Ode to Treats

A Pillow Case Full of Dreams

Costumes
Friends
Night time
Neighbors houses
Doorbell
Trick-or-treat
Chocolate nougat
Cookie centers
Running running
Across the lawns
Through the streets
Peanut butter
Gum
Hello
What are you
Oh so scary
Carmel
Candy Corn
What a fine costume
Where have you been
Did we get that house
Apple cider
Penny candy
Fun
Fantasy
Taffy
Toothbrush!
Get the toilet paper...
Home
Pile
Too much sugar?
Good night
Sleep tight
And in the morning
Take of your costume


Hey all,
Well, I hope you all like the new poem. Next weeks topic vote should be up soon over on Facebook later today. Stop on by and tell me what you think.

Paranormal SWAT #1

Well, here we are the first Friday in October and as promised my first post of a Halloween monster story. I hope you enjoy the adventure of our daring heroes and now without further ado I present...

Paranormal S.W.A.T.
Supernatural Weapons & Arcane Tactics

and

The Cul-de-sac to Hell

They could see the flames from the highway.  Dr. Griffin Wells (scout and forensics) had joked from the back, “it’s never easy is it?”  After a groaning pause, everyone in the back began putting on their tactical armor.  Each standard SWAT suit, originally designed to be bullet proof, was also inscribed with sets of sigils and runes, up the arms and across the back, to ward of more incredible threats.

Rabi Adam Stein (religion and heavy weapons) drove the truck, “I guess this confirms he’s not a crackpot, Albert,’ he said indicating the pillar of green flames still some two miles away.

Wells called from the back, “yeah, thank god he’s not crazy.  He’s just screwed.”

Captain Albert Card (tactics, command, and sorcery) swiveled his seat around to face the back of the weapon lined command truck, “I think that’s quite enough, don’t you Griffin?”  Wells placing the tactical helmet over his head, the visor obscuring the insides nodded silently, “excellent.”

Douglas Wulf (close quarters and wilderness survival) was gathering up guns and handing them around.  “What munitions you want Captain?”

“Let’s wait till we get closer.  It’s quicker to outfit there than it is to get it wrong and have to redo it.”  He started to swivel his seat back towards the front.  Albert ran his fingers through his jet black hair, made even darker by his pale skin.  Wulf noted that he ran his thumb and middle finger over the sides of his widows peak, a sure sign he was thinking “Actually, belay that, green flames is a good indicator, get the blue clips with the cold iron slugs ready.  If we need anything else I’ll decide once we arrive.”

“Will do,” Wulf cried out moving to follow the order.  While busily at work he looked to the last and newest member of the team, “Lagoona, you OK?”

Blake Lagoona (aquatic operations and sniper), already in full gear, a slight gurgling noise coming from his respirator, gave Wulf a double thumbs up as his answer.  Wulf wasn’t entirely convinced, he had hoped for a smaller job to break in the rookie, hoping to see if Blake’s inability to talk would hinder the team.

As they grew closer to the Donovan home they noticed the runes of their armor beginning to glow a little bit brighter.

*  *  *

Jim Donovan had just regained consciousness when the command truck pulled up to the house.  He was lying in the street, everyone afraid to move him, not sure exactly what had gone wrong.  His neighbors anxious to ask questions.  Albert wasted no time and leapt from the truck and approached the crowd, parting them with a gesture and stern glance.

The back door burst open and the team leapt out taking stock of the burning home.  Wulf, moved to the middle of the lawn and began staring at the house, his eyes moving from window to window.  Occasionally, he appeared to sniff, as if a clue as to the families whereabouts could be drawn from the very air itself.  Dr. Mullan, one of Jims neighbors, approached the back of the command truck where everyone was waiting getting the last few pieces of equipment ready.  It was Adam who turned to face him, “You’re Dr. Mullan, correct?”

“Yes, I am Dr. Mullan and who are you folks, your certainly not any of the local rescue crews.”

Adams seven foot frame loomed over the doctor, the specially ordered set of tactical armor barely fitting over his heavily muscled arms.  “Rabi Stein,” Adam smiled easily while adjusting his helmet under the other arm, reached his hand out and shook the Doctors, “We’re specialists.  Margret Donovan called us in to consult a week ago, and clearly, they ignored our advice to get the hell out of the house.”  Adam paused and adjusted the collar of the green turtle neck that stuck out of the top of his armor.  “I hate to ask this Doctor, but are Margret and the kids still inside?”

“Call me Seamus, and sadly, aye they are.  But I’m not sure how helpful you’ll be here, son.  Some of the lads have been trying to fight their way through the fire,  but this ones not taking to water right.”  Adam looked around and noticed that some of the local men had run hoses to the neighboring houses and were fighting the blaze with the quick efficiency of Chicago firefighters.  “I’ve never seen green flames before, I fear the only thing you’ll be doing tonight Rabi, is last rights.”

“Adam.  Once the Captains done talking to Jim and finding out exactly what were dealing with, well head in.  Feel free to use any of the medical supplies in the truck to treat his injuries, we have neck braces and a stretcher so you should be able to move him.”  Adam turned and looked at Albert, who was failing to keep a disgusted look from his face.  “He looks like he’s about done,” turning to the rest of the team, “let’s form up.”

As Albert approached the back of the truck he called to Lagoona in the back, “Grab the white clips with the silver slugs, we may need those too.”

Wulf turned back from watching the house, “Captain…”

“I know Wulf,” Albert interrupted, holding his hands up, “not a great sign, but I’m not sure what were dealing with in there.  We’ll start with standard munitions, and see where we need to go from there.  So everyone should have 7 clips.”

Wulf nodded, “I appreciate the concern, but that’s not what I was going to say.   The house, it’s not burning, it’s sinking.”

Everyone turned to face the house, and it was true, the foundation was a good foot below what it had been a week earlier when Wulf and Adam had been out to look around.  Wells was the first to speak, “I heard the bottom was dropping out of the properties market, but this is a bit much.”

Adam ignored the remark, “So Albert, what’s going on?”

Albert sighed, “Lets head in, I’ll catch everyone up as we go.”

“OK,” agreed Adam, “you want me to grab Mary?”  Albert turned to the back of the van where Adam’s Gatling cannon hung in its cage, the only weapon locked up.

Albert thought for a moment before answering, “no, the walls on the house are to thin. We’ll just end up killing the neighbors. Lets go.”

As they jogged off across the lawn, Wulf and Adam securing their helmet’s in place, Albert began the quick description of the nights events.  “The evening started weird, furniture moving itself, random noises, flickering lights, and then the dog flew.   That’s when he called us.  I told him, tell the wife and kids your going for ice cream and head to a hotel until we clear the house.  He decided to tell the wife what was going on so her and the kids could pack.  Whatever’s in the house heard, and decided that was not how the evening was going.  While he was getting the car this happened, everyone else is still inside.”

As they reached the steps Mike Flynn, the local Fire chief, called out to them, “You can’t get in there it’s to hot.”

“It’s OK sir, we’re professionals,” responded Wells.

Albert stepped up to the house, pulled a small icon from around his neck and called out, “Klaatu.  Barada.  Nikto.”  The flames pulled back from the door and parted allowing a way inside.  Wells, readied his sawn off shotgun and dashed inside.

Adam, Lagoona and Albert flipped the safeties off on their assault weapons and Wulf drew his two pistols.  Adam leaned over to Albert, “Really, the Day the Earth Stood Still?”

“You have to put on a show, if people knew how easy magic was, everyone would be doing it, and where exactly would that leave us?”  Albert paused and then in a more serious tone, “are you going to be OK in there?  I know how you feel about fire.”

“There’s kids in there.  I’ll be fine.”  Albert decided to drop it not wanting to push his friend.

The team quickly followed Wells into the house, staying just behind him, but always with a clear line of sight.  The house was filled with an eerie green glow from the flames dancing across every surface.  As they moved through the foyer and into the house, they watched as Wells opened every side room and closet door, checking the contents of each. After five agonizingly slow minutes, they had cleared the ground floor and found no one. Wells signaled the group that he was moving to the stairs up to the second floor.

 As the team crouched at the base of the stairs, Wells slunk along the wall, the runes on his sleeves brightened as green flames danced across his armor.  It took only a few steps for him to reach the top, and move just past the lip.  The rest of the team prepared to follow him when then sudden bark of his shotgun filled the silence.  There was another shot and Wells quickly backed into view, and down the stairs keeping his shotgun aimed up through the opening.

“Report,” Albert’s voice was crisp and quick as the team fell in to guard positions around Wells, watching every direction.

“The house has stated a serious objection to us going onto the second floor, by way of a walking corpse.”
“God I hate zombies,” Wulf groaned.

Adam paused, “one of the family.”

“Too old, who ever it was, they’d been dead a while. Not a zombie either, I’m packing rock salt for the run through, didn’t want to accidentally kill one of the kids.”

“Are you sure you hit it?”  Albert queried.

“Both shots, upper mass. Second shot tore it’s head clean off, and it kept coming. Now that I’ve backed down stairs, it seems to have lost interest.”

Wulf chimed in, “So how do we stop the house?”

“Switch to white ammo,” Albert commanded, everyone quickly complied.  “Whatever it is, it’s not the house.”  Albert nodded up the stairs and Wells and Wulf moved forward in tandem.  “The house is only two years old, the Donovan’s are the original owners, nothing has happened here to make it the house.”

Albert went up next with Adam and Lagoona following behind guarding the rear.  Adam asked, “was the house built on a graveyard or did some sort of tragedy happen here?”

Albert took position at the top of the stairs while Wulf and Wells moved forward. “No I checked, I even interviewed the inspector who checked the land and they did some pretty extensive surveys of the area, they came up with nothing but a dead squirrel.”

“This is one pissed off squirrel,” Wells called out moving into a bedroom at the top of the stairs.  Just as he was most of the way around the corner an arm, bathed in green flames, reached out of the room and grabbed his shoulder.  Wells shotgun barked and the arm flew back into the room.  “Silver works.”  Wells fired his shot gun twice more emptying the chamber, “Wulf, two more.”

Wells ducked down and backed into the hall as Wulf stepped forward and raised his pistols through the opening, he fired four quick shots, then after a pause one more. “They’re down,” he moved forward and Albert moved up while Wells reloaded.  Wulf holstered a weapon while crossing into what appeared to be the boys bedroom.  He quickly flipped the bed on it’s side then moving to the closet flung the door open.

He turned back to the group, “It’s clear.”  A burst of green flames erupted from the floor in the center of the room, and a huge rotted body launched upward into the room between Albert and Wulf.  It hovered between the comrades wreathed in green flames and then settled down and rushed towards Wulf with a burst of speed.  With the creature between them neither Albert or Wulf wanted to chance hitting the other.  Wulf ducked down and with his empty hand drew one of the long bowie knives strapped to the small of his back.  He moved backwards out of the creatures grasp bringing the weapon with the deep red runes etched into it’s surface glowing bright enough to change the color in the room.  The beast moved in again pushing Wulf towards the wall, and swiped at him with a clawed hand.  Wulf raised his arm to fend off the blow, bright sparks showered the room where the beast claws touched the armor.  The runes on Wulfs armor flickered and their light died away.  Taking advantage of his speed Wulf moved inside his opponents reach and drove the blade of his knife deep inside the creatures chest.  The creature paused a moment suspended on Wulfs blade, then slowly dissolved into a puddle on the floor.

Adam who had moved up to the door to support the outside of the room looked inside, “Albert, the runes are red.  Whatever this is, it’s not evil.”

Wulf looked at the blade, “if they’re red he’s right. If this were evil it would be white.  Hell, background evil alone keeps this thing white most days.”

Albert took the knife from Wulf and looked at the runes flicker across it‘s surface, “everybody holster your weapons.”  Handing Wulf his knife Albert slung his own rifle over his shoulder. He moved out into the middle of the hall holding his hands up in a gesture of nonaggression.

“Hello, I don’t know who you are and I don’t know what you want. We’ll do what we can to help you, but these are good people, they haven’t hurt you. Let them go and let‘s see what we can do.”

The green flames on the wall began to move towards the center of the hallway just ahead of Albert, they leapt along surfaces, leaving no trail of destruction, they gathered before him piling on top of one another forming a great hulking shape, barely contained by the walls around it.  It formed before him, standing as a man wearing long ceremonial robes, where it’s head should have been rested was a miniature sun with a blocky face looking down on Albert.

Albert stepped back from the sun faced monster in a brief moment of panic he moved his hands to ward his face. When nothing happened he paused and took a deep breath and regained his composure and said, “Show me what you need.”

The Sun faced monster looked at Albert and then without warning let out a deafening scream that was accompanied by the sound of shattering glass, car alarms and emergency sirens.  The creature reared back and then dove towards Albert, relinquishing it’s form and forcing itself down Albert’s throat.  Albert’s face contorted into a look of pain, his body convulsed as if trying to expel something horrible and alien, yet nothing came.  When the last of the creature disappeared into his mouth, a tortured shriek of pure suffering echoed from Albert’s lips.

*  *  *

It had been a whole fifteen minutes since the flames disappeared and the screaming had stopped.  No one was sure what to do, broken glass covered the grass and streets. Local fire trucks had arrived and the men had hooked the hoses up and had headed in, even though the fire appeared to have been put out.  Some of the fire fighters emerged a few moments later carrying the children.

Once they set them down, Katie and Danny Donovan ran across the lawn towards their father.  He was so overcome he just sat there in shocked silence until they ran up and hugged him.  Margret walked out with the team, Albert was leaning against Adam.  In his left hand Adam held a purple and red cloth with something metallic dangling out of it.  Margret walked past Jim and went to talk to her sister, Jeanne and her husband Officer Mike O’Malley.

Seamus approached the men as they crossed the lawn, “is there anything I can do to help?”

Albert looked at the man about to say something and then seemed to change his mind, “can you take the children to their mother, we need to talk to Jim.”  Seamus agreed and gathered Danny and Katie and walked them to their mother.

Adam passed Albert off to Wulf and Lagoona who helped him into the back of the van.  Adam then held the rag up in front of Jim and let a small, ornate, obsidian amulet dangle out the bottom.  “So, this was the problem.  It’s an old Incan talisman, belonging to a priest of Inti, the God of the Sun.  It was in a cursed tomb, and your wife was the first person to actually touch it.  Dug up in Peru, travels a couple of hundred miles, personally carried by messenger, hand delivered to you, wrapped in a box, left as a gift for your wife, and some how no one touched it but her.  Fortunately, we have a friend whose an expert on cursed tombs and such, so he should be able to take care of this for us.”

Adam pulled a velvet cushioned, lead lined, teak box, fashioned by Irish Druids, specifically for this sort of thing, from inside of the truck and placed the amulet inside.  Then with a quick twist of his fingers he secured the wrought iron lock, and for a moment, the box glowed slightly.  “Two quick pieces of advice.  First, the next time you plan on killing someone with a cursed Incan artifact, don’t talk about it in front of the artifact.  Second, don’t cheat on your wife in front of the artifact, either.  Mostly because that’s just tacky.”  Adam walked around to the front of the truck and pulled himself up.

Jim stuttered, “You can’t prove, I mean, I didn’t…”

Albert rolled over on the bench in the back of the truck and looked at Jim, “you’re right, we can’t prove it, there is no way to arrest you for murder, since sorcery isn’t recognized as an actual thing in this country.  However, your wife knows your cheating on her, and with who, so, get a lawyer.  Also, when I’m better, if I’m still this pissed, I may come and find you.”  With that, Albert collapsed, the last remnants of his strength escaping his body like an icy breath on a cold day.

Wulf and Lagoona looked out at Jim from the back of the truck, Lagoona still in full gear, shook his head in disappointment.  Wells, also still in armor rested his hand on Jim’s shoulder.  Jim turned to look straight into the empty face plate on his helmet.  “Expect our bill, dumb-ass.”  Wells climbed into the back of the truck and closed the door.

The End

Well I hope you enjoyed it if so head on over to facebook and let me know or simply leave a comment below. If you enjoyed this one check out the next installment, Heavy Metal Exorcism.  

A Well Pressed Metaphor

A Well Pressed Metaphor

Tonight we studied irony. We talked about nice pleats, good cuffs, and straight seams. We also talked about what makes Thomas Swift a rotten baby sitter. If you haven’t read a Modest Proposal I suggest you check it out.

The discussion broke down into two ideas, that sort of define irony or ironic speech/writing. The three pieces of irony, which is having a result that is the exact opposite of the expectations. There’s sarcasm, satire, and parody. Satire is defined as using language and literary means to illicit positive social change. I suppose if you define positive by the person who wrote the piece, then yes. Though I would think some people write satire just to be dicks. We also debated whether Alanis Morissette was a genius or an fool.  Since the song Ironic has no irony in it, which is quite ironic, don’t you think….

I’ve always liked parody Airplane, Blazing Saddles, and my all time favorite Loaded Weapon 1. Which is the skewering of an idea or genre without any attempt at social change. I like the idea of looking at a genre in a new way or new fashion and I find parody is usually the first step to doing something a little differently.

Finally we talked about the upcoming debate, I usually watch the debates, so this ends up being homework I was going to do anyway. I’m hoping both candidates are on their game, I like my debates spirited and informational. Certainly I’ll be checking politafacts.com in a day or so to see how accurate each participant was. I’m interested to see what Romney does here as he tends to poll as arrogant. Which gives him a pretty powerful tool in my mind, since no matter what he does he’ll be seen as arrogant he might as well just be arrogant. It should be interesting.

So tell me what you think, are you going to watch the debates? have you already seen them, and how do you think they're going? Head on over to facebook and let me know what you think.

Ode to Spring

Sprung

Coiled metal hoop
In watches beds toasters but
Slinky is most fun

well how's my attempt at a Haiku? Any opinion head on over to facebook and let me know.

Cul-de-sac to Hell Preview

Well we're one week away from the first installment in my October Monster Stories. I thought I might post a quick preview. So here's a small excerpt from Cul-de-sac to Hell one of the adventures of a Paranormal SWAT team from Chicago. Come back next Friday and see how it turns out.



As they reached the steps Mike Flynn, the local Fire chief, called out to them, “You can’t get in there it’s to hot.”

“It’s OK sir, we’re professionals,” responded Wells.

Albert stepped up to the house, pulled a small icon from around his neck and called out, “Klaatu.  Barada.  Nikto.”  The flames pulled back from the door and parted allowing a way inside.  Wells, readied his sawn off shotgun and dashed inside.

Adam, Lagoona and Albert flipped the safeties off on their assault weapons and Wulf drew his two pistols.  Adam leaned over to Albert, “Really, the Day the Earth Stood Still?”

“You have to put on a show, if people knew how easy magic was, everyone would be doing it, and where exactly would that leave us?”  Albert paused and then in a more serious tone, “are you going to be OK in there?  I know how you feel about fire.”

“There’s kids in there.  I’ll be fine.”  Albert decided to drop it not wanting to push his friend.

The team quickly followed Wells into the house, staying just behind him, but always with a clear line of sight.  The house was filled with an eerie green glow from the flames dancing across every surface.  As they moved through the foyer and into the house, they watched as Wells opened every side room and closet door, checking the contents of each opening.  After five agonizingly slow minutes, they had cleared the ground floor and found no one. Wells signaled the group that he was moving to the stairs up to the second floor.

 As the team crouched at the base of the stairs, Wells slunk along the wall, the runes on his sleeves brightened as green flames dancing across his armor.  It took only a few steps for him to reach the top, and move to just past the lip.  The rest of the team prepared to follow him when then sudden bark of his shotgun filled the silence.  There was another shot and Wells quickly backed into view, and down the stairs keeping his shotgun aimed up through the opening.

“Report,” Albert’s voice was crisp and quick as the team fell in to guard positions around Wells, watching every direction.

“The house has stated a serious objection to us going onto the second floor, by way of a walking corpse.”

“God I hate zombies,” Wulf groaned.

Art and Protest

First let me apologize for the lateness of this post, I had something else written here and it just felt hollow. So, I did a major rewrite and came up with something a little more in keeping with my feelings about this issue. So without further ado....

Puff and the Train to Clarksville

“I don’t care who started it, I’m finishing it.” ~Adam

So, this week we talked about art and protest and how they go hand in hand. Since the dawn of protest there have been artists subtly and not so subtly poking the powers that be in the chest like an deranged stick wielding camper who has found a sleeping bear. I like questioning authority, (just ask every boss I’ve ever had) I think it needs to be done frequently, just so they know you haven’t been fooled by anything their trying to do. However, I also think it should be done respectfully, because I want them to treat me with courtesy so it seems fair to treat them the same way.

Of course this doesn’t mean that those being protested against have had a long tradition of reasonable reactions to having their decisions questioned. Certainly there have been arrests, imprisonments, banishments, beatings, and the occasional head decoratively presented on a pike in the town square. That doesn’t mean we sink to that level. Here’s an example of how I think it was done right…

Amiri Baraka was poet Laurite of New Jersey during the attacks on September 11th, he saw both planes hit the World trade Center, not on a television, not on youtube, not on the news that evening but through a window. As a writer he dealt with the tragedy the only way he knew how. He wrote a poem. It was angry, scared, confused, and cathartic. It was titled Somebody Blew Up America and he debuted it 2 weeks later at a poetry festival. Reactions varied from shock, to awe, to tears, to joy, and sadly to anger. Some people hated the poem, were outraged that the official poet of New Jersey could write something like this. How dear he. They demanded his job, his censor, his head decoratively displayed on pike outside city hall. Amiri, refused to step down, refused to rewrite the poem and asked simply that the people who were angry sit down and have a dialogue with him. Sit down with him, discuss the poem and why it worked and why it didn’t. Could he explain to them what they hated about it and why it was there.

They refused to sit with him, to talk, to hear. Instead they got the position of Poet Laurite in New Jersey dissolved. He never got angry, he didn’t scream and cry and rail against them. He simply nodded his head and went on to perform the poem, again and again. There is a documentary about it directed by Mario Van Peebles, that we watched in class. I feel sad for him, because the situation sucks. But I’ve heard the poem and I encourage you to as well. Make up your own mind if it’s hateful and mean or peaceful and cathartic…

Whether I agree with Amiri or not, I agree with the way he handled it. He was respectful, polite, but he never yielded his ground. I like that. I don’t want to rant about this, so I’m not going to go into any of the specific art that I feel has handled it poorly. I realize this may, hurt my argument, but I don’t want to argue with people over this. I will say that, a lot of art that strikes out at a cause they don’t like usually is done in a mean and vicious way in order to deliberately provoke a reaction of anger and hatred.

There are people who do this, and when people react exactly the way they expected their defense is to point and exclaim, look at all the things they’ve done. Look at how they’ve mistreated whatever I’m mad about. Or what every parent since Adam and Eve has come to know as the he started it defense. Honestly, I don’t find it productive. When attacked people tend to raise their defenses and close down their empathy, not allowing for the honest discussion of ideas.

However in the interest of full disclosure, about a month after the whole Chick-Fil-A thing where some groups were boycotting and some were bussing in entire churches full of people over the companies stance on gay rights, I posted this in a public forum just to see what would happen….

So I just heard, a GLBT family bookstore in San Francisco let one of their employees go because he was a heterosexual and the owners felt he wouldn't be able to relate to their customers. Apparently, it's perfectly legal to fire him over this even though he'd been working their for over a year without any complaints because there is no law against it. Honestly I think we should have one so crap like this doesn't happen anymore.

For the record 2 likes and no other response.

So tell me what you think, leave any comments below or head on over to my facebook page and leave a comment there.

Extra Mail

Hey all, I just got his amazing letter from the folks at extra-life talking about an event that gets run every year and I wanted to share it whit all of you.

Hello Steve!

I just had the best week, and I wanted to share some of it with you.

Each year, Children’s Miracle Network Hospitals selects a Champion from each of the 50 states and all Canadian Provinces, and Delta Airlines flies them all to Washington D.C. to meet the president and then to Orlando for “Celebration”.

These are kids who have been through things that most of us cannot imagine, but have emerged on the other side of their medical challenges with a winning spirit and an infectious enthusiasm for life.

As part of that Celebration each of these amazing kids are presented with a medal at a ceremony attended by THOUSANDS and THOUSANDS of people. We are talking standing room only!

This year’s event was hosted by Nick Cannon and Jordan Sparks. As a member of the CMN Hospitals staff, we all wear a lot of hats, and this year I somehow ended with the “Alphabetize all of the kids for their medals” hat.

I’d wear that hat again for sure.

As I was helping these kids who ranged in age from 3 to 16 years old get ready it occurred to me that by any measure, many of these kids shouldn’t be here with us any more.

But they are.

They are alive and they are healthy, and their moms and dads are getting to celebrate birthday after birthday with their precious kids…

They are getting to do that because of you.

Because you didn’t sit idly by and let other people fill the world up with good.

Because you decided to matter in the lives of kids who live right down the street, in your town.

Because you cared.

Thank you.

Thank you for Sydnie, and Sim, and Kayla, and all of the new friends that I got to meet last week.

I can’t turn on a TV anymore without seeing things with the words “Brought to you by” followed by the name of a yogurt or chemical company.

But as I played with the kids, and then watched through relentless tears as they ran (YES RAN!) on stage to receive their medals, I realized that this experience was “Brought to you by….”

You.

Thanks for that.

We are just a few weeks removed from our 5th annual Extra Life event on October 20th. Please remember that each dollar you raise is another important raindrop in thunderstorm of hope that is brewing for sick and injured kids. Please don’t let the satisfaction of reaching your fundraising goal deter you from raising it, meeting it again, and raising it again

There isn’t one minute of one day to waste… not when the stakes are so high.

Talk to you in a few days…

I hope you enjoyed the letter, and please if you have sometime I could use some help. I'm taking part in the extra-life gaming marathon on October 20th and would love to get some more sponsors. Certainly I've reached my personal goal of $200 but any additional funds would definitely be going to a good place. You can sponsor me specifically at Team Mayniacs, go to the home site and start your own group, or you can go here to donate directly to the extra life charity group. We'd love your help.