Not much time (or wi-fi) for a long update! We just rolled into Sultan WA a little bit ago.
All I can say now is that I’m a tad tired and I want to hit the pillow.
Day was great, we crossed into the states, rolled in the dark for a while but thankfully had a police escort for the last 30km’s or so.
I ate a lot of cookies, drank an insane amount of H20.
Okay, night – 
I’m less than 20 days away from cycling across to AUSTIN TX!
I am so Incredibly close to my fundraising goal with about $1500 to go between now and October 1st. If you have it in you to give a little something please do… I’ve been working so hard that despite meeting the minimum goal of $5000 it is beyond important to me to meet my personal goal of $10,000 please visit http://convio.cancer.ca/goto/spoonsie. Make a difference in someone’s life.
Where to start, I can’t believe that the ride is almost here, May 18th when I decided to take this one seems like a million years away, even though it was less then 135 days away. I am exhausted but happy and so looking forward to the next month of crazyness.
The first thing that comes to mind is my fabulous friend Judy, really at the centre of this whole story. It hasn’t been easy for her as she is fighting her cancer “making it her b!tch and making it tap out” as my partner Geoff would say. Nonetheless she is a fighter and the manner in which she carries herself simply blows my mind day after day. I aspire to be as strong and courageous as she is. I can say that the best thing about this whole bike ride, fundraising etc is that I made a true friend for life that I otherwise wouldn’t have gotten to know. We would have continued to be to colleagues working for the man.
Here is a picture of the two of us taken at my surprise “send-off” last week.
Speaking of this little send off, I really need to thank two of my girls Rose and Johanne for organizing such a wonderful evening. I really had no clue and was caught off guard, so much to the point I showed up unshowered after 4 hours of spin classes thinking I was dropping our dog off to be babysat! I probably smelled like a goat, but they were all nice and didn’t tell me.
Something else cool that happened also as a result of this. I met with a wonderful girl named Kym who is doing a pretty cool project called 100 Strangers. http://lemien.ca/?p=409 We had fun doing a colourful photoshoot for the bike, see it here on her blog which is about to be published in the citizen! Woot! Go Kym!
Lastly what about me now? I am starting a long overdue holiday, seems like it’s been since Summer 2008 since I had more than a few days off. Part 1 of the trip I have the honour of travelling to Oxford UK with Geoff who will be graduating from Oxford University! Such a privilege to attend! I’m off to the land of fish and chips, I’ll be back soon for a final update before hitting the road.
Well this week we learned a valuable lesson in Media Relations. Click here http://ottawa.ctv.ca/servlet/an/local/CTVNews/20080319/ott_sportsspotlight_0800319/20080404/?hub=OttawaHome to watch the video and select the cycle link on the far right:
Don’t take me wrong, I am super thankful that CTV did a story on this as it is putting the message out there…
but I learned – only tell them what you want to see on TV as it’s funny how 10 minutes of interview can be summarised in a minute and 36 seconds!
It’s no secret to those who know me that my body underwent a transformation with all this training. Under their health and fitness side they wanted to share my story. I thought great, I get the cause out there and I get a link for my fundraising site… I agreed to before and after pictures.
Well they put the story there but they spun it around weightloss and not about the cause and the fundraising… Ah well, lesson for next time. In the end like I said, I am still super thankful they featured this and hopefully there was a former me sitting there watching and thinking “If she can do it, so can I”.
oh and for those who watched and are wondering, it’s not 10,000km’s in 135 days, it’s $10,000 in 135 days and I’m almost there! If you haven’t donated click here now to do it, if you have and you have not received anything from me don’t panic yet… CRA is in charge of the tax receipt and I am in charge of the thank you coming shortly to a mailbox near you!
A quick post to send a thank you to two great Ottawa Bloggers who are spreading the word around about my #givetolive journey.
The first one I would like to highlight is Andrea Thompkins… @missfish on twitter and author of an amazing blog called A Peek Inside the Fish Bowl. I had been following her online for some time up until I was doing the 12hr charity spin last February and there she was, drafting on the back left of my stationary bike! You definitely have to start checking out her blog, it is always so entertaining!
Andrea was kind enough to pass the news of my journey and fundraiser to her extended readership via this post: Highlighting the Good. Thank you Andrea .
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The second thank you of the day goes out to Chris from the Blog Nachos at midnight, life in Ottawa. I have yet to meet Chris, although funny timing, I get to meet him tomorrow at a Boston Pizza tasting in Orleans! Anyway, Chris picked up what I was doing from my twitter feed and decided to do a short write up and promote my cause: “Ladies who Blog”
Thank you Chris, it’s people like you helping me spread the world that will make this journey a complete success!
I can now add the quote :
As seen on TV
To my GIVETOLIVE tour except I am a heck of a lot more useful than a shamwow! Had a pretty cool afternoon on June 2nd. After going for my afternoon training ride (of the freggin windy kind), I met up for an interview with Carolyn Waldo of CTV News.
Before I even get on about the interview, I just want to point out that it was an honor to meet Carolyn… I’ll take any chance to meet a former Olympic Medalist!
Anyway, as I finish my ride, I head over to Dow’s lake pavilion for part 1 of the interview… Answered a few questions about why I was doing this, where I found the courage, advice for others, training requirements etc.
Then came the cool part; we headed out to a more isolated area with a long stretch of road and they did some filming of my riding. In all honesty they’ll probably use about 5seconds of it but the filming lasted about 10-15. Pretty cool to be cruising down, tucked on your areobars and know that to your left, there is a car and a camera shooting at you.
It was kinda of funny when we wrapped up, They both look at me and said, you are fast! Apparently I was maintaning about 35km/hr and making it look effortless
I am not going to spill all the interview details, but make sure to check back to see when it will air!!
