Haven't made your weekend plans yet? Here's a thought - take the time, anytime Friday night into early Saturday morning and be part of this year's Relay for Life, which is being held to raise money to fight cancer. It is not too late to join this great local effort that kicks off their festivities at 6 p.m. on Friday Night at Auburn High School's track.

The Relay for Life has grown in recent years, in large part to the leadership of both volunteer coordinators, Tompkins Trust Company's Lisa Giannone and Kelly Gridley. Every year they have been able to build the event on the solid performance of the previous year. This year Suzanne Redmond of Assemblyman Gary D. Finch#'s office joined to make it a leadership triumvirate, which has been working for several months to make the event even more successful than the year before.

Take just one facet of building that fundraising and outreach base. Two weekends ago, Majorpallooza, that was created in the backyard of Auburn police officer and school resource officer Chris Major 11 years ago, has grown to an event that packed the Auburn Correctional Officers Recreation Center. This year Majorpalooza, which hosted three bands and hundreds of people, raised more than $2,800 to help the local Relay for Life. What was even more impressive is that they pre-sold more than 700 tickets to the extravaganza and attracted a wide range of ages to the event, which also saw terrific support from the members of both the Auburn fire and police departments as well as the community itself.

The relay serves many purposes - from remembering those who have been victimized by cancer and who survived it to making this an evening and night (it ends at 7 a.m. Saturday) to educate people about how to survive cancer and to have a good time helping a great cause.

If there are two things that are worth noting about the event, the first occurs right after the welcome - the Survivors Walk around the track. That single lap will show you more about courage than any series of newspaper profiles. After that, once dusk has set in, the organizers will light hundreds of luminaries with the names of those who are to be honored as a survivor or remembering those lost along the hill near the track.

People can still participate in the 13-hour walk (with a team or not) or buy a $5 luminary by contacting either Lisa Giannone (730-1035) or Kelly Gridley (246-7893) - this is the weekend to help make a difference and enjoy your good works.

Cosentino is a former mayor of Auburn and can be contacted at cozguytho@aol.com