221

Archive for 'News'

Fresh Goat-O-Meter!

Things are picking up fast again, and we had to get that fresh goat-o-meter up! We are currently sitting at 48 goats, and we set the bar high at 500 again this year. Hopefully we get to see that meter fill up quick during this second round! Thanks again for all of your support, GOAT CANUCKS GOAT!

Whistler 2010

During the Olympics, we are hoping to spread some goat cheer and raise another giant herd of goats for hundreds of african families.

You can check us out here: Goat for Gold

But don’t worry, we’ll be back for the playoffs! Goat Canucks Goat!

Here a goat, there a goat, everywhere a goat

I wrote what I thought was going to be a farewell post a little while ago. I thanked everybody who helped make this a huge success and gave what I thought was going to be the final goat talley. After writing the entry, I expected goat purchases and t-shirt sales to stop. They didn’t. As of this morning we are at 859 goats! Or $21,475 of goats. I was curious what $21,475 can get someone here in Canada so I did some research…

For the amount of money we all raised, we could have purchased a brand new 2009 Mazda 6. I don’t know much about cars, but I think any model with the current year in it’s name is good. For someone who has never owned a car that was made any later than 1991, I would think it must be a nice car.

We also could have come together and purchased 429,500 fuzzy peaches from the corner store. I sure love those fuzzy peaches.

After browsing on ebay, I found an electric guitar that was autographed by “all 15 members of the Rolling Stones” for only $19,000. Was anybody else aware that there were 15 members in the Rolling Stones? That’s alot of stones.

Or we could have bought 8 seasons tickets to Canucks games in the lower bowl. This is the one that really put into perspective how much we have raised!

After looking at some of the items we could have purchased with the amount of money we raised for goats, it really made me thankful for every single donation and goat that has been given. There have almost been as much goats purchased since the Canucks were eliminated then when they were in the playoffs.

Yesterday we received this email from the Premier of British Columbia, Gordon Campbell:

From: OfficeofthePremier, [mailto:Premier@gov.bc.ca]

“We commend you on your efforts to raise funds for the purchase of goats for needy Kenyan villages.  Your idea of tying the campaign to the number of playoff wins achieved by the Vancouver Canucks was novel and obviously caught the imagination of a lot of fans.

 Again, congratulations.”

I think I read in his bio that Gordo’s favorite animal is the goat. And how could it not be?

Keep the goats coming!

Keeping the Momentum

Other than multiple chair throwing incidences and “property damage” as the police man called it, I think I have been handling the game 6 loss very well over the past few days. After watching the Canucks get eliminated from the playoffs, I thought it was going to be the end of the goat era. Since the idea was to buy a goat for ever Canuck win and the Canucks no longer had the opportunity to win a game, I was sure the goat-o-meter would stop rising. It appears that the complete oppostie happened. Close to 200 goats have been purchased since the Canucks were eliminated from the playoffs brining the goat-o-meter up to 705! That’s $17,625 of goats! Not ba-a-a-a-a-d at all! (Another classic goat joke which I have used every chance I get). Anybody else know a clever goat joke? It’s awesome to see that people are still getting their goats. I was curious about this, but then I found a website that explained the 5 stages of grief. With the recent spike in the goat-o-meter coming after the Canucks lost, I figure we must be at the “bargaining” stage in the process:

Bargaining: bargaining often takes place after the loss. Attempting to make deals with the spouse who is leaving (Replace the word “spouse” with the word “team”), or attempting to make deals with God to stop or change the loss. Begging, wishing, praying for them to come back.

If you’re like me you probably went through the whole, “I will buy 1.7 trillion goats if the Canucks win game 6″ thing. It sure is great to see that so many of you are still getting your goats.

A new batch of T-shirts has arrived so there are some more available now. Remember – the goat shirt never goes out of style. All proceeds from the goat shirts go to buying more goats, so you will be making a fashion statement and a social statement when buying a shirt. Plus you’ll just plain old look great.

Keep it up everybody! Enjoy the weekend.

Thank you!

I hope everyone is feeling a little better today after watching the Canucks get eliminated from the playoffs last night. I am still down in the dumps and am already tweaking the Canucks roster for next season. If we can talk Gretzky out of this whole “coaching” thing and add him to the line up we will be in good shape. Combine Gretzky’s offence with a new 4 or 5 year contract we give to Bobby Orr on defence and I really like our chances.

I woke up this morning and thought about all the excitement that has happened over the past month. Between the Canucks playoff run and the goats it has been very fun. Although it only happened 6 times, it was a very special feeling each time the Canucks won a playoff game. Goats were flying left, right and centre and it felt like everybody in the city was happy. Riding on the SkyTrain or the city bus, all people were talking about were the Canucks. Everybody was everybody’s friend. Christmas is pretty good as far as “times of year” go, but aren’t the playoffs fantastic?

As a lifelong Canucks fan, I have become very familiar with comforting sayings such as, “Maybe next year” and, “Well at least…” The truth is I think every year is “our year,” but until this year I have never believed the “Well at least…” part. This year it is different. This year we can all say that at least we changed people’s lives. It may not have been the Canucks year, but it is going to be a lot of other people’s year.

Maybe it is the fact that denial is step one of the grieving process, but I woke up this morning to lots of emails from people saying that they are still buying goats. More people even purchased goat shirts this morning. Who are we kidding, the goat shirts are fashionable all year round, but it was encouraging to see that so many people are still buying goats. Hopefully Goat Canucks Goat will help make buying a goat just as trendy as wearing a chic goat shirt.

While it is encouraging to see that so many of you are still buying goats, it is not surprising anymore. When I first started the Goat Canucks Goat facebook group the goal was to buy 16 goats. When I saw that the facebook group had over 50 members in it, I could not believe it. Then it just kept growing (unlike my patchy beard). Then Darrell from www.1981.ca emailed me and told me he wants to buy a goat and make a website and things really took off. When we set the goat-o-meter to 100 we thought it was going to take a deep run in the playoffs by the Canucks if we wanted to reach the 100 goat mark. After we reached 100 goats, the goat-o-meter exploded and goats came spilling out the top. We then thought we would set the new goat-o-meter to 500 just for fun. We would have been happy to get half of that. This morning we are at 584 goats. That’s $14,600 worth of goats! No kidding! (Get it? Baby goats are called “kids.” Very funny goat joke) People are also deciding to donate more than goats. A group of seniors in New Westminster also informed me that they have decided to get together and dig a well for a refugee camp. I should make that a little clearer. Don’t worry, the group of seniors will not be doing the actual digging of the well. That is done through CRWRC. The generosity and encouragement from people has been overwhelming. We had people visit the web site from 72 countries around the world and covered every continent. Even Antarctica! Unbelievable.

I would like to say thank you to everybody who came to the web site. You have no idea how much fun it has been to read all the comments and emails from people. Except for that Chicago fan who emailed me and called Luongo a goat. Don’t worry – he was locked and banned from the web site immediately. Thank you to all of you who purchased a goat. The goats have such a great impact on people’s lives. Thank you to the media who helped give Goat Canucks Goat exposure and in turn helped more goats be purchased. It was very fun to do radio and TV interviews. Who knows, maybe a scout saw my sweet hockey moves on the news and will contact me for a tryout now! Or maybe an agent saw how cool I look with a patchy beard and will ask me to star in some movie! But probably not. Darrell Koopmans from www.1981.ca made this amazing web site and put in oodles of work for Goat Canucks Goat free of charge. He deserves a lot of credit as he is the creator of the goat-o-meter! The web site is amazing. Thank you to Matthew Beimers also put in many hours of work for Goat Canucks Goat and handled the goat shirts.

Thank you to my beautiful fiancee Jennifer, who despite my enormous beard has still kissed me, supported me and been patient with how much time I have committed to Goat Canucks Goat.

Thank you also to the Vancouver Canucks without whom this never would have happened. It has been fun cheering the team on and I am already excited about next season. Next year is definitely our year.

While it has been easy for us to buy our goats, CRWRC are the ones who are doing and will do all the work involved with making sure needy people actually get their real, live goat. Thank you very much to Kristen VanderBerg, Rebecca Combs, Christina de Jong and Ida Kaastra Mutoigo. They have put in many hour of work for Goat Canucks Goat and will continue the great job they are doing at CRWRC. For more information about CRWRC, or to donate things other than goats, you can visit their web site at http://www.crwrc.org/pages/crwrc.cfm

Due to the amount of fun and excitement we all had because of Goat Canucks Goat, it would be very fun to make it an annual event. I have no idea where we go from here, but so far it has been amazing. For now we will leave the web site up and continue to post updates.

For those of us who are still feeling down about the Canucks loss, I will leave you with this.

“Courage doesn’t always roar. Sometimes courage is the quiet voice at the end of the day saying, “I will try again tomorrow.” -Mary Anne Radmacher

 
 

 

Canada AM!

It was an early morning for Joel, but he and Ida shined on Canada Am this morning!

If you missed live broadcast you can check it out here!

Joel Nagtegaal and Ida Mutoigo on Canada AM (The video will play right after the advertisement.)

Thanks again for your overwhelming support, the goat-o-meter exploded this morning again! Biggest game of the season tonight, you can follow us on twitter, and be sure to check out our goat shirts!

T-Shirts and game 5

Puck drop is right around the corner for game 5! The team is back at home in Vancouver and I think they are going to come out flying! The Sedin’s have been taking some criticism lately, but I expect to see them both have a great game tonight. Thank you to everybody who purchased a goat after last game. It was a tough loss but many people stepped up and still got a goat.

The response to the T-shirts has been absolutely amazing. I had no idea so many people would order one. I guess sporting a goat shirt IS pretty trendy though. Goat shirts are like jeans – they go with anything. Everybody looks good when they are sporting a shirt with a Canuck coloured goat on it. The current stock of shirts is nearly sold out already. Again, I had NO idea that so many of you would want a goat shirt. Please be advised that if you are ordering a shirt after today, it may take 7-10 days before it is shipped. Thank you to everybody who has ordered a shirt. Great shirt, great cause.

Time to watch game 5! Let’s hope for a win so we can watch the goat-o-meter explode!!! Go Canucks!

T-Shirts!

Yes, that is our exciting news for today!! With the Canucks heading back home for revenge on Saturday, we want everyone to be able to show their goat support by sporting a quality, 100% cotton Goat Canucks Goat shirt. You can click the button on the right to purchase your shirt(s). All pricing includes shipping! Shirts are $25 for Canadians, $30 for Americans, and $35 Internationally. All proceeds will continue to go to supporting families and their new goats!

Thank you for YOUR support, this has grown to to something beyond any of our imaginations.

We lost. Exciting news coming though…

Well, looks like I will be hanging out in my bedroom with the lights off and the blinds closed until Saturday’s game. I really hate losing. The Canucks lost the game 2-1 tonight. It is encouraging to know that they played a good game though. Saturday’s game is HUGE and should be a good one!

Despite the loss, there is very exciting news coming first thing in the morning! Be sure to check out the web site in the morning for the announcement!

The Peak 100.5FM

Joel just had another interview this morning, this time on The Peak 100.5 FM!

Again, if you missed the broadcast, you can listen to it here:

Joel Nagtegaal on The Peak 100.5 FM

We are also at 455 goats as of this morning!! It’s looking like we are going to have to update the goat-o-meter target once again as it’s going to explode again with goats soon! Big game tonight, 5pm, GOAT CANUCKS GOOOOAAAAAT!