The Final Shave

The final page has been turned on the Shave to Save saga. A good time was had by all (with the possible exception of Brent). Jack, just trying to be helpful, I'm sure, brought the hedge trimming shears, but Bob the Barber couldn’t hold them high enough long enough to get the job done, so the sheep shears had to come out.

As it turns out, Bob's barbering skills are dubious at best. He took the first few swipes at each head, but Wilma needed to finish the job. In the spirit of giving,Wilma even offered to let Bob take a few swipes at her, in the end offering up half her hair--the bottom half!--to the cause.

When the tally was done there was $1,025.34 on my head. Not too shabby, I thought. The amount that is; my head was plenty shabby! I was a little concerned when Lyle pulled out a brown envelope, but, although it made the competition closer, it was not enough to claim all my hair! I managed to get $1,378.00 on Brent’s head, so he lost it all, so to speak! That makes a total of $2,403.34 going to Bolivia for various projects! Thank you, Thank you, Thank you!

What I am most pleased with is Brent offering to do this for no monetary reward to him. He was not raising funds to subsidize his trip or to pay for new travel equipment. ALL the money goes somewhere else. $2,400.00 CAD C will go a very long way in Bolivia. So, thanks to all of you who gave, but especially thanks to Brent who gave of himself.

Sign Your Donor Card

I was involved in transplant surgery this past weekend, a surgery led by Dr. Joe. This is the second transplant surgery I have been involved with but the first time I’ve dealt with a scenario where there has been one donor and many recipients. I have mixed feelings now, after the procedure: sadness for the donor but happiness for all of those who benefitted.

Part of my role on the transplant team was to escort the donor to the procedure on that fateful Good Friday morning. (Well, it was a “good” Friday for some; not the donor!) It was eerie knowing that I was the last to have a conversation with the donor before Dr. Joe began. I found it odd that the donor willingly proceeded to the site of termination. I questioned the ethics of assisting in the act that would end a life even though I knew that the death would save many. I could intervene and save the donors life, but at what cost? Is terminal really terminal? What if a treatment was found and the effects of time could be reversed? Would the death of one on Good Friday really save the lives of others? If so, how many would benefit? Could such matters be reduced it a “score card” type of evaluation?

With the donor immobilized and then terminated, Dr. Joe began to remove the heart. I had the honour of helping by removing many other vital organs. Even some cosmetic donations were made. It took only a few hours to take the donor from fully functioning, albeit worn out, to a stripped-out shell. This was the saddest part for me. I hate to think that we are only a few boxes of good parts in an aging, decaying case.

But with death comes life! A younger recipient with a bad heart now has a new heart, (new to them at least) and the opportunity to live again after years of convalescing. To see her come to life again, reborn , and leave the surgery under her own power was very rewarding. But the death of one on Good Friday meant life for not just one but many by Sunday. A new heart for one, yes, but a new front end for another and a new brain for a third and boxes of hope for many more yet to be touched by Friday’s Sacrifice.

Thanks to Dr. Joe for giving life to our newest and best-looking shiny blue firefly, for fortifying the front end on my dear old friend and driving partner (515,000 km and still going), and for adding a new CPU to Heather’s pride and joy. My shelf of pretty-good parts is also growing, and has inspired me to begin planning a little cosmetic surgery on my old girl.

Sign your donor card, and you, too, can bring life where only death looks likely. Remember those who have made sacrifices for us, and always be nice to your mechanic!

Shave to Save Update

Well the battle is on! At the end of the first week, I am ahead by a hair (which means I won't end up with any!), so I decided to use this space to strongly urge you to pledge money for BRENT's haircut. Let me cut to the chase: if I can't raise some funds for Brent, I am going to have to pack an extra suitcase just for sunscreen!

I have received a number of email inquires about the beard; no, it is not coming off! Rumour has it that a consortium is being formed to double whatever funds are raised by 'shave day' if I will take the beard off, too. To quote Ray R., "Talk is cheap. It takes money to buy whiskey." I suspect Gord A. and Trish are behind this anti-beard conspiracy. As for me, I am still looking for a corporate sponor to donate to Brent's haircut. I think that may be the only way I will get to keep any hair.

It has been a hair-raising week. I never thought that people's need to get even with me would result in saving lives in Bolivia, but, hey, whatever works! In all seriousness, though, my thanks go to all who have cut into their own funds to help those in need. Brent has been doing a wonderful job of drumming up support to cut me down to size. There are now a number of posters up on campus that I suspect have seen the less-flattering side of a PhotoShop program. The Student Association has also gotten behind this and is advertising on our behalf. Funds are being donated online, and I recieve a number of emails every day.

To better serve the students and to drum up a little more support on Shave day, the event will be held in the Time Square in residence on April 24th at noon--the last day of classes. Please plan on coming out to see the hair come off! If you are wondering what I am talking about or can't remember how to become involved, please see the origonal release below. Thanks for you support, and keep it coming!

In an effort to raise funds for A Better World’s Rural Health Project (an initiative that covers medical costs for individuals and families who cannot afford medical care) and for Bolivian agriculture projects, a few members of the team are donating their bodies (well, just their hair) to science (okay, it’s cosmetology, but that is science, right?) Gordon Gilchrist, who is also ABW’s technical director, and Brent Nicol, student extraordinaire, have agreed to participate in this hair-raising scheme. They will have their hair cut—shorter and shorter as the funds raised pile higher and higher. So choose your favourite and give, give, give!!

Whoever “wins” 1st place (raises the most money) gets their head shaved clean!
Whoever comes in 2nd gets to keep a 1/2” of hair.

To donate:

• Email ggilchrist@oldscollege.ca, indicating amount of donation and who you are sponsoring.


• Or go to http://www.a-better-world.ca/ and click ‘donate online’ (Specify “Shave to Save” and either “Gord” or “Brent”)

(Charitable receipts available for donations of $25 or more. Include mailing address, please.)

If you want an idea of the kind of work these donations will support, read:

It is Not All Laughing Children and Happy Endings
How Does Your Garden Grow?
You Can’t Get There From Here
Bolivia or Bust Tour 2009!
Bolivia or Bust
How I Spent My Summer Holidays

Re-inventing the Wheel (or Why I should Document My Thinking)

When my mind is fully engaged, it’s a bit like a NASCAR race--always more than one idea racing along, sometimes bumping into another resulting in a crazy spectacle. All the ideas are headed in the same general direction, but it is hard to tell which one will win at the beginning of the race. I believe in putting a lot of cars on the track and letting attrition weed out the weak ones. Experience and skill slowly moves the best idea to the front of the pack, and 500 miles later, I have a winner.

I love to be fully engaged in a project: the smell of gears smoking in my brain, the flash of new ideas to explore. Last week, I found it necessary to become fully engaged with the cancellation of the GIS program at Olds College. Extreme disappointment and depression would soon fill the void left in my head by the departure of our program if I did not engage in some other activity. An idle mind is a dangerous thing (a saying never truer than with me)!

So I need an activity to engage in. As luck would have it, I also have an airplane I need to get built—the one we will use in Bolivia to gather mapping data. Before I build it, however, I also need to design it. Before I design it, I need to know components I will use. I know that this may appear to be backwards thinking, but I like to start with the outcome and work in reverse so that each part of the design meets the requirements of the final product. In the case of my plane, I started with the motor and prop. Making the best choice involves recording thrust, watts, amps, and volts for one of many motor/prop combinations on a test stand.

As I started testing with Murray one Saturday morning, it occurred to me that I had seen these numbers before and that the idea-car moving to the front of the pack looked awfully familiar. I began wondering why I bought 6-cell speed controls and such. I suddenly realized I had done this all before! I knew which idea was going to win this race because I had seen this race last year. I just didn’t write down the results!

Some might say that I wasted a Saturday morning doing these tests over again. I prefer to think of it as spending quality time with a friend and confirming previous results. Of course, if I had written the results down last time I could have spent that Saturday morning designing instead of testing. Murray wrote the results down this time so we won’t have to do this again.

I am well on my way to finishing the plane—thanks to Murray for help testing and my daughter for help cutting wings. I hope to have the plane built by the 14th and test flights run by the 21st. That gives me a whole week before I get on the airline to Bolivia! Uh oh! How am I ever going to fill the time?