Terry Fox Run 2007
High Park, Toronto

I shot the Polish Festival mostly within two feet of a speaker system. I’m still vibrating.

Some photos of the Polish Festival, as a slideshow, or thumbnails, or in the PictoBrowser.

I’m doing the Terry Fox Run for Cancer Research tomorrow morning at 9 o’clock so I’d better hie myself to bed. It’s not too late to add your pledge to my total! I’ve got $75 to go before I reach my goal…

skateboarding on Roncesvalles Avenue

I love watching skateboarding, but hardly any of these guys wear padding and I cringe when they crash; I’m close by and can practically feel them hit the pavement or the ramp. I saw a few doozies this morning and nearly got hit by a flying skateboard a couple of times.

“I think my skateboard likes you,” he said.

Photography can be a hazardous hobby.

This looks amazing! Check it out:

How to Knit Marzipan at Vegan Yum-Yum

And why would you WANT to knit marzipan, you may ask? Why, so you can create these:

photo by teenytinyturkey

I almost didn’t make it to my first screening at the annual Toronto International Film Festival. I arrived home early from work today (top-secret work mission accomplished, by the way!) and tried to nap before heading back out again, but I’m not very good at naps. I’m good at crashing, passing out, falling fast asleep, dozing off, snoozing, all of that, but naps require the use of at least three very loud alarms and even so, loud noises are not always effective at bringing me back to a state of consciousness. I barely made it to the cinema in Yorkville and I was only half-awake on the way there, but once the film got underway I was riveted.

I hadn’t planned to see Iron Ladies of Liberia, actually. Back in June I bought a Festival package through Visa called Explorer or something like that: 3 movies selected for the buyer at a much cheaper rate ($75 including taxes and fees) instead of the full price of $37.50 each. They guarantee all three films are either on weeknight evenings or weekends. I had to sell my other two tickets because the films were shown last weekend while I was in Philly, so this was the only one I could attend. Too bad. But hey, there’s always next year.

I didn’t mind not being able to choose the films because the fact that they made it into the Festival in the first place means they pass TIFF muster. That’s good enough for me. I also like the surprise. I read nothing about the film beforehand, but Liberia? I could certainly learn more about the country — the only factoid I can tell you is the name of the dictator they ousted for corruption (Charles Taylor).

The film info and synopsis from the TIFF site:

Iron Ladies of Liberia offers an up-close look at the hard work of nation building. How do you reconstruct a country after fourteen brutal years of war? This film has one good answer: let women lead.

To Western eyes, there are scenes in this film that prick the middle-class conscience: widespread pollution and lack of sanitation, grinding poverty, structural dilapidation. You see what the Iron Ladies of Liberia have inherited, what little they have to work with, and the larger question — where do they even start??? What takes priority? Liberia, in its years of corruption, had accumulated a debt that was impossible to pay back, and was in trouble with the IMF and World Bank, a situation that discourages any foreign investment to get the economy moving again. It’s a catch-22 situation, and the kind which you’ve probably heard Bono of U2 talking about for years: “debt forgiveness”. Here’s an article for an opposing opinion.

The producer, Henry Ansbacher, attended the screening, introducing the film and answering questions about it afterwards. Apparently CBC is going to feature it in October, and the Knowledge Network as well. I hope this movie gets picked up for distribution, because it’s a real eye-opener. It’s also very inspiring to see an articulate 68-year woman put heart and soul into digging her country out of a serious hole: a 90% unemployment rate, crumbling infrastructure, the constant threat of civil unrest. She is one strong lady, I tell you, but the film also shows her vulnerable side, the side that acknowledges the very real possibility she may fail to turn the country around.

I got caught in a flash storm over the Pennsylvania Turnpike last Saturday, just before I got on to drive to Philadelphia. I had to take shelter at an A&W because visibility was next to nil while the rains came down in torrents. I didn’t dare take my camera out of the car in case it got wet, so I had to wait out most of the storm with a frosty mug o’ root beer. When it died down a bit I dashed back to the car, soaking, and amused myself shooting the raindrops on the windshield until it subsided enough to drive again.

If you look closely you can see the reflection of one lamp post in the big drops.

Freak Storm #1 was through upstate New York two weeks prior to Freak Storm #2, when I drove through crazy lightning, thunder, wind, and rain before getting into Scranton at 2am. (Yeah, that trip I haven’t written about yet. I’ll get to it, after my top-secret current assignment for tomorrow is complete and I see my one Toronto Film Festival movie in the evening and process the photos of the regatta I promised the rowing club and mail off some lung cancer bracelets people asked for and get my passport photos taken… I don’t know how people have time for TV, seriously!!)

I crashed at 8:00 last night, so now that it’s Wednesday I think I can say I’ve finally caught up on my sleep deficit from all that driving last weekend.

On Sunday morning — well, afternoon once we had brunch at Rx — we recorded Episode #62 of The Unharshed Mellow in Addie and Seuss’s living room in Philadelphia.

Seuss, directing

the only shot I could get of Addie with the flash

The episode is titled “Home Economics Trauma”, which would only become evident once you listen to the podcast.

I’m not the only guest, by the way, artist Tyler Hudson is also on the show:

Tyler

I have to thank Tyler for taking the microphone away from me before I filled up the entire show with tales of my father. Sorry, Dad… you’ve underestimated how funny you are.

It was also the first time I used my new external flash besides the wedding I shot last month. (The bride’s back from her honeymoon and she loves the pictures!) I definitely need some practice with flash, but these didn’t turn out too badly. Check out the Sipping With Seuss segment:

foam ’stached Seuss

OK, time to head off for work!

The Swing at Ocean City, New Jersey’s Wonderland amusement park on the boardwalk

Mondays can be brutal, but a Monday after driving 1,200+ miles or 2,000 kms over a weekend requires major caffeination and a lot of willpower not to crawl underneath my desk for a nap. I’m going to see if I can catch a short snooze now, but I may just wake up tomorrow… before I go, I’d just like to thank everyone who donated online over the weekend to sponsor me for the Terry Fox Run on Sunday. I’m two-thirds of the way toward my goal of $300 thanks to the generosity of these kind folks. I’ve got six days to raise $100, so if you’d like to make a contribution, fire away! Your donor information will not be public (I’m the only one who sees any info), and you will receive a CCRA income tax receipt in PDF format right away. Apologies to those outside of Canada who can’t get an income tax deductible receipt valid in your country, but rest assured the Terry Fox Run is a well-established charity that has been supporting the National Cancer Institute of Canada for more than two decades. 87 cents of each dollar raised goes directly to NCIC.

From the Terry Fox website:

An electronic tax receipt for your donation, in accordance with Canada Customs and Revenue Agency, is sent to the e-mail address you provide and can be printed out on a printer. If no e-mail is provided, it will be mailed to the street address on the form. Our Charitable Registration Number is 10809 9979 RR0001 and our privacy statement is available for viewing.

More photos of the weekend to come, after a battery recharge. I did get to go flying!

over Lake Ariel, Pennsylvania

A photo from The Ex last weekend. The set thus far can be viewed as a slideshow or thumbnails.

I’m off for another computer-less weekend. Happy Friday to all!

It’s next weekend, Sunday, September 16. I need sponsors! I was reminded recently that the run was coming up, and I’ve just decided to try and do it every year. My goal is to actually RUN it, but I’m in no shape to do that next weekend — I’ll have to work up to it. Since I only signed up today and it’s 10 days from now, I’m going to set a modest goal of $300.

Any Canadian over the age of probably six knows the Terry Fox story because the whole country participates in the annual runs, from coast to coast. The schools I attended had the entire student population do the run every September, as part of school.

According to Wikipedia, the Terry Fox Run is the largest one-day fundraiser for cancer research.

From the Terry Fox website:

Terry Fox was born in Winnipeg, Manitoba, and raised in Port Coquitlam, British Columbia, a community near Vancouver on Canada’s west coast. An active teenager involved in many sports, Terry was only 18 years old when he was diagnosed with osteogenic sarcoma (bone cancer) and forced to have his right leg amputated 15 centimetres (six inches) above the knee in 1977.

While in hospital, Terry was so overcome by the suffering of other cancer patients, many of them young children, that he decided to run across Canada to raise money for cancer research.

He would call his journey the Marathon of Hope.

After 18 months and running over 5,000 kilometres (3,107 miles) to prepare, Terry started his run in St. John’s, Newfoundland on April 12, 1980 with little fanfare. Although it was difficult to garner attention in the beginning, enthusiasm soon grew, and the money collected along his route began to mount. He ran 42 kilometres (26 miles) a day through Canada’s Atlantic provinces, Quebec and Ontario.

It was a journey that Canadians never forgot.

However, on September 1st, after 143 days and 5,373 kilometres (3,339 miles), Terry was forced to stop running outside of Thunder Bay, Ontario because cancer had appeared in his lungs. An entire nation was stunned and saddened. Terry passed away on June 28, 1981 at age 22.

The heroic Canadian was gone, but his legacy was just beginning.

To date, more than $400 million has been raised worldwide for cancer research in Terry’s name through the annual Terry Fox Run, held across Canada and around the world.

When Terry Fox died in 1981, I just turned 9 years old, but I distinctly remember the television footage of this lonely figure running along the side of the road, trying to achieve this monumental goal and outrun the cancer. He had a prosthetic leg, so he had a unique lopsided running gait. That kind of imagery sticks with you for life.

Of course, even if I’d never heard of Terry Fox, I have my own personal reasons to support cancer research.

It’s been years since I did the run — Grade 12! — but it’s high time I joined it again. If you’d like to add your support, I’ve got online pledging set up through the Terry Fox website. The site accepts donations in any currency, and has a currency converter.

Yes, I’d like to support cancer research and Gail needs the exercise! Take me to the pledge page.

Where does the money go?
I want to find out more information.
I’d like to do the Terry Fox Run, too! Where else in Canada is it taking place?
I live outside of Canada, are there Terry Fox Runs worldwide? (From Flickr: there’s a Terry Fox Run in Hyde Park, London, every year.)

Please give generously! Thank you!