October 24

Thank you note from our visiting guests from Illinois and Minnesota

Thanks again for allowing us to join you and the gang on your run and for getting us back safe and sound. Winter Park is a beautiful setting and the people are just as great.

---Neil

Injury Corner

Marty Katz, a long time member of our group remains in critical condition after his biking accident several weeks ago, continues to improve but remains in the ORC ICU. Please continue to pray for Marty' full recovery.

Liz Lee also became a casualty of a biking accident and had surgery on broken wrist. Hope you can come back soon, Liz.

October 24 Run

I was AWOL due to a nasty sinus infection. Sounds like we had 15 runners with a nice mix of regulars, three people who have not yet on our mailing list-- and, believe it or not, a cameo appearance by Todd. Sorry I missed the fun and welcome back Todd.

Blanket Collection Update November 7

At the moment I feel like I've got a tiger by the tail. In contrast to prior years, we will have about a dozen groups participating in the blanket drive, which may present some daunting logistics. Running & Fitness groups include ORC, both Marathonfest groups, Galloway group, Winter Park Dawgs, Fleet Feet, Tri with Sway, TV Fitness Pros, Teresa Williams "Varsity Group" as I call them, start from Park and Morris. At lunch earlier this week with Melanie Fernandez, she volunteered to do a collection at their CPA practice, Cross, Fernandez and Riley. Melanie is a great runner and triathloner.

About half of the above groups plan to show up on November 7 and several of them dwarf our group in size. Some will just be delivering blankets already collected by their groups. Others will show up that Sunday with blankets. This presents some logistical challenges.

Need for Volunteers

Thus I am looking once again for volunteers to assist with the collection and later delivery to the Coalition. At the moment, my volunteer list is a bit anemic, so I am asking those of you who can make it on November 7 to help out. Here are our needs:

• Starting at 6:30AM (7:30 by your body clocks) we need volunteers to take possession of the blankets, hopefully maintain a count, and load them into the designated vehicles.

• Vehicles: We need people willing to take possession of the blankets and over the next several days to transport them to the Coalition. In addition we will need a team to take possession of the blankets in their cars. For example, my wife will join us for the collection and we load up our vehicles.

At the moment, Susan Paul (who runs Marathonfest) is planning to bring the Saturday group's collection to our run that day. If possible I would like to take possession of those blankets with one of our vehicles and I anticipate there may be quite a few blankets.

The current volunteer list is sparse, so I would ask those of you who care willing to help to let me know. The only volunteers we have at this juncture are Billy Kovali, Brad Smith, my wife Mary and me. We could probably use a dozen or so volunteers.

Sorry to get into the logistics so deeply, but I want to insure that you all have some sense of our needs.

Publicity

I want to acknowledge the great contribution that some of the ORC board members have made to help organize the blanket drive, especially Amy Tatum. Amy has gotten out the word to eight radio stations, the City of WP, Hearts of Florida United Way and the Florida East Coast Runners calendar. Great job, Amy!

Hope to see you next Sunday for our last run in October.

Jack