RUN Ballarat: what a great concept, cause and a great run for years to come. It's even a great name.
Run, now that's a great word - descriptive and useful in so many ways.
Forget how to many the term fun run is an oxymoron: we can do so much more here. Let's run with it. We may run out of steam, or gas or ideas; we might even run into trouble or be given the runaround.
We run articles, run programs, run guns and its not enough to just hold raffles or events, we have to run them.
And it seems I can run for office and stand for office at the same time - cool.
In daily life, colours, paint, makeup, engines - they all run; stockings don't merely snag or tear - they run; we need more bus runs, more print runs, more runs on the board.
We try things out in dry runs, we're run over, run through and we run the gauntlet.
And our nose doesn't just drip, it runs! We might become really run down if we run up big debts but we don't just escape - we go on the run!
When our great Olympians run a mile, they're heroes; if we "run a mile" we're cowards.
Of course, we all knew about genetics well before the scientists and DNA. It was common knowledge
a long time ago
that insanity runs in the family.
At least there is no confusing the terms "run in to Ballarat" and "run out of Ballarat" - perhaps my fate one day.
Run is more than just a useful word - as a noun, verb, prefix, suffix, it is a powerful word.
And when you put this great word 'run' together with our great place Ballarat well, there you have it, Run Ballarat.
I hope we all get to run with it.
FRANCIS FITZGERALD
Ballarat