I am very happy to report that after only a few days the quota has been met, thanks to a few generous folks. Thank you so much for helping out. It really means a lot to me, and really, anything I can do to repay the debt, I am more than willing. With the money raised, the website and journal will surely remain intact and active throughout the rest of the journey and for the next year. Below is the original message. I wanted to make sure that everyone knew the target has been reached, but I decided to leave the link there below, just in case anyone feels generous.

Well, folks, first of all I want to thank everyone who has been reading along throughout this journey so far. The comments are definitely a morale booster for me as I pedal along. Although I spend almost all of my time alone on the bike, it is nice to know that others are out there reading along. Physically, so far I haven’t had too much trouble, but mentally and emotionally, this trip has had plenty of struggles. The support of friends and family has really helped keep me going. It’s great to hear positive feedback about my writing, as well. Thank you, everyone.

So here’s the situation: This journal is hosted by me on my own domain and hosting plan. I’ve had this domain name- crestlinestudios.com- for several years now. It was the production company that my brother and I came up with when we used to make short movies in high school. Since then, I have kept the name alive and plan to really have my own company with it sometime in the near future. Just before I left Chicago, I realized that my domain and hosting plan expire before the end of this month. That means I have to pay to renew it to maintain the domain name and ensure that I don’t lose any of the information I have up on my site, including this journal. The yearly cost of maintaining this domain name and hosting plan is about $70, paid annually.

Since finding out about the expiration, I have been back and forth on how I was going to pay for it. At first I had the idea of asking for help, but then some unexpected money came my way, and I thought I would be fine. Since then, however, some unexpected costs, such as new tires, as well as the expected costs of some decent cold weather gear and stocking up on food for Montana, have depleted my funds much quicker than expected. So, I came back to the idea of asking for help.

I’m not asking for much. I’m not asking anyone to pay the full amount. But if some people could contribute a little, even just a few bucks, that would help me out to make sure I don’t lose this site and this journal. If I do, well, that means no more updates and pictures, unfortunately. I set up my paypal account to make it easy, so that nothing has to be mailed. I have already had so much trouble with mailed checks, and I would rather not deal with that hassle any longer. So the link to donate using paypal is below. Just click on the button.

So thanks again to everyone for reading along and expressing support, and thank you in advance to anyone who can help me out monetarily with keeping this journal alive. And feel free to let me know anything I can do in return for anyone’s generosity.

Sincerely,

Otis, the Nomad