October 31, 2004
Saturday's Walk for Diabetes
Yesterday was busy, busy, busy...social butterflies that we are, we had two parties, a housewarming in the afternoon and a Halloween costume party in the evening. But before that, I did go downtown with my sister for the Walk for Diabetes. (Victor, bless him, stayed behind and took rat Jim to the vet for me.)
While wandering around the sponsor tables before the walk began, we were picking up pamphlets on exercise and eating. My sister remarked that a big reason she does all the walking and watches her diet is to avoid ending up like our grandmother, who had diabetes and ultimately several strokes. MK sounded almost ashamed that her motivation wasn't more global. But that's a huge part of my motivation too...I can't remember where I saw the statistic, but I have read that lifestyle is over 50% of your risk factor for diseases like diabetes, cancer, and heart disease (that's the next walk, by the way, Heart Association in two weeks). I watched three grandparents die and I see the struggles my living grandmother and great aunt are having with their health now, and I see what my parents are doing now to try to mitigate earlier diet and exercise choices.
If I can help anybody else along the way to helping myself and my family, that's a nice bonus.
Here are the pictures...setting the scene:
I'm not bald...I realized that in all these walk pictures, because I tend to tie my hair back and wear a cap, I look it.
The Casimir Pulasiki statue at Freedom Plaza.
Waterfowl! Even in the city, I find waterfowl!
It wasn't the prettiest day for touristy pictures. Usually you can see a pointy top to this landmark.