November is Raining Diabetes

Guns and Roses sang about November Rain.

Well, they missed a beat in their tune. As November is American Diabetes Awareness Month, it's only appropriate to pick up where the rock band left off and highlight the D-activities this month that appear to be raining down, like cats and dogs with a diabetes touch.

Brace yourselves. There's a lot of D-Raindrops falling in November. Which is totally awesome, but a little overwhelming at the same time. Seriously. I have a full hamper of a laundry list to spell out here just to keep track of everything so I don't forget. Hope the printer works, so that I can print out and post on my bulletin board as a reminder:

• The American Diabetes Association has this campaign called Stop Diabetes, and this 11th month of the year is a big deal for that initiative. You can make videos. Join this campaign. Sing and dance. Or whatever floats your boat of whatever size and model. Have fun.
• Today is SAE Day, meaning you should Support, Advocate and Educate. This is the brainchild of Sarah over at Sugabetic and the point is to raise awareness in a big way.
• Wednesdays, 9-10 p.m. EST: Yep. Just because it's November, doesn't mean there won't be the Diabetes Social Media Advocacy discussions online. Join in with Twitter at #dsma or @DiabetesSocMed. Be a part of the huge discussion, and you may even get an invite to a little something called #dprom. Yep, I said it. #dprom. Bacon. Diet Coke. Unicorns. Friends. Wrastling Gators. Fun with Friends. What an event it'll be!
• Some Diabetes Online Community members have changed their blog and site color schemes to represent the color blue. In honor of the month. As you can tell, I did this in October because I could. Come on. Join the club. Everyone's doing it. You know you want to.
• Diabetes Research Institute wants you to Be a Part of The Cure. With just a $10.00 donation, you can upload a photo & submit a short story about how diabetes has affected your life. The campaign is being sponsored by Animas and LifeScan, who will match the first $25,000 in donations. The final CURE collage image will be reproduced on a giant banner that will hang within the Diabetes Research Institute at the University of Miami, the beneficiary of the campaign proceeds. 
• Go Blue: No, this isn't a battle cry for the University of Michigan (not this time, at least!) Cherise wants the Diabetes Community to sport some blue attire each Friday of the month, unless some otherwise-planned event or color-deviation is warranted. No, she's not advocating this color simply because she now lives in Indy and that's the color for the Colts. Rather, it's D-Month and blue appears to be the closest thing to a universal color we have. So, we're asked to Go Blue for November Fridays!
• Friday, Nov. 5: DiabeTEES. Make your own diabetes-themed T-shirts. This is the fun challenge comes from Jeff Mather, who plans to design and unveil his shirt proclaiming "A Velociraptor Ate My Pancreas." AWESOME idea. Others say they're joining in, too, so check out his posts here.
• Also on Friday, Nov. 5: Orange: Will. You'll find more about this initiative over at DiabetesSisters, but basically it's an effort aimed at Women With Diabetes. Like pink is to breast cancer, Brandy Barnes and Sisters are striving to make Orange the universal color for D-Women. This isn't meant to interfere with the color of blue and other efforts to adopt a universal D-color, Brandy says. But rather to point some focus on these women and the chronic condition that so many live with each day. So, there you have it. Go represent, whether you're of the female persuasion or not. There's already so many D-Colors ou there (gray, blue, red, orange, whatever else...), might as well add another...
• Sunday, Nov. 7: The local JDRF Chapter here in the central part of the Hoosier State is holding an event at the Children's Museum of Indianapolis, aimed at education and advocacy.
• Tuesday, Nov. 9: Annual Diabetes Blog Day. This year's topic = Six Things You Should Know About Diabetes, According to Me. A full listing of these #dblogs from everyone can be found here at the Diabetes OC, thanks to Gina Capone.
• Saturday, Nov. 13: OmniPod and a Movie - maybe this is our chance to finally see Buried??? Well, whatever the movie - it's a fun day up in Noblesville where you get to learn about the tubeless pump, grab a demo kit, and then catch a flick!
• There's even multiple events happening on Nov. 14, which is World Diabetes Day:
• Type 1 Talk: A network of D-meetups nationally, all connected by the JDRF Advocacy office using a live-stream video Q&A on various D-topics. This is the first year, and the national organization is trying to make this an annual thing that sparks discussion and networking within the D-Community.
• D-Message In a Bottle: We are being all crafty, by creating an artistic masterpiece that illustrates a message in a bottle. Whether an actual bottle or a drawing or sculpture or whatever it may, and then hanging it in the window or displaying it online for all to see.
• Big Blue Test: At 2 p.m. YOUR LOCAL TIME, test your Blood Glucose. Then, exercise for 14 minutes and test your BG again. Then, go online and post your numbers. Aside from all the connectivity with this worldwide event, Accu-check is also playing a part by funding a video that people can watch online. For every view/share, Roche will donate a dollar up to $75k to help it go viral. You can watch the video here, or see it below.
• ACT1 Dancing for Diabetes: Go out dance on the streets of New York City! Find more details here.
• Media Awareness: This is my own initiative. Being a newspaper and media guy, I want to make sure that reporters know the differences between Type 1 and all the other types of diabetes. To that end, I've created a media cheat sheet for reporters to rely on. I've also pushed some stories locally, but can't guarantee any will run that Sunday to help spread D-Awareness!
• Friday, Nov. 19: Diabetes Youth Foundation of Indiana is holding its annual gala.
• Thursday, Nov. 25: We have much to be thankful for this Thanksgiving. Like the always-present camaraderie of the DOC! And a visit from my parents, including my Type 1 mom. And so much more.

Some have "surprises" planned for this month, and World Diabetes Day specifically. Can't say that I'm on that bandwagon, although my mom did make a couple cool little items for WDD that I'll display later in the month. Though I did consider NaBlPoMo (National Blog Posting Month) where you most put up a post every single day of the month, including weekends. But I just don't think I can swing that, energy-wise or time. Instead, on a suggestion from our own Ninjabetic, I am going to wear my Blue Circle Pin to work every day and keep tabs on how many people ask about it. We'll see what happens!

Aside from that, we've got a whole calendar month to get through! Looking forward to seeing everyone and the various activities as we make our way through toward December and (gasp) the end of 2010. Now, I leave you with this great video below: