Swinging with the Stars – for Hospice

My wife and I are involved in the Hospice fund raiser, Swinging with the Stars, this year.  The Central Okanagan Hospice Association (and similar non-profit organizations elsewhere) provide compassionate care and supportive assistance to the terminally ill and their families.  A good friend of mine, Lori Welbourne, was one of the “stars” last year, and introduced me to the event.

I dragged my poor wife, somewhat kicking and screaming, along with me when I realized that I had to come armed with a partner, and came to the further realization that asking any other woman on earth to dance Argentine Tango (a very sensual dance) with me would be a disaster in the making…

I quickly learned that the dancers ourselves are expected to do a lot more than just provide the entertainment for the gala event – we are also expected to raise a lot of cash.  Three very good friends of ours enthusiastically stepped forward to form our campaign team:  Julie Hill, Darla Brown, and Jessica Harrison.

One of the ideas they came up with…was to solicit donations with the promise that on reaching certain levels, Paul (me) would do outrageous stuff.  Imagine that!

The thermometer, with the “outrageous stuff” is at this link:  http://www.hergottlaw.com/dance/category/blog/.

Well…. we’ve broken through $3,000.00, meaning that I must do the polar bear dip…in retrospect, I should have set the bar higher!  On Sunday, February 6, 2011, at 11:00 a.m., I am scheduled to tango with the Okanagan Lake at the beach immediately beside the Westbank Yacht Club.  In short order thereafter, I expect I’ll be having a leg waxed!  At the rate things are going, I expect we may well reach the $10,000.00 mark which will require me to jog into Kelowna in a hot-dog suit and sell hot dogs for Hospice.

My campaign team is planning a preview event for February 25^th, 2011, at Shannon Lake Golf Course, tickets $20.00, $10.00 for the burger/drink and the other $10.00 a donation towards our campaign.  Terri and I will be giving a preview of our routine at that event.  It would be fun to have a full house for that.

The more publicity for Hospice, the better for Hospice, and the more publicity for our campaign, the more that our campaign will raise.  I doubt that this blog gets much traffic, but every little bit helps!