Comments for Charity Wrap-up & Winners

I just want to thank everyone who left comments on the travel posts from The Roadtrip 2009 for the CMP Comments for Charity. I twice extended the ‘deadline’ since I was still posting highlights well after I returned home. The last of the highlights went online Friday, so yesterday morning I sat down and ‘generated’ a list of everyone who commented between the blog + the RSS feed updates posting on my personal Facebook account, as well as the Twitter responses & retweets … and even the comments on the handful of images I’ve posted on my personal Flickr account.

… and the grand (combined) total is …

142!!

I set the goal of 150 comments — in increments of 25 comments = $25 to a pre-designated charity. So — while only 8 comments shy of the 150, I will be making a $25 donation to each of six charities …

$25 to the USO 
$25 to the Veterans of Foreign Wars
$25 to the Paralyzed Veterans of America
$25 to the Wounded Warrior Project
$25 to the Humane Society of the United States
and …
$25 to St. Jude’s Children’s Research Hospital

How will you know that I’ll be making these donations? Well — I get paid every other Friday at my day job, so I will be writing out the checks (or donating online) to one charity each payday (or over the weekend immediately following said payday). And after I write out the check/make the online donation, I will photograph it (of course blurring out my bank/credit card account info) and post it here on the blog. So starting this Friday (well this coming weekend) through the first weekend in October, you’ll see a weekend post every other weekend regarding the donations. They’ll also be tagged with the comments for charity tag so you can easily locate them.

As a thanks to everyone for commenting, I have a few prizes to award! After tallying up the count, I used random.org to determine the winners …

The 11×14 mounted print goes to … Cheryl!

… and because I had so many online and photographer friends (on top of clients, coworkers, and friends from over the years) rally to help CMP reach the Comments for Charity goal, I decided to add in two 8×10 mounted prints and a set of postcards … random.org chose …

Evie (8×10)

Jen Gentry (8×10)

and …

Vinita (postcard set)!

I also ran a Twitter contest for a set of eight postcards (created by me) – those that responded to or retweeted my travel tweets were eligible.

The winner of that postcard set was … Photomomma!

And I have to recognize the two individuals who commented on nearly every post from The Roadtrip: Timber — my best friend — and Lydia — the awesome harpist featured here back in May. Look for a surprise in both of your mailboxes as well!

So …. Cheryl, Evie, and Jen — look for an email in your inbox asap and let me know your mailing addresses and the image you want for the mounted print! Vinita and Photomomma — let me know your mailing addresses asap as well, the postcards are in hand and ready for shipping!

Thanks again so much to all of you!

In other slightly off-topic news, check back later this week for the the travel photography gallery information plus the first of two contests I’m about to announce!