Start a Hero Fund

This weekend, I'm pleased to be participating in the Hero Round Table in Flint, MI. I'll be leading a breakout session on "Creating a Hero Fund." Here's the description from the Hero Round Table website and program:

Money can’t solve every problem, but it can often help out. This session will discuss the ways in which money can be used heroically (and wisely) and how to organize your financial life to create a “Heroism Fund,” so you have money ready when you see a need.

So what do I mean about a "Heroism Fund"? Ever since the 40 Days of Giving project began (and for a few months before), I have been putting 10% of my gross income directly into a separate bank account entirely designated toward giving. (It's easy to set up separate bank accounts in Capital One 360 online banking.) This means that at any given time,

For example, several years ago a family member got meningitis and was in the hospital for several days. During this time, I went to mow her yard. I finished and went into the house to get a glass of water ... only to realize that it was hotter inside the house than outside. In the summer heat, the house was a sweatbox, and her window air conditioner was broken. Because we had two young children, we couldn't invite her to our house to recover ... but because of our giving fund, we did have enough money to buy her a new air conditioner, so that she could recover from her illness in comfort.

Without having the money set aside, we couldn't have helped in this situation.

In addition to helping in straightforward ways, of course, the "Heroism Fund" can be used to donate toward charities that will help people on a grander scale.

One of the key elements after you've begun putting back money for heroic uses and charity is figuring out where best to give it to achieve a positive outcome. There are a lot of places that eat administrative costs. There are at least two websites that I use specifically to help investigate new charities, to be sure that they have the sort of impact I want to donate toward:

• Give Well blog
• Charity Navigator blog

How do you find charities to donate to? How do you investigate them to make sure their impact is worthwhile?

The Gift of Family Time

Throughout the 40 Days of Giving project, I realized that one of my biggest issues is with giving time. I am fairly self-sufficient, so don't need a lot of time devoted to me in order to feel needed, nor to feel a connection to others. A few hours here and there, and I'm honestly good.

I just don't need to go through the sorts of rituals that most people go through to establish their emotional ties to each other. Surely my friends know that they're my friends, and I don't need to invite them over to make that clear. If they wanted to see me, they could just as easily ask me over. The fact that they don't doesn't mean that I don't think they like me. I assume they do, unless something happens which indicates to me that they have stopped liking me.

Because of this willingness to have my relationships by mutual understanding rather than through actual interactions with people, I sometimes joke that I have Asperger syndrome.

Having a family, of course, doesn't quite allow for that. For reasons that I don't quite fathom, Amber and the kids like having my direct attention for more than just an hour or two a day. It's really quite baffling, since I'm not that interesting.

But there's where the conflict arises, because I'm something of a workaholic. I always have a bunch of projects going on (and, in fact, at present am approaching something of a train wreck as many deadlines approach all at once), and while I'm happy to schedule time for family events and activities, just planning generic family time that has no real point has never made much sense to me.

However, with schedules and family life growing more hectic - my elder son in kindergarten, my freelance work, my day job, Amber's school, Amber's internship, Amber's new job with Lia Sophia, a 10-month old baby who's closely approaching the walking stage, and so on - it's becoming more crucial to set time aside.

So we've begun setting Monday evenings as Family/Date Night. We haven't quite worked out what this entails, other than that we are not allowed to schedule any non-family event for Monday night. So far, it's been nice.

We also set this weekend aside in a similar fashion. On Friday, when I finished work, I came into the back yard and set up two tents. We camped out the last three nights, and have spent most of the weekend outdoors. We considered going out to a nearby campground but, frankly, money is kind of tight these days.

It's been a great weekend, filled with a continuous campfire, sleeping bags, s'mores, roasted hot dogs, bugs, and other outdoor adventures.

And, in the midst of all of this, I've still gotten some things accomplished. I wrote a blog post for About.com on multiple universes and one for Black Gate on a possible The Sandman television series. I've cleared over a hundred pages of Cherie Priest's Boneshaker (quite good so far, though not as action-packed as I was expecting from a steampunk zombie tale). I'm also making my way through the pile of role-playing games that I have to review for the upcoming issue of Black Gate. And now this blog post.

In short, I've actually gotten about as much done during a camp out weekend as I normally get by hectically holing myself up in the basement for a couple of hours and getting as much done as I can. But instead of being a frantic rush of activity, it's been nice and leisurely, interspersed with time spent around the campfire with Elijah, roasting marshmallows. Even Amber commented that watching me work yesterday was a lot different from how I normally seem to work, and it looked (and felt) more relaxed, while I got just as much accomplished.

Back in February, I reviewed The Generosity Factor, which listed the Gift of Time as one of the many ways to give. This strikes me as one way of doing that - focusing on the here and now, and detaching a bit to give some time to those you care most about.

Or, to put it in a more intellectual way, consider this interview with William Powers, author of Hamlet's Blackberry: A Practical Philosophy for Building a Good Life in the Digital Age. In it, he suggests (as many others have done over the years) that our modern society is not built to adequately embrace the connections among people that we desperately need for happiness. Like Thoreau, he believes in building a bit of space for contemplation. His family practices disconnected weekends - Internet Sabbaths - which is something of a sacrifice in this connected age.

I'm not sure if I've quite reached the point of embracing weekend-long Internet Sabbaths, but it seems to me that putting tents in the backyard every once in a while is a good place to start. It's a gift not just to your family, but to yourself.

What other ways have you found to really set some good quality time aside, especially when life is at its most hectic? How do you make sure that you can give the gift of family time?

Oenophilanthropy

Oenophile (or Enophile): Someone who appreciates wine. (Wordnet)

Philanthropy: Voluntary promotion of human welfare. (Wordnet)

Oenophilanthropy (or Enophilanthropy): Appreciating wine in a way which actively seeks to promote human welfare. (Coined at 6:02 pm Eastern time, June 6, 2010, by AZJ. Feel free to use to your heart's content, but please link back to this posting!)

So let's imagine - just for the sake of argument - that you like wine. And let's assume that you're the support of person who likes to support worthwhile causes. How can these two things be linked together?

Well, I suppose that one option would be to establish some sort of wine-tasting charitable function to raise money for your favorite cause. And certainly that's a clever and worthwhile goal.

But another action that even the laziest of oenophiles could perform is to orient your wine-buying activities so that the money goes to businesses that themselves support philanthropic activities.

And there's certainly no shortage of them, as I learned when my mother handed me a page form Food and Wine magazine with the clever title "Grape Causes." (Although I think that Oenophilanthropy is clever, too.) They discuss some great wine-related giving programs:


Wine to Water: This group of oenophilanthropists have done just what I suggested above: raise money through benefit wine events, such as tastings, and use the proceeds to support water access projects around the world. The lack of clean, fresh water is one of the biggest world-wide problems, affecting over 1 billion people worldwide. The organization also produces their own wine label as a means of generating funds.


Indego Africa: This organization sells fair-trade handicrafts, with proceeds going to the Rwandan artisans who craft the items, as well as providing training in entrepreneurship, literacy, and computer skills. How does this impact the oenophilanthropist? Well, they have wine coasters and wine bags.


Boisset Family Estates' Fight Against Hunger: Each bottle of wine sold by the Boisset Family Estates winery results in the donation of three meals for families in need! This is an astounding donation, but it may be over. Though the Food and Wine report is from April 2010, the website itself indicates that this was in place for June through December 2009, with no indication (that I can find) that the program has been extended. They exceeded their goal of 1.2 million meals!


Fledgling Wine: A joint project of Twitter and Crushpad's custom winemaking, this new wine label is created to provide funds for the wonderful Room to Read project. Room to Read provides local-language books to impoverished areas around the world.


O Wine Company: 100% of the net profits from this wine goes to fund scholarships for at-risk youth. In 2009, the owners signed a contract with Oregon State University's Science and Math Integrated Learning Experience (SMILE) program to fund 5 scholarships over 5 years, resulting in a total of 25 needy students who will achieve financial assistance from O Wines.


Korks 4 Kids: This wine cork recycling program uses proceeds to support programs that help children, focusing initial efforts on the Autism Society of America (ASA). The organization's Rubber 4 Rugrats program also recycles rubber-based goods, such as tires, to raise money.


Help for Haiti: Wine producers were among the many people donating to Haiti relief, of course. The Spirit of the Americas (funded by Diageo) donated more than 45,000 pounds of food to Haiti. Constellation Brands provided medical supplies through an ongoing partnership with InterVol.

Andrew Returns with Word of Other Givers!

After nearly a month-and-a-half absence, I'm back to the blog. I wish that I could say the absence was entirely due to my immense giving efforts, or because I was hard at work on the book, but the fact is that I have mostly been distracted by the day job and the coming of spring.

And, to be honest, after 40 days of giving away my entire income, I was slightly burned out, so needed a break from blogging about the subject, for at least a little while. Through this sabbatical, I have had some time to work on the book. From now on, I will continue to use the blog to detail great giving opportunities, as well as to present my thoughts on giving.

My colleague in giving, Brigid Slipka, has been more diligent about continuing to chronicle her giving thoughts and activities on her Actually Giving blog. If you haven't checked it out, it's truly a great, thoughtful read, and well worth the time. Brigid isn't the only giver out there, of course, or even the only giving blogger, and I figure that my return to the blog is as good a time as any to cover some of the other major voices out there talking about this subject!

A Year of Giving
A Washington, DC, gentleman named Reed is doing a Year of Giving project, which involves giving $10 a day for the entire year. Amazingly, he started this project when he got laid off, which shows far more commitment than even my full-income-for-40-days giving plan! If I didn't have an income, I have to admit that I'd find it really hard to give. Kudos to Reed!

Reed is clearly also a more social than yours truly, who tends to be fairly introverted and hesitant to approach people he doesn't know. Reed gives the $10 to individuals by walking up to them and having a prolonged conversation. On his Year of Giving blog, Reed chronicles the stories of these recipients, including a page of people that he's encountered who need some help beyond what he's in a position to offer. With his year-long timeline, he's even caught the attention of CNN.

One of Reed's goal appears to be to establish June 15 as a Worldwide Day of Giving, where as many people as possible give $10 (or more, if able) to a complete stranger. I wholeheartedly endorse this project, and hope that the readers on this blog will join with Reed, myself, and others across the country and world in this endeavor!

Giving One Day's Wages
Eugene Cho believes in giving, so he started an organization called One Day's Wages, which tries to motivate people to give their wages from a single day toward solving problems of severe poverty in the world. The organization was founded by Eugene and his wife, Minhee, who clearly believe in their mission - they donated 100% of their 2009 income (a total of $68,000!) to the cause of fighting extreme global poverty. They continue to give to the organization, trying to reach a personal goal of giving $100,000. This is a major "put your money where your mouth is" step, and lends them a great deal of credibility when they ask others to give just one day's wages.

How much is one day's wages? It turns out to be just about 0.4% of your income. This is certainly an amount which could be given away without a severe hardship on most people, so is something worth considering. And, of course, if you have a more specific charity that you'd like to support than Eugene's, then you can take this philosophy of giving and use it toward the charity of your choice. My guess is that once you start giving, though, you'll find that one day's wages aren't nearly enough, and you'll begin looking for ways to give more.

29 Gifts
Gifts of money are nice, but of course they aren't the only way you can give. In fact, on an interpersonal level, I'd argue that they aren't even the best way to give. Enter Cami Walker, the author of the wildly successful giving book 29 Gifts: How a Month of Giving Can Change Your Life, who began her giving activities while having trouble dealing with the symptoms of Multiple Sclerosis. The gifts she describes are more spontaneous giving activities, which are not focused on the giving of money. Her first gift was, in fact, a supportive phone call to a fellow MS patient. As she details the story, she had amazing mental and physical benefits from this emphasis on giving, and she's founded a 29-Day Giving Challenge to spread the message that she's learned..

This confirms my research - both the reading that I've been doing, and my personal experience with my own giving project. Giving really does have profound, scientifically-proven implications that it will improve many aspects of your life.

Yes, after 40 days I was slightly burned out ... but it wasn't a bad kind of burned out. I imagine that it is sort of how one feels after running a marathon. You're very happy that you've reached the finish line, you probably want to curl up into a nice bed for a few days, but you're immensely satisfied at the sense of accomplishment. That was me.

Now the fatigue has worn off, and I'm looking for the next marathon, the next way to get the rush that comes from giving to others. I've got some great ideas, and I look forward to sharing them with you.

What are your ideas? What givers have motivated you? What is your giving story?

First Reflections - By the Numbers

Over the last 40 days, Amber and I have given all of our actual realized income to others - mostly in the form of donations to worthwhile non-profit organizations, but also in some more personal ways, such as giving out gift cards to a local grocery store, some generous birthday gifts, buying breakfasts for random people at a restaurant, and so on.

We have kept some money, as I outlined at the beginning. For example, we used the child support we receive from our oldest son's biological father to help with groceries, childcare, and other expenses. We also have a rental house which clears about $50 a month in profit, after the mortgage and other regular expenses are paid, and we put that $50 back for maintenance expenses. And we of course didn't give away money that we didn't get - so my paycheck deductions for taxes, insurance, 401(k) contributions, and so on were all done before the money was given away.

So we had two net paychecks from my day job and a monthly payment from About.com which we gave away. In addition, shortly into the project, we learned I was getting a bonus, and decided to give that as well ... but, again, taxes, 401(k) contributions, and some other things were taken out of that, and we only gave the remaining balance that made its way to us.

I say all of this to make it clear that we really focused on giving away the money that came into our lives during these 40 days, in an effort to stay true to the spirit of what we were doing. Even the $100 I received as the first payment on our sold pickup, which was given to me a few days prior to the start date, was mostly given away.

So now that it was all said and done, I was curious ... how much did it actually cost us financially?

Fortunately, I keep my financial records in Quicken Home & Business, so it's easy to check. This tracks everything - retirement accounts, business accounts, student loans, car loans, mortgages, checking accounts, savings accounts ... I even track how much I have in PayPal on this thing! So I can pull up a report which tells my net worth at the start of the project and my net worth at the end of the project, and figure out exactly how much my net worth changed over the course of giving all of our money away. (The only thing that isn't taken into account is any depreciation on our home or vehicles, or any other physical assets that we have.)

The difference in our overall financial picture, after having given away 40 days worth of income, is ....

$674.37

That's right. From February 15 to March 29, our net worth dropped by exactly $674.37.

But over the course of the project, I also taught a writing workshop which I haven't yet been paid for ... so once that's taken into account, the actual cost is less!

And that's in the immediate aftermath, not even taking into account anything else that may come along as a benefit in the coming weeks!

How is this possible?

Well, my first answer is: I'm not really sure.

I was expecting to be down about $2,000 or so dollars, to be honest, when I ran my original pre-project estimates. That was with us being incredibly frugal ... which we weren't. We normally are fairly frugal (or outright cheap), with a substantial portion of our income going toward debt repayment and savings. Once we unlocked the "emergency fund" and began living off of it, we didn't really exercise a ton of restraint. With the amount of time I was devoting to work and to the project, and Amber being in school full time, and a four month old baby, we spent much of our time fairly exhausted ... so if one of us suggested eating out, the other one typically jumped on the idea.

Since I knew it wasn't from frugal money management, I looked at the accounts to see where the increases were. They were pretty exclusively in our retirement and investment accounts, which is understandable, since these are the only accounts that can go up without putting money into them.

There was some inflow into these accounts, of course. The money that came in was from my 401(k) contributions and the company's match, on two paychecks and the bonus I received. In addition, there's a strange event I haven't been able to investigate yet, where more shares were deposited into my retirement account! I believe this is a result of my company's profit sharing plan, but I'm not sure. I'll have to investigate this further.

Still, these contributions account for a little bit over half of the increase in my retirement and investment accounts. The rest can be attributed to only one thing ... the stock market going up during this time.

Here's the curious thing about these numbers. Once I figure up the actual amount our net worth is down over these 40 days, and the amount we gave out, I notice an interesting relationship. We lost only about 10% of what we gave.

For the math challenged, let me provide an example. (These aren't the actual numbers involved, because I don't want you all knowing my exact salary.)

This would be like giving away $7,400 dollars and then finding that your net worth only dropped by about $700!

It's truly unexpected, and this almost ten percent ratio is a bit chilling. To quote my friend Annabella, "It went from serendipity to spooky." A unexpected tenfold increase in giving is not something that I expected.

I need to let it sink in a bit more to really have an opinion on this.

But your opinions, of course, are more than welcome!

Day 40: The Finale, or the First Day of the Rest of Our Lives

So today I woke up with a sense of relief that this crazy roller coaster ride which I got us on was finally coming to an end. Don't let this seem as if I'm disappointed in the experiment - far from it, I think this has been one of the best experiences of my life.

Still, the fact is that by setting a goal to give in this way, I turned it into a bit of a chore. From time to time, I'd reach the end of the day, exhausted, realizing that I hadn't really given anything ... and I can honestly say that, at those moments, I wasn't really a cheerful giver. So, while goals are nice, and it's good to set aside a portion of your income, I don't suggest turning it into a chore in any way.

But the project was what it was, and today it ends ... and my work of turning it into a book which people will want to buy begins. I'm actually really looking forward to it, and I have a great deal of confidence that the giving experiences I've had in my life and in this forty days will prove compelling enough to get the attention of a publisher.

So ... on to the day 40 gives:

First, some catch-up. You may recall that we were buying Joy a membership in the Aspire Indiana Farm, to provide her massive family with fresh vegetables over the summer. I went onto their website and signed Joy up, but did so by entering her contact information, including her e-mail. They sent a confirmation e-mail to her, but I need the invoice number from that e-mail in order to actually pay for it. It's been two weeks, and I'm still waiting on that invoice number. So I wrote a check to Aspire Indiana Farm for the amount of the CSA and am sitting it aside to pay for Joy's invoice once I get the number.

Similarly, my sister's birthday present (swim lessons for her 16 month old daughter and herself at the YMCA) continues to go unpaid, because she hasn't gone to the YMCA to find out the cost. So I just wrote a $50 check to the YMCA and am mailing it to her, which should be enough to cover the lessons.

With those expenses caught up, we were able to look at the money left over today and decide what to do. First things first, we stopped by the grocery store on the way to church, which was have a potluck lunch, to pick up our food.

Then, following lunch, we went out to my mother's house and I unloaded things from the back of her pickup truck. She'd moved up from Vincennes to Anderson (a three hour move) last fall, but hadn't been able to bring some of her outdoor supplies, including some spring flowers and bulbs, and so Amber drove down with her yesterday to collect some of those things. The truck, therefore, needed unloading today ... and I did that in relatively short order.

After Mom's truck was unloaded, I then proceeded to my dreaded give of the day ... Locks of Love. Yes, you are correct, I came nowhere close to reaching my $10,000 goal for Heifer International in 40 days, and originally I set this as a condition for me to contribute my hair. The problem is that it just didn't work, so I was left with a decision ... either give up or not.

We decided not. Amber and I remain committed to raising the $10,000, even if we now realize that a 40 day time limit is perhaps a bit limiting (at least in our current situation). And since we will raise the money, I figured I might as well go ahead and donate the hair now and get it over with. So now .... the before photos:

And the "after" photo (more to come):

It feels strange to be without the tail, and I'm certainly not too sure how I feel about the new do (although Amber claims she likes it), but ... it was (relatively) painless, and the hair will be used to make a wig for a child with medical hair loss, which is a far better use than being on my sorry old head!

For that matter, my hair will probably be a bit healthier now and this may prevent the slow thinning that I was beginning to notice. So, once again, this act of giving holds within it a reward, which has been a recurring theme throughout this experiment, and is of course the very concept that inspired me to start it in the first place.

And having started it, it's now time to finish it ... which means that the last bit of my income has to go away. We gave a $25 tip to the hairdresser who performed the cut above. (The Great Clips hair salon chain, or at least the one we went to, do not charge for Locks of Love donation cuts, so in order to tip the stylist on the debit card we use for our giving fund we had to buy some hair product. It cost under $10, which is less than the haircut itself would have cost.)

When I got home, I was ready to pay out the last of the money ... and then the phone rang. Our local firemen association was soliciting donations. Yes, they could have some money. (If they'd called 20 minutes later, they'd have been out of luck.)

The final two donations are in honor of my friend Robert J. Sawyer, the science fiction author who wrote the novel FlashForward, which provides the basis of the ABC television series of the same name. (He's known for many other things, but at the moment that's the biggest one.)

Early on, I reached out to a handful of friends and asked for some ideas of charities they like to give to, so that I could profile them. Unfortunately, the 40 days slipped by faster than I really anticipated, and I didn't get to focus quite as much on profiles of individual charities as I would have liked ... but still, these two charities are incredibly worthwhile, so I decided to split the remains of our giving money between them: 

• The Huntington's Disease Society of America
• American Diabetes Association

Note: Rob is Canadian, so he donates to the Canadian branch of these charities.

I recommend Rob's 1997 novel Frameshift, which features a main character who does, in fact, suffer from Huntington's Disease, a horribly debilitating and ultimately fatal neurological disorder, as a enjoyable way to learn further information about the disease. (And yes, I do realize that's a slightly ironic choice of words.)

To learn more about Diabetes, just follow a modern western diet of fast food and high fructose corn syrup ... you'll get it eventually and learn all about it.

And with those donations ... the 40 Days of Giving project is officially complete, but the giving does, of course, continue. In the coming days, I'll be posting some immediate reflections on the whole experience but one thing is certain - this experiment is just the beginning. Amber and I are continuing to raise money for Heifer International, and other charities, and we're looking for ways that we can get the proceeds of the book (once it's published) to help promote further giving as well.

I think some of the results of this project will absolutely fascinate you. Stay tuned!

Day 39: Breakfast of Champions

This morning, Elijah and I went out for breakfast at a small local diner, Eva's Pancake House. After having breakfast, I walked up to the counter and told the manager of the restaurant that I would like to pick up the tab for everyone in the restaurant. This amounted to me paying for 9 meals (plus our own, but that didn't come out of the giving fund), and on top of that I tipped each of the waitresses $25. (Waitresses who were on multiple tickets did not get tipped multiple times. My hope is that the customers were so thrilled by having their meals paid for that they tipped generously on top of the amount I paid.)

Let me tell you, though ... if you want to be treated like a king, try a give like this. Early on a Saturday morning at a relatively low-traffic restaurant, it wouldn't even cost that much money ... especially if you cut the tip down to a normal 20% or so. (If I'd done the give about 20 minutes earlier, when we got to the restaurant, I'd only have had about half as many tables to pay for.) People came up to me to shake my hand, talking about how appreciative they were.

"I was having breakfast with my mother and sister. This just made our day," one woman told me.

A guy came up and said, "My kids wanted to thank you," and two teenage boys offered their thanks and asked questions.

One waitress said she had goosebumps over it. "God bless you! And he will!"

This was a big change over some of the earlier personal giving experiences. It's enough to give you a bit of an ego ... which makes it probably just as well that I saved this one until the end of the experiment. If I'd had an experience like this early on, I might not have given to any charities ... I'd have been out there giving every cent of the giving fund to people on the street.

The waitresses and some of the customers got my website info, so if any of you stop by, I'd love to hear from you in the Comments section about what you thought or felt about the experience.

Just one more day to go!

Share Your Giving Experience

Have you ever had an experience where giving has seemed to, remarkably, result in a reward?

How has giving (either as the giver or the receiver) impacted your life?

On this blog, I've been sharing my own giving experiences and thoughts, but that's just one life ... and one of the things this has helped me learn is that one life is fairly meaningless unless it's connected to other lives. So, in that spirit, I'm asking all readers of this blog to share their own stories of giving by leaving a comment on this blog post. 

Please, when leaving your story, keep in mind that this is a public site and anyone can view the posts left here, so personal information should be left out of the post. (If you wish to share something very personal, or would like a response from me, contact me at azjauthor@gmail.com.) Some of these stories may be included in the book 40 Days of Giving, so by posting you are giving permission for that, but anything that goes in the book will be edited and any personal details will be removed.

Day 38: Educational Giving

Education is very important to me, and in fact to my whole family. Both of my parents were teachers. (My father still is.) My grandmother was a teacher.  I've worked in the educational field for over a decade ... five years in the classroom with Project SEED, and now for over five years with an educational publishing company that focuses on educational assessment.

In my opinion, education is the single most important political issue there is. Every election, my most intense analysis goes to the candidate's stance on education (assuming the position has anything to do with education - for example, I don't really care too much about the county coroner's educational stance).

Why is this more important than the wealth of other issues? Because, simply put, a good educational system, which teaches young people to think critically (a skill often sadly neglected at home), puts us on a firm foundation for solving all other problems ... including the problems that haven't even come up yet! Raising an ignorant, unthoughtful generation of students just pushes problems off so that the next generation can mess things up worse.

The Status of National Education
As I mentioned, my current occupation is in educational assessment. This is at the heart of the 2001 No Child Left Behind Act. One of the issues, though, is that each state has different standards to be assessed. In addition to creating inconsistencies in American education, this also increases costs, because each state has to create (or pay a company to create) educational and assessment materials.

Recently, several states (along with the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Virgin Islands) have decided to voluntarily join together and work on a set of common standards. The Common Core State Standards Initiative has just released their draft version of English-Language Arts and Mathematics standards that would apply across most of the country. These are not federally-mandated standards, though ... they're a voluntary set of standards that are being developed to provide a foundation for the instruction in each state  (except for Texas and Alaska, who aren't a part of the process, probably in part be because they feel they already have adequate standards).

The draft versions are now open to the public for comment, so one of the best things that I can think of to help education nationally is to review the standards and offer my own expertise by commenting on them ... and to urge everyone else out there to do the same. This may well provide the basis for the next wave of educational reforms, so it's important that we see that these common core standards reflect the education we want our children to have.

Project SEED
Another way to help is to support programs that promote academic excellence. Project SEED is a great non-profit, and since I worked for them for five years, I fully know that they get great results. SEED has been using Socratic teaching methods to provide instruction in advanced mathematics to elementary and middle school students since the 1960's. This program really enhances the ability of students to think mathematically, and has been shown in a number of research evaluations to have a powerful, prolonged positive impact on student performance. The following video, which shows some student activity, is probably the best way to get an idea of how the program works.

Unfortunately, I also know enough about how Project SEED works to know that small donations don't really do much toward getting more instruction in the classroom. Even a donation of $500 (a very large donation on my budget) wouldn't do a ton to help actually provide any additional benefits to students (although I'm sure it would be appreciated as a way to defray some of their operational expenses). It takes several thousand dollars to fund a class, which means their funding needs to come in bigger chunks - either from portions of school budgets allocated toward this excellent classroom instruction (and professional development) or possibly grants to cover the costs.

Having said that, I certainly don't mean this as a discouragement for any educators (or parents and citizens, for that matter) out there who want to seek Project SEED expertise in their own community. These grants do exist, and since Project SEED provides both classroom instruction and professional development, this means that professional development funds can be used to help train the teachers in these instructional methodologies. If you're interested, then I urge you to contact Project SEED to find out more and perhaps get a demonstration at a local school.

Every Child is Gifted

Growing up, I was always tagged with the label "gifted." I was in the advanced classes, and excelled at them. I sought out learning experiences for fun. At age 16, I left home to attend the Indiana Academy of Science, Mathematics, and Humanities, a state-run residential high school for the top gifted and talented juniors and seniors in the state.

I was a geek, in other words, and (eventually) proud of it.

However, my time in Project SEED convinced me of one simple truth - every child is gifted, and it's only because we draw such distinctions that we become convinced that any child is not gifted. Any child - if given the proper opportunities and encouragement, would find and embrace their gifts ... and even if the child doesn't display gifts in a certain area, if nourished, they will at least develop skills in those areas.

In other words, I now hold the firm belief that there is no such thing as a child who is inherently bad at mathematics ... or, for that matter, anything else.

Would every child be gifted in science or mathematics? Would every child want to be? No, of course not. But they would all grow to cultivate the unique gifts that they do have. And it is the cultivation of these gifts that turns them from gifts into brilliance, as beautifully described time and again in Malcolm Gladwell's book Outliers: The Story of Success.

If the Beatles hadn't practiced for many hours, they may have been gifted musicians, but they wouldn't have been able to revolutionize rock and roll. All great musicians are great because they have devoted themselves to music. No one just lucks into it on the basis of exceptional natural ability alone.

If Bill Gates hadn't been able to cultivated his computer skills, he may still be a bright guy, but he wouldn't have been able to transform our modern world with technology.

The fallacy that Gladwell ably debunks is the idea that some people will succeed no matter what environment they're placed in. There is no such thing as a true prodigy, who will thrive even in a situation where their gifts are not nurtured. A gift that is not nurtured will wither ... no matter how great its potential.

Similarly, a withered ability that is nurtured will begin to flourish. The brain, which contains the skill sets that we develop in life, is amazingly flexible. The plasticity of the brain (as it's called) means that we can always pick up new skills, and research is showing that while it may get more difficult as time goes on, this ability never really stops.

For example, I'm a horrible musician, but that's in part because it's never been particularly important to me to develop musical skills. Despite some time in middle school band as a percussionist, I never devoted as much time to learning music as, say, reading. But if I decided - even now at age 33, or a decade or two from now - that it was really important for me to play the guitar or piano, or even to sing, I would be able to do learn how to do it. It might be tough, but it's a skill that's reachable. I could even, I'm sure, become competent or even good at it, if I put the proper time into the developing the skill. It would, however, take me years to develop this into an instinctive ability and master the skills.

Compare this to, say, a Miley Cyrus or a Mozart, whose musical ability has been nurtured since childhood. Both began working in music early so that, by young adulthood, they were each expert professionals in their particular musical crafts. (Gladwell discusses Mozart but, understandably, doesn't draw the parallel between him and Miss Cyrus.)

While Project SEED utilizes innovative strategies to reach the gifted mathematician within each student, an organization called All Kinds of Minds is dedicated to major school reform, seeking to transform the educational methodologies of American teachers so that they can connect with the many ways different students learn. It is rooted in the principles of Dr. Mark Levine, as outlined in his book A Mind at a Time, which lays out recent research in learning styles. By teaching educators about the profound variability in student learning styles, they hope to create a school system where every student will actually have a chance to thrive. That is certainly a goal worthy of support, which is why they got a check as part of today's give.

Local Education Support
In addition to giving to a national educational non-profit, I'm also offering up a donation to the Anderson Education Foundation, which provides grants for classroom instruction opportunities in my local area. There are a lot of these private non-profit foundations created for the purpose of supporting the local public school system ... and as we all know, our school systems need a lot of help.

If you live in Indiana, you could go to the Indiana Association of Public Education Foundations (IAPEF) to find out whether there's such a foundation in your area.

Outside of Indiana, you can look into the National School Foundation Association to see if there is a local chapter listed among their affiliates. (Some Indiana public education foundations, such as in my hometown of Vincennes, are listed on the NSFA site but aren't members of IAPEF.)

These would also be great organizations to approach about the possibility bringing consultants from Project SEED, All Kinds of Minds, or other innovative educational programs into your local communities to help with professional training and development. Where the school system falls short in providing adequate funding, maybe these organizations can help ... if their local communities support them.

Days 36 & 37: Giving Across America

A check to the National Audobon Society was the Day 36 give. (What can I say - they sent me a solicitation in the mail! Besides, I like trees.) No muss, no fuss.

In addition, I went to the bank and picked up four cashier's checks for the Day 37 give.

Early on in the project, I thought of randomly picking a name from the phone book and sending them money. Then I realized that I didn't want the person showing up at my house, so I struck on the idea of sending it to someone in California. But still, I really didn't think that sending a check, which contained my address, was a good idea. And sending cash wasn't a great option, because I needed to be able to document the giving, in case someone (either a critic or the IRS) someday questions the honesty of my account.

Giving really shouldn't require this much thought!

Anyway, I decided that a cashier's check was the best option, since it didn't have my address on it.

Now it was just a matter of getting the address. I have a friend in California, so decided to send her a message over Facebook and have her select a name and address randomly from her phonebook.

It seemed appropriate to send the check across the country, and a mental image came into my head of the envelope crossing the country, sort of showering psychic charitable energy all over the place. Crazy, to be sure, but it was a nice image, and it took root.

Then I began thinking, "Well, why just one, then?" If I could do it from Indiana to California, I could do it some other places, too. I began thinking through my list of friends and found some other ones from around the country who could help me find names.

I ended up with a set of four names from four "corners" of the country - California, Massachusetts, Alaska, and Florida. Once I had the four cashier's checks from the bank, it was just a matter of writing a letter explaining the situation. Though the checks had no strings attached, I did ask that they get in touch with me to let me know what they felt about getting the check, if they were willing. I provided my name, e-mail, and phone number. (I was hesitant about the phone number, but figured the checks might go to someone who didn't use e-mail, so I should provide an alternate contact.) So they're all ready to go. (They'll actually get mailed out on Day 38.)

In my mind is an image of positive energy flowing out all over the country, with these four points connected by people sharing this curious experience of receiving money in the mail.

Is there any reality to this image?

I guess it depends ... how real is a metaphor?

As someone who loves science, I believe in the power of metaphor to describe reality. As a human being, I hope that this particular metaphor has at least a little bit of reality to it.

200 Fans - Time for a Shameless Plea

You've helped us reach 200 Facebook fans on the 40 Days of Giving fan page, which is nice. Great, in fact, given it only started about a month and a half ago, and I honestly haven't promoted it too much. (In comparison, my Andrew Zimmerman Jones fan page has just over 465 fans, but that's been around since last November. It focuses more heavily on my science writing, so has a different potential audience.)

But 200 is a significant number, because it means it's very easy to do math in your head. $10,000 (the amount we're trying to raise for Heifer International) is also a nice round number. In fact, if you take $10,000 and divide it by 200, you get ... $50 per fan.

In other words, when you (and everyone else reading this blog) raise $50 for Heifer International, then our $10,000 goal would be reached.

So that's exactly what I'm asking. Each and every one of you can commit to raising $50 for Heifer International - either by donating themselves or collecting donations from others ... by next Sunday, March 28, when the 40 Days of Giving Project ends.

This is totally do-able. I'm certain of it. Most people blow $25 going out to dinner, so if they can be convinced to stay home instead, they won't even notice the lack of money.

If you're willing to aim higher, then do so ... because we all know that the vast majority of people will fall short, or not even try. Becoming a fan on Facebook is about the easiest thing in the world to do, and so I don't expect everyone to accept this call to action.

But if even half do take up the challenge, and if I am able to motivate a few people to go above and beyond, then we can reach the $10,000 goal by our deadline.

So call your friends, call your family, and see if they'll be willing to contribute to making poor families around the world into farmers who can feed themselves, and gain some income, in a self-sustainable way.

You can make a difference for generations to come ... but the first step is trying.

And remember - if we reach our goal by midnight on March 28, I will cut my hair for Locks of Love, where it will be made into a wig for children with medical hair loss. Further, I will provide rewards to anyone who collects over $500 toward the team goal!

Day 31: The Postman Gives Twice

The mail brought us two different giving opportunities over the last couple of days - one of them local to Indiana and one more global in scope. So we took advantage of both of them.

The Gift of Song and Laughter

For several weeks, Amber has been attending a yoga class at the local Unity Church of Anderson, and I've attended a meditation class there. We've gone to a couple of services, as well, and are finding it a relatively good fit for what we're looking for.

Well, last night when Amber went to Unity for yoga class, something unexpected happened. An envelope had come to the church addressed to me, in the care of the pastor. The pastor knew that Amber attended the yoga class, so left it for her there. Presumably the pastor, having learned of our project, passed the word along to some sort of mailing list or forum or something, and someone sent a response to the only address that they knew - to the church from which they'd heard about it.


Both Amber and I were thinking the same thing, because we'd been really trying to figure out how to get to the $10,000 goal for Heifer International. Could this possibly be a check for Heifer? Would it just fall into our lap like this? Did things like this really, truly happen? Was The Secret actually right?


This was actually a fairly foolish way of thinking, but not because such a thing is absolutely outside the realm of possibility. (I still check the mail expecting a $10,000 check, just in case.) The fact is that the envelope was 6" x 9" and padded, which was way more than what would be needed for a check. 


Still, it could have included a book or a pamphlet or something, along with the check. 


There was hope. 


Right?


Well, it wasn't a check.


But it was  a very nice gift: a CD by a comedic singer named Greg Tamblyn, called Analog Brain in a Digital World. There was a note included which commended my efforts and also directed me toward track 12, "A Brief History of God (G-String Theory)." The CD was really funny, and we're both very pleased to receive it. (Although, again, if you wish to send a $10,000 check, I'll be checking the mail for it daily. Apparently, if you address mail to me at Unity Church of Anderson, it will find its way to me.)


The musician, Greg Tamblyn, also suggested in the note that I should check out the charity TreesForLife.org.


I guess I knew where I was giving the next day (i.e. today).


As it turns out, Trees for Life is actually a really great charity. They have the highest possible rating on Charity Navigator, and they have a similar "pass on the gift" philosophy to Heifer International. (In fact, Heifer was founded by a member of Church of the Brethren, and Trees of Life indicates it has a connection to Church of the Brethren's volunteer arm. Also, their web pages follow fairly similar layouts. I'm not sure yet if the connection is more substantive than that, though.)


When founded in the early 1980s, Trees for Life focused on planting fruit trees in impoverished regions. Since then, the organization has grown into supporting a wide range of locally-initiated projects around the world. Since the programs are initiated by members of the community, they automatically have a local base to work from in getting community involvement, and aren't just outsiders who are trying to implement their own ideas.


Plus, as with Heifer International, this charity gives you a sort of "shopping fix" while you're donating, because you get to add things to your shopping cart. Your donations can now include gifts of trees, books, libraries, cook stoves, learning centers, computers, and various educational materials.


Masonic Giving
In the standard mail today, I also received a letter from the Grand Lodge of Free & Accepted Masons. The Indiana Freemasons were sending me address labels, and asking for a donation.


This is actually a fairly standard ploy to gain responses. Marketing people have figured out a lot of ways to heighten our likelihood to respond to something and I think it's good that we all know about it. (For a more comprehensive list, interested readers should look into Yes!: 50 Scientifically Proven Way to Be Persuasive.) Providing a minor gift - address labels or a notepad, for example - increases the likelihood that a recipient will respond to the mailing. Adding a personal note, handwritten, on the letter also helps. And a sticky note on the document? You bet - it helps personalize the mail and, therefore, increases the possibility that the person will positively respond.

One of the major persuasive strategies is getting people to make a small concession in the beginning, such as putting up a small yard sign, before asking for a bigger concession, such as a monetary donation. Since people have agreed, there's a psychological predisposition to respond favorably to a subsequent request. (Did you become my fan on Facebook? Then you should donate to Heifer International!)

If you live in the United States, you likely received a notice about a week ago letting you know that the census  was coming and you should respond. (You have responded, haven't you?) This is the same sort of thing. In fact, a friend of mine who works in marketing called this a "fluffer," presumably because it gets the recipient ready to do the real work you're asking them to do. (If you don't know what this has to do with the word "fluffer," you'll need to look that up on your own. Kids may read this blog.)


Still, completely aware of all of these tactics, I went ahead and donated to them. Just because these persuasive tactics are used has no indication on whether or not the organization is worthy of the donation. Really, if an opportunity to give comes up during the project, I don't see that I can really pass it up. (Only 9 more days, charity telemarketers!) So they got a donation from us today, as well.

Parental Giving

On the PBS show Faces of America, they are exploring the family histories of a number of amazing Americans. One history being explored is of the famed cellist Yo-Yo Ma. They were able to track down a genealogy, including biographies and even naming conventions for generations, that had been lost and rediscovered in China. The oldest record they could find was for the ancestor Ma Lin-Guan, born 1435. The following is from the episode "Making America" where they explore this record:

(Reading from the genealogy record about Ma Lin-Guan) Living an upright life and without holding an official post, he accumulate virtue and cultivated goodness, and thus he laid the foundations for the family for 10,000 generations to come. To pass on good fortune to the descendants, isn't that what it's all about. Isn't it?

(Yo-Yo Ma's commentary) That's what I'm trying to do is live an upright life without holding an official post. Actually, I'm just trying to stay upright (laughter).... That's the best we can do as parents. It's not passing wealth, but passing, you know, certain values. In this case, virtue ... and good fortune.

Work and Family Balance

On March 2, as I was getting ready to head into the office, my four-year-old son walked up to me, and asked me not to go. We play this out every once in a while, so I gave my standard response, "Well, I have to go to work, so they'll give us money and we'll be able to buy food."

This time, he was having none of it. "Just tell them you don't need to work. We have enough money."

I sat down, smiled at him, hugged him, and then said, "You know, even if we didn't have any money, we'd still be pretty happy, right?" He nodded. "You know why?" He nodded. "Yeah, cause we've got family," he said. "Yeah," I said.

Then I went off to work for the day.

That's what we have to do to live a reasonable lifestyle today. I am very fortunate, because my job allows me to work from home much of the time, but I have so many irons in the fire that it still means that the time I'm able to devote to my family is one of the major sources of tension between Amber and I. Writing a book takes a lot of time, and when you have a full-time job in addition to that, well ... that's a lot of time you're devoting to goals outside of the family.

I think that I balance it fairly well, but sometimes - like when my son says things like the above - I do wonder if I'm successful. It's important to always remember that giving begins at home ... which is why this afternoon I will be conducting the Mentos geyser experiment, as well as maybe the egg in the bottle experiment ... no matter how much time it takes.

Day 29: The Gift of Time

I missed yesterday's give because Amber had the debit card that we use to access the giving fund, and she went to bed early. She went to bed early again tonight, and once again I'm hesitant to wake her up to get the card, and I don't know where she's left it.

Still, overall, today was successful on the giving front. We packaged up the books which had been requested from a Day 5, and finally got them in the mail. (Sorry for the delay on that.) Amber also set up the food drive boxes that she's getting together for the Student Leadership Academy at Ivy Tech Community College.

I am taking this week off from the day job to focus on this (and other) writing projects, so you'd think I'd be getting a lot done, but not today. At around 1:00 pm, Amber rushed home because our car, which is in need of an oil change, was making curious sounds - so I went to Sears for an oil change, taking How to Change the World along with me for company. The oil change went relatively uneventfully.

Then I got home just in time to give a family member a lift to the hospital, because he couldn't drive himself. On the way home, I got a call from Amber, asking if I could come to my mother's to help move a few things. This turns into a substantial activity that takes the majority of my afternoon, as I moved a major pile of wood from her front yard, where it had been left when a tree was removed, into the back yard.

When I went to pick Elijah up from daycare, and was on the way back to my mother's to continue moving the wood, I was fairly upset. Frustrated, my brain was firing off in its usual way, "I really should be at home working on the book. I can't believe I'm wasting my time moving wood. This is not helping me at all on the project!"

Then it hit me - this was the project. I was helping my mother with something she needed done. That, and that alone, was my project for the time being. The book, I reminded myself, will be written. Now it was time to move the wood.

Time is one of the hardest things for me to give, because I feel like I have so little of it. I work a full-time job and run my own business, which essentially includes (at any given time) two distinct part-time jobs (About.com and whatever other writing project I'm working on). But today, I felt not only willing, but glad, to be giving up my time for this task. There was a strange peace in it (except for the brief period of time where Elijah attempted to argue with me over whether or not he was allowed to play in the truck bed with an unstable mountain of firewood), and that was nice to reach.

Anyway, end of story: I got the entire pile of wood moved, and now on to the next day of giving ....

Answering the Critic(s)

As a writer, I don't think you ever really feel like you've "made it" until you have a strong critic. Well, I now have one! Yeah me!


Motivated by the Herald Bulletin newspaper article, there is one individual (who I shall call "The Anonymous One") who has decided that I should be the temporary target of his ire. I am pleased to serve in this capacity for him because, quite frankly, it seems like he needs something like this in his life to feel complete.


He brings up a number of excellent points, which I would like to take some time to address.


1. A Religious Sacrifice

"... to describe [this project] as a Lenten sacrifice is a despicable sacrilege. Any TRULY religious philanthropist would give anonymously to a worthy cause, rather than make a public display like a foolish braggart, hoping to make money on a future book." - The Anonymous One

I agree with this completely and, had I ever described this as a primarily religious effort, I would certainly feel the same way.

But I didn't.

In fact, here is the precise quote from the Herald Bulletin article, taken from the interview with me about the project. After explaining that I came up with the idea and the title, 40 Days of Giving, I said about my choice of timing:

"You begin thinking '40 days,' and immediately Lent pops in your head. So I decided to start on Ash Wednesday."

The choice of Lent is clearly, from this statement, not a strongly-held religious statement about my own desire to sacrifice for religious reasons, but a matter of symbolic convenience. It is not a "Lenten sacrifice" in a religious sense, nor do I particularly think of myself as a "religious philanthropist." In fact, I specifically describe myself, in the interview, as a skeptic.

The Anonymous One certainly cannot be faulted for believing that I was trying to position myself as a religious giver, though, because the article emphasizes that aspect of the story far more than I was comfortable with. The photo caption says that it's showing us "explain the Lent-based reason for handing out grocery gift cards." The first line of the article reads, "Andrew Zimmerman Jones is taking his Lenten sacrifice to his wallet."

Honestly, when I read that I fumed for about 5 seconds. I wasn't "taking my Lenten sacrifice" anywhere ... if I hadn't come up with the idea for this project, I wouldn't have been sacrificing anything for Lent. It really is a bit of a misrepresentation of how I want the project to be perceived, and there it was in the very first line of the article! (From a writing standpoint, though, it is a good hook for the story, so I don't particularly blame the writer for framing it that way.)

2. Giving to Bad People

"The people who accepted your offer did NOTHING that you knew of to be rewarded for, in fact, they may well have been (for all you knew) thieves, crack addicts & prostitutes who were more worthy of PENALTY (the OPPOSITE of REWARD!)…

…or are YOU declaring yourself a DEITY who is capable & worthy of passing judgment upon those who you bestowed your Holy Gift Cards?" - The Anonymous One

Giving to worthy people is an issue that's come up (in more civil forms) a number of times between Amber and me. Part of my initial conception of this project was that it would be giving without really worrying about where it's going. In other words, if I chose to give in a certain way, I'd give to whoever showed up, without any form of judgement on my part. If this means I'm buying gas for someone in a Hummer, well, them's the breaks.

(The one time I faltered on this goal was at the first grocery store give, where I was about to walk up to a woman with three children to offer to buy her groceries. I glanced in the cart and noticed that it was full of pretty much nothing but junk food and soda. I didn't offer to buy her groceries. We all have our limits, I suppose.)

I actually made a poor taste joke about this to a guy at church this weekend (which, I suppose, I'll pass on in poor taste here). Let's say that I go out and do something nice for people, and one of the people I help is a serial killer. Should I not do the project at all because there's a possibility I might do something nice for a serial killer? What if I do something nice for him when he's on the way to kill someone and my act of charity makes him decide not to kill someone that day? "You know, rather than killing someone, I'm going to sit here and enjoy this nice ice cream cone that guy bought me," or something like that.

Yes, it's an extreme case. But what's the alternative? Don't help anyone? Because any help you ever provide to anyone could be used in ways that you don't particularly like. It could, ultimately, benefit someone who is "bad."

And that brings us to a second problem that I have with this criticism - I don't believe in "bad people." I used to believe that peoples' nature was somehow innate, and that there were roads that you went down that set you for life. I don't really believe that anymore. The longer I live, the more evidence I see that people can - sometimes with great effort or only under extreme circumstances - choose to change a lifetime of bad behavior, with the proper motivation.

Certainly, there are people (such as our hypothetical serial killer) who do absolutely horrible things, and these people need to be arrested or stopped ... but I don't believe that there's anything inherent in their nature that's bad. They do bad things, and they may even be driven by strong impulses to continue to do bad things, but are not necessarily themselves bad, and in different circumstances I believe that same person could probably be convinced to make good choices.

Consider the example of Jabbar Gibson, a man with multiple felony arrests. He is currently awaiting trial on a number of charges, including a 2006 arrest for possession of cocaine, heroin, and a revolver. This is one of the quintessential examples of a "bad person" that I might accidentally help during this project, to be sure.

Yet why does anyone care about Jabbar Gibson, in comparison to the many other drug-related felons in the country? It's because on September 1, 2005, twenty-year-old Jabbar Gibson (already a felon) commandeered a bus in his hometown of New Orleans as Hurricane Katrina headed toward the city, loaded up 70 passengers from his impoverished neighborhood, and drove 7 hours to Houston. They arrived well before any government-sanctioned evacuation efforts reached Houston. They had to stop the bus for gas three times, and did so by passing a hat around to get gas money.

Jabbar Gibson made (and continues to make, by the look of things) a lot of bad choices about how to live his life. From all accounts it's probably better for a lot of people that he's in jail right now. However, when Katrina hit, he made the right choice, a choice which helped others. Does this make him a "good person?" Not necessarily, but it certainly makes it harder to make the case that he's a "bad person."

So I don't agree that there are bad people out there. And if I help someone who is making a lot of bad choices ... well, I figure those are the people who need the most help.

3. Socialism!

"Your “gifting” could easily be perceived as a thinly-veiled “experimental” microcosm of a welfare state & of your enthusiasm to participate in such a socialist debacle" - The Anonymous One

I won't go into much more depth than this, but did want to make it clear. Socialism implies that the government controls the majority of wealth and the systems by which the wealth is distributed among the citizens. The acts of giving are random, non-systemic, and non-governmental - therefore, the project is not an experiment in socialism. I'm not a socialist, nor do I support socialist causes. I am, in fact, not a member of any political party or broad-based political ideology. I support individual ideas and policies on their own merits.

Days 24 - 27: Catching Up

Wow, what a hectic weekend. Okay, so here we go on the update:

Day 24 - Friday, March 12:
I presented my speech "String Theory for Everyone" to the monthly gathering of Central Indiana Mensa (CIM). It was well received, and I sold several copies of String Theory for Dummies (as well as one copy of Heroes and Philosophy). I kept enough from the sales to restock the sold books, but donated the profits toward the CIM scholarship fund.

Day 25 - Saturday, March 13:
Amber and I spent Saturday morning at a public meeting on proposals to improve mass transit in our area of Indiana, where we encountered our state senator and various other local officials. An interesting (if slightly long-winded) time was had by all, but it was interesting to be involved in discussions relating to the public sector ... and a bit startling how many of these people now recognized Amber and myself from the newspaper article that morning!

In the afternoon, I went to Muncie with Elijah to see the interactive science show, Doktor Kaboom! I had an interview set up with the Doktor before his show, for the About.com Physics site. That morning's Anderson Herald Bulletin had a picture of him on the cover, because apparently he had performed at Anderson Community Schools the day before. I took the front page of the newspaper to him, as well as a copy of String Theory for Dummies.

Now this is a bit of a key point, because I personally suspect that a month ago, I wouldn't really have thought to have brought him a copy of the newspaper. If someone had suggested it, I probably would have thought, "You know, that's probably something he'd like to have." Instead, as soon as I saw his picture on the cover, I thought, "I should take him a copy of this." Part of the goal of this project - making the act of giving instinctual - does seem to be taking place, at least on some level. (The gift of String Theory for Dummies is always mildly self-serving, of course, since I do hope that people will like it and review it.)

Also, my sister's birthday is coming up on Monday, but she was in town visiting on Saturday, so we announced her gift to her. Instead of the normal token (and cheap) gift that we normally get, because we're unable to think of anything else, we decided to get her YMCA swim lessons with her one-year-old daughter. It should be a very nice bonding experience. (I thought of this while watching the group ahead of Elijah at his YMCA lesson finishing up. Again, that instinctual giving thing is kicking in!)

Day 26 - Sunday, March 14:
I'm a major geek. I mean a really big geek. And once a month, I get together with my geek friends to ... you guessed it ... roleplay. That's right, some full-on old-school roleplaying. The game varies - at the moment it's a Mage: The Ascension campaign, but we've been playing regularly for about four years now, I think. (Twice a month for a while there, until several of us got lives.)

So, as part of the 40 Days of Giving, it occurred to me that it would be nice to treat my geek buddies to lunch. I bought a couple of pizzas and some appetizers at Art's Pizza in Anderson, then drove it down to Indianapolis for the game. There was much appreciation, since they don't have Art's in Indianapolis, and so we're frequently deprived of it.

For the record - Amber thought this was a lame give, but I'm sticking by it.

Day 27 - Monday, March 15:
This morning ... dreadfully early this morning, especially given daylight-saving time ... the family loaded up and drove down to Panera Bread, where we had placed an order for an assortment of bagels. We got our order for take-out and drove it back across town to Eastside Elementary School, where we had already gotten permission from the principal to provide the breakfast to the teachers. We set them out in a break room off of the cafeteria, then left ... like nocturnal bagel-wielding elves.

This one, honestly, made me feel pretty good. Both my parents are teachers, and I spent 5 years teaching, so I know there's nothing that provides more satisfaction in that tough job than when you realize that someone actually appreciates you. Hopefully this helps start their week off right!