2010 Moonwalk for Breast Cancer

The Playtex Moonwalk for Breast Cancer was held in London on May 15, 2010 and was a smashing success!

An incredible 15,000 places were filled in the 2010 London Playtex Moonwalk for Breast Cancer which raised about 1.6 million English Pounds for research and support of breast cancer patients and survivors - with three more events to come!  Official "Walk the Walk" website.

This year Goddesschess was pleased to outfit a team of four lovely ladies with "show girl" costumes (it seems the fame of those fabulous Las Vegas Show Girls reached even into the wilds of Wales), who walked the entire 26.2 mile marathon!  They all trained very hard, doing training "walks" of increasing length and difficulty as the weeks ticked by from February, our first contact, to May 15th.  As the weeks counted down, the ladies obtained pledges and when they let it be known that Goddesschess' very own Las Vegas Show Girls were providing outfits for them, interest in their quest grew.  Bambi and Candi, those fabulous Show Girls, were pleased to help and I was drafted to 'coordinate' everything.

I confess I had a few nervous moments when I finally mailed off the package to England -- I got it out much later than I'd originally planned and fears that the erupting Icelandic volcano might put a nix on all flights to England and the package of costumes, long black gloves and black feather boas would not arrive in time!  Fortunately, the package arrived ahead of schedule and best of all, the costumes fit!

Here is a report from Tracy, one of the walkers.  We are so proud of them!  Well done, ladies!

Have attached a few photos, us sitting down is in the 'Pink City' an enormous pink tent where 15000 women and a few men warm up and wait for their start time. We started at 11.30 it was a clear but very cold night (i wouldn't advise anyone be out all night in london without a lot of clothes usually!) but we were all kept warm with the fantastic reception we got with every turn we were asked to stop for photos and just generally pose as to quote 'your costumes are the best we've seen' how amazing is that?
We had to walk quite a way to queue to get into the big pink tent along a line of waiting walkers, we were met with many envious glances, many people commenting on how great we looked an a lot of rounds of applause as words were not enough!
We had a fantastic night the 26.2 miles were made a lot easier with your very generous donations of the costumes you are obliviously 2 amazing women THANK YOU.
We have raised so far over £500 and its still coming in probably about 700 when we finish double last year. (the costumes helped with that too!!)
Will send more photos later
I cant say it enough THANK YOU
Tracy, Hailey, Lynn and Amanda (last minute stand in for Emily as her horse is ill!, but costume fitted like a glove and she wore it with pride)
Not to mention the fellow walkers who enjoyed seeing our costumes the millions of people who benefit from the walk the walk breast cancer charity who have raised 80 million to date. THANK YOU

More photos to follow.

2010 Moonwalk for Breast Cancer

Here is a photo of the top part of the costumes Goddesschess has purchased for Tracy and the other walkers!  The theme for this year's Moonwalk is "show time" and I think this costume embodies the spirit of a chorus line.  Pardon the photo, the best place to get the "dress" against a light background was in my bathroom :)

Also included as part of the costume but not part of the photo are a pair of hot pants (short shorts),  a black sequined garter and a little dress top hat that, unfortunately because of shipping, is squished and I'm not sure how it might be reconstituted.  We also added a feather boa and above the elbow length black gloves for each of the costumes.

I wanted to check the construction of the costumes before sending them on to Tracy.  The costume is very nicely constructed and sewn, everything (other than the hat) has passed inspection.  I'll be shipping the box of costumes off to England probably tomorrow when I get back to the office.

Here is Tracy and the walkers' website where you can make a donation if you are so inclined.  Their goal is to raise 300 BPS.

Moonwalk for Breast Cancer - May 15, 2010

Lots more information about the upcoming Playtex Moonwalk on May 15, 2010 in London, to raise funds for breast cancer research and patient assistance.

Here is a link to the actual Playtex Moonwalk website - I didn't have this earlier.

These photos are from the 2009 Moonwalk sent to me by Tracy French. The first photo is a crowd shot - gives you an idea of the thousands of walkers who turned out to support this fabulous event in 2009, that started at midnight.

The second photo shows Tracy (far right) and two of her friends (both teachers), decked out in their costumes for the 2009 Moonwalk. Ladies, you are absolutely gorgeous.

This year, Tracy's team will be four strong! Goddesschess is providing "Show Girl" costumes and accessories for Tracy, her daughter, her sister, and a work friend, who will be walking in the 2010 Moonwalk. Bambi and Candi, those irrepressible Las Vegas Showgirls, took a personal interest in this sponsorship and I received much instruction and direction from Las Vegas. Isis helped a lot, too! Thanks, Girlfriends!

Tracy's team is taking pledges, darlings! Please visit Tracy's website to make a pledge. Last year, Tracy and two friends who are teachers raised 581 BPS (British Pounds Sterling) for the cause. This year, there are four walkers in Tracy's group: Tracy, her sister, Tracy's daughter, and Hayley, a co-worker of Tracy.

If you can find it in your heart, please support this wonderful cause by making a donation or volunteering - on-site volunteers are needed in London.

Moonwalk! Update

Hola Darlings! It's been done - costumes ordered. Now there are four, not three. A friend of the British trio asked to join the group when she learned of our small Goddeschess sponsorship for costumes, and Tracy asked if we could possibly underwrite another costume. Well, how could we say no? We could not. And so now there are four. Accessories ordered too! Black fishnet hose, black feather boas, black above-the-elbow length gloves. Ooohhh la la! We can't control the weather, I sure hope the ladies do not freeze in these outfits; or what shoes the ladies wear. Since it is a 5K walk, I'm thinking they'd best wear good athletic shoes and forego the stilletos. Fish-net stockings and Pumas. Hmmm... Isis and I will take a look at the costumes when they arrive (thank Goddess for digital cameras and email) and perhaps add some glitz here and there, and then ship the whole to Tracy in England in plenty of time for the May Moonwalk. Tonight I sure got an eye-full looking at "rhinestone cuffs" online. Not recommended for minors. Oh my. I was looking for inexpensive faux diamond cuff-bracelets, just to get an idea of cost. Oh my. I will have to very carefully tailor my future web searches for costume jewelry. Oh my. Perhaps I'll stick to the local Claire's at the Mall.

Moonwalk!

Hola! More about Goddesschess' newest sponsorship - non-chess, darlings! A few days ago I received an interesting email that introduced me to an event I had not heard of: The Moonwalk Marathon for Breast Cancer. To make a long story short, Goddesschess has agreed to provide Las Vegas Show Girls costumes to three participants in an upcoming Moonwalk in Great Britain that our three ladies will be participating in on May 15th. Woo wooo! Please check out the main website: Walk the Walk. The Prince of Wales (Prince Charles) is 'the' Royal Patron of Walk the Walk. In 2009, during the height of the Great World Recession, the combined moonwalks and sunwalks around the United Kingdom raised in excess of 8.4 million English pounds. This year's walk theme is SHOW TIME. We know the sizes. We've done some research - well, I've done some research. I thought Isis would have a heart attack when I emailed her and said guess what 'Sis, what do you think about underwriting obtaining three Las Vegas Show Girls costumes for ... I had no idea at the time I sent that email to her, but Isis, being a long-term resident of Las Vegas, knows exactly what it costs to outfit a real show girl with a decent costume - from around $875 to over $2,000. That's for the real deal - custom-made and sized. I had no idea that beading, sequins, glitters, feathers and g-strings could be so expensive. But there is an entire art and science involved in constructing the costumes for the real show girls - it is fascinating. Anyway, after assuring 'Sis that I did not intend for us to sponsor up to $6,000 for costumes for the Moonwalk, she jumped onboard (and her heart rate dropped back down to normal). After further research, I have arbitrarily decided either to design and make our own costumes for our three walkers (both 'Sis and I can sew pretty well), or purchase suitable costumes. I have the ladies' sizes in hand, and have a good idea now of what is available and what can be made for a reasonable price. Even if we buy ready-made, with our sewing skills we can add custom touches. That Isis. She is Ms. Mystery. I know that she once played championship level billards, and she once owned an antique/vintage furniture shop. I also suspect that she was once a Las Vegas Show Girl herself. Amazing as it seems, we've had so much other stuff to talk about during our 10 year friendship, the subject hasn't come up. Eventually, I hope we will have photographs of the Goddesschess ladies in their costumes on the night of the Moonwalk. Stay tuned!

Friday Night Miscellany

HOUSE WOES! Hola! I was so put out last night, I couldn't do a single post. There was scheduled a 7 p.m. showing of the house, for which I cleaned for 2 days beforehand and ran home from work last night to do last minute dusting and putting away of this and that, leaving the house before 6:45 p.m. just in case someone should show up early. I took a leisurely stroll to the Walgreens and then the Pick and Save supermarket a mile away, and took an equally leisurely stroll home, a mile back, and got within sight of home sweet home about 7:40 p.m. Guess what - there were STILL cars in the driveway. I couldn't frigging believe it! Mind you, not only was it cold and extremedly damp out, we are experiencing our first January "Thaw" in years and it's more "raw" than usual out there, with all the semi-melted snow constantly fogging into the air. I was tired and bitchy as hell and lugging two heavy bags of groceries. I had envisioned arriving home, finally kicking off my shoes and warming myself, having a large glass of wine, and eating something - anything. I was starved! (It's hard to believe that photo was taken about 2 months ago!) NOT! I was pissed! But I dutifully lugged my groceries a couple of blocks away from the house and then a couple of blocks back - and those damn cars were still there. So, I say to myself, "Self, that is your house. GO HOME!" And so I did. As I was putting my key into the door, it opens and there is an older man holding a flashlight. A FLASHLIGHT? There are several people behind him. They all seem intent on looking at something on the carpet by the heat register. What, I think - is there a bug that decided to appear through the grating? Or a dead mouse? I take off my glove, roll up my coat sleeve and look - POINTEDLY - at my watch. What happened to the 7 p.m. viewing? It is now 7:45 p.m. FINALLY, as I start to muscle my way into my own home, one, two, three, four, five - six people come out of my house, the last being a young attractivl lady who must be the broker, at least I hope she was because she has the key in her hand and puts it back into the lockbox hanging on the doorknob. I would have slammed the door on their butts, but with the weather-stripping in the frame there is no way it slams anymore. Damn! THEN it takes them another ten minutes to leave. What the hell are they doing out there, I wonder? Having a pow-wow? Smoking crack? This house ain't exactly Buckingham Palace. It would be a stretch to say it would take 30 minutes to THOROUGHLY view it from top to bottom - and that is only if one decided to go through the hatchway in the upper hallway into the attic and also crawled around the outside foundation with a FLASHLIGHT on hands and knees. So, I fire off an email to my less than useless brokers reminding them that they told me at the beginning of this incredibly stupid waste of my time and energy that a viewing takes TEN MINUTES - in and out, they both said. Yeah, so what happened to that TEN MINUTES STRETCHING INTO FORTY PLUS MINUTES? And I hear - nary a word. From either of them. So now I am doubly pissed off. The house is coming off the market. I'll do the letter and send it out certified from the office on Monday. Enough of this baloney. On a more pleasant note, Kevin the Wonder Handyman called me on Sunday morning about some work I wanted him to do - but I didn't have a list prepared and so he said he would call me on Wednesday. Well, he didn't call me. So if I don't hear from him this weekend I will give him a call on Monday because now I have my list! More things to be done around here - for me, ALL FOR ME. Bwwwwaaaaahhhaaaahhhaaahhhhaaa! I have decided that crown moulding will look wonderful in the family room, with it's classic Phi proportions :) And I am going to more seriously attempt to track down some painters who have the means to do this two story living room of mine and make any necessary mends to the drywall inner and outer corners, etc. That is, if it comes in less than $2,000. Otherwise, forget it! For that money I can go back to New York for a week. Darlings, do me a favor. I'm not sure if this will work, but please try it. Please click on this link and feign lots of interest in Maison Newton's listing, as if it were the mansion of someone like Pi Diddley or Rush Limbaugh or Mama Gaya - oops - I mean, Lady Ga Ga - rather than a mere Goddess like me. MOONWALK FOR BREAST CANCER I had not heard of this wonderful way to raise funds for this worthy research cause - I think it must be a Euro thing - they have a lot less hang-ups than us pseudo-prude Americans. We have the Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure to raise funds for breast cancer, which is a worthy cause, indeed. But I have to tell you - the Moonwalk sounds like a lot more fun! All of the participants must wear bras. The kids, the women, the men (yes, men and boys too). All to make a point, er - no pun intended. Yeah, you know the kind of bras, like gals wore back in the not so old days - the real pointy ones, with seams and tips! Like Mae West worek, and Jane Russell wore! Like Madonna wore during her early Whore-Look Days. Yeah - THOSE BRAS! Playtex Pointies! The mechanics of which were patented by an engineer employed by Howard Hughes, no less. Remember THE OUTLAW? Banned in its day - yeah, baby! And, you've got to check this one out - I dreamed I was half-naked... Hey, sometimes I do. I couldn't make this stuff up if I tried! The theme of this year's Moonwalk (and I think, the Sunwalk too), is "SHOWTIME." The imagination runs wild :) What fun! STAY TUNED! A couple of Las Vegas Show Girls I happen to know have been asked to render assistance in designing some costumes for this very special walk... BUYING MOVIES AT BLOCKBUSTER It has recently been bandied about the financial pages of various newspapers and websites of late that the business model of Blockbuster cannot be sustained and DVDs have gone the way of the dinosaur. Well - tell that to Milwaukee! Five days a week, I happen to walk past a relatively new Blockbuster bricks-and-mortar location on my way to and from work - and sometimes I walk past it on Saturday and Sunday too. The parking lot always has cars in it, no matter what time of day. I have walked past in early morning, to late at night, doesn't make any difference. I had been thinking for the past few days about re-activiting my Blockbuster "membership" and renting a movie or two for the weekend since I recently discovered less than a week ago that Netflix bumped up its basic membership from $4.99 a month to $8.99 a month. RIP OFF! TOTAL ABSOLUTE RIP OFF! I freely admit it - I'm a cheapskate when it comes to stuff like this. I cancelled my Netflix membership a year or two ago when I decided I wasn't getting my money's worth at $4.99 a month. Ha! But with the new year, and with some movies out there that I wanted to see, and hearing that the coming season was going to have several more films that I thought I'd like to see when they are eventually released into DVD, I thought I might renew my membership. Only to be disappointed at the doubling of the cost to re-join. NO THANKS, NETFLIX. So - there was the Blockbusters building. i was walking up the hill past it on my right. On an impulse tonight, as I was nearly past the building, I decided to stop in. It was right around 6 p.m. A busy time! There were lots of people in the place and more cars pulling in the parking lot even as I was taking the sidewalk off a side-drive toward the entrance. At this particular Milwaukee-area location, they are doing okay business-wise. I go in. Lots to see - but my eyes zero in on tables where they are selling "used" DVDs. Some are 4 for $20. Some are 3 for $20. Bargain! I picked out three and gladly smacked down $20 for these DVDs: Harry Potter: Half Blood Prince; Angels and Demons (which I will watch and have fond thoughts of our 2009 May trip to New York, where I first saw this rip-roaring film in my first visit to a high-rise cinemaplex); and Julie and Julia! There are at least 3 more films I quickly spied that I will gladly purchase next pay-period :) and more after that - some not-so-recent releases that I would like to add to my film "library." I was in and out of the place in less than 10 minutes. I'LL BE BACK... So now I'm cutting this short, because I want to watch a movie tonight and forget all my relatively stupid and slight cares and woes.