Rowing in June

12 Jul 2010 posted by Dave Holby

Current Location – South Atlantic

32059km rowed… 7016 km remaining

Goodness me, what a scorcher! Glorious sunshine over the last few weeks has caused me to sweat off at least half a stone in weight which bearing in mind I’m built like a twiglet anyway meant I was on the verge of disappearing altogether. Fortunately I’ve developed a love of eccles cakes and although the weight is sitting in all the wrong places I’m hoping I won’t be vanishing into a sweaty puddle just yet. We’ve got some great fundraising dates coming up so I’ve got everything crossed that the pennies will keep coming in over the summer months.

Last month I was very honoured to be invited to the Place To Be Proud Of Awards in Festival Place – particularly delighted with the fact that we got to eat lots of chicken and potatoes. I was thrilled to be nominated but genuinely didn’t expect it to go any further, consequently I had a little glass of wine and being the complete and utter lightweight that I am it went to straight to my  head. The last award of the night was the Judge’s Special Award which I managed to pick up and I was so thrilled that I pulled the most outrageous drunken and sweaty gurn for a photograph for the Gazette – unfortunately it made appearance a few days ago along with the title of ‘Does This Man Deserve To Turn On The Christmas Lights?’. I have to say that I looked at the paper and thought I wouldn’t let that person out of the house until I realised that wine fuelled mad man was me – I’m just so thrilled it was shot torso up as at that point in the evening I’m convinced I’d taken my trousers off and left them somewhere!

Brilliant and lovely chap that he is, Stuart Dimond (of raising lots of pennies for Breakthrough through two fantastic gigs at The Red Lion fame) and I have been banging heads together (just ours, we wouldn’t hurt anyone else) and our in the process of producing a charity CD called ‘The Breakthrough Album’. It will feature fourteen cracking Basingstoke artists (all aged between 15 to 19) and the hope it will not only be a good fundraiser for Breakthrough but also to celebrate what musical talent we have in our home town. They are all amazing and we hope to have the album ready for sale (for £7 and every single penny going to the charity) by the middle of August – I promise I’ll keep you posted. In the meantime I wanted to pop up the album cover, designed by Stu and Cameron – what clever lads they are x

We also received a lovely visit from June of Hampshire and Isle of Wight Air Ambulance to collect over 300 bras that have been so kindly donated over the last two years. I didn’t want to let them go but alas they have gone and to a wonderful home too - the bras have been sent to women in countries across the Third World, a terrific cause. 

A huge thank you to Romy for Jo for donating on our justgiving page - I’ve got my fingers crossed we can crack that £14,000 mark as soon as possible x