UKC

Thanks Chris, another great piece  

Thanks, I really enjoyed that. As I approach a certain age, articles n the Other Half Of The Bell Curve of performsnce become more important. 

Chris, you have a very special writing style too!! Ta again.

Cheers Chris. Great article.

Great article Chris - love the writing style and humour.

Enjoyed that, thanks.

Only one tiny criticism, Mark Vallance didn't invent friends, he distributed them. Ray Jardine did the inventing.

Excellent. That reminded me of the early On The Edge style of article.

The mention of crack climbing at Warwick reminds me that we used to do laps on the jamming cracks there - on at least one occasion with Chris as I recall, which makes the article even more poignant.

A really well-written and thought-provoking piece.

And strictly speaking, Ray Jardine didn't do all the inventing as they ended up paying Jeff Lowe for an infringement of his patent...

Hi Denni ,,,, err, Chris,

Given you barely ever used both feet when we climbed together I can't see the loss of one hand stopping you. I had good footwork and you just powered through time & time again wi' out  really using yours and it really wouldn't surprize me if you you could still break a world record by being the first person to climb a hard route by dynoing footless hold-to-hold one-armed only!

Be a b*gger to place or clip any gear though and you'd have to be pretty darn quick to chalk up.

Another nice article written in your inimitable style.

Best with everything,

And. xx

Hi Chris, Brilliant. I love the associations you make: from clapping one hand, to a crap camper vans, to Arnis Strapcans... and the secret swimming pool under the pulpit is Devine. Makes me ashamed to have taught for 25 years yet never climbed with a student. The closest I came to it was in the communal showers of the university swimming pool: I'm soaping myself down when one of my students - one who was always driving me up the wall - appears out of the mist. He gets real close and demands to know why he got such a bad mark for his essay. 

Your writing is informed by so much more than climbing. I look forward to more and more.    

I couldn't actually read the whole article. The writer comes across as arrogant and up himself, it got boring quick. Apologies if you don't agree, seems like many people were able to enjoy this and I am glad for them, it's just not for me.

Interesting response! 

I can't imagine anyone less so!

When I first started climbing, I used to see Chris and his mates a fair bit at Kenilworth Castle.

At the time I thought they came across as a bit up themselves but they were "Rock Gods", we were then the punterest of punters and there was probably a degree of jealousy to cloud my judgement.

Reading Chris' articles has totally debunked my early impressions; I love his self depreciating humour in addressing his illness and getting the best from life.

Reading this response makes me feel as if I have made a misjudgement of his character. I apologise for any offence I have caused.