Duck's blood, Ronda, fundraising, St. John and soccer

You may be excused for wondering what these five things have in common:

1. Duck's blood
2. Ronda Rousey
3. Fundraising
4. St. John the Baptist Catholic church
5. Soccer

The first part comes from a story told to me by Jennifer, which turned out not to be strictly correct, proving that one should always have a healthy skepticism when it comes to matters of faith pronouncements by the one daughter who decided not to get confirmed.

Her story went something like this

Holy shit, how much of that Ronda stuff do you have in the closet anyway? Pretty soon, people are going to think it is like in the middle ages when they were selling the blood from that saint as a relic and finally someone asked how much blood could one saint have had, anyway. When they investigated, it turns out that it wasn't even human blood, it was duck's blood.

If you are curious about the story, you can read it here. It was not a relic being sold. It was supposedly the blood of Christ and some say the whole duck story was trumped up. Anyway, it was 500 years ago so I guess we'll never know, nor, in my case, care.

In answer to Jennifer's question, we had about car trunk full of Ronda's fight gear, which made its way into the closet in my office when Ronda gave her old Honda to Julia as a birthday present. There were a couple of things that had sentimental value, like some exercise equipment that Gene LeBell gave her, gloves from her fights (although she did donate one pair of those).

I would say about half that stuff has been either auctioned off or she decided to keep it. There are about a dozen things still in the closet and four more that she recently autographed and gave to the Armbar Nation folks to auction off. So, when it is gone, my house will have more space and a few charities will have more funds.

The two charities that will receive the funds from this latest auction are

• Ojai American Youth Soccer Organization Under 16 team - they are playing in the national games to be held in Torrance, and we need to raise about $4,000 to cover the cost,
• St. John the Baptist Catholic church - they are building a new chapel, and Ronda gave them cash for the deposit but they still need over $10,000.

Ronda agreed to deliver the items in person the day after her fight, if the winning bidder would like to pick them up from her at the establishment of her choice where adult beverages are served. (Hey, she's planning on having won and being celebrating.) Or, we can put whatever you won in the mail, if you would prefer.

You can see what is being auctioned off here. There are four things, wraps from her UFC 170 fight camp, two pairs of gloves and a pair of shin guards. Ronda pointed out that she doesn't wear shin guards any more, she just used those when she was beginning her mixed martial arts training. (She thought collectors might find the fact that there won't be any more of those interesting. I don't know if she ever had another pair than these. It is possible there could be one in her house buried under a pile of something. As far as I know, this is the only one pair. )