relay

My last-second plea to get Relay For Life donations

April 25, 2012

If you have a few bucks to donate, I'd appreciate any support!

I have a feeling everyone reading this has somehow seen what cancer can do to someone.

Whether you’ve dealt with it directly, or read about it, or know someone who has dealt with it, you know what it can do. And who knows when or if a cure will be found, but they are continually trying to find it.

For those who don’t know, my father had cancer twice — colon and lung. The first time, he beat it. The second time, the disease won. After a long and courageous battle, he died on Aug. 17, 2007.

Not a day goes by that I don’t think about him.

Cancer is one of the worst things you can see someone go through. My grandmother died of cancer. I watched one of my best friends — in his early 30s — deal with it. I have other family members and other friends who have battled or are currently battling this disease.

It knows no age. It knows nothing about race and/or sex.

Relay For Life 2012

It knows only that it attacks people and it is a nasty, nasty disease.

Ever since my father died, I have participated in the American Cancer Society’s Relay For Life in our area. It’s an excellent event. Though the event itself sometimes can drag on, the idea of it is wonderful. And in the end, I’m actually only concerned with one thing when it comes to the Relay for Life — raising as much money as we can.

That’s where you come in.

Many of you who read this blog, I know. Others, I don’t. But I still ask the same — will you donate to my fundraising page?

Every dollar counts. No matter how much you can give, it helps. I understand the economy at this point. It’s not the greatest. But for some things, I always try and give. So anything you can give, I highly appreciate.

This year, I’m trying to spruce things up a bit. So, for every $5 you donate to my personal Relay For Life page(you can do luminaries, too — just do them through my page!), I will give you one entry for a random drawing to win a quilted scarf. The scarf, which is flannel, was quilted by my mother. It’s really nice and warm.

So, donate $20 and get four entries. It’s as simple as that!

The details about the scarf:

Material: Flannel.
Dimensions: The scarf is about 5 1/2 inches thick and about 58 inches long.
Who is it for?: Unisex.

If you want a little more info about the scarf (and more photos), check out the original post I had a couple of months ago.

So this is my final plea. I am trying to reach my personal goal ($500) and need a late push to make it. Even if I don’t make it, I’m happy with how much I’ve raised — and that our team has made its goal as well.

And, remember, you have a chance to win that wonderful quilted scarf! (Click on the link above to see photos and get the info… hopefully, that will sway you to donate!)

Feel free to leave a comment, or e-mail P.J. at hoohaablog [at] gmail.com. Also, please “Like” HooHaa Blog on Facebook!

Day Zero Project: Completed No. 3

May 22, 2011

A Day Zero Project goal of P.J.’s has been completed!

Goal completed: Attend a rally for a cause I really care about.

Date completed: April 29-30.

Number: 3 (remember, these goals will not all be done in order. It’s a random list where the numbers actually are).

Description: I had seen this one on the Day Zero website and thought it would make for a good addition to my list. It seems like a good thing as it gets you out into something and doing something for something you believe in.

Why I wanted to do it: Because, truthfully, it’s worth getting involved in some things.

How I did it: My “rally,” is a borderline rally, but for this list, it works. I attended and participated in the Relay For Life. The Relay is a fundraiser for the American Cancer Society. This rally, the Delaware County chapter, raises more than $100,000 each year. The Rally is a great evening of people coming together to celebrate those who have beaten cancer, remember those who lost the battle and support those who are currently fighting the disease. There are ways to raise money, events to participate in and people walking constantly. In the end, it’s people coming together to try and beat this awful disease. Our team raised more than $1,600, so we did pretty well, I think. Overall, a rally worth attending.

About P.J.’s Day Zero Project: Day Zero is a project where people come up with 101 things to do over 1001 days. I started the project on Oct. 10, 2010 with an anticipated finish date of July 8, 2013. Goals will not be revealed until they are completed. A private list is at the Day Zero website and the list will be made public upon completion of the project. It’s my thoughts that if things are kept private, should I not do them, change or find a way around it, I’d only be cheating myself.

What a … long … weekend

May 1, 2011

The putting basket with all the Relay For Life luminaries growing in the background.

It started Friday.

And the weekend went forever, it seemed. But I guess that happens when there’s a lack of sleep involved, eh?

The Relay For Life opened Friday night in Delhi. Our team (small one this year) had to worry about setting things up in a bit of rain and then had to deal with many more things during the night as Mother Nature wasn’t nice to the Relay this year.

To start things off, Darren went down early to set up our disc golf course. As a fund raiser, Darren had gotten custom discs to sell the night of the Relay. Those at the event then had the chance to come over and play the six-hole course three times around (so, 18 total holes) and compete for spirit points and some disc golf prizes.

We were also lucky enough to have Bob, a pro out of New Jersey come and join us. I think that was a super bonus, too, as he really seemed to get a lot of people involved and excited about the game. The course wasn’t too bad, but with the rain, the grounds were wet and the lighting wasn’t the best. That being said, it wasn’t a bad overall experience as we sold probably about 20-25 discs for the night, which is a great thing. However, the weather probably hurt us as well because the track became smaller to avoid too much mud and our tent was set back further than originally expected.

Which is too bad as I think it could have been a lot more fun with great weather. I really do think more people might have investigated with better weather. Too, there were fewer people hanging out than normal.

But, on the bright side of things, we learned some things and found that people really seemed to enjoy the idea. So, we might consider it again next year, though we were talking about doing an actual tournament next year as a fundraiser and maybe having the night one as a smaller event at the actual Relay. We also learned that we’ll need to light things a little different, but Darren seems to have some ideas and that could make things better.

As a team, we raised nearly $1,500 for the event, which raised more than $122,000 total.

We broke it down when all was said and done and I didn’t get home until about 3 a.m. or a little later. It took a little bit to get to sleep and the alarm going off at 5:10 a.m. wasn’t easy to answer. I figured I got about 1 1/2 hours of sleep. A quick shower and I was out the door to head off to meet Darren and Bob to hit up a disc golf tournament.

It was a beautiful day, but after 36 holes of disc golf, I was whipped. My feet hurt. My back was OK, but a little sore. Needless to say, I was ready to head home and catch some sleep… finally.

I enjoyed the tournament. It’s at one of the best courses in this area and despite all the rain New York got recently, it was in excellent shape. I shot better than I’ve ever shot at this course, but it still wasn’t that good. I need to get some confidence in my putting and I bet I could have shaved a good 5 strokes off my score in each round.

Darren, however, placed in our division, so that was cool.

Darren placed fourth at the tournament

All in all, it was a good weekend. A sleepless one, but a good one.

A lot of money was raised for cancer research and it was perfect weather for a disc golf tournament (despite the fact that I finished last in my division).

You can see more photos from the Relay For Life on my Flickr stream.

Feel free to leave a comment, or e-mail P.J. at hoohaablog [at] gmail.com.

It’s never too late to give

April 29, 2011

Glow discs for our on-site Relay for Life fundraiser.

Later tonight and into tomorrow morning, our Relay For Life will be taking place.

Despite the weather we’ve had this week and a soppy field, we’ll be doing the event to raise money for cancer research. It’s never too late to give, either. For those who were considering donating for this event, please check out my page and give if you can. However, at this point, I wouldn’t do it via luminaries as I am not sure how they go about online ones if they come after 8 a.m. the day of (when they started putting them all together). A regular donation would be much appreciated.

My page can be visited by clicking here.

We went down to the fields tonight to check out and test a few things for our on-site fundraiser — a glow disc golf tournament. We’re hoping to sell many of the discs and have a good turnout for the event as we hope many of the relay participants will buy a disc and play in the tourney. We have some pretty good prizes for the winners!

We did some “light writing” to get ourselves prepped for the Relay as well. This is Darren doing the writing in this sequence.

: Relay For Life 2011

Relay For Life 2011

Once again, thanks to anyone who can and/or did donate. Every dollar counts. Let’s hope to cure this awful disease.

Feel free to leave a comment, or e-mail P.J. at hoohaablog [at] gmail.com.

My annual plea for Relay for Life donations

April 25, 2011

Hi all.

This Friday and Saturday is our annual Relay For Life in Delhi.

For those who don’t know, the Relay For Life is a fundraising event for the American Cancer Society. I’m sure pretty much everyone reading this has been touched by cancer in one way or another. Whether it be a friend or family member. Someone who lost their battle or is a survivor. Either way, cancer is so widespread that most people have been touched by it some way or another.

I’ve seen several sides of this awful disease.

I lost my father to cancer. I watched two very close friends in their 30s battle it and beat it and hopefully it stays away. I’ve known several others who have lost their battles to the disease.

It’s awful.

My hope is that in my lifetime, we’ll see a cure for cancer. It won’t be done without help, however. Money needs to be there for research. This disease needs to be beaten, so it’s something that we should all strive to help defeat.

So I come to you, my few readers of this blog. I am asking for a donation to our Relay For Life team.

The Relay for Life is an all-night affair. Teams have people walking the “track” all night as other events go on in hopes of raising more money. People sell things. Run events. Run raffles. Anything to make more money. In the 10 or 11 years that the Delaware County Relay has been going, its raised more than 1 million dollars to go to the American Cancer Society.

Yes, more than 1 million dollars!

I’d like to see that trend continue.

So I ask you to give what you can. Five dollars. Ten dollars. Twenty dollars. A hundred dollars. Please give if you can, however.

You can do it one of two ways — by a straight donation or by purchasing a luminary ($5 each). The luminary can be in someone’s memory or can be in honor of a survivor or someone battling the disease.

Should you purchase a luminary through my page, please let me know whose name you put the luminary in. On the night of the Relay, when they do the luminary ceremony, I will do my best to try and find the luminary and take a photo of it and post it during my Relay wrap here on the blog. For the best chance of me finding the luminary, you should purchase it no later than Thursday night.

You can start the donation process by visiting my page on the Delaware County Relay site (click here). If you don’t have or don’t want to use a credit card and live local, let me know and I can try and meet up with you to get your donation. If not local, I can give you an address to send a check to if that would be easier.

Thank you in advance for anything you can give.

Feel free to leave a comment, or e-mail P.J. at hoohaablog [at] gmail.com.