The Family

Mom and I joined Kiva 1 year ago today.
Ramona’s profile
Mom’s profile

Between the two of us …
With our individual $25 contributions, we’ve joined forces with over 620 people from 26 different countries to send over $25,000 to 33 developing businesses in 20 countries. Almost $6,000 of that has already been repaid.

Feels pretty amazing.

Actually, Kiva always feels pretty amazing.

I’m connected to the world now. I can make a difference in people’s lives, not in big grand gestures, but from one person to one person. I’m part of an international community that is out there, on the ground, making a positive impact on people’s individual lives.

There’s a way for me to directly help someone in Kenya (Geoffrey Onyango) when they’re being rocked by election violence. I care about Kenya’s election violence because I know someone (Mary Otieno) in the middle of it. I can address immigration concerns by helping someone in Mexico (José Labrada) improve their living conditions.

(all of these examples are taken from my and mom’s portfolios .. I say “I” but that’s a generalized “I” .. some of these are technically mine, some are technically mom’s, but for the sake of the post, it’s all generic)

I have seen the amazingly creative businesses out there around the world – photography and film; embroidery, fashion design, iron working, even a wine bar.

And I’m part of these businesses.

There are now Kiva teams, for the lenders to get together. We have a team – Part of the Solution. There are teams for Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, Mormons, Catholics, and Atheists. There are teams for businesses, schools, people celebrating weddings or 40th birthdays or how much they all like pets, cats, or bicycling.

And I have something in common with all these diverse groups. We all have loans together.

So there’s this sense of being part of a very specific and individual interaction – I am loaning $25 to Kan Pheap in Cambodia to buy a cow. And then I step back .. and there’s the sense of being part of something much, much larger. Kiva itself is only 3 years old. And in 3 years, 350,000 people from everywhere have banded together and have sent 47 million dollars abroad. That’s not exactly “micro”finance.

365.61 – Office Space

Here is a decent shot of my ‘office space’. We don’t do doors and we also don’t really have any desks that don’t have curves somewhere. We can thank the design firm that owned this office space before us.

A few mundane details:

I do put my monitors so they are wider than tall; worth it for coding and reading documentation. I also test our application in a lower resolution, so it fits one screen perfectly. (well, and that’s the normal resolution of most of our users too)

The desk space on the left side is mostly storage space. I love it as it keeps my space empty. I also keep my office phone over there as I don’t use it much.

Yes, I do have two trash cans. Dunno how that happened exactly.

That blue cable along the back wall is my power connection because there is no power plug in the wall on the side my computer sits.

I know the glaring white power cable for my under-shelf lights doesn’t fit the decor. I didn’t have time to do better, and it works… so it remains.

And yes, that is a Red Swingline stapler. It’s the best stapler in the office, so it is often stolen/borrowed. Not sure if that counts as irony or not, but it makes me laugh.

Also, if you click the link through to flickr, I’ve made other notes on the picture itself.

So here we are in Denver while a hurricane bears down on Houston. I should have thought to bag and box up important papers and take really important papers to Chris for the duration of my trip, but i didn’t.

We have neighbors, of course, who are taking care of the place, but if something catastrophic happens, it is so much better for the home owner to be there. So Luke went. He flew out early this morning, Friday. He said the plane was full. I tried to find a flight yesterday but they were all out of reasonably priced tickets. Why are all these people going to Houston??? Do they all live there or have elderly relatives to care for?

Last night as we were packing and arranging for someone to pick him up at the airport, we learned that our neighbor sent his son and another teenager over to put the wood up on the windows. That was fine, but then we learned that they gave our leftover clips to a neighbor who had not been able to buy any because the store was out. We should not have had any left over clips! Perhaps it is a good thing Luke will be there in time to go over things.

As i sit here, watching the weather channel, i wish i was there too, but i know Luke is glad to have me away.

Pat called yesterday morning. He said the tide is several feet high and the waves in the panhandle of Florida were 13 feet high, higher then they have ever been, and were tearing up bridges. Amazing when the storm is closing in on Texas for it to be doing so much damage all along the gulf coast. Fortunately it has not strengthened like they said it might.

Preparing for the worst and hoping for the best…. I would like for my trees and roof and shed and carpet to survive. Perhaps i should be worried about my husband, but he is so competent it is hard to think of him as being in danger. At least we are not right on the coast. According to the weather channel, the coast is already under water.

I am working on the tree again. I called Jean’s sister tonight and got some names and dates. We are going to talk again next week when she will have the old family Bible in hand and be able to give me, probably, verification on the older dates that i have, and hopefully, something new.

There is something about my tree that bothers me. Documentation. I have none for most of my information. Bill has collected pictures of many headstones which helps; I intend to attach those pictures to the tree. I also intend to ask various people who might have birth, marriage, and death certificates to make me copies. That will only document the most recent entries and there is little question of their accuracy, but i think it is a good idea to document what i can.

I would like you to copy anything of interest for me to attach to my tree. Birth, marriage, etc. I would also like to enter as much info as i can on the families of Christina and Kevin, particularly Christina. One of these days Aleah and her sibling might like to know more about “mom’s” family. It would be nice to have it all in one place. Much of the information i will be entering is so recent it will be of little interest now, or even next generation, but if we can round up birth certificates, etc, for grandparents now, that will be old enough to have real value in a few more years.

As to what information i am interested in, besides birth, marriage, and death, there are suggested topics like health, education, employment, land ownership, baptism, christening, and any information of general interest can be added. For example i just entered that the grandmother or great grandmother of someone who married one of Jean’s siblings was the first woman doctor in CO. We do not have the line leading to her, but if that line is found, the first doctor bit would be a conformation, and even if the line to her is not found it is interesting.

365.30 – Garage Cleanup

In two days the garage has turned into a collection of boxes and buckets all over the floor into what you see here: boxes and buckets stacked up on shelves. This would not have happened as quickly without the timely help of a good friend, David, who was just passing through the area. We did at least feed him. And we’re trying to think of something else we can do that would be nice; maybe we’ll cook up some ribs, seal them, and send them his way. I hear they re-heat well.

Anyway, a few more things to take out of the garage and we’ll be able to actually park a car in here. (Imagine that… parking a car in our garage. We only had to live here for a year and half first.) There are a few dead computers and a few boxes of stuff that need to be pruned. We also need to figure out what to do with the abundance of chairs we have. Half of them are broken in some way; most of those we can fix, the others… not sure. They will probably end up broken up and in the trash. We also have a great washer/dryer sitting out there. I think we’re going to sell that for dirt cheap, just to get the space back.

Next step is going to be cleaning out stuff from the house. That’s going to be a long process and I’m not sure were any of it is going to go, being that our garage is already full.

It’s always so much easier to intend to do something than it is to do it. I am going to take this time when Luke is away to remake myself, i say, I believe. I look forward to that time with calm intention. Only it is not working out. Why did i think it would?

The first few days after i got home from NM i excused by lack of proper diet behavior because there is always a let-down after i return from a trip, and always a couple of days of panic eating when i know i am going to restrict myself. (Like i think i am never ever going to have ice cream again) Accepting the inevitability of this behavior actually makes it less intense, so it was not bad.

On the third day i woke thinking today is the day. I was calm and free of compulsion.

But i am not doing it!!!! I wish i understood myself.

Balancing Act

The parking at work is a gravel lot. There was some debate about having it paved, but that would require the removal of shade providing trees. I’ll take gravel and shade over pavement and blistering sun.

One of the nice things about having gravel is the creativity it allows. I could rake it into paths, but that would probably take longer than my lunch hour. I also doubt the work folk would appreciate me turning our parking lot into a zen garden. I could also smooth out a section and do some rock art; a big smily face perhaps. Best if I could do the entire parking lot before satelite imagry was taken, for pure entertainment value. The last thing that came to mind was attempting to stack some of the rocks. Rock stacking is an art. I’ve seen beach pictures of a stack five or six large rocks high. I had quite enough trouble with the two rocks I did balance. Adding a third proved to be beyond me. Perhaps it was rock choice, but I now have a new lunch hour hobby.

Headgear

A while back Christina was making a purse and we were taking pictures of the parts. She asked for the shoulder strap, so I tossed it over to her. Aleah thought that was quite entertaining, so Christina put it on her head like a hat. This further delighted Aleah, so Christina left it there for a while.

Meanwhile, I was being the dutiful photographer. Having the macro lens meant I had a decent chance at getting a good shot in the low light of the living room. Christina looked over at one point and I got this shot which has become one of my favorites. I’ve even printed it up for putting on a wall, desk, or other display in the future.

This is a notice to inform you that Kevin Traynor has sent you a postcard!

You can pick up your postcard at the following URL:

[http://www.birdseyeview.net/]

If the above URL is not clickable, please copy and paste the Web address into your browser.

Your postcard was sent on Monday, June 16, 2008 at 08:38:58 and will remain available for pickup for the next 30 days.

Ok, here’s a quick question:  Has anyone here looked around at any of the other pictures I’ve put up on flickr?

I’m asking for two reasons.  One, I’m actually curious to know if anyone around here has looked at them.  Two, I’ve been thinking about actually paying for an online image hosting service so I can push as many pictures out there as I want.  (flickr, for instance, only displays the last 200 shots on free acounts).

If ya’ll are looking every now and then, I’d push more stuff out there.  If you’re not… well, I probably won’t push pictures quite as often.

On another note, which place looks more interesting to you:

flickr (http://www.flickr.com/photos/13725832@N06/)

smugmug (http://clazbill.smugmug.com)