Drew Olanoff is one of us – a Geek. He works out on the West Coast with GOGII, a company that’s trying to improve on the mobile phone text messaging experience. Social media is his life.

And oh yeah – Drew has cancer. Specifically, Stage 3 Hodgkins Lymphoma, as diagnosed on May 20, 2009.

This is not an unusual story on the outset – a lot of people in our country, and across the world, are suffering from various forms of cancer. And, like a lot of people, Drew has chosen to fight the disease to the bitter end – a prospect that is good for Drew, since Hodgkins Lymphoma is a highly curable disease. However, it’s how Drew is handling his cancer that makes this something worth writing about.

Stage one in Drew technique to fight his cancer: Blame everything on it. Lost the keys? Cancer’s fault. Can’t find the wallet? Cancer did it. Twitter down…again? Stupid cancer, did it again. Drew’s favorite team, the Philadelphia Phillies, having a crappy night? Cancer’s to blame. It’s an amazing way to keep his spirits high, and to fight the illness at the same time. After all, if the average human can’t handle being blamed for everything that has ever gone wrong since his or her birth, why should cancer be any different? The pressure should at last mount to an unlivable condition, and the cancer will pack it bags and shuffle off.

To face the challenge of cancer and the threat it poses, as well as the prospect of the medications used to fight it, with such humor and grace takes some serious cajones. But Drew was not content just blaming the cancer alone. In fact, Drew wasn’t even content having his friends, family and acquaintances blame his cancer.

No. Drew had to get the entire Internet, or at least the Twitter using segment thereof, blaming his cancer.

In case you haven’t heard of this yet, Drew is using his tragedy to try and change the world. First, there’s the Twitter component. Using the hashtag #BlameDrewsCancer, anyone on the microblogging service can blame whatever they want on Drew’s cancer. Then, through his website (aptly named Blame Drew’s Cancer), you can see all of the people blaming Drew’s cancer for things going wrong with their lives. When the project finally reaches it’s goal, and Drew beats his cancer, sponsors of the program will donate a dollar to LIVESTRONG (also known as The Lance Armstrong Foundation) for time someone Blamed Drew’s Cancer. And already, sponsors have begun to appear to help the cause of cancer research – just today, 23andMe signed onto the project, committing itself to the $1-a-blame pledge. Additionally, Drew is devoting his time and energy into raising money to fight cancer in all its forms, as well as discussing with the public a disease that is often ignored as a sore subject.

I have to say, this is probably one of the coolest, most heart-touching fundraisers I have ever seen. Godspeed, Drew. All of us here at Geeks With Issues wish you a complete recovery. And in your name, every time something goes wrong with our show or website, we’ll be blaming your cancer.