Just about a year ago, the Cartilage Free Captain community rallied around our friend Thomas Wachtel, the managing editor of SBN’s Arsenal blog The Short Fuse. Thomas had injured himself while rock climbing, and through aggressive fundraising we were able to help raise over $5000 to help keep Thomas out of financial ruin.

It gave us all warm fuzzies, kept Thomas from having to sell an organ, and in exchange, we got to take over The Short Fuse for a day. It was a heck of a lot of fun.

Ever since that day, the fine folks at The Short Fuse have been itching to even the score. Despite their unconscionable choice of clubs, we like our co-workers at the Gooner blog down the virtual hallway. So we put our heads together to find a good way for the wonderful and friendly competition to continue.

While my initial suggestion of “injuring Thomas again” wasn’t warmly received, we did come up with a compromise plan. So today, I’m happy to announce the beginning of:

The Cartilage Free Captain / Short Fuse Charity Challenge!

This is, in its simplest terms, a one week charity fundraising competition. Whichever blog community raises more money for its chosen charity by Wednesday, August 10, wins.† The winning community does a blog takeover of the losing team’s blog on a date to be determined later.

The chosen charity of Cartilage Free Captain is Noah’s Ark Hospice. Noah’s Ark is a small but growing charity based in North London that gives support and assistance to children and their families living in North and Central London that are dealing with life threatening and life limiting illnesses. They are also an official charity partner of Tottenham Hotspur. We’ve been exchanging emails with the fine folks at Noah’s Ark for the past couple of weeks. They’re good people. It’s a great cause.

(If the campaign end date says July 31, ignore that. They’re going to edit in the right dates for us later.)

Meanwhile, The Short Fuse writer pdb is participating in a charity bike ride this weekend to benefit the Multiple Sclerosis Society, a charity near and dear to his heart. It’s also a worthy cause.

Carty Free enjoys a larger reader base than our friends at TSF. But let me say this: The Short Fuse writers are super, duper motivated. They want the keys to our blog. They want revenge. They want to talk about Piers Morgan and make bad St. Totteringham’s Day jokes in OUR SACRED SPACE.

This will not stand.

So spread the word. Tweet the fundraise page. Post it to all the Tottenham Facebook pages you can. Recruit your Tottenham-loving mates. Help us take over that damned red blog for the second year in a row. I know you can do it. I know we can do it.

Give what you can. It all goes to Noah’s Ark, and they have already expressed their gratitude for what we are doing. Let’s stick it to the Gooners and help out some sick kids at the same time.

† – Because Noah’s Ark Children’s Hospice is a UK-based charity, donations given from the United States will be considered gifts and not charitable donations that can be deducted from taxes. If you are from outside the USA and UK, you will need to investigate the tax laws in your own country.