Slacking on the updates again...

Sometimes I'm getting so much done that I forget I should be telling all of you about it! First things first, let's thank some donors:

Christine Sensenig
Judith Herzlin
Scott Shreiner and Holly Scroggin
Prestige Air Conditioning Systems, Inc.
Wayne and Nancy Griffin
Lillian Roberts
Muscle Express
Tom and Lisa Koza
All of the Bike & Builders who have purchased the bike charms donated by Reller Gold

I really appreciate all of your contributions and support for this ride!

So, now for a general update. I am much closer to my fundraising goal than I was at my last update. I'm almost at $3000 and, as of 27 minutes ago, I have one month until I leave! I think (hope) a lot of my recent success has had to do with other things I've been doing, which I guess I'll share now. A few weeks ago, I sent press releases to quite a few news venues. None of the newspapers in Gainesville picked up the articles, but three newspapers in the western Palm Beach County area did, and all of them published different articles about me and Bike & Build. I know that at least two of my recent donations were a direct result of one of these articles, and they got the word out about B&B, so I'm really excited!

Also, Juan, the guy who runs the farmer's market (who is awesome, by the way), told me that there is a Haile Village newsletter that comes out monthly. I got in touch with the guy who runs that, Bryan, and he also published an article with a pictures of me in the newsletter and linked to it from the main webpage. Check it out: www.haileguide.com. The article is "Local Woman to Bicycle Across US," in case that wasn't really obvious. While I was at the market today, a few people told me that they had read the article and purchased t-shirts and bicycle charms. I am now sold out of small bicycle charms and only have the larger ones left!

How did I sell that many charms, you ask? I actually sent an email to all of the Bike & Builders for this summer and asked if anyone would like one. The response was awesome! People on quite a few different routes got them, some for Mother's Day, some to commemorate the trip (which is why I have mine), etc. They were really excited that all of the money goes to B&B too, since each of them is also raising $4k for the organization.

I really like being at the farmer's market every Saturday. I'm going to be sad when it ends. There's always this big struggle to get out of bed that early on a Saturday morning (mornings are not really my thing), but it has become such a nice way of connecting with people. There's a good mix of people I know from other areas of my life (my two coworkers usually stop by-one brought her baby today, my old faculty advisor usually stops by-today he and his wife got me breakfast, I saw my old research advisor today, sometimes I see friends, etc.), people who have met me at the market and want to get updates about training and fundraising, and new people to talk to about B&B. I'm also getting to know some of the other vendors well and just enjoy spending my Saturday mornings not hanging out at my apartment.

Okay, so now for the training update. I got the Dolce finally! I went and got it fitted at Chain Reaction and it rides beautifully. There is nothing like having a bike that fits you really well. I really haven't been riding nearly as much as I should be (as in I haven't taken the Dolce out for a long ride until today). I was out of town for two weekends and have been really busy trying to get ready for everything. I did a 30 mile ride with my friend Hugo today after the farmer's market (on the Hawthorne Trail), but I was hurting. I think I got severely dehydrated, because by the end I couldn't really form coherent thoughts, got a splitting headache, and got off the bike and threw up a lot (sorry if that grosses anyone out). I was so out of it I forgot to clip out of my pedals at the end of the ride and fell over and smashed my face on the pavement. That was nice. Thank goodness for helmets, though! I was a little dehydrated before we left, I think, and it was hot today. I ended up getting sick again when I got home and just went to bed at around 6 PM. I'm up now because I needed to eat and do a couple of things, but I'll be back in bed shortly. I would like to ride another 30 miles before going to teach tomorrow. We'll see how I feel, though. I'm still a little weak and headache-y.

I've gotten a bunch of gear ordered and bought, so it's all sitting in my room, ready to go and I'm very excited. I think I'll still need a few more things, but that will wait until next paycheck.

In personal news, I bought a house in Texas (one of the weekends I was out of town)! We close in June. By we, I mean I signed power of attorney over to my parents so that they can handle the closing for me since I'll be somewhere in Ohio riding my bike when closing happens, I believe. Also, I'll be 23 in less than a week now. My birthday is on Saturday, and it's very weird. 23 is not a big one. It's not 18 or 21. I probably won't even go out (I have to be up early for the farmer's market and I would like to get a ride in sometime too, so there will be no drinking), but I think what's weird is that I knew I would be going on this ride, closing on the house, and starting grad school when I was 23. Since I'm not 23 yet, those things can't possibly be happening yet. Once I turn 23, I think it will hit me that it's all happening in the next 3 months. So there are my general musings for the day.

I will try to update again soon, and if I ride tomorrow, I will certainly let you know how it goes!