Update

Kiva added businesses and I just got a charcoal seller. YES!

Signs

Like most years, the ringing in of the new year brought with it a new number...however, the implications of 2008 are more interesting than they have been for awhile. Virtually hovering all over the workroom this year are invisible balloons and banners reading, "Lordy, Lordy look who's 40!" ScheduleMaster was the first to cross the decade line. Her birthday was yesterday. I will join her in April and ML will join us in November. My grandmother always said that I would not become myself until I was 35; she had no way of knowing that I would move to Florida and things grow a little quicker here. If I could go back and tell my 20-something self to chill out, I'd gladly take that trip because 33-39 has been a great improvement. I don't know if "40 is the new 30" but I'm digging the way the 30s have ended up. Once I find out how ScheduleMaster's first weekend in the 40s went and if I can get my hands on a Nintendo DS Lite (have I mentioned that new obsession)...then I'll be ready to roll.

Giving - Part 2

This morning I was all set to log into Kiva and find some chickens to buy or a pharmacy to fund or something cool like that. The average Kiva lender has 2.2 loans in his/her portfolio and I only have 2. This one guy (a property tax consultant by day and sax player by night in Chicago) has 94. Anyway...when I logged in, Kiva said there were no businesses to fund. According to a banner running on the Web page the impact this week was: "3.3 hours to fully fund a business, 473 businesses funded, $322,325 loaned, 8208 new lenders, and 341 businesses finished paying back loans." So I took myself over to Donorschoice.org, also on my 43 Things list, which is a site where teachers register project proposals, request funds, and people fund those specific projects. The other day I finished off a proposal that had been on there since May and had 12 days left. I like searching for projects that just need a little bit of money to complete them and then I can swoop in and save them. Today I bought violins in NC, books for an Ancient Civ. class in Chicago, and book storage for a 1st year special ed. teacher in the Bronx. Donorschoice is neat because it maintains an account for you of the number of students and classroom hours you impact, the locations, types of students by economic need, etc. you are helping. Unlike Kiva.org, all donations to Donorschoice are tax deductible. So far I have funded 4 projects and impacted 87 students and 1075 hours of learning.

'Tis Better to Give...

Because it is AWESOME! Here's why...As I mentioned in a past post, I am a Nobel Prize groupie and when Muhammad Yunus won the Peace Prize in 2006 for the economics behind microloans, I was captivated by the concept. The idea is brilliant that small loans to real people can make a real difference in the global economy. So Kiva.org was created a couple of years ago to facilitate microloans around the world directly to the people who need it, whom you choose, through field partners. One does not donate through Kiva, one invests because the loans are repaid and then the investor can reinvest or pull out of the project. I put Kiva on my 43 Things list and last night I registered, not knowing exactly how everything worked. I found I could create a profile, including uploading a photo (I chose my caricature) and a description of what my motivation is for joining Kiva. The portfolio shows where you are invested, % countries, % female owned, and % type of business, etc. Individual businesses show what lenders are invested and then you can click to see their portfolios. Last night Kiva indicated that it was taking 4.2 hours to fund a business. Pretty fast. Right now they are holding individuals to a maximum investment of $25 per business to allow everyone to participate. The field partners show the delinquency rates of their loans so you can decide where to loan. It is amazing that the Tanzania office can have 100% repayment rate while the US has such credit problems and we are sending debt collection letters to library patrons. Last night I helped a group of Peruvian women get the final $25 they needed to get travel money to sell their weavings in the city and some Tanzanians run a restaurant. I wanted to help buy some charcoal in Dar es Salaam, but I didn't click fast enough. Competition is fierce. Maybe next time.

Happy New Year

The New Year has been rung in, all 12 Drummers have drummed, and the Wise Men have arrived. My mother migrates her Kings towards the Holy Family as the Epiphany draws near. If I were to do that in my house, as those of you who know about my collection of Wise Men can imagine, it would look like a scene out of Braveheart. I enjoy my collection of Magi. They make me happy. It also cracks me up that my parents find ways of springing sets of them on me. This year they hid 2 sets during a brief visit.

My holidays were great. I got "Carnival Games" for the Wii and a group of us played that along with board games and "Guitar Hero" on New Year's Eve weekend. We began the gathering at 2:30 p.m. with 75 Jello shots (6 varieties) and wrapped things up around 1:15 a.m. with 21 shots left. Here are some truths: champagne foam does gel and the gold flakes in Goldschlager look awesome in Jello shots, TFM is the king of Guitar Hero, and 10+ hours of playing with friends is much better than working.

I have been working on my list of 43 Things for 2008. I did 51% of last year's list. Erica did not learn to juggle and requested that she be placed back on the list. I have also relisted several others from 2007. New to the list include: use raclette grill by 2/29/08 (or I have to get rid of it), make 4 recipes from my new subscription to Southern Living, read Peaceable Kingdom, dig for shark teeth in Venice, and weed personal bookcase at home. Perhaps I will share more in upcoming posts or in response to reader demand (haha). As always, I invite you to make your own lists and share them with me.

I hope your 2008 is a happy, healthy, and prosperous one.

NPR Homework

On Saturday as I was driving home after work, on my way to "Christmas Break," and I was listening to NPR when the commentator assigned us homework. I was so enthralled by the idea that I called my voicemail at work to remind myself to think about it for the blog. I just went to elibrary for the transcript to give you the exact wording:

"Melody Kramer is a producer at NPR's WAIT WAIT DON'T TELL ME. She lives in Chicago. Melody just told us what she's happy she did this year. How about you? For this week's homework assignment, I want you to send me a story about the best thing you did in 2007. What are you proudest of? What did you accomplish that you never thought you could?"

I really liked the question, especially as I prepare to review last year's 43 Things to make new ones for the coming year. High on my list of best would be the recent Disney vacation. The 4 of us had a great time and it has been a long time since I have been away with my parents. Another highlight was riding the Segway. I had a massage in a palapa on the beach in Mexico this summer. Super awesome! I never thought I would actually read War and Peace. There are a lot of things I'm proud of this year, especially Ann's quilt. Even though I was already a technogeek, I made great a great leap forward with this blog and the Professional Collection one and other technology. Overall, despite the accident, I had a terrific year. Perhaps being happy at work and home is my great accomplishment.

Want to add your bests, proudests, and surprise accomplishments?

End of Year Thoughts

I will be making some posts to close out the year and I thought I would break them into separate posts to make them more coherent and manageable. First of all...Fantasy Football. Although football season is over and some fantasy leagues still have playing time, ours concluded this past week. I came in #2 behind EG who was our "control" subject. After setting up her account and creating a super cute avatar, she never logged in again. In the automatic draft she was dealt a very solid team. She had the #1 kicker and very consistent players at the other positions. EG never shuffled players off the bench to cover bye weeks or players out for other reasons. Nevertheless, due to the consistency of her team in the aggregate, she won. As I mentioned in previous posts, I neither follow nor fully understand football. I worked hard on my team this season. I read expert reports, researched players, analyzed statistics, traded players, and moved people around. My rank was never lower than 4th, I was in 1st for several weeks, and I ended in 2nd. For my first attempt at Fantasy Football, I feel that I made an honorable showing. I will admit that I am much relieved that the season is over. On Saturday night I was out to dinner at Il Primo and on side-by-side televisions Shark Tale and the Cowboys were playing. I was watching football. Not good!