 15, 2010
 

President Pat started the Kirkland Rotary Meeting at 6:30pm.  Rich Bergdahl led the members in the Pledge of Allegiance.  Pat thanked Chuck Brockway for greeting, albeit rather late, and for scribing.

 

Rather than doing the traditional inspirational minute, President Pat recognized and thanked all Veterans for their service to their country.  Bill Woods was recognized as being our oldest Veteran, having served in Alaska in WWII.  John Overleese commented that a WWII Vet dies every 90 seconds.  Thankfully Bill made it though the entire meeting.

 

This was followed by a toast to a Rotary Club from Australia that has a practice of toasting one of the many Rotary Clubs, worldwide.  Kirkland was the recipient of their toast last week.

 

Visiting Rotarians and Guests:   Guests included Peggy Ostrander, wife of Rick and Sharon Hunter, wife of Mike.  Rick Walter attended his last meeting as a guest and Monty Gregor, having something to do with wine also joined us.  We were also joined by the children of our speaker, Rachel Knight, Alex and Nicky.

 

President Pat handed out several red rose stickers to be applied to the badges of those Rotarians who have already registered for the District Conference in Portland.

Destrey Seiler, our student of the month from Juanita High School, was introduced.  She plans on going to either the U of W or to Colorado State.

 

 

Announcements

  • Dan Bartel announced that two families will be helped with Thanksgiving baskets this year.  Please remember to bring the food, gift certificates, etc., to the November 22 meeting.
  • The Alcohol Awareness program will presented by Chief Eric Olsen and the Kirkland Police Department at the meeting on November 22.  Two of our members, a man (Steve Shinstrom and a woman (Katherine Kehrli, will be drinking shots of alcohol on empty stomachs.  They will be given breathalyzer tests and checks of coordination so that we can all evaluate the affects of alcohol on our systems.  Sadly, your scribe was not selected to participate.
  • A Rotary fellowship night is scheduled at Benaroya Hall on Saturday, November 20th to see the Celtic Tenors
  • David DuBois made a plea for the KDA to help hang cedar garlands and Holiday lights in Kirkland.  The gathering point is George’s @ 8:00 AM on Saturday, November 20th.
  • Brian Tucker presented our club with a banner from the Finot Rotary Club in Ethiopia with added thanks for soccer balls and pumps
  • Don Dicks said that we have passed the 20% mark for Every Rotarian, Every Year for Paul Harris contributions.  We are also well over the 50% mark for our total club contribution of $10,000.  As a reminder, there is an internal club push for PH participation.  For every dollar, over $100, the club will match your point contribution.

 

Presentation

Don Dicks presented a Paul Harris Fellow + 3 award to both Pat Swenson and Steve Shinstrom.  Club members stood and recognized both Pat and Steve for their contribution to the Rotary International Foundation.

 

Induction

It was indeed another lucky night in Rotary, as Brandon Honcoop inducted our newest member, Rick Walter, a Bellevue CPA.  Dan Bartel, Rick’s sponsor, pinned him and mentor Steve Shinstrom gave Rick his red badge.  Club members stood and recognized Rick as our newest member.

 

Chuck Brockway solicited many happy dollars from club members.  Happiness included a Cougar Pac 10 win; proud grandparents to be; wine from Walla Walla; Brian’s lament, but for 3 points and something about Gary Bruner and John Overleese perhaps being related.

 

Program

President Pat introduced our own intrepid and brave Rachel Knight and acknowledged that in addition to Rotary, Rachel serves and has served on many local community boards.

 

Rachel acknowledged that she has always enjoyed hiking and backpacking, but has never climbed a glacier.  Inspired by our own Fred Tuttle, who has scaled all of the world’s greatest peaks, Rachel made the decision to go for it.  Upon making the decision to climb Mt. Rainier, she enrolled in a course to learn the skills and techniques associated with mountain climbing.

 

Rachel began her course with OSAAT (one step at a time) in February and completed the course in June.  She was required to attend all classes and to be participating team member.  The course initially consisted of six 3 hour classes followed by a mid term exam.

 

Rachel’s initial outdoor experience was at Camp Long in West Seattle, where she received map and compass training, followed by repelling and knot training.

 

The class of 10 then went to the snow to have ice axe training and learning to do ice arrests. This was followed by glacial travel training, which included crevasse training.  It was at this point, that Rachel called on Brian Tucker to come up to the front of the room to be fitted with his harness.  Rachel explained the techniques for getting out of a crevasse using a pulley system with help from at least another 2 team members. Rachel discussed several techniques and knots, often mentioning prusik, as both a knot (noun) and a verb.

 

Because much of their climbing would take place in the dark, they had to do night training, where they would get to sleep in until 2:30 AM before beginning this phase of their training.  They had to successfully complete conditioning hikes, the first of which was at Mt. Dickerman where Rachel had to complete 3.5 miles, with a full 30 lb. backpack in 2 hours.  The second phase was done at Camp Muir on Mt. Rainier, which required a 10,000 foot assent in less than 5 hours.

 

Rachel shared many photographs of her training, but the actual pictures from her July assent of Mt. Rainer were magnificent.  Rachel said that she loved the blues of the ice deep in the crevasses.  Her tent mate often had to bring her back from the edge of a crevasse, where Rachel would stand, mesmerized by the beauty of the ice.  Rachel completed the trip to the summit and said that her muscles were much sorer coming down rather than going up.  Rachel ended her talk by introducing us to the climbing term, “blue bagging”.  This was a terrific program, followed by many questions from the group.

 

Joker Pool:  Jim Going asked Destrey to draw a ticket and John Pruitt’s number was drawn.  Unfortunately John drew the 3 of hearts, so now there are 41 cards left and a pot that is now over $500.

 

President Pat adjourned the meeting at 7:55 PM.

 

Submitted by,

 

Chuck Brockway

Scribe