For those of you just tuning in, Erica Murray is a Fletcher student who is currently battling leukemia. She inspired me to register as bone marrow donor and I encouraged all of you to register as well. Cupcakes were promised.
First things first, I need to clarify something that I said in my previous post. I warned of big scary needles. Erica’s friend Abby left a comment setting me straight. The big scary needle is only a small possibility. Seventy percent of the time, donating marrow isn’t any more difficult than giving blood. So, for providing misinformation, I humbly apologize. Mea culpa. I sincerely hope that I didn’t deter anyone from registering. It is truly a noble cause.
(So, get yer butts out and register)
Erica left a comment on my entry and I was humbled. She also requested cupcakes and guitar lessons, things that I will happily give her the next time that she is in Boston.
(Seriously, why haven’t you gone out and registered yet?)
Fast forward to this week, when we get an email requesting that someone help webcast an event so that a student with cancer can watch it from California. This starts to sound oddly familiar. I put two and two together. You do the math. Well, you can’t offer to give someone cupcakes and then refuse to webcast an event for them. You just can’t. I’m pretty sure that there’s a rule about it somewhere. It’s bad karma.
So, we figured out a way to make the webcast work, namely that I will be bringing my video camera in from home and hooking it up to my laptop. I’ll then send the video feed to Erica using Skype. We’ll even patch her into the A/V system for the crowd to see at some point. We tried it out tonight and it worked perfectly. Of course, this means that my laptop will probably catch on fire tomorrow. Such is technology. Cross your fingers that everything goes smoothly.
I wish that I could give my marrow and not just my technical expertise, but it is a nice feeling to be able to do something to help. It’s very rare in my field that you get to do something that really and truly will make people happy. Mostly, we just put out fires and tell people that their laptops are dead. I spend the majority of my day dealing with the angry, the frustrated, the just plain disgruntled. I feel honored to have a chance to do something positive for a change.
(So, give the marrow registry people a call and maybe you can feel the same way)
First, you deserve credit for figuring the webcast thing out. That stuff can be such a pain sometimes. Sounds like you have an impressive solution!
I’m glad you get the opportunity to help. It is a field that can be frustrating at times and it is nice to actually do something that matters in the big picture that is life, rather than just the smaller business world.
This registering thing is a little depressing. I’m trying to find a way to register in my area, rather than doing the mail thing, and it really takes some digging (I have some phone calls to make tomorrow). It’s sad that information isn’t more readily available, someone really has to search for it.