janet's Easter Thank You

 I'd like to take this opportunity to express my deep thanks to the PEI RoadRunners Club, their executive, and the Island running community for your emotional and financial support during my recent eye surgeries. I've been a huge fan of you all since you embraced Alex, with such acceptance, when he joined the PEI RoadRunners in the Spring of 1994. Although, technically, I am a member, as a non-runner I often forget that fact. This is the 2nd time now it's been made very clear to me that I am part of a community, and again I am humbled and honoured by your consideration.

In the years since Alex joined the RoadRunners it has been a pleasure to support the Club, the race directors and the runners in many little ways... holding a stop sign, a cup of water, a sweaty discarded shirt, a handful of keys, a wallet full of money, the hand of a child... 
Before too long I settled into my regular role as Jamie's assistant at registration and the finish line. 
I do try hard to take good finish line photos of you, and I know I often fail miserably at that, but at very least I try to document the event and provide "photo backup" for times when the timekeepers on the finish line are overwhelmed by your numbers and Jamie is faced with, and does an absolutely incredible job of, putting together the race results by cross referencing registration information and photos to fill in the blanks on the finish line sheets.

A word about those photos...
Almost all the public photos on our Flickr account are race photos. 
As I write this there are 98,381 public photos. 
They have been seen 2,510,180  times. 
(Alex's Runman blog has 1,252 posts and has been viewed 328,894  times.) 

If you ever see a photo of you there that you hate, and you want it removed, just ask me and I'll remove it. Email me at jypsy@planetautism.com, use a subject line like "Flickr race photos" and tell me the set name and photo number(s) or send me the link. 

If you ever see a photo that you like, and you'de like the originl, high resolution, un-watermarked copy, just ask. Email me at jypsy@planetautism.com, use a subject line like "Flickr race photos" and tell me the set name and photo number(s) or send me the link. 

If you're at a race and want a photo taken of yourself, your group, etc., with your camera or mine, just ask. If I'm not busy taking finish line photos, I'd be happy to.

I have always credited (and blamed) my camera for my photos and will continue to do so. If you're interested in what my camera is, and I'm on my 4th point and shoot Canon digital camera, you'll find that information by the photo on Flickr. It is rare that I have ever known the quality of my photos until I could download them and see them on my computer screen. Such was the state of my eyes and my vision. Although it will be a few months until I'm fully heeled, already I'm quite giddy at times by the improvement in my vision. I hope it makes for better photos.

A word about my eyes, for those interested...
I've been struggling with high pressure in my eyes for a number of years. The handful of eyedrops I'd been doing numerous times a day to try to control it gave me that lovely bloodshot eye look I'd been sporting for a while now (and failed to control it). 
It became obvious in November 2012 that surgery would be necessary eventually. In January it became more urgent so the first surgery was done in late February with plans for the 2nd eye to be done in April or May. 
However, 3 weeks later I was back in Halifax having emergency surgery on the 2nd eye. 
The surgeon is happy with his work and my eyes are responding pretty much as they should. 
The surgeries I had were both combined operations that were aimed primarily at lowering the pressure in my eyes and preventing future vision loss from Glaucoma. 
Another eye condition, Iritis, (that dates back exactly 25 years to when Alex was 3 months old), and its treatment, ruled out a simpler glaucoma surgery and had left me with steroid induced cataracts, so I had new lenses implanted at the same time the glaucoma shunts were implanted. My eyes now also carry tissue from the eyes of 2 donors, an incredible & generous gift, and I will forever be deeply thankful to those unknown donors and their families.  

Happy Easter!

Thank You!