Over the holiday weekend, I updated the designs for this website, my Twitter feed and my Tumblr. Doing so always takes a great deal of time and effort, but I find these template alterations satisfy the new-year-clean-slate urge I get every January.
Hope you like the changes. As always, comments and suggestions are welcome.
A couple of people have asked about the new button at the bottom of each blog post. Most readers recognize the social media buttons and the email/print buttons, but what the heck is this one?:
Interested in helping your favorite content creators? Sign up here and receive your first 100 cents free. Then, just click on the CentUp link whenever you see it on a particularly good blog post or podcast. Here are some links to get you started:
While many nonprofit organizations do amazing work, they can always use additional funding to continue their efforts. Even charities staffed entirely by volunteers have overhead costs — administration, rent, supplies, promotion — and every little bit helps these groups support a cause or assist those in need.
What is your favorite charity? I tend to gravitate toward nonprofits that support animal welfare, arts and culture, education, the environment, health and human resources and organ donation. In addition to giving money, time or supplies on a bi-weekly basis, I also participate in the AmazonSmile program. Here’s how it works:
1. Sign up for Smile here.
2. Select your favorite charitable organization.
3. The next time you want to purchase something on Amazon, skip the www address and instead type in smile.amazon.com. As you shop, you’ll find the exact same prices and selection offered on the www version of the site; however, shopping through Smile means that Amazon will donate 0.5% of the purchase price to your favorite nonprofit.
You can change your charity listing at any time, and there are nearly 1 million eligible 501(c)(3) public charitable organizations to choose from. So far, I’ve made donations to VPR, NHPR and the Monadnock Region Humane Society.
If you don’t know what organizations to support, check out Charity Navigator, a website that evaluates America’s largest charities. Listings contain plenty of background data as well as full contact and financial information. Best of all, Charity Navigator maintains a donor advisories list to warn philanthropists away from less-than scrupulous organizations.
So this was my first year participating in Reddit’s Secret Santa exchange. I signed up on a lark, and had a great time finding a fun gift for my person. I honestly didn’t give much thought to the man or woman who would receive my name because, frankly, it’s more fun to give than receive.
Well, my Secret Santa turned out to be really good at his job.
To research my gift, Santa searched my profile and my website. Then he sent me a gorgeous mug from NPR. Buying this mug not only brought me much happiness — who doesn’t love a big mug of coffee/tea/cocoa/soup? — it also helped NPR, which is one of my favorite institutions.
He didn’t stop there, though. No, Santa went above and beyond this year. While researching me, he stumbled upon a blog post I wrote in November. In it, I mentioned that anyone querying about what birthday/Xmas presents to buy should visit my Amazon wish list; it contained about 90 items, half of which were under $20. In that same post, I also mentioned that if buying stuff wasn’t appealing, I would love love love for people to do one thing for me: Sign up to become an organ donor.
Now what I didn’t mention in that blog post was that my best friend in the whole world died in 1999. Kind, pretty and funny as hell, Amy spent years dealing with a bum kidney. Despite being on meds and dialysis, her previously donated kidney slowly deteriorated. And before she could receive a new one, Ames had a stroke and died. Alone. On the floor of her living room.
She was 29 years old.
I have missed her every day since then. Every single day. And if I could have one wish, it would be to turn back time and figure out a way to get her a new, healthy kidney. Since that is (currently) impossible, I have made it my mission in life to get others to help. Please help. Sign up to donate your organs after you die.
And that is exactly what my Secret Santa did.
Thank you, Santa. The mug is lovely and I will certainly put it to good use. But your decision to check that little box and agree to donate your organs was the best gift of all.
Someday, it’s a gift that could save another person’s life. How cool is that?
I feel the need to call out the “Holiday Gift Guide” published on BOOKish.
For those of you who may be unfamiliar with the site, BOOKish launched earlier this year to promote books published by Hachette Book Group, Penguin Group and Simon & Schuster*. I subscribe because I like receiving reviews and excerpts from new releases.
The recently published guide, which features recommendations from the site’s editors, claims to help you “find the right book gift for everyone on your list.” This is a worthy goal. However, if some of the gift categories are any indication, the site’s editors need a serious lesson in sexism.
Under the “For Him” category, there are book suggestions for political junkies, history buffs, sports fans, comic book collectors, music mavens and film buffs.
Under the “For Her” category: Books about parenting, sex, romance, cooking, being a good hostess and bibles.
Did I miss something or have we time-warped back to the 1950s?
BOOKish, please fix this guide. You’re doing a great disservice to your readers by assuming women care nothing about politics, history, comics, sports, music, film or, you know, the world outside of the home. Oh, and if the massive restaurant industry is any indication, your male readers probably want to become “kitchen maestros,” too.
* Transparency note: My husband once worked for Simon & Schuster and had nothing but good things to say about the place.
