jessie newburn dot com

A DIY "certified" nonprofit group

Your Luminosity. What a name! But look at what they do. From their site,

"... at Your Luminosity we make setting up your own foundation or non-profit organization both easy and inexpensive. In less than a week any individual can set up their own non-profit organization or foundation, and go on to --

• Create a webpage
• Solicit donations
• Send tax receipts
• Grant money
• And more"

It looks interesting. They charge $60/month and basically handle a lot of administrative and compliance issues for a nonprofit. Looks like you have to use their website to get their services, at least for donations received.

I wonder if this business offers an expense relief to many of the smaller nonprofits nationwide. If it does, what a gift that would be for small organizations to be relieved of some of the time-consuming tasks of processing donations.

One more reason to love Chipotle

Yay for Chipotle: a chain restaurant with style, soul and healthy, tasty food at a great price. Now there's one more reason to love Chipotle: they are beginning to source food locally for their chains. It ain't easy, but they're working it out. Washington Post article on the subject here.

at&t does it, why not others?

I noticed that at&t is charging a "payment administrative fee." Says them, "Please be advised that payment made with a representative may be subject to an administrative fee. There is no cost to pay by mail or via an automated payment method." et cetera.

It's about time. I hope more businesses and, particularly, municipalities start adopting a similar stance. EZ Pass is the most glaring and visible opportunity. Every car or truck going through a human-operated toll booth in order to pay the road tolls should be charged a surcharge for the extra cost required to serve them. Period.

Local municipalities should do the same. If someone has to walk into an office to pay, for example, a water bill with a human being, charge them more. In all fairness -- and with a high degree of that unpopular but highly useful concept of "profiling" -- it may be kind to have a cut-off date for age. People over, for example, the age of 60 could be exempt from the extra fee.

I don't know how the psychology works on such things. Maybe it's better to offer a discount, so people feel they are able to save money and get a little extra for themselves. I don't know. I just know that I believe it's time for radical self-responsibility and that simple things like getting an EZPass should be a civic duty. You don't want one? You want to wait endlessly in line for a toll booth operator to take your $2, great, get out an extra bill. It's $3 for you. Consider it a usage tax of sorts.

You don't like it? Take responsibility and lessen your impact on "the system."

It would be funny, except ...

... except, it's not.

Bear Stearns staff are auctioning company-branded items on eBay. Someone even had the idea to create "white T-shirts emblazoned with: 'I invested my life savings in Bear Stearns and all I have left is this lousy t-shirt.' " Hardee-har-har-har.

Now, I appreciate style, quirky humor and an enterprising spirit. And the B-S (funny initials they have, huh?) folk seem to be playing their demise for all it's worth in the press. Going out with a bit of style, right?

Well, there's not much else for me to say here without going into a diatribe... Maybe said folk won't find eBay auctioning quite as funny when they're auctioning off their excess personal items to raise some cash for living expenses. Then again, the company does have the markings of a slimeball operation; thieves and con artists tend to have amazing skills for coming out of their crimes on top of things, with slick smiles on their faces and a wake of victims behind them.

Oops. I did start off on a diatribe ... My bad. Perhaps it's my own way of finding some sarcastic humor to amid the tragedy of the B-S.

Photo credit ... compliments of MySpace

I got a kick out of this. Reuters giving photo credits via a Myspace page.

They're kidding, right?

Brushing my teeth earlier this morning, my eyes landed on a puzzling statement printed on the tube of toothpaste from which I had just squeezed out some paste: "If you accidentally swallow more than used for brushing, get medical help or contact a Poison Control Center right away."

They're kidding, right?

Now, I could take this toothpaste warning down a humorous path, with ease. But I'm going to jump to what may seem to be an overly analytical stance: This kind of statement both hastens and underscores the intensity of institutional decay. See, institutions have power when people have faith in them. And who can believe a toothpaste manufacturer that claims their product, when ingested, should cause the consumer to seek medical help ... or, Lord, have mercy, contact a Poison Control Center? It's in-credible ... un-believable ... and under-mining of authority. There's no truth in this statement. Microscopic as this is in the big ol' scheme of things, it's an indicator.

I just came from a girls-only, mid-day Sunday PJ party, drinking champagne, eating chocolate and watching chick flicks. The "flick" was bootlegged, which spawned a bunch of jokes and laughter. Much of it around the ridiculously disproportionate FBI warnings in the front of movies about international crimes and such related to piracy. The jokes went on about the movie industry's attempt to compare stealing a car to stealing a movie. Please.

This type of BS undermines authority, rather than supporting it. And while I can definitely Get My Rebel On, institutional authority (intelligent authority) has its place. I find it disturbing to see it eroded so foolishly.

But, hey, I'm just one chick, currently in PJs, blogging about how I see what is, what could be, the gap in between and then some.

An Internet Party

A clever and funny vid on the many internet and social tech sites around today. Thanks for passing it along Dave: blogger, Facebook friend and the one who introduced me to Twitter. Oh, and I think I know you IRL, too.

my.barackobama.com

My goodness. If the dot-com era required an "e" in front of every new word, seems the Oh-Ohs require "my" in front of all new endeavors.

I just stumbled across the "my.barackobama.com" page for "Tommy from Columbia, Md." To even begin to articulate all the stuff going on in this site, this phenomenon and this tactic would be overwhelming ... even to me, and I just love me some details. Got 5-10 minutes? Click around. It's fascinating. They even took the O of the Obama logo and LGBT-ified it here. They "first American"-ified the logo here. (I like that term "first Americans" ...) Kid-ified it here. And, well, you can see more for yourself.

It's worth a whirl, even if it overwhelms you.

Happy Meals for Good McGrades?

McGrades. Wow. Now, that's a term to add to our pop lexicon. ;-)

"An Orlando parent said she was appalled when her 9-year-old daughter brought home her report card cover and it contained an advertisement for McDonald's promising free Happy Meals for good grades, attendance and behavior." ... from the St. Petersburg Times.

Sorry, Internet

Oh, I how I just love YouTube (and concurrently hate-hate-hate the so-called "news" coverage of traditional media ... save, The Economist, that is). You gotta be a YouTube viewer to get half the humor in this vid. Double-click to get the full image.