Hey there folks.

I'l try to keep this as brief as possible, as I realize it's not entirely topical to the forums here and I've not been a regular for about a year now. Still, I figure there are folks here that remember the grumpy dorf and Cleric of Nacho, so it was worth a drop by.

Last june, I signed up to participate in a 545 mile bike ride for HIV/AIDS charity. I'll be riding from San Francisco to Los Angeles over 7 days. I signed up for this in honor of/memory of a friend I lost 2 years ago. That friend was the one that originally pushed me into looking at trying my hand at making quilts, so it only seemed natural that one of my fund raisers for this ride be to MAKE a quilt. The rules are simply: Raffle ends at midnight on my birthday (Feb 14th, this thursday). Every $50 in donations is considered an "entry". Multiple entries are permitted, but only in $50 increments...so $80 = 1 entry, $100 = 2.

I realize pennies are tight for a lot of folks, which is why I've tried to make my fundraisers at least have the potential to give something back as incentive. For an example of my last finished quilt so you can get an idea of the style I use:



Winner will be announced February 15th. They get to pick the color scheme for the quilt and size (twin/double/queen).

Thanks for your consideration. If you are interested, donations can be done here:

http://www.tofighthiv.org/goto/alexdarke

Entries must be received by Feb 14th to be considered as part of the raffle.

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Rugen, I jsut saw this or I would ahve bought 3 tickets.

Let me know next time you decide to do something like this I would be more than glad to buy some.

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"Every normal man must be tempted at times to spit upon his hands, hoist the black flag, and begin slitting throats." -Henry Louis Mencken
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VEGETARIAN -Noun (vej-i-tair-ee-uhn): Ancient tribal slang for the village idiot who can't hunt, fish or ride.

Very cool! Also sorry I didn't see this.

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All good. I ended up netting $2300 for my ride with this, so it was very successful! I wish I could do another, given how successful it was, but the timing constraints on it are pretty tight with how much work goes into them to complete on top of how much time is taken up each day with me doing my daily rides (training).

I've started the winners quilt, in case anyone cares. Here are some of the initial hexagons created from the fabric they chose....



If I somehow finish this quilt super early and think I have time to do a second before the June deadline, I'll let you know, but I honestly doubt it. I'm getting into days of 30 mile rides and then 2 back to back days of 100 miles, so the time constraints are pretty severe. Still, not too shabby for a fat computer geek that had 0 physical activity prior to starting training for this.

Thanks for the consideration folks. And if you are feeling super generous... you could always just donate at the link above. (/shameless fundraising whore for a good cause).

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Figured I'd give people a status update, since the ride is now complete.

I managed to break my fund raising goal of $20,000 for HIV/AIDS charities. $21,370, in fact. This year was a record year for the ride and while they had less riders total, they raised a record amount: $14.2 million dollars.

This fat boy rode every mile. Every "hill" (oh god... Texas hill country did not prepare me for some of those climbs, but I made it!) was ridden. 545 miles, 7 days. Longest day was 109 miles. Shortest was 42, but it had 2 wicked, back to back, climbs and by day 5, your legs feel like wet pasta so you felt it in a way that I will never, ever forget. Bone weary has a whole new meaning to me these days.

Thanks to the supporters here who donated.

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Very cool