Charity- the best room in the house

"Faith, Hope and Charity have been called the 3 steps of Jacob's Ladder, reaching from earth to heaven, Faith is the ground floor, Hope is part of the stairs... the best room in the house at the top is charity."

Benjamin Franklin

April 18th, 2013.

Our family has been the recipient of charity many times and we do our best to give whatever we can to help make this world a better place for everyone to live. Not long ago our house was painted, yard was cleaned up, a part of our floor was repaired and several other things were repaired in our house. This was done through a program at Heritage Church in Moultrie, Georgia called Mega Impact. Yes it did have a Mega Impact on our family and we will always be grateful to the many people that made it happen. I would love to mention everyone of the people involved but he list is exhaustive to say the least. There were 120 plus students from Tennessee that came down to participate, there were sponsors, donors and other volunteers that also participated. It was a joint effort of church an community and showed what people can do if they are willing to try.

The projects included in Mega Impact included 7 wheelchair ramps, roofs on houses, lots of painting and yard work, at least one handicapped bathroom installed and a whole lot of fellowship going on too. The students that worked on our house were absolutely wonderful. They did good work but were also very personable and really seemed interested in our family especially our 2 handicapped sons.

Over the years we have also helped with numerous charitable causes. I love bicycles and have for years. I got back into cycling as way to rehabilitate a messed up knee after an injury while in the military. I was injured playing softball in GTMO Cuba while our ship was doing refresher training back in the 70's , and during the recovery period I found that cycling helped my knee. After my discharge from the Navy in 1976 I sort of got away from cycling for a while. Ruth and I did keep doing some charity work like a walk for the March of Di,mes and such as that before we left Ohio.

Bicycles and charity have now become a common combination for us. In 1995 we moved to Georgia, and transferred my National Guard affiliation from the Kansas Artillery  to the Georgia Mechanized Infantry. It was about then that I realized that cycling was a way to stay fit as well as help others and our family has been doing that through numerous rides and events since then.

In 1997 B-100 Radio started a program through Toys for Tots called Bikes or Bust. Through this program a DJ and a Marine were raised in an RV 100 feet above the Wal Mart Parking lot in Albany. They were to stay up there until 100 bikes were donated by listeners or 100 hours whichever came first,  The first year as I recall "Mustang" Mike Kelly went up with a Marine Corporal, at 4 hours there were 100 bikes on the ground under the RV. Mustang would then say that they were not coming down but they would stay up the entire 100 hours and get as many bikes for the children as they could rather than stop at the 100. We donated a little money that year, but I wanted to do more.

Over the next year I did some extra training and even joined a cycling club in Albany (Pecan City Pedalers, "Nuts on wheels") I spoke with the radio people who at that time was  Ray Fox and Dottie Davis and set up a program where i would ride around 50 miles per day for 3 days totally 150 miles and have people sponsor me on a per mile basis, I would ride in to Albany on the 3rd day and give the money raised to the Marines. I set the goal at 1000.00. On the second day I had about 500.00 collected and the Albany Herald ran a front page full color picture of me on my bike telling about the plan. I heard Dottie and Ray talking about it on the morning show and it was all set. Three days later I would ride into Albany Georgia and meet Ray and Dottie and numerous Marine reservists to give them an envelope filled with cash, checks and pledges from businesses for slightly more than 1000.00. On Friday Morning I stopped at Baptist Hospital of Worth County where I was employed and was greeted by the administrator Billy Hayes. Mr Hayes asked how far I was from the goal, and I told him that I was about 200.00 short, so he donated the difference through he hospital.

I did the ride for the bikes every year until 2002 when they stopped doing that particular ride due to expenses of getting the RV, cranes and gasoline etc, so I found other rides and such to do for charity.

In 2000 I did my first Century ride which raised 1125.00 for Cystic Fibrosis. There were also many other charity rides like the Horrible Hundred in Orlando Florida, The Myrtle Beach Marathon in Myrtle Beach SC, Biking Bleckley in Cochran Georgia, and numerous others. In 2009 I became the event director for Caroline's Ride 2009 which was set up to help a friend with the expenses associated with his 5 year old daughter's disease, Neurofibromastosis. In 2010 Bret Wagenhorst started the Tour de Tifton and asked for some help, we had just started our little bike shop in Moultrie. For the past 4 years I have provided the mechanical SAG for the Tour as well as doing other charity rides whenever possible.

We are working on setting up an Honor Ride for wounded veterans here in Southwest Georgia hopefully in September of this year. The money from this ride would go o R2R (Ride to Recovery) to help wounded heros coming back from any war.  I will do several other charity rides in addition to this.

Another Charity program that I have developed is through the recycling of bicycles. I take old bikes that are discarded or sold really cheap and I repair them into usable bikes then donate them to either individuals or groups that distribute them So far I have repaired and donated a total of 6 bikes as well as repaired one for a young man staying at the mission in Moultrie. I am looking for donations of bikes and parts that may be usable and for places to donate these bikes too once they are ready. Funds are limited so can't do a lot of donations at this point, but will do my best to help out anyone that asks.

If you by any chance have any bicycles or bicycle parts that you don't need or want, please drop them off here or give me a call so I can pick them up. If you are out of town then call and we will see if we can make arrangements to pick them up or get them shipped.

I have also been working with Empower Network to help me raise funds so that I can make the bicycle charity program more productive.  You may need money for a charity, for your own expenses or just to pay bills, if so you should check out Empower Network.

I just heard from a good source that if you race BMX then you should check out Peachtree City BMX this weekend. We won't be able to make it, but Anthony and Shane always have great events and it is  a really nice track. Race for Life on Saturday, State Qualifier Sunday. 2 races in 2 days, can really get some points built up quickly.

For more info on me click here

For answers to questions on cycling click here

For answers to questions on Fitness click here 

For a program that is automatic and pays 100% Commissions click here

For Heritage Church Click here

Have a great day

Jerry

Plumbing and Bicycles

April 7 , 2013

"For  every failure , there's and alternative course of action. You just have to find it. When you come to a roadblock. take a detour. "

Mary Kay Ash

For more info on me click here

For answers to questions on cycling click here

For answers to questions on Fitness click here 

For a program that is automatic and pays 100% Commissions click here

For Heritage Church Click here

Several Months back the bathroom faucet started leaking so we went out to Lowe's and looked around for a suitable replacement. My wonderful wife picked out a really neat looking one that  she just fell in love with and since it was on clearance the price was OK with me.

I got it home glanced at the directions and decided this was going to be a project I would have to do on one of my days off. I had just started working nights so I was working 7 on/7 off at the hospital. I had done some plumbing in the past and was decent at it. I sure didn't want to spend the money on a plumber.

The old model that was in there was a Moen and a decent model but a piece inside the shell had broken and the hot water side was leaking. The new one is and American Standard and a completely different design. Old one uses two handles and one faucet, new one one handle and one faucet. The new install would also require replacing the plastic sheet that covers the wall and some carpentry modifications to get everything plumbed and fitted properly.

It has been several months now since the leak started, and it has gotten worse. I have been exceptionally busy  the last few months with taking Ruth to daily radiation treatments, repairing bicycles, taking the grandchildren to various events etc.

Ruth's last radiation treatment was Thursday, so I told her that Friday I would set aside to to 2 things 1 fix the drain under the house and 2 put in the new faucets for the bathtub and shower.

Luckily for me the drain was a real easy fix. We have a crawl space under the house and the drain for the bathtub which goes to the main drain runs in a way that makes in difficult to get through if anyone has to work down there. We had some people that did some work on the house, they did a great job, They had apparently removed that drain pipe so they could get in and out easier, but forgot to put it back when they were finished. The water from the tub had been running out on the ground since they had worked on the house. Luckily it was just bath water and really did not do any major damage. Anyway I just hooked that back up and it is working fine all the tub water is now going to the drain.

So after that it was time to remove and change out the faucets, The old plastic wall was removed and the old faucets came out without a hitch.  I was thinking this may be easier than I thought originally. Be real careful what you think as things that seem easy, may not turn out that way.

Old faucets are out, and it is time to put in the new. This is Friday about 1 PM, I have made a couple trips to Home Depot to pick up stuff that I din't know at first I would need, I decided to replace a couple of things that probably could have been reused but were not really in great shape. I figured I better go head and replace them now instead of having to take everything apart again in a week or 2 just to replace something that could be done while I have to all apart. Well that is where it got me (isn't there always a gotcha in these stories). I went to tighten a fitting on a piece of the pipe (this is old galvanized pipe, house was built around 1930).  Anyone that has ever worked on old house plumbing can probably relate to what happened next. The pipe broke in two just below  the threads and the HOT water, it's always the HOT water begins to spew out into the wall. I had installed shut off valves in the pipe several years back when I put the old faucets in, but this broke off on the other side of the valve.

This caused a hasty trip to the street to turn off the main valve, probably should have done that in the first place , but was trying to let Ruth use the water in the kitchen. Sometimes things just don't work out like you plan. The broken pipe is about 6" long and I figure I can just unscrew it, but since that pipe has been there for probably 80 plus years it just did not want to come loose, and to be honest I was a little scared that something else would break and I would end up replacing all the plumbing, which is probably also a very good idea, just not right now.

When I got to the street to turn off the water I noticed that the meter was damaged. It only took a few seconds to figure out what had happened. There had been a pile of leaves near the meter, the city had picked up the leaves. They had caught the meter box in the device they used to pick up leaves. I called and told them, they came out, said that since it was still working and not leaking they would be back Monday or Tuesday with a new meter and antenna,

I got the water off to the entire house and worked for several hours trying to get that 6" piece of pipe out without breaking something else. I did not get it out Friday and I had to be at The Tour de Tifton Saturday Morning. I had planned to take the race trailer with me and a few bikes to show at the TdT. When I went to crank up the trailer the handle for the jack broke off in my hand, so I just took the van and tools and what I could get in the van. Did you ever feel like everything is against you? I was beginning to get just slightly depressed.

It was abut 6 PM Saturday before I could work on the faucets again, and I had to get that piece out before I could go any further, a can of WD-40 and several hundred blows with a hammer did not budge anything. I told Ruth I needed a pipe to put on the end of the pipe wrench to get that loose. She brought me several different things all too small or too weak.

I had just about given up, when she comes in the bathroom where I am still trying to budge this thing and getting absolutely nowhere carrying of all things a fence post setting tool. This thing weighs about 10 or 12 pounds and has handles on both sides. It is used to pound the metal fence posts into the ground.  Neat thing though is it a sort of pipe and it fits over the handle of the pipe wrench so why not. I set the pipe wrench put that fence post tool on the end and pulled, amazingly the pipe moved a small amount. I could only turn it about 1/4 of a turn each time because the wall was in the way, but at least it was moving. It took a while but I got it off. I was too tired to do anymore Saturday evening so went to bed, got up this morning at 4 and finished the installation of the plumbing parts. Everyone will get a nice warm bath before church and I will cut the new plastic after church .

Now some stuff about bikes. The 4th annual Tour de Tifton was held yesterday in Tifton Georgia. Bret Wagenhorst and his crew of volunteers as always did a fantastic job of setting up the courses and getting everything prepared.  I have provided SAG for the Tdt each year since it began. I ride throughout the routes and check to see if the riders are safe, need any mechanical support or maybe even need a ride back to the Y.  I keep a supply of tools and small parts like tubes and such in the van. Yesterday a young man picked up something that tore a hole in his tire. It just so happened that I had a new one in the carrier on my van, Placed it on his bike for him and changed out the tube so he could finish his 62 mile ride on his bike. It always feels good to help someone. He came up later to pay for the Tire and we spoke for a few minutes.  I don't charge labor on anything at events like this, but I do have to get reimbursed for parts, so I just tell the riders to stop by the van or booth after the ride and give them a business card, telling them to call Monday or just send a check to the address on the card if we miss each other.  As yet I have always collected from every person I have done work for at one of these events.

The Tour de Tifton ride went very well and is for a great cause. This year the ride was dedicated to a good friend Ilse Boyette. Ilse was born in Germany and married Henry Boyette from South Georgia. She was a special lady that loved cycling, the outdoors and her family. Ilse always had a great outlook and as one of her good friends said at the opening ceremony she could light up a room just by walking in. This year we had exceptional weather for the ride. Do you suppose Ilse had anything to do with that?

The money from this years ride will be divided between the Ilse Boyette Scholarship fund  Tiftarea YMCA programs for children.  Ilse was a Nurse at TRMC and a scholarship has been started in her name to help cover the cost of books for Nursing Students.

I have not heard how much the ride raised for the charities, the target was 10,000.00 total with 5000 going to each.  It would be wonderful if they ,made even more.  I am looking forward to doing it again next year.

I have been speaking with Linda from the R2R and am going to start trying to put together an Honor Ride for wounded veterans ) can be physical or emotional wounds. The target date is September 28th, but I am looking for a place to have it. YMCA's, Churches, and certain Veteran's organizations are usually good places.  I will probably start calling places like that Monday.

If you  are like me your money always seems to run out way before the month ends. If so why not check out the Empower Network. I am starting to show some progress with the Empower Network and I am sure I can help you too, that way we can both make some extra money.

Have  great day

Jerry