Autism Holiday Readathon!!

This is Kate. Isn't she puurty??

Today I am turning things over to my friend Kate, who most of you may know as Verb Vixen. Kate is this gorgeous, smart, funny, sweet, gorgeous twitter pal of mine, and the other day she said she wanted to do this Readathon, and give the proceeds to an autism charity of my choice! Woo hoooo!!! She asked me to help get the word out and also to pick an autism charity that I felt was most deserving.

I chose the HollyRod Foundation, and not just because both Holly and Rod are following me on Twitter. No, I'm really interested in helping organizations that provide iPads or grants for iPads to autistic people. I'm amazed at how much of a difference an iPad can make in the communication skills of a person with autism and I really want to help people be able to communicate, if they're unable to with their words.

I'll make my pledge right here and right now, by the way: I will match what Kate has pledged, which is to donate $1 for every 100 pages she reads from December 1-December 25th, 2011. But she's a serious reader, people. Who KNOWS how much this will cost me (and you) in the end....

I've created a new page here on Y.GT. dedicated to collecting your pledges for the duration of this readathon. You can get to it from that link, and also a new tab that you'll see above, any time between now and the end of the 'thon. Kate will be making daily page count updates on Twitter, so make sure you're following her to get in on the page count action.

And now, heeeeeeeeeeeeeeere's KATE!

---

Kate's Holiday #Readathon Challenge

Tis the season to be giving, tra lalalala lala la la.

You probably don't know me, unless you're on twitter in which case, you might have a smallish percent possibility that you've stumbled on one of my tweets before. But even then let's pretend like you don't know me so I can keep this little introduction paragraph I've written.

I like to consider myself a member of the Literati. Haven't heard of us, well, we're growing, or shrinking, depending on who you ask. I have a little blog called Verb Vixen where I write reviews about all the books I read and post literary quotes and bookish things. Anyway, every holiday season some book bloggers get together and decide we should do what we do best to help others: READ. On December 2nd-4th a number of book bloggers will be participating in a holiday #readathon sponsored by WhoRuBlog, where they pledge a donation for every page they read. This year, I've pledge my donations to the HollyRod Foundation.

While any donation to any cause is worthwhile, I started thinking: What if we book bloggers told other communities of bloggers we were doing this? What if we stopped thinking about only what we could give, but how others could give too? What if we did something like a real fundraiser, where people could sponsor a reader and match donations? And what if it wasn't two days but the whole holiday season? It seemed like it could have potential.

That's when I contacted Jillsmo, because she's the best autism blogger I know. And Jilly totally wanted to support this hairbrained idea! Since she knows so many more autism bloggers than I do, it seemed like a good idea to host this in her space. Before we get to the challenge, I feel like I should tell you all, I read A LOT and REALLY FAST. Just how fast, you're asking? Well my record is about 1700+ pages in a day and about 162 pages an hour. While I can't read that pace every day or even most days (I do have a life to live people!). I can easily do a few hundred pages a day. Here's the real pledge:

I, Verb Vixen, pledge to donate $1 for every 100 pages I read from December 1-December 25th, 2011. My goal is to do about 400 pages a day for 25 days to reach a $100 donation. And because I'm extra giving this year, for every book I finish I'm donating a canned good to a food pantry or a toy to toys for tots.

Would you like to sponsor my reading as well? If so, I triple dog DARE you to take my #Readathon challenge. Visit Jill's page to make your pledge.

---