#3

This past weekend I raised money and rode in the Tour de Cure. This is a ride that benefits the American Diabetes Association. Diabetes is a very serious disease that has had a great effect on my family. When I decided to participate in a charity, the ADA is what I had in mind. Fortunately, Cedar Rapids had its own bike ride so I didn't have to go far.

If you are not familiar with diabetes here are a few facts for you:

23 Million Americans have been are diabetics

57 Million Americans have Pre diabetes

This means that roughly 1 in 4 Americans either have or are very close to having diabetes.

The World Health Organization says there are 171 Million people in the world with diabetes and that number will likely double by 2030.

It is very very scary. I hope that we begin to take this disease are serious as cancer or another serious disease. I would love to be apart of the end of it.

Ryan

All in a day

One of my favorite things to do is to drive on a beautiful day with the windows down and the music up! I got to do some of that today. I recently moved to Iowa so it was fun to see some areas that I had never been to before.

I found out one thing today. Northeast Iowa is BEAUTIFUL! Hills and trees everywhere. So gorgeous. It reminded me a lot of Tennessee or deep Southern Illinois. It definitely made me feel at home. I was driving on a two lane highway north of Cedar Rapids and I thought, I am never on two lane highways anymore. Kind of sad. This particular highway reminded me of 127 in Illinois. It always felt good to take exit 50 and know that I was going to be in Greenville in a half an hour.

Overall it was a very good day. Saw Dubuque, a massive umpire, the Worlds Largest Strawberry, a town named after me, the Field of Dreams, a bunch of Flags, heard a crappy local band play R.O.C.K. in the USA at a town festival, and 3 states in one day! FUN.

I am going to pile some pics below all of this. I still want to complete 3 items this weekend. 2 down 3 to go.

Ryan

a water tower with my name on it. It's Iowa's version of the Space Needle.

A church I liked, honestly I can't remember the town.

and then there's this...practically the Statue of Liberty, & the World's Largest Strawberry

Grimey bar with my name on it. I took this while driving and getting staired at by a local lady!

This rock was randomly along the highway.

Field of Dreams - if you build it

3 states 1 day

Write this down

This morning I woke up around 8 am and began my usual morning routine. I made myself a large bowl of Cheerios and sat down to re-watch some of last nights sports scores. Upon finishing my very typical breakfast with ESPN still playing in the background I pick up my laptop to check MSN, Facebook, and email. In my inbox I had double digit unread emails and multiple facebook notifications. Communication has really changed! Since this blog is about numbers and specifically my age, in my birth year my morning would have looked drastically different. ESPN and MSN would have been replace by the Cedar Rapids Gazette and I would have to wonder if my friends were bored, tired, or hungry and would not have Statuses to rely on. But I would have been enjoying Cheerios!!! And hopefully will in 30 more years.

I gave you this small dissertation to set up the fact that today I wrote a hand written letter. I couldn’t remember the last one I have written. Hand writing is still terrible so that made me feel at home! I’m not going to say much more about it other than I wrote it to someone who means a lot to me. I have a goal this weekend of completing 3 tasks this weekend so 1 down 2 to go.

From Cedar Rapids with love,

ryan