This year the motorcycle world lost a few icons (and many others) in brutal accidents. People whose faces are so familiar as to almost be family whose loss leaves the race tracks sort of empty of their personality. Similarly there was recently a gathering to honor those lost climbing. I had a very close friend die of a heart attack while ice climbing an easy mountain in Oregon. He had soloed Acancogwa? and many unnamed peaks in the Andes. Ive had homeless friends who live in the woods around Bend just vanish without a trace. God bless them and keep them all. Anyway as we get older more friends vanish and I'm afraid to tray to contact people now for fear they are no longer around. Jim