Christopher Eldridge

It's been five years since Mary-Lou lost her battle with cancer.

To honour and pay tribute to her memory I'm hosting a BarbeCURE at 76 Sandy Camp Road WYNNUM on Saturday 24th February to fund vital research to find a cure for people with cancer.

Please help me by making a donation through my page. It only takes a minute, and any money you can give (no matter how large or small) will go a long way to helping me reach and exceed my target.

The more people that know about Cure Cancer, the greater their impact, so please also spread the word by sharing my page with your friends and family.

Thank you in advance for your generosity, it means a lot!

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Mary-Lou's BarbeCURE

Friday 23rd Feb

Well, Knock me down with a feather!

Not in my wildest imaginings did I think we'd be able to raise this much. Just another $103 and we'll crack the $3000.00. My most sincere thanks to everyone who's donated you are all, to quote the hostie on the Virgin ad, truly wonderful!

There'll be some good stories come out of this and I'll just take this opportunity to relate one to you all. It's a bit long but worth reading to the end.

When we were at Booyal M-L was thought of as a bit of a a rebel. Her attitudes to many things rubbed the locals up a bit but over the years they came to respect her for them. In particular was her stand on Indigenous rights and the wrongs that had been done to our First Nations people.

Some of the locals decided to buy M-L a concrete Aboriginal statue garden ornament just to rev her up a bit and see what she'd do.

So, not to be intimidated by our inappropriate neighbours, Mary-Lou called him Neville and gave him pride of place in the driveway and planted an olive tree beside him. The locals soon learned not to question M-L about Neville or indeed anything else for that matter because she'd give them the rounds of the kitchen over their racism.

Skip forward to December 2018 and we've moved to Brisbane and Mary-Lou is in the middle of the cancer treatment and has commenced her transition to work. We've decided to get rid of the farm and I'm going up to get anything of importance left there and to talk to an Agent. I asked M-L if there was anything she wanted and her answer was "Neville, we don't know who'll end up there and I want him here with us".

So I brought him back to the Gap and we all know Mary-Lou was only with us for a few short weeks after that.

I moved to Wynnum and Neville came with me and got a nice spot where he could look down the driveway, with a Madagascar palm planted beside him.

Skip forward another couple of years and I'm having a concrete driveway built and really struggling to find a concretor because of covid. Eventually someone from work gives me a contact to a young bloke, Dan. Dan turns up on time, gives me a good price and does a really first class job. I cant recommend him highly enough.

End of day one and Dan asks me if I'd sell him the statue.

No way! He belonged to my wife, and I proceed to explain the circumstances to Dan, and he understands the significance and says "If you ever consider selling him let me know, I'm Indigenous and I'd like to have him but I appreciate why you want to hold on to him".

Fast forward, again, to last week. I'm washing up looking out the kitchen window and I'm looking at Neville and I'm absolutely certain he's looking at me and saying "Mate, it's time we both moved on, ring Dan". So I rang Dan and when I said who I was he said, "I was just thinking about you last week". I went through all the BarbeCURE stuff and asked if he'd like to make an offer on Neville and make it a donation to the Mary-Lou BarbeCURE fund. "I'd be happy to contribute to the fund even without Neville as my Dad is currently getting treatment for his third cancer".

Well Dan will end up with Neville and Cure Cancer will get a donation and I'll be happy that Neville will be looked after appropriately and I think Neville will be happier to be with his own people in a family that has kids.

Everyone's a winner

Mary-Lou's BarbeCURE

Thursday 15th Feb

Hi all and just a bit of an update and some details on times etc.

But firstly and most importantly, thank you for your generosity and support. I'm truly overwhelmed by it and I know Mary-Lou would be too. It speaks volumes to the regard in which she was held by all who knew and loved her.

When I registered with the Cancer Council I thought if we could raise $1000 it would be a great result. Well, over a week to go and when I last checked we were nudging $2500. On behalf of Mary-Lou, myself and the cancer researchers a heartfelt thank you.

Now, some details.

The BarbeCURE has actually sort of morphed into a PizzaCURE. I recently finished building an outdoor pizza oven which I'm madly practicing with to get it just right for the Big Occasion.

We'll be firing it up around mid afternoon and it'll take a couple of hours to get the temperature settled so we'll be good to start cooking at around dusk, just in time for the mozzies, so bring your favourite repellent.

I'll have plenty of bases, cheeses, sauces etc but I might struggle with toppings, particularly "exotic" ones so it'd be appreciated if you could bring some of your favourite toppings. We can do some mix'n'matching and experimenting.

Arrive any time you like from mid arvo on and that should give us all time for a few drinks, some memories and doubtless some tears. And in keeping with Mary-Lou's best practice there will be no closing time.

This is all about remembering, honouring, and paying tribute to Mary-Lou, who we all miss dearly, with the added bonus of helping to advance research into beating cancer.

Location: 76 Sandy Camp Road WYNNUM Qld

Time: Mid Afternoon Saturday 24th February 2024

And finally please spread this on through your preferred social media.

Thanks, Christopher

Thank you to my Sponsors

$1,000

Anonymous

$500