The Countdown is On!

Yesterday evening I went to pick up my Torchbearers' uniform. Here's the logo on the back of my jacket.

One side of the left arm...

...and the other side. Colourful, isn't it?

These are the special mittens. You can see they look just like the red mittens everyone bought during the Olympics, but with two very important differences:

The maple leaves are made of grippy rubber instead of being fuzzy...

...and the top side of the mittens bear the Paralympic symbol, the Agitos. (Latin for "I move".) These are going to be rare as hen's teeth because they are only for the Torchbearers and won't be sold in stores.

Here's my toque.

A close up of the patch on the toque.

This is my official leg of the 24 Hour Torch Relay. Unbeknownst to me, VANOC used the 24 hour clock when handing out the relay times. You can imagine how surprised I was to discover I was running my leg at 2:37 a.m. !! YIKES! This means I have to be up at midnight to make the collection time of 1 a.m.!

It's going to be a really long (but exciting!) day for me because on Friday afternoon, I have been invited via the Mayor's office to a special Paralympic Torch Relay celebration at LiveCity Downtown in the afternoon and then we have tickets to the Opening Ceremonies in the evening. Somewhere between doing the torch relay and the celebration, I will need to fit a nap in!

They gave us all our info in these cool folders. I will be recycling mine into my Olympic/Paralympic ROD journal, which is in the works.

Inside was some postcards and stickers, which are also destined for my ROD journal.

When I went to pick up my uniform, there were a ton of people there to do the same thing. People in wheelchairs, people with guide dogs, local celebrities (I stood next in line to Mi Jung Lee, a local news reporter, who is also running a leg in the relay.) and everyday folks. It looked like a nice cross-section of British Columbians were chosen to participate in the Relay.

I also, by chance got to meet the Torchbearer who will be lighting my torch. His name is Kevin and he lives in my community. He's #146, I am #147.

I am really excited that in 16 hours, I will hold my torch in my hands and walk it into the official Paralympic history books. I know the moment is going to be fleeting ( as all the best moments of life are) but I will be savouring every second. Hopefully my guys will be able to get good photos and perhaps capture it on video as well. For one brief moment, I will literally get to be a luminary.

Back soon with a story to tell. It doesn't get any better than this!