(Photo courtesy of ThinkStock)
Take a guided tour of some of Richmond’s finest gardens by bicycle and enjoy some beer afterwards at the annual Pedal Through Petals fundraiser to benefit the VCU Massey Cancer Center.
The 10-mile trek begins at 10 a.m. on Sunday, April 17, in Scott’s Addition at the Isley Brewing Co., 1715 Summit Ave. There are several stops along the way for this leisurely excursion, including Agecroft Hall and Virginia House.
It’s accessible to all skill levels and each group of 10 or so riders will be led by an experienced cyclist to watch over the group. You’ll need a helmet to ride, and you must be 21 or older to imbibe in adult beverages (Isley Brewing is buying everyone a glass of beer afterward).
The event is sponsored by Amy’s Army of 100+ Cancer Warriors, which was organized by Amy Williams, a Richmond attorney who was treated for breast cancer in 2011 at the Massey
Amy's Army
Cancer Center. Williams said Wednesday that about 135 riders participating in the inaugural event last year, and that they’re expecting 250 for this year’s excursion.
Tickets are $40 for an adult, and $20 for a student, plus a fee for each. A sponsor ticket is $500, good for up to 10 riders, plus extras. For the after-ride party only, admission is $35, which includes five raffle tickets. Individual raffle tickets are $5 each. There’s also a costume contest and participants are encourage to decorate their bikes. Prizes will be awarded.
Richmond Rides Bicycle Tours is providing rental bikes for the day, with a $15 donation to the Massey Cancer Center serving as your rental fee. Bikes must be reserved by Wednesday, April 13. There are 30 sponsors so far, and sponsors will be accepted through March 25. Volunteers also are needed.
Amy’s Army raised $52,000 for cancer research last year. The Pedal event raised $9,000, and the goal is to double that amount this year. Williams had been involved in charitable fundraising in the community for research in leukemia and lymphoma well before she was treated at Massey, but was impressed by their work and decided afterward to focus fundraising efforts on the cancer treatment center.
She’s a late bloomer when it comes to engaging in outdoor activities, describing herself as the kid who excelled in class but was the last one picked in gym. She says she was completely sedentary until about a decade ago, when she started walking and running a bit and engaged in some team training for a fundraiser.
You won’t find her name on the leaderboard now, it’s just steady-as-you-go and finish as she takes part in activities including a marathon and ultra-marathon, an iron man competition, a triathlon and a century ride.
“I’m still at the back of the pack in everything,” she says.
MORE MERCY
The Civil War medical drama “Mercy Street” is returning to PBS for a second season.
The initial run of six episodes focused on the staff of a Union hospital set up in a former hotel in Alexandria and on the Southern-sympathizing Green family that owns the property. What sets “Mercy Street” apart from most period dramas is its effort to accurately portray medicine as it was practiced in the mid-1800s.
Mercy Street Renewal
"Mercy Street's"Jedediah Foster (Josh Radnor) and Dr. Byron Hale (Norbert Leo Butz).Courtesy of Antony Platt/PBS
The storyline will be continued in the second season, but PBS reports that it will be expanded to take the series closer to the fighting. The setting for the season is the period between the Seven Days Battles around Richmond in June and July of 1862 to the bloody fighting at Antietam in Maryland in September of that year.
“Mercy Street” was filmed mostly in Richmond and Petersburg. The Laburnum House served as a stand-in for the Alexandria hotel/hospital, and other scenes were filmed in Petersburg. Filming should resume in late April, with six episodes in the second season.
PBS reports that the initial season episodes were streamed about 2 million times from Jan. 14 to Feb. 28 (episodes were broadcast Sundays from Jan. 17 through Feb. 21). The initial episode reached more than 5.7 million viewers, according to PBS.
The “Mercy Street” website, which has features that include a test on Civil War medicine and back stories on the histories of the characters and the medical practices of the era, has had more than 600,000 unique visitors.
IRISH I KNEW
I love movies, and I’m fascinated by health and medicine. In honor of St. Patrick’s Day, I’ve come up with a quiz that combines movies and television series with players of Irish descent in key roles as doctors, patients, or friends of patients. Your task is to match the synopsis with the title of the TV series or film, and also with the actor or actress who played the role.
I’ll make it easier by providing you with the answers to the first five. Here you go:
FILM 1
SYNOPSIS: Irishman with cerebral palsy becomes an accomplished painter and writer with an unorthodox technique.
WHO: Daniel Day-Lewis
THE FILM: “My Left Foot”
FILM 2
THE PLOT: Young doctor becomes involved with The Irish Republic Army in the 1920s. Trouble ensues.
WHO: Cillian Murphy
THE FILM: “The Wind That Shakes the Barley”
FILM 3
SYNOPSIS: Irish-born actor plays a doctor who plays with lightning and gets a bit too creative in the laboratory
WHO: Kenneth Branagh
THE FILM: “Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein”
FILM 4
SYNOPSIS: Irish-born actress portrays the best friend to Bette Davis, who plays a woman with a malignant brain tumor in this dark tearjerker.
WHO: Mary Fitzgerald
THE FILM: “Dark Victory”
FILM 5
Irish actor stars as a country doctor in love in the wilds of Australian in the early 20th century in this adaptation of Chekhov’s Uncle Vanya.
WHO: Sam Neill
THE FILM: “Country Life”
THE REST OF THE QUIZ
Match the synopsis with the correct title and actor or actress. Email your answers to tharong@richmail.com by 6 p.m. Wednesday, March 23. Everyone with a perfect score will be listed in next week's RH Factor.:
1. Brawler accompanies a patient to a hospital and enlightens wise-cracking doctors on Lucky Charms and living life fully
2. Psychologist gains personal insights in sessions with his patients
3. Larger-than-life actor’s final film has him portraying a doctor in Mexico in an adaptation of a John Steinbeck classic
4. Young actress plays a World Health Organization doctor in the front line of its war against a disease that’s left much of the world’s populace with some less than desirable dining habits
5. Classic Hollywood character actor portrays a grumpy physician who is less than enamored with Bing Crosby, the new crooning doctor in town.
THE PLAYERS
A. Gabriel Byrne
B. Colin Farrell
C. Barry Fitzgerald
D. Richard Harris
E. Ruth Negga
AS SEEN IN
I. “The Pearl”
II. “Scrubs”
III. “World War Z”
IV. “In Treatment”
V. “Welcome Stranger”
