Throughout the month of November, armies of blokes are banding together in workplaces, sporting teams and more, pledging to groom, trim and wax their “lip foliage” to perfection (or otherwise) in order to raise funds and awareness for men’s health, specifically prostate cancer and depression in men.

Kicking off in Melbourne back in 2003, the charitable event has grown massively to now boast over 1.1 million participants and pulling in over $72 million during last year’s event!

2011 promises to be bigger and better than ever and I’m personally hoping to contribute to this year’s event as much as possible. The careful cultivation of my very own “facial grub” has begun, and all that is missing now is the generous influx of donations and sponsorship dollars from you – my friends, family and loyal readers!

ALL I AM ASKING FOR THIS YEAR is for all of you to give up a couple of your daily coffees and instead donate $5 or more to my fundraising efforts!

Simply click on the “DONATE TO ME” button below to get started with your credit card donation!

To see how I’m going in my ongoing quest throughout Movember, make sure you swing by my very own “Mo Space” (http://mobro.co/masey) where you can view my running donation tally, leave messages of support, and also find out more about the men’s health issues that we are all rallying around.

Here’s what you need to know:

Tickets will be available as of this Friday, 21st January.

Here’s how you can get your hands on tickets:

1. Track me down sometime over the next week in the lead up to Wednesday night. Good luck!
2. Enter your name and the number of tickets you want in the form below. You will be placed on a guest list at the door on Wednesday night and you’ll be required to pay for your tickets ($10 each) then.

Each ticket will inclue your first drink* FREE thanks to the generous guys and gals at REPUBLIC! It’s important that you arrive before 11pm or you will be subjected to Republic’s regular cover charge on top of the ticket price.

* Check with bar staff to see which selection of complimentary drinks are available.

Let all your friends know about the event!

FACEBOOK

Check out the event page I have thrown together on Facebook. This should make it easy for everyone to share the event around amongst your friends. It won’t hurt to hit the “Like” button at the top of this post either *wink, wink*.

PLEASE NOTE: Even if you indicate on this Facebook Event Page that you are attending, you still need to submit a request for tickets in the form above. Very important!

TWITTER

Copy and paste the following tweet! Simple!

Make a donation if you can’t make it on the night

You can wire (using SWIFT) donations directly into an account set up by the Queensland Government for overseas donations. Here’s the details you need:

For more details, visit the Queensland Government Flood Relief Fund information page.

And that’s it! All that’s left then is to come out and have a good time, celebrating all things Australian and contributing to what I hope will be a really successful fundraising event!

Now, I witnessed the Vancouver Giants’ teddy bear toss at last week’s shootout loss to the Spokane Chiefs at the Pacific Coliseum, but I can tell you now, the local effort had nothing on what was captured on camera at the Calgary Hitmen game versus the Red Deer Rebels at Calgary’s Scotiabank Saddledome last Sunday night. 23,000+ stuffed creatures of all sizes rained down on the ice, hurled by a mere 16,844 spectators in attendance, following the Hitmen’s first goal score by #16 Cody Sylvester.

What makes this truly astonishing is that this all occurred MID-PERIOD! Completely nuts – but a super charitable effort by everyone on the night!

Dubbed “Twestival” (Twitter Festival), the whole idea of the day/evening is to, on a large scale, use social media for social good with 100% of the proceeds from events, raffles, silent auctions and more going directly to “Concern Worldwide”, a charitable organisation whose, “education programs target the poorest people in the poorest countries in the world, with particular emphasis on reaching out-of-school children such as girls, orphans, street children, working children, children affected by conflict, children affected by HIV and AIDS, and children with disabilities.”

This year’s Vancouver Twestival is set to take place at a really cool location, CBC Canada’s The Audience Lounge at Georgia & Hamilton, at 6pm on Thursday evening. Tickets are only $20 and can be purchased online right now.

For your 20 bucks you get the following:

• Admission (donation to Concern Worldwide)
• 1 Wine ticket (more available for purchase)
• 1 Raffle ticket (more available for purchase)
• Food (sushi & canapes)
• Official souvenir YVRTwestival button
• Entertainment (Rob Cottingham, live DJ, Mojave)
• Socializing and networking with Twitter friends & contacts.

For further details, check out the official Vancouver Twestival website: http://vancouver.twestival.com/

There’s set to be a silent auction on the night to which I have personally donated one of my more popular framed, limited edition photographic prints called “Calm Outlook”. Shot on the edge of British Columbia’s Harrison Lake a couple of years ago, the print is bound to provide a tranquil influence in anyone’s home and I’m really hoping that a bidding war breaks out on it! Haha!

The HeARTS for Haiti event a couple of weeks ago was a tonne of fun and a big success, so there’s no reason why this little shin-dig can’t be exactly the same! So grab your ticket online now (hurry cause they are selling fast), come on down to Vancouver Twestival this Thursday and dig deep for this worthy cause!

I’ll be down there (@masey), so make sure you find me and come say hello if I haven’t met you face-to-face already!

With an estimated 230,000 people losing their lives in the Haiti earthquake on January 12, 2010, and a further 1,000,000 left homeless, the 7.0 magnitude quake left in it’s wake one of the worst humanitarian disasters the world has seen in a long time. Many organisations and generous people throughout Canada and the world have been donating their time and their money in an effort to relieve some of the pain and hardship now being felt by the people of Haiti.

Recently released on iTunes, the “Wavin’ Flag” track and video are now available to purchase, with all proceeds going to the Haiti relief effort. 50 artists in total came together to record the song, including K’naan, Sam Roberts, Justin Nozuka, Avril Lavigne, Nelly Furtado, Hedley, Justin Bieber and the girl of the moment Nikki Yanofsky.

Having just looked right through the “Young Artists for Haiti” Facebook fan page, I have now purchased the track and urge any of you out there who enjoy good music, and/or have not donated to the Haiti cause as yet, to do the same!

A couple of bucks is all it’s going to cost you, or a little bit more to purchase the video, or even a t-shirt from the recording.

Crank up iTunes and do your bit to help those in need. Every little bit helps!

As mentioned in my introductory blog entry over a year ago, I chose to sponsor Nanano Swaibu and her pharmaceutical business in Kasubi, Uganda. After receiving update notifications on how Nanano’s business has been fairing over the last year or so, I recently received a “loan fully repaid” email which has freed up my lending funds to help out another business.

Since I sincerely believe in the good work being put in by the Kiva organisation, I’ve boosted my invested sum by USD$75 to take my lending balance to USD$100 for 2009. This has enabled me to provide loans to 4 start-ups around the world for this year, and following are some details on who I have decided to go with:

• Zarbibi Mahmudova – Retail Business – Tursun-zoda, Tajikistan
  Zarbibi Mahmudova, 52, is married and has 6 children. Zarbibi lives in Tursun-Zade. Her husband works as a helper at a construction site. Zarbibi has been selling plastic covers for 4 years. She applied for this loan to purchase building materials and to pay rent for her stall. Zarbibi will use the building materials to build a shed for her stall. She will repay this loan within 12 months.
• EMIGDIO – Refrigeration Services – Bolivia
  Emigdio is 45 years old. He lives in his own home located on Viru Avenue in the Peatonal Zone with his wife and their four children who are 20, 17, 14 and 16 years old. Emigdio has had his refrigeration shop on the same avenue for many years. There he lives and has his accomodation and he can count on his children for help. Competition is low since his shop is the only one of its kind in the area. As a result, he has a lot of work. And regarding his accomodation, this is because there are others in that place. Emigdio invested the whole requested loan amount in his refrigeration shop, a value of US $1,000. This would be his third loan requested from this institution. All of the previous ones he repaid punctually. He has an outstanding debt with another financial institution.
• Sreyton Lot – Fruit and Vegetables – Khsach Kandal district, Cambodia
  Mrs. Sreyton Lot, 26, and her husband, Mr. Saman Lonh, 25, live in a small village along the Mekong River, about 20 kilometers from Phnom Penh. They were married in 2004 and have one young daughter. Sreyton has been selling sugarcane and corn for two years. She buys her supplies in her village and resells them at nearby villages. Mr. Saman Lonh has been farming for five years. He grows rice. Besides farming he is a horse cart driver as well. Sreyton is requesting a loan of 1,000 USD to purchase contracts of sugarcane and corn for resale.
• Fares – Barber Shop – Nabatieh, Lebanon
  Fares is a 31-year-old man who lives in Nabatieh, southern Lebanon, with his wife and their three children. Fares has owned a barber shop for eight years. He has requested a loan of 1000 US dollars from Al Majmoua in order to purchase tools for his shop. This is the first time that Fares has requested a loan. Fares is special in his work because he does good haircuts and likes his work. His clients are his friends and neighbors. When he first started his business, he was afraid that his business would fail. In the future, he plans on expanding his business.

If you too want to get involved in this awesome and easy opportunity to help your fellow man out across the world, sign up for a Kiva account at www.kiva.org.

Thanks to a website called “Kiva”, I have lent money to Nanano Swaibu and her employees to help them purchase stock for their business as well as purchase a boda-boda motorcycle taxi to rent out to generate more income. Nanano has requested $2,000 which I, and a selection of other Kiva members will loan to her business on a twelve month repayment term managed via a local “on-the-ground” microfinance institution.

Over the coming weeks, I will be able to log onto my Kiva account and view reports submitted by Nanano regarding her business success and progress in repaying the loan given to her. Once my loan has been repaid, I will then have the option to either withdraw my investment, or to use my “Kiva Credit” to help out another business in the developing world. What a fantastic idea!

The brainchild of Matt and Jessica Flannery, Kiva.org has been endorsed by leaders around the world including former US President Bill Clinton and is currently receiving press all over the place. The reason I love this concept so much is that when it comes to “charity”, I believe more in empowering people to help themselves, rather than just delivering hand-outs.

If you’re looking for a different gift this Christmas that will make a difference, check out www.kiva.org. Loans start for as little as $25 and let’s face it, the feeling of satisfaction that you have helped make a difference in the life of a business owner in a developing country, and subsequently all of their customers, is worth so much more.

Oh, by the way, I’ll do my best to add updates on how Nanano’s business is going in the comments section below, over the coming months.

My good buddy Jordan recently launched a new blogging venture in support of his Dad “PJ’s” current bid to cycle from Powell River, BC, Canada down the US West Coast to San Diego in Southern California.

Like Jordan mentions in the opening entry on the Blog “30 Days With No Underwear”, PJ (third from the right in the pic) is a keen recreational cyclist, and while fit as a fiddle and as energetic as the next guy, he suffers from asthma and is therefore, “…known athletically for short bursts of speed followed by shortness of breath.”

This next passage from the Blog explains what PJ and his mates are up to now and what that intriguing title means:

“…one day an acquaintance of his (Al Craigen, another character in this story of ours) asked him if he’d like to go on a bike ride to benefit the BC Lung Association. After very little thought, he agreed. So here are two men, in their fifties, pledging to ride 200 km over two days, with a little less than six months to train.

Well, they did it. And have continued to do “The Trek” for the past six years. But they didn’t stop there. As I write this, they are pedalling down the Oregon Coast, on a 30-day trip from Powell River, BC, Canada, all the way to San Diego, California, USA. 30 days. They have a support van, but no solid laundry plan. In his wisdom, my esteemed father decided that laundering his underwear during this trip would be too much trouble, and that “going commando” was the preferred method.”

I had the pleasure of meeting PJ myself on my recent trip up to Powell River (Blog entry and images coming soon…) and got to know his great personality and sense of humour. I know that all the guys will be having a fantastic time and with them entering the second week of their journey as I type this, I wish them all the best for the remainder of the trip.

They thrive on comments from their supporters, so if you derive some kind of entertainment out of the photos or Jordan’s writings about their quest, please drop a comment on the Blog on any of the posts to show you are behind them all!

Please spread the word about “30 Days With No Underwear” and please continue to support the lads by keeping an eye out for the book in the future. I can promise you it will be a great read full of fantastic yarns!