All in a good cause?

A few more ideas to add to the list of suggestions so far, but I’ll come to that in a minute.  There were a few reasons behind the idea of doing fifty firsts in a year.  Some, like going to Anfield, were about fulfilling a life long dream, others like the tarantula holding, were to do with challenging myself to face my fears.  However, I’m hoping that I can also use some of them as opportunities to do something worthwhile, put something back into the community and raise some money for charity.  

Skydiving naturally springs to mind as one of those events that might raise a few pounds for a good cause, but which good cause?  Do I pick one charity and use any of my fifty things that fit the bill to raise what will hopefully be a sizeable amount for one cause?  Or do I choose different charities for different events, some local and some national perhaps?

Top of my list would be Great Ormond Street Hospital.  Not through any personal involvement other than taking a group of students on a visit a few years ago, but because it is one of the most inspiring places I have ever been to, filled with a vast array of positive, enthusiastic staff, despite the inevitable difficulties they must face on a daily basis dealing with the children and families for whom the good news they long for doesn’t arrive.  It’s hard to argue against such a sentiment, but as I’ve recently become a governor at a local primary school, with a constant need to fundraise to supplement the basics local authority funding provides for, I feel duty bound to do something more than sit in meetings, so there’s a strong argument for them to benefit from my endeavours too.

Anyway, as far as other suggestions for the Fifty Firsts go …

Ice skating – I had roller skates as a child and I’ve done a bit of roller blading along the sea front in my time, but I’ve never attempted ice skating so camel spins here I come!

Being an extra in a film or TV show – sounds dead easy, I mean there can’t be much to it surely other than do as you’re told and look inconspicuous in the background, but I suspect it’s not that simple … well for starters, I’d have to persuade someone to take me on in the first place and I’m not sure that ‘Well, I’m trying to do fifty things for the first time during my fifty first year’ would be construed as a good enough reason!

A bush tucker trial style eating challenge – I absolutely refuse to go the whole hog (no pun intended, well maybe a little bit) and eat meat items, having been a non-meat eater for 22 years.  However, I do eat fish and seafood and there are a few things I’ve never tried, such as oysters, which I’m not overly enthusiastic about trying, but I could probably cope with that.  Now do snails count as meat?

Learn a new skill maybe, although I’m not sure what.  I can knit and sew, do most of my own DIY round the house – wallpapering, painting, putting up shelves and that kind of thing.  I learnt French, German and Latin at school, although I don’t remember that much, and did a course in British Sign Language, which I remember the basics of.  Maybe a new language, like Spanish, but I’m not sure how it could be measured to tick off as having been achieved. I mean do I attend so many classes or have to be able to say a specific number of phrases or hold a conversation for so many minutes, in which case I’d need someone to converse with.

Some more food for thought at any rate, and that’s still only 12 ideas!  Surely there must be fifty things I haven’t yet done?  Come on people I need your help!