lolcat, lolcat...where have I been?

The past few months have been totally crazy. Last fall, I applied and got accepted to take part in a charity cycle ride across Canada - the Sears National Kids Cancer Ride, backed by the Coast to Coast Against Cancer Foundation. Most rides of this magnitude take between 8 and 12 weeks - some as long as 16. We're doing ours in 19 days.

Suffice to say, I've been training my ass off and focusing on work. Not too much time left for anything else. I'm writing a separate ride blog over here - be sure to check it out. We're raising funds for childhood cancer wellness and research programs. 100% of the funds we raise will go directly to sending kids with cancer to summer camps, cancer research and a ton of other worthwhile initiatives.

If you would like to make a financial contribution, please visit my fundraising link: http://2008.snkcr.com/ross/donate.html

While I would totally appreciate your financial support, that's not the purpose of this post. The real reason I'm dusting off the blog is because we are looking for a chief blogger/podcaster/vidcaster type of person to come with us on the trip. This is a volunteer position, but Depending on the commitment you can make, this could be a paid position and all expenses are paid and I'd have to say that if I wasn't going to be fastened to my bike, I'd definitely consider doing this myself.

Essentially, we need someone that can own all aspects of the online activity while we are riding - this means daily blog posts, interviews with riders, celebs, politicians and other luminaries along the way, spearheading our relationship with the blogosphere, helping us get some better traction with our facebook initiatives and that sort of thing. Basically, we need you to do what Scoble is doing for FastCompany, what Doc does for Open Source and Marketing, what Dave does for RSS, and what Arrington does for web 2.0 startups - be our champion and help us shine. Because the ride is happening in a huge country with lots of empty spaces in it, most of the more interesting stuff will be happening without the benefit of spectators. To overcome this, we want to bring the ride to the web and you will be a huge part of making that happen.

If are interested, or know of someone that might be interested, please drop me a note at ross -at- tucows daht com. Even if you don't know someone directly, it would also help us greatly if you could put the word out to your network.

While I'm at it, we're also looking for experienced bike mechanics and a few other types of volunteers. If you think you'd like to pitch in to make a difference, be sure to let me know and I'll put you in touch with the right people.