Those of you who also sponsored Phil's AIDS ride may want to write a similar letter. Even though he's been in the training rides on his unicycle, they were aware of him, and he was even pictured on his sponsorship page holding the unicycle, they've made a last-minute rule banning unicyclists from the rally.
If they'd said it from day one, fine, but the impression I get is that the road biking guys just don't want unicyclists in it, so pressures got him kicked at the last minute… In any case, it was done in a really underhanded way with a lot of stuff behind closed doors and different people being told different stories (myself included) until the last moment. Anyway, my letter:
To: "Scott Cheslock" <scheslock@pwatoronto.org>
From: Shannon <glider@zentastic.com
Subject: Rally Refund Please
I am writing to request a full refund for the amount ($250) I donated on behalf of Philip Barbosa riding his unicycle in the Toronto to Montreal rally. I feel what happened is unfair to him and unfair to those who donated money, because they wanted to help not just a good cause, but to do it through a unique individual on a unique cycle. I feel very uneasy with the way the rules were changed and the last minute to kick him out since I know how hard he's been training and has been looking forward to this.
It makes me very uncomfortable seeing a charitable organization treat people this way, and at this point would feel more secure donating my money to an alternative group and would appreciate the full refund you offered. Thank you in advance for dealing with this promptly and confirming when it has been done,
Shannon Larratt
647-***-****
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Shannon Larratt - https://zentastic.me/
"Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch. Liberty is a well-armed lamb contesting the vote." --Benjamin Franklin
I just really think it sucks and is really uncool (to say nothing of the now-wasted positive PR that having a couple unicyclists in the rally could have helped them generate).
Opening the rear gate of my truck I didn't wait long enough to reach in so the gate wasn't up and my head got a bit smashed up. Well, I'm not too worried about it — I'm kind of used to head wounds by now. Oh, and I think this is the first time I've seen my tattoo from above (that I remember)…
Click the pic for the article, c/o Allen!
(Original forum unavailable, sorry)*
I think this is one of my favorite photos that I've gotten for Under Mars. If you'd like to see a closeup, here's one of the guys carrying the dead cow and one of the old guy in the foreground. The picture was taken in Kabul, Afghanistan while Multi 6 from 16 Signal Regiment (I admit I don't know exactly what that means, sorry).
So as many of you probably know, there have recently been a series of arrests of minors and young adults here in Toronto in a “Muslim terrorist” bust… According to the authorities they wanted to blow up the Parliament buildings (in Ottawa), chop off the Prime Minister's head, storm the CBC, demand the release of various Muslim prisoners, and then chop off some more people's heads.
To me the sitation reads like a bunch of stupid kids because from my point of view Canada is pretty nice to Muslims, but I asked an Iranian friend of mine whether I was wrong or not and I guess that in the mind of an extremist (or someone who desperately wants to be an extremist), there's not much difference between America and Canada because they're perceived as allies (even though Canada isn't in Iraq), and there's a larger, generalized enemy of “the West” which is slowly eating away at religion of all kinds.
