“Oh *%!* I’m climbing a mountain”

“Seriously? You mean he’s going up there?”

Christopher Cockburn, quite heroically in our view, is taking on Mount Kilimanjaro.

The headline, taken from his own words,  probably won’t be reproduced by the Ealing Gazette but it succinctly sums up his feelings.

We’re hugely grateful that Chris, who knew Tom well, is making the climb on behalf of Tom’s Fund and CRY in either January or February 2014.

He has a Justgiving page up and running at http://www.justgiving.com/christophercockburn

Please show your support for Chris by giving it a Facebook like, Tweeting it etc. If you know anyone who wants to donate, please point them in the direction of his page. He’s trying to raise £500 and, just as importantly, he’ll help to raise shedloads of awareness.

So thanks again Chris and good luck from me, Claire and Ellen!

Overwhelming

Launch day was unbelievable – thank you to all those who followed us yesterday on Twitter and liked us on Facebook. We have been overwhelmed by the support.

We’ve even had our first offer of a fund-raiser – more on that when things firm up a bit but if you have any thoughts, please let us know. We want to raise £30,000 in 12 months to mark Tom’s 21st. It’s a big ask but if you don’t ask …

It was great to see so many show their support who had gone to school(s) with Tom or knew him from football, Questors or elsewhere. We old folk can try our best with websites but CRY is a charity for and about young people as CRY’s postcard campaign graphically illustrates.

So whether you’re getting yourself sponsored or sticking up a CRY poster at your business or college, it all counts and is appreciated.

Getting the word out at a uni or workplace can really make a difference. If you want leaflets or posters, let us know via the comment form on the Contact Us page.

PS: We had a problem with a flickering screen on pcs caused, it seems, by the carousel of images. We’ve turned off the automatic animation while we sort it out. If there’s still a problem in the meantime, please let us know.

Our new site

Tom would have been 21 at the end of this month. We wish we were celebrating that milestone with him.

Instead we are marking the launch of our new website which will carry news and information about Tom’s legacy, the Tom Clabburn Memorial Fund.

We do not think it right that Tom and so many like him lose their lives when screening might save them.

We know that many of you feel the same because since its launch in 2008, Tom’s Fund has raised more than £70,000 for the charity Cardiac Risk in the Young, CRY. That’s down to family, friends and supporters in west London and we are hugely grateful to them all.

That generosity has enabled us to hold free heart screenings in west London every year since 2009. The 2013 screenings, this coming Sunday, are already fully booked. As usual, they were over-subscribed.

We’d like to mark Tom’s 21st by trying to raise £30,000 over the coming year, which would mean the fund reaching £100,000. If we could do that it would secure free screening in west London for many years ahead and also help to fund CRY’s vital research programme.

If you’d like to help in any way, you can do so via the Support Tom’s Fund/ Contact Us page.

You can also follow Tom’s Funds updates via Twitter, Facebook or email.