Fund mattyc's 'Stache!

Donor submitted photo request. Me doing my own version of River Dance. First thing that came to mind for me is a Hobo dancing in a river. And where better than the Cumberland River in Nashville.

Today is the last official day of Fund-a-Stache so It’ll be the last day you can make a donation for a user submitted photo request. After today you can still make donations…but not for a photo request. I may have few more photos to take/post SO stay tuned.

Donor Submitted request. Me discussing things philosophical for old times sake. This Is Shawn. He is awesome. I’m staying with he and his wife in Nashville. I like them both. Even though Leslie told me she couldn’t take me seriously with my blue moustache. But what does she know right…

Don’t forget….donor submitted request donations must be in by then end of the day tomorrow. I’ll be continuing to post photos till I run out of submissions. Thanks to everyone who has donated.

Yesterday I went down to The Lyons Den Hair Salon to visit my friend David Skidmore. I only get over there every 9 months to a year or so but every time I show up everyone at the shop is really excited to see me. David’s an awesome dude and I knew he’d be down for dyeing my moustache. He and I have collaborated on many other awesome hairstyles. Also David wouldn’t let me pay him…So i made a donation in his honor.

Also met A really nice lady at the salon who took a picture of me to show her nephew (I think it was her nephew) who was in the hospital with a staph infection. The kid’s seriously bummed out. I his surgery went well today. If you guys end up reading this…let me know how things are working out. I’d love to stop by the hospital for a visit when I get back in town Tuesday.

So here’s the sweet video… Enjoy. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5PeSyljozGc

Photo suggestions donations must be in by end of the day monday.

Funkfinger (the host of this moustache fund raising party) and his lady made a photo request yesterday. They wanted a photo of me doing something I love. Many of you know I fractured 2 vertebrae in my back in January. I wore a back brace for 3 months and have been in physical therapy for just under 2 months. The doctor does not want me doing any high impact activities yet…so I have not been on a skateboard since the first week in January. I had no plans of stepping on a board until the doctor gave me the ok. Mostly I knew if I started pushing around on a board I’d want to start doing tricks…So I’ve just stayed away. Since I like Jay so much I decided I’d hop on a board for the first time in months for him. It felt really good just to cruise down this little hill. I can’t wait till the doc give me the go ahead to skate again.

Only a few days left to make your donor submitted photo request donations. All those donations must be made by the end of the day May 31st. I’ll keep taking/posting photos until I run out.

This morning before work I went to the Baton Rouge Zoo to take this Donor Submitted photo: Me Performing Shakespeare at the Baton Rouge Zoo. The zoo employees were nice enough to allow me to take some photos. I’d never been to the BREC Zoo before and I was pretty impressed. I wasn’t expecting much But it was pretty sizable and had a great selection of animals. And it was dirt cheap compared to other Zoos. I wish I’d have had more time to look at the animals. It was too early in the morning for the monkeys to be out and about. But it was a fun morning and everyone at the zoo was very helpful. Here’s a link to a couple alternates http://www.flickr.com/photos/21718587@N08/4645371722/in/photostream/ http://www.flickr.com/photos/21718587@N08/4644756709/in/photostream/

Still need $36 more dollars in donations by noon Friday for my moustache to be dyed blue

This is my tribute to George Ohr (1857-1918), “The Mad Potter of Biloxi”. Last month I participated in Culture Candy’s Looking at Art. It was a lot of fun and we got to see some really great art in Baton Rouge. One of the exhibits we toured was the George Ohr Exhibit currently at the LSU Museum of Art in the Shaw building downtown. His pottery was very unique and shattered the norm for pottery in his time. I was slightly more intrigued by the photo portraits of him. He took very unusual/unique portraits that are nothing like other portraits I’ve seen from the time period. Also He had awesome facial hair.

For more info on George Ohr you can visit http://www.georgeohr.org Or you can go see his exhibit on display at the LSU MOA till August 1st http://www.lsumoa.com/programs.php?program_id=122 And if you Live in Baton Rouge and have not heard of Culture Candy…you must not be paying attention. You should go to http://culturecandy.org/ and find out what awesome things you are missing.

NEW CHALLENGE INFO This morning I was on the Jim Engster Show on WRKF and I announced what my newest challenge: $500 in donations by Friday at noon and I’ll be dyeing my moustache BLUE. Lucky for you people have already made donations so only $236 to go.

Lastly Business disclaimers. I’ll be out of town Saturday, Sunday and Monday…but I’ll still be doing my best to go all out on photo requests. While technically my fund raising is only through the end of the month if people make photo requests by May 31 I’ll still take the photos even after the 31st. But in order to get a photo request you have to make your donation by the 31st. Also some people have asked about late donations. Yes You can still donate after may ends…but It won’t count towards me getting a tattoo. The $5000 must be reached by the 31st.

NEW CHALLENGE

If I get $500 more dollars in donations by Noon (central time) Friday my moustache configuration will be changed drastically for the awesome. It’s still under wraps for the rest of the day. But if you want to know exactly what it is you should tune in to the Jim Engster show tomorrow morning on WRKF 89.3 at 9am. I should be on at roughly 9:15ish. If you don’t live in the area you can hear it here http://www.publicbroadcasting.net/wrkf/ppr/index.shtml

UPDATE. I just heard from Jim and he’s bumped me to around 9:50 but you should definitely tune in for the whole show as It’s usually pretty great and informative.

As of today there is one week left in the month. So far I’ve raised $2541.99. That’s a whole lot of money. But wouldn’t we all like to see me get to the $5000 mark…then I’ll have to get a moustache tattoo. For those of you who don’t know, I do not currently have any Tattoos and have no plans on ever getting any. But If I make it to $5000 by the end of this thing I’ll be getting a tattoo. I’m gonna try to squeeze one more challenge in as well.

Also my buddy Chris Trew (nerdcore rapper, improv actor, stand up comedian, sketch comedy writer and all around funny dude) wrote a nice little blog about my fund-a-stache. Check it out.

http://terp2it.com/awesome-friend-report-matty-c/

Of all my photographs this month…this one is the most Brilliant. Not because it’s that fantastic of a photograph but it was a brilliant donor submitted idea. Let me explain why.

The place behind me is called The Chimes. It’s an iconic restaurant in Baton Rouge. It’s right outside the North Gates of LSU where I went to college. If there were one restaurant in Baton Rouge to be named the favorite place to eat and drink in town it would no doubt be The Chimes. For instance on a typical weekend night you might wait well over an hour to get a table. I have lived in Baton Rouge for just under 11 years now and I had NEVER eaten there and furthermore had never even been inside of the place. I simply refused. I claimed “moral opposition” to The Chimes anytime people wanted me to go there. It was simpler than explaining why I was opposed to eating at the place. It’s pretty well known to anyone I’m friends with that I do NOT eat there EVER. Even when people I haven’t seen in a long time are in town I don’t go to this establishment. Everyone I know thinks it’s ridiculous and that I’m an idiot

Well my good friend Chris Carrington came in town this weekend…and he made a $100 for a picture of me eating at The Chimes.(We took this photo outside shortly after eating…it looked better than the photo we took inside.) Being a man of my word I ate there with him for the first time in my life. Below is a brief review of the place.

We got boudin balls (a cajun favorite) to start out. They were decent. Not the best I’d ever had because it’s really hard to get better than Tony’s seafood market in north Baton Rouge. They also weren’t the worst I’d ever had. They were somewhere slightly above average.

For my main course I got crawfish etouffee, which is one of my favorite things to eat. I felt like the portion on this dish was surprisingly small for the price. If you make this dish at home it’s usually fairly cheep to make the most expensive aspect of the dish being the crawfish which shouldn’t matter right now because it’s crawfish season right now and they’ve been cheaper than I’ve seen them in years. That being said the dish did have a lot of crawfish in it. I’d had several people before rave about how good that dish was as well as the waitress telling me that people order it a lot. It was not that great. It was only average as far as I’m concerned. There are several other places in the city that do a better job with that dish in this city….and a number of them that do worse. The bread they give you with your dish was pretty good for sopping up the leftovers. It was a little harder than I prefer my bread but the taste was good so I was ok with it.

All and all the restaurant is just plain average. Not exceptional and not terrible. I still feel like it’s totally overrated. I’m still totally morally opposed to it and will not go again…..Unless people donate $100 dollars to charity and pay for my meal…because apparently that is the price of my morals.

This morning my friend Robert and I woke up around 5am to walk 10 miles (round trip) to get water from the Mississippi River. Chances are by the time you woke up today we’d already finished our walk. This is a photo of us filling up water. The River was a bit high so there were still some large areas of collected water near the bank so it was easy for us to fill our bottle. The water was really gross looking and none of us would ever think of drinking it. As gross as it was…it’s still way cleaner than the water people drink in many African Villages. We go to the sink to get water whenever we need it. People in these villages have to travel up to 10 miles round trip to collect water. If you don’t think that’s a big deal I urge you to try a walk like this yourself. I did this as a personal task to see what it was like to be in their shoes (if they are lucky enough to even have shoes). I asked Robert to come along because he was very instrumental the last time I raised money for Blood:Water Mission. Last time we raised money he and I walked a combined 56 miles during the 12 hour walk-a-thon we hosted. When I asked him to walk with me he suggested we leave at 5:30 to make it more authentic. It’s a good thing we decided to go that early because on top of the sun and heat it was insanely humid. Not to mention the fact that our bodies really aren’t use to walking long distances. By the time we got their our feet were already hurting. Not just the bottoms of but all joints in our toes. All and all it was a pretty satisfying endeavor and hopefully it’ll urge some more people to donate or convince more people to learn about the water crisis in Africa.

Today is PHOTOSHOP FRIDAY.

People have been asking about all the awesome colors in my photos. Here’s the real secret.

Also Tomorrow morning me and my buddy robert will be waking up at the crack of dawn (or actually before it) to walk 10 miles round trip to get water. We’ll be simulating the journey African women make to get water. If you live in Baton Rouge and are thinking of passing by to see us email me and I’ll let you know the route. mattaithiew@hotmail.com

ALSO I POSTED THE VIDEO FROM YESTERDAY…IT’S DOWN BELOW….ON YESTERDAY’S POST

So this outfit is pretty awesomely embarrassing. Been wearing it all day. Getting some awesomely awkward looks. Also a couple almost laughs in my face. So thanks for donations.

UPDATED. Here’s the video link

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aCjBpBjOa3k

Still need $95 more dollars in donations by the end of the day today or else I won’t be wearing a really embarrassing outfit all day tomorrow.

Also Saturday I’m going to be walking 10 miles to get water. People in Africa have to walk up to 10 miles round trip to get water. I’ll be walking a mile (or 10) in their shoes. Still figuring out the route…i’ll post it here just in case anyone wants to drop by while I’m walking.

Still need $250 in donations before the end of the day Wednesday in order to have me wear a ridiculously embarrassing outfit all day.

Also planning on doing a 10ish mile walk to get water to simulate what African Woman have to do for water….that isn’t even clean.

Donor Challeng #2 successful. 10 Donors of any amount = one moustache ollie. And Yes…it was super sketchy to see/hear a skateboard coming directly for your head.

Watch the video here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q0gFmm5dmxA

Also New Donor Challenge $300 by the end of the day Wed and I will wear a super embarrassing outfit on Thursday…to work…to lunch…to the gym…to the store…maybe a bar. I’ll post a video of me the following day of all the places I wore this ridiculous get up.

SO $300 dollars by the end of the day Wed. Lets do it.

Power Puff Girls photo. Thanks to The real BK for the big donation and awesome photo requests. Britney (BK) and I use to watch the Power Puff Girls together in college.

Also Big thanks to my sister for throwing together some sweet costumes in a couple of hours. Big thanks to my brother in law for being Blossom. Big thanks to my aunt who let us trash her house while making costumes. Big thanks to my brother for the projector/computer. Big thanks to my mom and step dad for letting us shoot this in their house.

Here’s another donor submitted request photo. Me Hi-5ing a kid with a fake moustache. Luckily Samantha (my good friend Abby’s daughter) had been wanting to go back to Chuck-E-Cheeses. Also luckily my Friend Rachel (Ali/alijoon’s wife) had given me some pink moustaches to give to Samantha. Samantha loves moustaches for some reason.

Another Donor Submitted request. Via Jessica Hageman who coincidentally won last sunday’s prize drawing. She’s got a pretty sweet prize coming her way.

Still need a couple more donors till you get to see someone Ollie over my moustache. Donations must be made by the end of the day.

Also on a logistical note…if the donations are made…the Ollie photo/video will not get posted till Monday.

Note…what makes this photo most extraordinary is the fact that i despise cat photos on the internet. I hate LOL Cats and every other cat photo on the internet. I feel there is no place for cats on the internet…but apparently there is a place…and that place is raising money for charity.

This is a donor requested photo. Me doing my best MC Hammer.

Speaking of donors… I still need 4 new donors before you can see someone ollie over my moustache. It doesn’t matter how much you donate…but you must donate by the end of Friday. Every Dollar counts because every dollar I raise provides 1 year of clean water to one African. If all you have is 10 dollars that’s 10 years of clean water for a person.

Don’t forget to Watch this video I made to see why you should donate http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UIFuA3sjPwg

I hear from the people at Blood:Water Mission today and they loved what I’m doing.

Also Still Need 5 new donors to see an Ollie over my moustache.

Check out some recent press

http://www.azcentral.com/thingstodo/events/articles/2010/05/08/20100508fund-a-stache-has-men-grow-mustaches-charity.html

http://www.biteandbooze.com/2010/05/matty-cs-fund-stache-kfc-double-down.html?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter

Current Donor Challenge Still in Progress. Need 8 more donors till someone Ollies over my moustache.

New donor Challenge One thing my charity, Blood: Water Mission Does is build wells in Africa. I made a short video about why this is important You can watch it here

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UIFuA3sjPwg

Here’s the deal. If I get 10 more Donors by Friday my friend will Ollie over my moustache Evel Knievel style. We’re talking full out big air ollie over my head while i’m sitting upright. So 10 Donors…no matter how much you can afford (even 5 bucks) because every dollar makes a difference.

***I’d so something skate related myself but I’m still recovering from a back injury. I wanted to including skating in my fund raising because it’s something I love to do.

Enjoying a wonderful ninja snowball by request. Check them out on check em out http://twitter.com/ninjasnowballs or http://facebook.com/ninjasnowballs

Wanna see me do something else. If you donate $60 to Blood:Water Mission…I’ll take whatever photo you want to see.

Today I went out to do a donor submitted photo. I went to the outdoor part of the mall of Louisiana and set up my sign. I had about 8 or nine people stop by during the hour I was there. Most of them were just high school kids who hang out at the mall. I talked to this one really cool kid who didn’t want to go into the mall while his friends shopped…so he came to talk to me once i was freed up from other conversations. He wants to be a game warden when he grows up. He’s only 17 but already dealt with a ton of tough stuff due to some rough family issues. It’s a good thing he didn’t go into the mall with his friends because they got busted for shoplifting…and he told me if he had gone in there with them he’d have likely gotten busted to. Right after he was telling me this really rude “rent-a-cop” asked me what my problem was today. He told me I wasn’t allowed to do waht I was doing because it was “soliciting”. I asked him how it was soliciting since I wasn’t asking for anything…I was giving something. He told me to put up my sign so I put it upside down on the ground as I wanted to finish my conversation with the young man I was talking to. He told me If I wasn’t buying anything at the mall I had to leave. Ironic part about that is…out of all the kids I talked to at the mall that day only one of them had bought anything. So After being kicked out of the mall I went Downtown where no one was interested in free conversations. I spent about 2 hours there reading my magazine…So While I completed the challenge..unfortunately I am alone in this photo.

So it’s been a full 7 days and I’ve raised $947. I’ve got three pending donation requested shots. 1) Me offering up free conversations in a public area 2) Me hugging two cats 3) Me taking a leisurely sunday drive on the gocart…making a gocart traffic jam.

ALso stay tuned for a Video about my charity and for a new Donation Challenge Next week.

Raised $735 so far. New challenge coming up. as well as a new video.

This is Cackey…she was my first Fund-A-Stache donation. She won a cool prize. Also we ate tacos.

DOUBLE DOWN CHALLENGE: COMPLETED http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BtjcgTrY4eQ&feature=player_embedded

Challenge #1 reached. Tomorrow’s photo will be double double downs…one of them Lutherized (on a donut).

also new rule

Anyone who Donates $60 dollars or more can put in a photo request. So donate some money and I’ll Take whatever awkward/embarrassing scenarios you wish. Keep in mind that it must be legal/family friendly…and also keep in mind that I’m still recovering from a broken back so “high impact” activities are off limits.

Fund-a-stache challenge #1

If I raise $150 dollars more (bringing the total to $500) by the end of the day Tuesday…I will Double Down 2 KFC Double Downs. Photo + video to follow on Wed. Wish Me luck…now lets get some donations…every dollar counts….15 people 10 bucks each… 3 people 50 bucks each.

Also don’t forget about the weekly prize…and my matching funds.

Raised $350 dollars so far. Not too shabby. The webmaster told me he’d have page totals on the site soon…so feel free to follow me along on my journey.

WELCOME TO MY FUNDASTACHE. HERE ARE SOME BASIC RULES. MORE TO COME AS THE MONTH GOES ALONG.

1. THE FIRST PERSON TO MAKE A DONATION WINS A PRIZE (IT’S A SECRET PRIZE BUT IT’S PRETTY COOL AND CUSTOM MADE).

2. FOR EVERY DONATION OF $100 OR MORE I’LL MAKE A $50 DONATION

3. EACH SUNDAY I’LL PUT THE NAMES OF EVERYONE THAT DONATED INTO A HAT AND DRAW OUT A RANDOM NAME TO WIN A PRIZE.

4. IF I RAIS $5000 DOLLARS I’LL GET A MOUSTACHE TATTOOED ON MY BODY (I HAVE NO TATTOOS OR PLANS TO EVER GET ONE).