So I've been learning that I tend to do things backwards. I've been running around getting all my stuff in order to write my fundraising letter and send it out to people, but only today did I download the Fundraising Hangbook. Duh. And let me tell you that it's a lot better than the book I got out of the library - "How to Write Irrestible Fundraising Letters", from 1965. So I will hold off another few days on writing my plea for money.

Speaking of money, for the marathon, the total amount I'm required to raise is $5700.00. I would love to raise more than that, but I'll deal with first things first, as this is my first go at it all. I'm a bit worried, as I really don't like asking people for money, but I will go about raising that much money in the same way as I am going about running 42.2 K - slowly and surely.

This run is just getting easier and easier. Well, not that I've even been running that much lately, but I keep finding new sources of inspiration that I'm sure are going to make the miles just fly by.

At the Joints in Motion meetup party last week, I met all the very inspiring people who ran this past year, as well as several people who will be running again this year. That was exciting. It's very interesting to see how people sign up to run year after year and the marathons or the fundraising don't seem to consume them. I think all the passion and motivation in the room has a lot to do with that and it is for sure contagious. Next year, they're going to do the Great Wall Marathon and I'm already scheming ways to fit that in before our South America trip! But anyways...

This year I signed up to run the Joints in Motion marathon in Athens, Greece. It's a charity fundraiser that's put on by The Arthritis Society of Canada, where my mother worked before she died a few years ago. Her death has been hard for me to get over and one of the ways that I found really clears my head and gets me focused is through running, so I've been training at it intermittently and last year I ran the Scotiabank Half-Marathon. I didn't do very well in terms of time, but it was a milestone for me, an indication that I can accomplish what I set out to do in a mental or physical (or both) challenge.