The Great Solar Eclipse of 2017 crossed the continent, from Oregon to South Carolina, and gave millions of people the chance to witness one of the most awe-inspiring events in the natural world.

But you had to be within the "path of totality", a narrow band across the earth's surface several thousand miles long but only about 70 miles wide. Outside that band you would only see a partial eclipse, not a total eclipse.

And there is no such thing as a "partial total eclipse", despite the impression blogs and the news media might give. I honestly think that's why so many people misunderstand the utter beauty of the spectacle; they may have seen a partial eclipse in the past that was total somewhere else, and even though they weren't in the path the news kept gushing about it being a total eclipse, so they assume they must have seen a total eclipse and just didn't find it all that impressive.


Posted by Dan 08/29/2017, revised 09/06/2017

In Fall 2000 Kim studied in London for a semester before returning to Willamette. With London as her base, she made the most of her semester abroad and explored many other parts of Europe.

Always one to try new things, Kim managed to squeeze a 2-week bartending course into 4 days while in San Francisco just before returning to Willamette! At the end of high school she became fascinated with belly dancing, and now is an accomplished belly dancer and trained bartender, to boot!

Meanwhile, Whitney is in her freshman year at College Park High School, where she plays high school volleyball and soccer. She also continues to play Class-I club soccer. After two successful years with the Lamorinda Wild Things Class-I team, she now plays with the Bay Oaks Blasters U-15 team.

Posted by 02/02/2001

Went to watch Nik in his final road race with the Cal Poly team. Since he'll graduate in the Fall, he'll be able to race the Fall Mountain Bike season but won't be around for next year's Spring RoadRace season.

This one was a criterium--a fast, multi-lap race around a short, flat course on paved city streets. Although hosted by Stanford University, the course was a five-cornered, half-mile loop in Morgan Hill, adjacent to the headquarters of Specialized Bicycle Components (who just happen to be one of the most popular makers of racing bicycles in the world).


Posted by Dan 04/25/2011

For the past 3 months, our Flogging Molly volleyball 4's team has played every Friday night, fighting to get into the end-of-season playoffs. Well, we did it. We've worked hard, and this past Friday evening, we came into the playoff games in 4th place, the lowest position for playoffs. We beat the 3rd place team in a solid, close game, and then an hour later beat the 2nd place team by a Golden Point! It was off to the Saturday Championship game with us!

Saturday evening, 5:15pm, we faced the Yellow Tails, the #1 team all season. Games against them are always my favorite - they're a good team that plays the game well and enjoys the sport, and we always play a close game against them. We came out pumped, and I could feel my competitive side really coming through. The whole season has always been about fun and recreation, and it still was all the way through, but this was the Championship game - this was my arena, and it felt GOOD.

The game was tight, and we fought hard, but the Yellow Tails are a good team, and in the end they got the win they deserved. I could feel my competitive side get a bit frustrated with the loss for a moment - I really don't like losing. But very quickly, I remembered the whole reason behind the league: this was a fun thing to do with a great group of friends, and the 4 of us (roommates Scott and Crystal and our friend Hugo) have really come together over the season to create a fun team to play on.

We never would've thought that our scraggly crew, who came into the season late, losing all of our first games, wildly scampering all over the court for out-of-control balls, would ever make it to being the Runners Up of the league. But we did it, and we had a fantastic time doing so. Now, each one of us has a great glass-framed "trophy" sitting on our desks, reminding us of the great time we had this season.

Our trophy for 2nd place - Hugo, me, Crystal, and Scott. Yay Flogging Molly!

Posted by Whitney 06/15/2008, revised 06/19/2008