Just a little (link) love: babies and twins edition
March 3, 2016
CAREER + MONEY THINGS
We were poor, we qualified for school lunches, but thankfully my earnings didn’t follow this earnings curve.
We donate to the local homeless shelter and the animal shelter. It would not have occurred to me to donate pet food to the homeless shelter but Penny’s post reminded me to ask if they’d accept it. Our latest donation was a bit of a coup: we redeemed a reward for a pile of nice new household appliances and we donated them new in box to the shelter. Before that we pulled together all those often overlooked “conveniences”: sample sized toothpaste, full sized toothbrushes, nice soap bars, shampoos, conditioners, utensils and crayons for kids. Yeah, I know that last one doesn’t match the rest but kids deserve to have some fun, especially if their family’s going through hard times, right?
Women, be careful who you choose to marry. The exception I’ll allow for “Do not even consider marrying the following people: “I’ve never changed a diaper.'” is PiC because it was followed up by “how can I get some practice so I know what I’m doing?”
This is beyond creepy: employers don’t do this. “To determine which employees might soon get pregnant, Castlight recently launched a new product that scans insurance claims to find women who have stopped filling birth-control prescriptions, as well as women who have made fertility-related searches on Castlight’s health app.”
I HATE “gender judo…explicitly stating ownership over one’s accomplishments in a way that includes the offender. It could sound, says Williams, something like this: ‘Kanye, I’m so glad you liked my idea. You’ve added something important, but here’s the next step.'” It may have its uses but I hate it.
People take “the customer is always right” to terrible levels.
FUN THINGS
This woman’s such a winner. I like pretty things too but I LOVE self confidence and being comfortable.
INTERESTING THINGS
People were always trolls, apparently!
So confusing!
“When your dad is a twin.” ?? pic.twitter.com/PnfVZSakym
— Tweet Like A Girl (@TweetLikeAGirI) February 11, 2016
When our dog died in November, we took her beds and food (prescription–she had pancreatitis at the end) to the animal shelter. They were very grateful for both, and said about the food, “We’ll put this in the medical section.” It hadn’t occurred to me to donate that to homeless shelters, although it does make sense. We are going back to the animal shelter soon with a slew of old towels.
I’m curious to know what you hate about “gender judo.” It’s something I’m definitely willing to try, depending on the situation. I’ve had idea-claiming happen to me multiple times, and have been aware of it since I was a child and saw it as a recurring joke on Speed Buggy.
Tragic Sandwich recently posted…Doing What Works, Because It Works
We should take Doggle’s extra bed to the shelter, probably. Seamus now has all 4 beds which is, even for us, absurd.
I’m spoiled in that I’ve been able to freely speak my mind at work for the last several years without repercussions even though I work in a predominantly male-staffed workplace. Before that, there were definitely repercussions. So my hatred of gender judo is really more about hating the need for it, and that men get away with acting like utter buffoons without being dinged, but that women actually have to do things like this in order not to be punished for speaking forthrightly. It’s the principle of the matter.
A local pet rescue charity does a pet food drive every month outside various grocers. I volunteer with them every month asking people to pick up a bit of pet food while inside, if they have room for it in their budgets. The pet food we collect is distributed through the local food pantry, Meals on Wheels for seniors with pets, and even to local homeless individuals with pets. It’s one of the reasons why I like and support this charity: they are focusing on helping people keep their pets through hard times, instead of having to surrender pets to the local shelter that then need rescuing. Some people still prefer to donate cash, which we then use to buy pet food. Last Saturday, in addition to collecting a big barrel-full of pet food, we also collected over $150 in cash donations. And that was just in my 3-hour shift outside one grocer. We usually collect about 1,200 lbs of pet food every month at the nine locations where we set up our tables and barrels. 🙂
Oh my goodness, that is amazing! I didn’t realize the specifics of what this charity did but I absolutely love that they’re helping in a way that lets people stay with their pets. How large is the region that they serve?
This charity serves Napa County, but also helps out in other nearby counties. We did a lot of support (including providing food and foster care) for people and their animals displaced by last summer’s Valley Fire in neighboring Lake County. There is going to be renewed focus on just Napa County in the coming months as we partner with the local humane society to bring down the euthanasia rate. And I was reminded to check back here because I was just doing some volunteering time providing “respite care” for a foster momma dog and her five puppies. Puppies!! 🙂
What wonderful work that is. You had me wondering if we could foster some puppies!
Castlight is not thriving: http://seekingalpha.com/article/3859606-negative-outlook-castlight-health Deservedly, from what you say!
Those videos of the twin parent + aunt/uncle are hilarious!
Some veterinaries also appreciate donations of pet food. Our Humane Society branch, though, is always pleased to receive it.
That’s quite a revelation from the Washington Post about earning curves vis-a-vis college education and SES. Lately I’ve come to really appreciate the WaPo…it’s better than the Times these days! And free, to boot…at least, so far. At any rate, those figures are really discouraging if you teach in the community colleges, where the whole idea is to help people bootstrap themselves out of poverty. {sigh}
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Good riddance to Castlight! Harumph.
It’s a darn shame – I attended some community college classes and greatly appreciated the opportunity.
I also grew up super poor, but am on track to make a 1%er salary. I often forget this is an anomaly situation, and am very curious to see if there is any research on consistent key factors necessary for individuals to break the cycle of inter-generational poverty.
It is an anomaly, and so a great congrats to you for making it to that point. I suspect that at least one of the key factors has to be some kind of financial support that helps people through the hardest times. I know that my journey out of poverty/debt was fraught with so many setbacks because I had to keep dipping back into the savings to end one crisis after another.