I'll Rest When I'm Dead!

It’s been a while since I have had a chance to do another blog entry, as I’ve quite literally had no time to spare.  I find myself alone on an aircraft flying back to Calgary from Vancouver with my laptop handy, so what better time to catch up!

With the provincial elections approaching in April, we decided to do a “town hall” style debate for the McCall riding in Calgary NE.  I literally had one week to find a venue, organize the technicalities, plan the structure of the debate, then pull it off live on-air too.   The debate went off without any major issues and many people contacted us afterwards to tell us they enjoyed listening from their radios as well.  

The next week (On Tuesday), we decided to do a last minute radiothon with the Alberta/Canadian Red Cross, to raise funds for those affected by the earthquake in Nepal.  With very little time, we managed to get a fully functional, 10-line phone system operating, organized over 40 volunteers and staff, created and printed 4000 donation forms, planned and executed promotions and all on-air activities.  We met at 0730 on the Friday to organize and train the first wave of volunteers, and then kicked off at 0800 sharp!  Donations rolled in throughout the day and we kept at it until about 8 PM.  When we shut it down, we had accounted for $326,500.00 CAD.  As of today, we have reached about $350,000.00.  Radiothons are amazing to pull off but you have to be extremely well organized to avoid a catastrophe!

Finally, we still had Vaisakhi which was the following Saturday.  This year, we organized a more elaborate stage with speakers mounted up on 10’ scaffolding and a 350 meter analogue phone line for a reliable broadcast solution. We strategically scheduled live cut ins from the parade route, which were then also broadcast live onto our stage and on-air.  Our hosts were able to communicate live to air with the reporters from the festival and back to the studio.  The turnout at Vaisakhi this year was about 30,000 people; at times our stage had literally thousands of people in front of it.  We had a fair number of live performances in addition to our heavy broadcast schedule and managed to pull off another $5000 giveaway contest to cap the day off.  When you plan major events, you need to ensure that you are mindful of also planning the post-event tear down!  Set up for Vaisakhi started at 0600 and I finally reached home to my extremely patient family at around 8 PM on Saturday.  Waheguru (as they say!)

Three major events in 3 weeks, my poor family!  Now that the dust has settled a little, I have been enjoying time with my amazing boys and wife.  I am the luckiest man I know and every hardship I have ever known has been all worth it to find myself where I am today.  We gave Coltrane a bike with no training wheels and he was riding up and down the street immediately.  Putting him on the strider bike last year was the key to getting him rolling on an actual bike so quickly.  Adderley is now riding the strider bike and quickly getting the hang of it!  We are also enrolling Coltrane into BMX lessons here in Airdrie, as he seems to be so into bikes!  We are looking forward to summer and many more adventures.. Winnipeg in July and back to BC in August!