Luane's riding 100 miles in summer heat...why?

From previous posts, you'll remember Luane ran a marathon (that's 26 back-blowing miles...at once) two years ago with Team in Training which raises funds for Leukemia and Lymphoma research. This year, she's willing to put on very tight pants with a pad in the butt and ride 100 miles (all at once) in summer heat through the mountains of Lake Tahoe, CA to do the Team in Training Century Ride. Our baby Jordan and myself will be there to cheer her on.

We need your help to raise $2500 for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. Donate now online at: http://pages.teamintraining.org/sj/ambbr09/lbeck

Since Luane's marathon, a 40-year old teacher of the two boys she helped raise was diagnosed with leukemia and is currently desperately seeking a bone marrow match to stay alive (know anyone who's German and Native American?). She has a husband, she has kids and a life she'd like to live. Luane, who's German but not Native American, couldn't just not do anything.

We're asking for your donation and support for Luane, the teacher, and the thousands of others touched by the disease. Every bit helps so to donate: http://pages.teamintraining.org/sj/ambbr09/lbeck

Meet someone who's alive today because of people giving to Team in Training...below is also a very inspiring story written by Luane's training coach, who's also a cancer survivor.

We all have a story.........Here is part of mine!
Even though I don't like the limelight, I am involved in Team in Training because I do feel that it brings awareness and hope to those that now meet face to face with cancer. All of us will encounter a love done with this deadly disease some day. But, as we become educated, the fearthat cancer carries with it is tackled, and hope is born! With hope comesaction. We can then take steps towards contributing to something greater than ourselves. I truly believe that the greatest satisfaction is not only challenging ourselves to overcome life's many steep mental and physical climbs, but to share the gift of life that each of us holds. Through my surviving Hodgkin's Lymphoma, I want to show that life after chemo, life after radiation, life after spinal cord damage...... is life as we make it. I admit, I still have the fears of a shortened life due to chemotherapy poisoning, a destroyed thyroid and heart damage, but I am not going to let it slow me down. "Life is short" they say, but a childhood friend once told me why *he* did not fear death: he said "it is the lastthing I will ever do, so why worry now?!" Clever. I try and live by thatmotto. With my involvement in Team in Training, I hope in my own way that Ican help give those that will be diagnosed with cancer the same great odds that I have been given. At the same time, helping individuals attain their fitness goals and take on a daunting challenge such as a 100 mile bike ride, gives me immeasurable joy. I have seen so many lives changed! This change happens to those that look fear straight in the eyes, use the resources available to them and then never look back as they work hard to the end. A person's goal is never met in a solo effort however! It is always a team effort. This is the philosophy that Team In Training promotes, and I believe in.

Thank you for your support,

Mike

We all appreciate anything you can give: http://pages.teamintraining.org/sj/ambbr09/lbeck

Thank you for...being you and for being in our lives.

Kim Clark

Portia Apologizes for Marrying Ellen

Movie Posters Arrive

Our distributor sent us some theatre posters and boy are they huge. We don't know where we'll put them but I'm thinking of taking it around our screenings and talks and take photos with it like Amelie's gnome (and taken over by Travelocity's ad campaign).

Believe it or not, I sometimes forget we have a movie (actually two) available for rental and purchase all over the world. It's a trip when I see it listed on Amazon, in Barnes and Noble and on Netflix. It's been 5 years since our first movie released and I guess I just won't get used to it.

Some people ask what's next for us...Luane wrote a very funny narrative script and we're in pre-production in getting it funded and cast....and when that starts to happen, it'll be for a different blog. In the meantime, we enjoy seeing God and Gays proliferate around the country. Thank you for watching it and we hope it's done ya some good.

Prop 8 Hearing on March 5th in California - A Day in Catholic School

This week, I spent an entire day speaking at an all-girl Catholic high school (my third year there) junior's class about the movie and all things GLBT. It happens to be the week the California Supreme Court are also hearing oral arguments on the legality of prop 8. There's a ton of places to go to get filled in so I won't duplicate it here but one thing I said to each class was that they were in live history.

I let the class drive the discussion and we often ended up talking about the whole "us vs. them" societal evil. We talked about the movie Milk, prop 8, the holocaust, interracial marriage, women's suffrage, native american genocide and Chavez's work for the mexican farm workers. Each class would see the connections on how the "us vs. them " paradigm remains alive and well to this day...the "them" just keeps getting updated. Currently the "them" are GLBT folks. Next up, according Rev. Dr. Mel White and many others...actually you can see its been happening for a few years now, are muslims (just ask Sally Kern - see March 2008 postings).

They took a lot away from the discussion and got their questions answered of which they had many. I wish I could do these kinds of talks every day, everywhere. Imagine how much could be accomplished when we actually talk and get to know each other....

See us on Ellen??

The first time coming in from the front, the next time from the back. That's my philosophy on how we'll get on Ellen one day. My sister made the first part come true by getting four tix to the Ellen show audience. My mom, sister, Luane and I were on the show with Naomi Watts Wed Feb 18th. My mom and sister were shown 2-3 times, they sat in the "dance row" and Luane and I were on the first aisle she dances on, I had an aisle seat so you see me 2 or 3 times as well. We had a great time, it was a neat experience, my hands hurt from clapping so much. We're half way there...

Before the taping, a friend of mine who edits the TV show Chuck took us for a tour around the Chuck set and we watched the actors block and rehearse a scene. We got to meet one of the Nerd Herd, Scott, who's a very cool guy. He was the character who was a Missile Command champion in a previous episode. We walked around the set, with the baby even who didn't make a sound.

We saw Kristin Chenowyth from Pushing Daisies and Wicked (NY) who fell for the baby's cute cheeks. It was good to be back on the Warner Bros. lot again.

We were only in LA for 24 hours, to do the show and tour and bolt back, man that was a crazy trip. I attached a photo of Luane on the lot with the baby.

I'm Turning 40

My big 4-0 birthday is coming up and with the new baby taking up all possible energy, I won't be having my big party with everyone I've ever met in my life boogeying the night away while eating chocolate chip cookies as I had always dreamed. Instead, my mom and sister are in town for my grandfather's memorial 5k run and family reunion so we're going to have a baby shower.

I don't know yet what I'll do exactly on my birthday, but it may involve sleep...I'll have to make it up later in the year, like a 40.75 birthday party.

Racial Workshop...and a baby?

This weekend, I've been helping shoot video for a weekend workshop Rev. Deborah L. Johnson is running on the Power of Privilege. She's taking on the hardest and deepest wounds around racism...and connecting them to all the other "isms" in our society...classism, sexism, heterosexism and so on. It's been profound seeing all they all operate under the same fear and how she puts things into perspective and lowers the threats, teaching us to see the big picture, it's been an amazing weekend. She hopefully will release it on DVD soon.

Before the workshop started, Luane and I got a call for a newborn still in the hospital. Luane and I have been licensed fost/adopt parents at the County for just over a year and this is the first time it looks like we'll actually get a kid. We're learning all about him...how he's in the NICU because he doesn't have the natural capacity to know how to suck. He was exposed to meth while in utero.

We've been trained and are prepared to take on this challenge and help him recover sooner than later. We're so excited, we can barely sleep...when that's what we need most of before the critter comes home and owns our nights.

Wish us luck....