Too long, for sure. Lots of work, lots of traveling, personal changes... Maybe I can start making up for lost time.
I got an email yesterday from Jack Compton, who rode with us on the 1st Coast to the Coast. He says he's been riding a lot lately, unlike some of us, and he's traded one of his straight-up roadies for a sweet Cannondale tourer.
Apparently the bug bit hard - he's in the initial planning stages of his own tour, from Houston, to New York City, with a goal of ending there on September 11th, 2009.
This is part of what he had to say about it:
While the Department of Veteran’s Affairs provides numerous programs, there are many Veteran’s needs that are not covered by the U.S. Government and often the resources that are available take much more time than necessary for them to be effective. The need for a third party entity to provide Veteran’s advocacy is necessary to fill gaps in the VA programs and to provide faster response to the needs of our Veteran‘s. Our intention is not to reinvent the wheel here. The Soldier’s Angels (SA) and Wounded Warrior Project (WWP) are doing an outstanding job in providing for wounded Veteran’s in their transition from battlefield to rehabilitation to civilian life and beyond. Our intention is to simply provide SA & WWP with the money to be able to keep doing what they do so well. During this time of economic trouble and with the expense of healthcare, it is even more important that we ensure our Veteran’s are being cared for in a manner commensurate with the manner in which they performed their duty for us.
We propose to ride the approximate 1600 miles from the Department of Veteran’s Affairs Regional Office (VARO), Houston, Texas to the World Trade Center Memorial (WTCM), New York, New York in an effort to raise awareness of the 31k+ wounded Veterans, to demonstrate the need for a third party advocacy group and to raise $5.5 million for direct Veterans assistance. We are providing for those who provided for us (actually, we are those who provided trying to get others to provide for the rest of us...).
Project Participants
Latseen & Jessica Benson
Jack & Theresa Compton
Nieves Rodriguez
Charlie Hunt
Good to see Nieves and Charlie will be going along, too. Oughtta be a fun ride, I wish I could go. We should plan to ride along with them for awhile at least.
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