I’m regularly getting up to 300 miles a week in mileage over the past few weeks.Last week my knees starting aching, particularly my left knee. I tracked it down to riding without knee coverings in the spell of cold weather we were having. For several days we never got out of the 50s and we didn’t get above 60 degrees for almost 2 weeks. Also, in doing some research, I followed suggestions to raise my saddle and focus on keeping my leg movements as linear as possible. After following that protocol for a few days the pain is almost gone. The other physical setback was having some kind of allergic reaction to pollen that must’ve been blown into my eyes during some extremely windy (and chilly days) – 5 days and most of a box of Benadryl later, my eyes weren’t swollen shut. What was weird was that I had no other symptoms: no runny nose, sneezing, or respiratory issues. I’d like to avoid this next year if possible.

Fundraising-wise we’re doing pretty good for starting the effort about 2 months ago. We’re over the 50% mark and there are some corporate donations slated but there have been a few frustrating issues. This is the Pan Mass Challenge but the majority of my donations have come out of state, courtesy of my very kind and supportive friends. I’d like to see more donations from Massachusetts, particularly the Berkshires where I live but I’m having a hard time figuring out how to get people to convert. These are people who will most likely know someone who has gone to Dana Farber for treatment or who would seek treatment for themselves there. It’s great that there’s over 170 people in my Facebook Support group but its strange that we’re not seeing some people that we know pretty well and who we know have the resources haven’t joined the group or made a donation. OK, so perhaps you can’t give, literally, just a few dollars this year but why can’t you join the group? I get a lot of invites to groups and I join most of them but some of these people aren’t reciprocating – and this is for a serious charity effort.

Alright, so I apologize for venting a bit. On the whole I’ve been incredibly overwhelmed by the support I have received and genuinely surprised by whom has helped me, some with multiple commitments – it really almost pushed me to tears on several occasions. It’s been great to find out more about people, how they’ve been affected by cancer, and to make this connection with them. I hope to be able to provide similar support for everybody who has helped me when I get the opportunity to do so. It’s kind of a strange way to find a way to be optimistic about life and people but that’s probably a good part of why I got involved in the PMC. If you’ve signed up to help me this year, thank you so very much, you are incredible.

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I’ve also been doing a cleanse diet since Monday which has meant restricted calories during the day which certainly hasn’t helped the energy levels and resulted in a near bonk earlier in the week. I found the diet in a blog post from Gwyneth Paltrow’s site and I chose the diet because it seemed to be a little more “real world” than some of the ridiculous ones like the Master Cleanse, which just seemed dangerous. The hardest thing to let go of was the refined sugar – I’m too used to eating whatever cookies and candy that I want. As the days have gone by I’ve gone from wanting cookies and candy to wanting something as basic as bowl of cereal or even a piece of bread.

I have enjoyed the organic vegetables and the soups but I’ve had to combine the meals of solids into one meal in the evening, mainly because I don’t have the time to prepare completely separate sets of soups. I’ve stuck to the recipes in the diet with the exception of the juices since I don’t have a juicer – I’ve just been having tea and instead of having a “handful of almonds”, I’ll have a bowl of them – something a bit more realistic for someone my size who is riding a bike several miles per week. It makes one wonder how many people make adjustments to these diets and if they are still keeping an eye on their overall intake. The only other changes I made was to have a couple grapefruit during the week which makes me think I’m still within the calorie intake boundaries.

What makes the diet tasty are a homemade carrot-ginger dressing for vegetables and a teriyaki sauce for the chicken. While I’m not normally a fan of salmon, I’ve enjoyed it steamed as the diet calls for. A big bonus was the inclusion of avocados which are used in both the raw vegetable meals as well as in a very tasty “soup” of pureed cucumber.

The big disappointment for the week has been the slacking off of donations to my PMC fund. I have $1700 in there now, and am truly thankful of the effort from people who stepped up in the first 2 weeks, but that’s a far cry from the $5k I need to raise by August. I’m almost at a loss of how to raise more money – any ideas you might have would be greatly appreciated.

Below are some of the videos I’ve been making and posting on my Facebook PMC Page:

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PLEASE SHARE MY DONATION PAGE WITH FRIENDS and make a contribution. 100% of the donation goes to cancer research and it’s tax deductible. I will be posting progress here and welcome your feedback and ideas on how to raise the $5000.

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Hopefully people will check out my entire photo set of the Olympics which I’m almost done identifying and captioning – perhaps there are 30 or less photos to process at this point.

The funny thing is that in looking over FasterSkier.com, I discovered that they are based out of Williamstown, MA, about 15 miles north of where I live. Many thanks to editor Topher Sabot who posted the link. Would be cool to meet those guys in person sometime.

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The first PaleyFest event I went to was their “Community” night on March 3rd. Here is my LAist post about the night (or just check out the video here). I was bowled over by the opportunity to exchange a few words with Chevy Chase, an idol of mine since 1977. He thoroughly took advantage of me as he did everyone in the press line as well as the panel – I’m glad I wasn’t the only one. He was irrepressible and hilariously so.

The following night was “Dexter” night (full LAist write-up) where I finally had the chance to ask a couple questions of Julie Benz (aka Rita Bennett) – I had missed her at both the SAG awards and the Emmys so I’m glad it finally happened. I also spoke with Desmond Harrington and Brando Eaton whom I hadn’t connected with before.

Because I went to the 25th Film Independent Spirit Awards on Friday the 5th at the Nokia Center I missed the PaleyFest’s “Cougar Town” night which is unfortunate because, although I’m not a fan of the show personally, I know that a lot of my readers at LAist enjoy the program. I’m not sure what to say about the Spirit Awards. I was invited by IFC to cover it but it was somewhat miserable: they had overbooked press so there was literally no room on the carpet – we were jammed into each other which would have been even more uncomfortable except it was so cold and windy we actually benefitted from each others’ warmth.

You can see my LAist post on the Spirit Awards which was somewhat of a failed experience. A lot of the talent didn’t have publicists with them and were largely inapproachable. Organizers put the photographer pool at the wrong end of the line which created a gridlock of invited guests and their friends in front of us, but no one to manage who they talked to and for how long – a lot of the talent simply left. When I went to go upstairs I discovered that my accreditation gave me virtually no additional access so I hopped from foot to foot for a while until I got some pictures with Richard Kind, Matt Dillon, and Anvil, who were very nice and gracious. I did get a lot of photos – check out the published pool at LAist or my Flickr set which has even more. If I get asked to do it again next year I will demand an all-access pass or no go.

March 6th I went back to PaleyFest for “The Vampire Diaries” where I only got footage with Nina Dobrev and Paul Wesley but, of course, because of the teenybopper factor, that video and those photos have been getting more views than anything else I did during the trip. Nina Dobrev was actually very engaging and I think that she would have talked a lot longer if there hadn’t been other people waiting – a cute Canadian girl who was psyched about how well the Vancouver Olympics went. [See the LAist PaleyFest photo pool or my Flickr set.]

Sunday the 7th was manic because of the Oscars – actually, most of Hollywood was a complete mess for the week because of the closing of Hollywood Boulevard for set up. It took me less time to get to the residential area of Burbank than from Santa Monica/101 to the Wilshire district, which, if you aren’t so sure of the layout, is ridiculous, let me assure you. I decided not to go to the Oscars as I knew I’d just get a bleacher seat and 10+ hours of timesink. Instead I decided to hang out with my hosts for the morning and afternoon before heading over to the new W Hotel in Hollywood for E!’s Oscar party.

Unfortunately nobody from the Oscars showed up but I talked to plenty of TV people which is my beat anyways. Got some good interactions with cast from “Glee” and the upcoming “Dancing With The Stars” contestants. Snapped some photos but not many, although I think there are some winners in there of Buzz Aldrin.

My last day in LA was similarly busy, starting out with an interview I had scheduled with veteran actor Len Lesser (most popularly known as Uncle Leo from “Seinfeld). We talked for about an hour at his house in Burbank, a modest, if not classic bungalow, and the footage really looks good – I’m trying to figure out how to edit it together. I’ll probably have to make a 10 minute chunk for YouTube and perhaps a 1/2 hour piece for LAist.

My Lesser experience was followed by an interview with comedian Tom Green at his house/studio in the Hollywood Hills. Green was friendly enough but we were pressed for time as he had phoners to do with Australian outlets pending his 10 day trip out there. I do appreciate him setting aside time to speak with me as he had just arrived that morning from touring most of the United States and he could have used a rest instead of dealing with more press. The interview was posted and most people seem to like it a lot – I hope to interview him again later this year before his trip to Boston.

I have some invites to go to the TCM Festival and the TV Land Awards in April but I need to see how feasible that trip would be. I’m forever indebted to my hosts Molly and Desiree, Tim, and Elizabeth – but I don’t want to otherwise overstay my invitations as that would be my 3rd trip in 4 months. I’ll keep you posted here as I learn more about the future. Thanks for reading.

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