Indie's running adventures

“There are those who give with joy, and that joy is their reward.” -- Khalil Gibran Peter, in a team meeting last week, heard me talk about Lotus Petal and mission 30x30. Before I know it, there was a donation made. Education, you see, is something he is passionate about. Back in 2001, he and some friends at the Rotary Club of San Diego built a High School for homeless children in San Diego. He donated a 40 seat computer and audiovisual lab to the school and then he continued with a laptop donation every month to give as a gift to a deserving student. https://monarchschools.org/ The story is part of a book, “ Guts!, Companies that Blow the Doors off Business-as-usual ”. Here’s a snippet: -- At a planning meeting for Monarch in the early days, Peter asked Susan (chairperson), “What needs has nobody stepped up for yet?” When Susan shared her vision of a state-of-the-art computer lab, Peter pulled out a small pad of paper, made some notes, and said, “I’ll take care of that...

Checkout the video of this run here . Mission 30x30 continues.  Highlight of the week was double digits of runs done and double digit entry into our fundraising (we are at 11% of our 30k target now). This week concluded with 14 half marathons, last 3 of which were a single run in Kings Canyon National Park.  Kings Canyon is glacier carved canyon, in Kings canyon national park CA with a rich history.  The area is home to world's tallest trees , the giant sequoias.  The park is rugged, and least visited amongst the Sierra parks in CA.  Over the last century, loggers wanted to log, gold diggers had plans for mines, development interests wanted to build hydroelectric dams and then there was constant push back by conservationist.  Finally the sense prevailed the park was designated a national park and all tourist resort/dam plans were shelved.  Thank God! Me with AR I had plans to do it with V, my regular wilderness run partner.  After...

Unlike 2017's 12in12 initiative for lotus petal....where every run was out in nature, with varying degrees of weather changes and altitude and unexpected company of fun people...it was a joy writing those reports as well (see previous posts in from Jan to Dec 2017 on this blog for same)...this time its just me and my garage treadmill! So unlike 2017's progress report where I used to report post every run, this time I will try to bundle up progress reports (or if I am out of garage for a run, I will try to post more frequent). Here's first update on 30x30 mission. I started June 5, 2020.  Given COVID 19, all races are cancelled.  Road running is allowed but running with mask isn't the most fun.  So the choice is treadmill.  In Garage.   And if you are familiar with California summers, we are talking 90-100F temps in there.  Its an Oven. So with garage door partially open, and side door opened as well - you have a bit of a tail wind which hel...

"A kid's future shouldn't have to suffer, just because we couldn't arrange a laptop!"        - My talk with Kushal (founder of lotus petal ) early June 2020.   Friends, This is an appeal.   To raise funds to provide laptops to Lotus Petal kids, in these COVID-19 times, so they can continue their education.  There is a need for 30k USD and I am running 30 half marathons in June/July/Aug 2020 to raise awareness and funds for the same.  I need your support.  Just like you came together and helped with 50k initiative back in 2017... I am counting on your support...Read on... Never did I realize that a mere laptop could be the difference! But it is...today....for lotus petal kids. See, coronavirus has been a kicker. Before we could realize, schools were closed, students sent home and the city went on lockdown. Thanks to an earlier "school-in-cloud" pilot, we were able to pivot to online classes (live zoom sessions and...