Since I first made my list of 100 goals as ALife4Sale was coming to an end last year, I have only made one change, and that was done before the 100 weeks period commenced. One of my goals was to ride on the now closed thrill ride “Fly By Wire” in New Zealand. I wrote about the change of goal here. I replaced the impossible goal with seeing Chichen Itza, which I achieved in July earlier this year, details here.
Well, I am going to have to make one more change before I get to the end of my list, as I have two conflicting goals, and I can’t see any reasonable way to achieve both. Over the course of my adventures during the last sixteen months, I have become a firm believer in never saying that anything is impossible, because once you believe it is impossible, then for you it will be.
I did write in a blog post that one goal had become “unachievable”, because the date of the event had been changed from June to August. You can read that post here. However, when I re-examined the problem, there was a simple solution. All I had to do was change the planned dates for the “7 Peaks in 7 Days” goal, and find a cheapish return from Denver to London, in order to take part in the Worthing Birdman Competition.
And so I have another conflict of dates coming up in February next year. The world has many festivals and events which take place on Shrove Tuesday, or Fat Tuesday, as it is called in many places. Fat Tuesday, a literal translation from the French term “Mardi Gras” is on 16th February in 2010, the day preceeding Ash Wednesday, the first day of Lent, and of course is the day on which Mardi Gras is celebrated in New Orleans.
Fat Tuesday is also the day on which the Carnival in Rio reaches it’s festive conclusion. But unfortunately, on the same day, the Sedgefield Ball Game takes place in the north of England. I have weighed the two events, and the carnival in Brazil is the one that I think offers more of a challenge, and is more in keeping with the nature of my 100 goals adventure. The ball game will be there in subsequent years, and is only about ten miles from my mum’s house, so is still something I would like to attend one year. I just don’t think it is going to be in 2010.
Please note that I don’t say that it would be impossible to attend both events. It would be feasible, and I would be prepared to give it a go with the right sort of assistance! England is 2 hours ahead of Brazil, and I imagine it would certainly be possible to attend the ball game on the Tuesday morning, jump on a plane straight afterwards at Teeside Airport (time for a quick pint before leaving Sedgefield, of course!), and then fly direct to Rio for the festivities that evening.
One small issue is that I will already be in Brazil for the build up to Carnival, so would also have to fly back to the UK for the event. A second issue is that there are no direct flights from Teeside to Rio, so the only option would be a private charter. Now, if someone out there has their own jet and crew that they can lend to me, I’ll happily give it my best shot! But without such assistance, I am unable to fund such an option myself, and even if I could, I probably wouldn’t! I already seem to spend far too much of my time on aeroplanes as it is!
So here’s what I am going to do. I am going to move the goalposts (pun intended!), by removing “Attend The Sedgefield Ball Game” from the list of goals, and replace it with the sixth most-voted-for goal from the “Add 5” list chosen by blog readers before the start of my 100 weeks, when my final 5 goals were chosen by a vote.
And I was really hoping this one would make it to the final five, and therefore the list of 100, and I am now excited to add my new goal:-
LEARN HOW TO RIDE A UNICYCLE.