Journey for a Tobacco-Free World

Day 45 — a well-deserved day off, if I may be so bold — finds the JTFW in Medicine Hat, Allberta…and the Saskatchewan border is only 2 days away!  Yee hah!

Yesterday was the absolute worst day of the entire trek (weather-wise), thus far.  The day before (Day 43), one of our Saskatchewan colleagues called to ask where I was.  I told her (I was east of a place called Tilley)…and she told me there was a tornado warning for that area!?!  Conversation was difficult as the wind whistled by me and my phone (I’m guessing the winds were at least 40 – 50 km/hr)…and even just walking in a straight line was challenging at times, as stronger gusts hit me.  But other than the strong winds, it was a great day; mostly sunny, warm and clear (I was very comfortable in shorts and a t-shirt…and runners, of course).  I had a perfect 360 degree view of the horizon…and checked it frequently for anything that resembled a tornado, but it was fine.  I assured Lynn that it was all good, to which she said, “Not according to the Weather Channel; there’s a big purple dot over your area!”  I can only assume tornadoes are represented by purple dots on the Weather Channel.  In any case, I survived.

As I said, yesterday was much worse:  The early morning was reasonably nice, but then the same strong and sustained winds returned, with a vengeance; this time, it was much colder (next time I got to the van, I bundled up like an Eskimo and put on some winter gloves) and, to really make things interesting, Mom Nature threw in a whole bunch of rain and even a little hail!  It was brutal!  I had never been so tempted to call it quits for the day, but persevered…and, about 11 hours after I started, completed my 42 kms.

There was a picture of me (and a brief caption) on page A2 of today’s Medicine Hat News…and I did an interview with “Power 93.7”, a local radio station ( www.power937.com ).  I spoke with Warren (the general manager of the station) a couple of days ago.  John, the reporter, told me today that normally there would be some discussion among the staff as to whether or not they would do the story at all, how they would cover it, etc.  But in this case, Warren just told John to “go get the story!”  Clips of the interview will air on the news (at the top and bottom of every hour, between 6:00 and 8:30 a.m….or 5:00 and 7:30 B.C. time!?!) tomorrow, July 15.

I continue to be amazed by the level of public — and, more and more, media — support for the ‘total eradication of the global tobacco industry’ idea.  In fact, of the dozens (perhaps a hundred or more) of complete strangers I’ve mentioned the idea to over the last 45 days, there has not been any opposition whatsoever.  Not even any ‘neutrality’; the vast majority of those people have been very enthusiastically agreeable and supportive.  And all of that just has to translate in POLITICAL support…and much sooner rather than later.

That’s all for now.

Errol