Wednesday, August 15, 2007

The Finish Line Is Almost Here

Hello All,

The last two days have been full of skating through Connecticut. Yesterday we skated near Dan’s high school, Loomis Chaffee Prep School in Windsor, CT. Windsor is a beautiful little town with a flat surface. We skated 30 miles and had three falls. As Striech was helping Ben down a small hill, Ben lost control and brought Striech into the bushes with him. Thankfully no one was hurt. In the last half a mile, I clumsily skated over a stick and ate it on a curb. I ended the day with a nice big bruise and scrape. Kelly and I now have matching wounds on our upper left leg. Don’t worry, we will take a picture and post it for the rollingforautism website. Now I can put my four years of nursing school to use to put a dressing on Kelly’s bum. Thanks to Doctor Stevens she has medicated cream and antibiotics to help heal her grapefruit size scrape.

Today we visited, Patty, who kindly raises dogs with the help of her children to give to children with autism. Her company is called North Star and runs throughout the nation. We had the opportunity to play with two goldren retriever puppies who were amazingly calm. These dogs can make a tremendous difference in how children act; decreasing anxiety and fears. We thank you for inviting us into your home and feeding us lunch! This afternoon we skated from Hartford, CT to Sturbridge, MA. Kelly and I drove and let our legs heal. There were a lot of fairly big hills so great job to the skaters…Dan, Streich, Carson, Amber, and Billy!! Tomorrow we have another six skaters joining us as we head to Worchester, MA.

Reminder, this Friday is our big event in Boston. 6 PM at the Improv Asylum in the North End and then 9 PM at the Bell in Hand Bar.

Hope to see you all there!

Elaine L.

Monday, August 13, 2007

Winding hills, Wrong directions, and Medical attention

How's it going -

Today was fun. It was a good mix of humor, fun, nervousness and excitement. The day started out late. For me anyways. I didn't get up until 11 o'clock 11:30ish. Dan was up early I heard as he was on the phone with people and doing some business for the trip. 6 days left including today. They can't believe how fast the trip has gone and they are all looking foreward to sleeping in their own beds for a change. We left between 12 and 1pm-ish to do our daily skate. We drove out into the middle of nowehere. Myself, Dan, Carson, and Sean got out - laced up our skates - and started skating. We had the cars go ahead a couple miles and we would meet them there to take a brief break to allow us time to hydrate ourselves and give our legs a rest. We did this numerous times........

When I stopped skating - 10 miles or so later, I joined Amber and Vicki in the van and rode with them for what we thought would only be alittle while. Elaine drove the Subaru ahead of us. We guessed wrong on how long we would be driving. We talked to Streich at one stopping point and apparently there was a miscommunication of where they [the skaters] were supposed to turn off to meet us. So when we turned off on the road to where Kelly, Sean, Orto, and Carson were to meet us Vicki, Elaine, and Amber all went out for a short skate. And Vicki tackled her first real hill on rollerblades. So congratulations to her:) They returned and we still had not heard from any of the four main skaters. So we went out looking for them. It wasnt until one of the skater's cellular phones rang in the back of the van that we had our first clue of where they were. Apparently, Orto and Kelly both fell. Orto fell into a tree and Kelly slid down a hill. Medical attention was administered and both are doing fine now.

After we recieved the phone call, we took down the address of where they were, punched it into "Jim" the GPS system and expected him to guide us there. Well - it guided us to the middle of nowhere. This scenic path outside of town. We called back the number at which we were called from and then spoke to someone (I don't know who because Vicki did the talking). We got the correct address and went out looking for it - without the use of the GPS system. We pulled up to a complex on the main road to find Streich waving us to the driveway and two skaters laying on the front lawn. From this point we took a couple of minutes to gather ourselves before heading for gas and then to our place to stay for the night. A beachouse in Milford, CT. Thank you to Dan's aunt for allowing us to stay at their place. A couple of us went to the beach. We had a BBQ with burgers, corn and such. All the food was good.

Today was my last day on the trip. It has been a good time. The memories last. And so will the friendships. I have a big travel day tomorrow before I have to work tomorrow night so I'm going to go to bed.

Take care,
Jamie C

Sunday, August 12, 2007

Carson Sang

Good Evening,


The RollingForAutism Team spent this past weekend in the Big Apple, and as predicted...things got a little "bonkers."

The weekend started Friday evening with a party at Manhattan's Bar XII. Arranged by several RollingForAutism Team Members and Bar XII, the night was an enormous success. Through the combination of Bar XII's drink specials, cover charge, and generous patrons, nearly $1300 was raised in just a few hours. More important, everyone in attendance had a great time, and the night gave our skaters and workers an opportunity to mingle with old friends and meet new supporters. Not to mention enjoy a great night out in an amazing city.

After a skate through Queens, the rollingforautism team was lucky enough to have two amazing supporters and friends, Guido and Lenny, invite them all out to a fantastic dinner in one of downtown Manhattan's trendiest restaurants, Botino. Lenny and Guido treated the 25 or so RollingForAutism skaters, family and friends in attendance to one of the best dinners and most memorable nights of the trip. After closing down the restaurant, most of the crowd Migrated with Guido and Lenny to a hip piano bar in the East Village, where we had the pleasure of listening to the artistic stylings of RollingForAutism's most talented performers, Carson Strang. With a unique rendition of our country's Star Spangled Banner, Carson was the hit of the night.

The weekend ended with a skate into Southern Connecticut for a trip to the Bridgeport Zoo. Luckily for the skaters whom were unable to shower between their skate and the zoo, their scent was overshadowed by the animals. We'd like to take the opportunity to thank the animals of the zoo for making our stay more pleasurable.

Briefly, thank you to Guido, Lenny, Jenkins, Calabros, Mrs. Silvestri, Bar XII, and Francis Scott Key.

Cheers,

Dan T. and Vicki K.