Why do places think struggling people can bring materials in-person and do phone calls when no one else is expected to?

So I'm trying to apply for LIHEAP/fuel assistance. It's a great program, and I'm glad it exists; don't get me wrong. But come on, what year is it? 

ABCD does have an online portal for applications, though it was hard to find, as most of their e-mails and materials only have physical addresses and phone numbers. It's on this page, about halfway down.

The portal lets you register, then says it doesn't work if you've applied previously but didn't apply last year thus don't have a PIN. There is no way to reset this and have one e-mailed or texted. It says if you don't have a PIN to come in to the office or call. Also it doesn't appear to be a self-selected PIN where I would have it in my records. I can log into the IRS and access really sensitive information, since it lets you self-select, but not fuel assistance. Also, can I mention that the IRS, which is a notoriously "difficult" agency, but which deals with people of all income levels, does not require me to speak to anyone on the phone, go anywhere, or physically mail anything?* (*In general; I recognize there are sometimes situations in which people cannot e-file, though the IRS does accept faxed returns and documents). 

People realize that struggling folks in particular aren't going to be able to make phone calls during business hours or go into a place during business hours or ever, right? Also that there's still a pandemic and we're supposed to be minimizing unnecessary comings and goings in offices and such?

It's 2022, and we're approaching the third year in which we're in pandemic mode. 

Why can't this just be done online? Why can't this be set up by now that people can do it wherever they are, at 2am when they're finally free of work or caregiving responsibilities?

I did find an e-mail for them, though it was a generic "contact" one, and I e-mailed them asking if they can reset the portal. I'll update whether this happens. Also, I should mention that the go-into-the-office option assumes that poor people, or any people, have printers at home. I went through this last time, which I think was why I didn't end up applying. "You can bring the originals and we'll copy them." No Susan, "the originals" of my bills and financial documents are online, like most people's. 

EDIT 03/02/22: Someone at ABCD called me during business hours in response to my e-mail in which I explained that I can't take phone calls during business hours because of caregiving responsibilities. The person ignored me when I mentioned that I'd sent an e-mail asking to deal with this via e-mail since I can't take calls. There is no way to e-mail or upload documents. They require low-income families to have a printer or go pay for printing and mail the documents or bring them in. In 2022. They also don't seem to know there's a pandemic. They have e-mail, but said I can't e-mail the documents. "That's not our setup." 

I guess this becomes another year in which I'm eligible for fuel assistance but can't actually receive any.

EDIT 03/07/22: They're now willing to take the application via e-mail, but this was accomplished by calling me, insisting a "telephone interview" was needed, then when I said I really couldn't talk and needed them to e-mail me (was meeting with a healthcare worker at the moment, you know, the people who ding poor folks for "taking phone calls" rather than being available and attentive), said "OK I guess we'll just not be able to update your information and will have to go with the old information then." I now have the forms and am able to update them myself and e-mail them back along with my proofs of income. But why is this confusing in freakin 2022? People keep all different hours, and disabled people who don't communicate well or at all verbally are increasingly raising children and are heads of households. Can we not just have "don't call me" be one of the standard options for all the many folks who need this? (Especially when our families and our parenting are constantly judged by middle-class folks who don't have to use the phone to deal with their bills and affairs and will say they had no idea anyone gets phone calls these days that aren't spam.)

****

Oh, and this morning, I e-mailed a durable medical equipment provider for my family member. They responded, I responded, and then they called me just to say they had done what I requested and it was all set. An auto-confirmation thing was sitting in my inbox as I picked up the phone. I literally picked it up while in the zoom waiting room for a healthcare provider for my family member, 30 seconds before the appointment started, thinking there must be some problem where they needed verbal authorization or something. Nope, just a call saying the same thing as the e-mail. Why do people think I want to pick up the phone and talk to someone when I've been e-mailing them?!

Hey, I appreciate that phone support is available, since some people need this for various reasons. But this default-to-phone thing needs to stop. Text options need to be provided for deaf/Deaf/HOH folks, folks who might have a hard time with calls due to anxiety or autism or similar, folks who can't get to somewhere to make a private call about sensitive issues, working folks, folks with caregiving responsibilities, folks who can't do business during "business" hours, and I'm sure plenty of others. Oh, not to mention people who want a paper trail of their communications; I'm convinced this is really one of the primary reasons places want to insist on using the phone. But really, text-based-as-default would make it easier for businesses too -- don't you want a paper trail of whether your people did their jobs, and whether a irate customer is telling the truth or is making up some entitled-ass story?

I'm really hoping the next version of the Americans with Disabilities Act specifically spells out that businesses are required to have an e-mail/text/chat portal function for communicating with them. I continue to just be in awe that this isn't universal by this point. 

Those times when scraping is an advantage

OK, so, when something from a nice brand in the original box comes into my home (hey, it happens sometimes -- online closeouts, eBay, new or close-to-new stuff at thrift stores, TJMaxx, etc.), and I need to save it for a birthday or whatever, I've discovered I actually don't even need to hide it aside from just sticking it on a shelf.

People in this house see a box with a brand name on it and the last thing they assume is that anyone here bought any such thing. They just figure someone gave me something in that box and I saved it, or I rescued some out of the building's recycling or someone packed my items in it at a garage sale or something. #winning

People who buy things on eBay, Craigslist, Facebook, etc.: Don't ghost people. Just don't.

As someone who sells items on these various platforms, I wanted to pass along some tips about ghosting people. Actually, one tip: Don't!

What is ghosting?

Ghosting, in this context, is when someone contacts someone to express interest in something, then stops communicating (or worse, makes an appointment and doesn't show.)

When buyers ghost sellers, the seller can feel annoyed or frustrated. "But Loco," you might ask, "why should I care about some stranger on Craigslist's feelings? I'm not responsible for their feelings!" Well no, I might respond, you're not, but if you can make someone feel respected and content with very little effort, and if not expending said effort can make them aggravated and wondering if something is wrong with them, why not just put forth the tiny bit of effort? Especially if we consider that the first of these community boards were created by a bunch of hippies and originated as a way to keep items out of the trash and help folks have affordable items. We should honor them by being neighborly.

Reasons people might ghost:

• They got distracted and forgot to respond
• They are worried they might make the person feel bad if they expressed interest and then changed their mind or realized the item is not for them
• They lost access to the e-mail address/phone number/app they were using
• They saw who was listing the item or where it was located and they don't wish to deal with someone of a particular demographic

Things people might think if they get ghosted:

• I did something wrong
• That person sure is rude
• That person wasted my time
• I wonder if that person saw who I am or where I live and decided they don't wish to deal with my demographic

Things people generally do not think of they get ghosted:

• I'm so glad they didn't contact me and say they weren't interested. That would have hurt my feelings.

So, in short, if you decide something isn't for you once you've asked a question about it, or if your preferences or circumstances change, just write to the person and tell them you're sorry but you are no longer interested, and thank them for their time. If you can, let them know the size won't work or you had an emergency come up or whatever the case is, to allay the fears that they did something wrong or are themselves wrong. If you backed out of the interaction because something was awkward or felt fishy, generally refrain from giving this feedback, UNLESS they did or said something egregiously inappropriate, in which case it is appropriate to tell them you won't be completing the transaction because they hit on you, used blatantly offensive terminology, asked intrusive questions, or whatever the case may be.

Please especially refrain from ghosting with free items on Craigslist, Freecycle, Everything Free, Buy Nothing, and similar forums. Please do not think that the lack of financial consideration means that manners do not apply. I would argue that manners especially apply when someone is going to the trouble to list something and communicate with people about it while expecting nothing in return.

Public Service Loan Forgiveness program not actually geared toward people in low-paying fields

I previously jotted down some thoughts about the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program planning to blog about it, but last week a story broke that the program has a lot more problems than I thought. (WSJ seems to have the best coverage; google the topic if you're out of free WSJ articles and you'll find other coverage.)

Still, the thing that stuck out to me is that the program requires employment 30+ hours per week for 10 years (120 payments -- doesn't have to be consecutive) at a qualifying nonprofit institution. There is no way to work part-time and have this prorated to complete the program over a longer period of time. This means that people who work part-time due to parenting, disability, or other reasons just can't do the program.

It also relies on an employment model that shows the people who created the program aren't actually familiar with nonprofits. Many human services, education, and arts jobs pay "per hour" based on the actual face-to-face time spent with a student/client/whoever, with a pay rate that is meant to cover the hours spent preparing, scheduling, traveling, documenting and so forth. My friends who are arts educators at community organizations make an annual lower-middle-class salary based on working 20-25 hours per week. They are of course actually working for closer to 30-50, but their pay is based on the hours they are physically teaching a lesson. The pay stubs and forms they would submit to verify their employment would say they work 22 hours a week, which would mean they wouldn't be considered full-time employees according to this program. My friends who are counselors are paid based on a similar model, paid for each client with pay stubs that say they have about 22 hours.

This would be where I would usually suggest some ways of reforming the program, but based on the articles stating that most of the people who appear to qualify aren't actually having their loans discharged, as well as talk that the orange guy and his buddies are going to cut all these programs anyway, I think I'll just suggest that higher education should be free or close to free like it is in most civilized countries.

Wheeee more free Amazon money, from different places this time

OK, this is pretty great when things like this just show up in my inbox.

The $100 one, I'm not even sure what it's from. The company name was a pretty generic research project name. I've frequently gotten offers on Swagbucks and MTurk and other places to provide them with additional feedback either to enter to win an Amazon gift card or to get an Amazon gift card. I generally figure, why not, I have a lot of time and not a lot of money, so I might as well help out and see what happens. The thank-you message suggested it was from a survey and was their thanks for my helping them out, not from winning a drawing. Note: I don't do this when it's something that sounds scammy, and I typically don't volunteer my time for market research around consumer products. I will if it's nonprofit-type research.


The $75 one was also a surprise; a friend who works in healthcare patient-experience research posted on social media looking for people who could comment about practices and policies in our various states of residence, and I responded with some personal experiences and a lot of links to pages on state/hospital/university websites that I found on the google. The friend's project director e-mailed and thanked me for the information and asked me what my pay rate was for this type of work. Damn, apparently 1) I've apparently been working in the wrong fields, since I assumed she was looking for volunteer assistance and 2) I apparently need to set pay rates for things! I just responded to him that it took about 30 minutes of work, and I hadn't expected anything for it. He responded with the $75 Amazon card and said he hoped it was enough. Um, OK!

I guess the moral of this story is, be nice. Do things without expecting anything in return, and you may just get something tangible in return. And if you don't, then you still come out ahead. Also, apparently we all need to look into which fields have a ton of money lying around and very different standards in terms of what people are worth. And be sure to set your pay rate.

Oh, and people who are new to having a large portion of your family income be in Amazon gift cards; spend some time checking out what all Amazon sells. They sell damn near everything, and their prices are often the best ones for new items, except for some IKEA and Dollar Tree items. I've bought nonperishable groceries items, hygiene items, office supplies, books obviously, snow boots, other clothing items, electronics, bike parts, cat food, cat litter, etc. I think I'm going to use my current bounty for an actual new printer, or perhaps an actual new vacuum. I am pretty damn handy at fixing printers and vacuums that people have thrown out, but sometimes it's nice to have reliable things for once.

About the wine though; WTF FedEx

Can we discuss my free wine again though? So, the boxes are printed with a thingy indicating it's an alcohol shipment and requires the signature of someone 21+. The lovely FedEx driver left the box on my steps. Leaving aside the ongoing issue of every delivery driver thinking that items left on steps in a city are likely to still be there much later (a neighbor fortunately noticed the box and grabbed it for me), my nerdy ass is curious what would happen if FedEx left the wine and a minor were to get a hold of it. What if the minor consumed a ton of it and got alcohol poisoning? Or committed crimes while under the influence? I mean, U.S. alcohol laws are just kind of ridiculous anyway, but I'm curious whether I'd be liable, or FedEx would, or the underpaid migrant laborer who picks the grapes, or what?

Ridiculous employment categories on surveys

So, I do a lot of surveys, between Swagbucks and Mechanical Turk. As I complete them, my brain seems to have developed a hobby of assessing survey design. Most of the bad questions I come across tend to have the flaw of breaking down options so that most people would fall into the "other" category – and sometimes they don't even offer one, so respondents are required to pick a choice that is not remotely close to the truth.

A particularly laughable one I keep coming across is the ones that ask what category your role at work falls into, and then have options of:

CEO
President
Vice President
Senior Management
Junior Management
Supervisor
Person who sweeps the parking lot

Putting aside for a minute the idea of CEOs and such doing surveys on Swagbucks, are these people not aware that many (most?) skilled employees are not in any sort of management position? These aren't surveys that are only screening in management folks. They ask if you are employed, and then they ask which managerial rank you hold. They sometimes only have managerial ranks, or sometimes they have managerial ranks plus an option like "clerical." There's no option for most of the people who do most of the work most places.

Just what kind of workplaces are these folks coming from and basing their model on? Where are these places where you have clerical people, then a bunch of managers? What exactly are the clerical people doing paperwork/communication for? What are the managers managing? How does any work get done in this place?

Donating used items helps low-income families. So why are so many low-income folks against it?

From Vox: "A lot of the advice I hear about what to give, and what not to give, is well-intentioned, but it's rarely informed by the experience of the people who actually rely on thrift stores to keep their closets stocked and their budgets balanced."

As someone else who does a lot of shopping at thrift stores and on eBay, I will say that this is largely on point. Yes, people like me will buy things that you think should be thrown out rather than donated. I have no superstitions about using something that may have touched who knows what; we wash everything. And stuff that's got some slight wear? It's going to get that way anyway the first time it's used.

The one thing I think this article does get wrong though is the suggestion that it's mainly wealthy people who think no one wants something slightly worn. As a long-time resident of a mixed-income, racially and ethnically diverse neighborhood, I actually notice that my friends who tend to be the most meticulous about things needing to be new and flawless are people who have grown up in intergenerational poverty.

I get why this happens. I've written before about how my family, despite being poor, has enough educational and other privilege that people think "resourceful" and "hippie" when they learn that we eat a lot of rice and beans and most of our belongings are from thrift stores, rather than thinking "can't afford hats and gloves for their kids" or "better call child protective services." A lot of families don't have these same protections as we do. I absolutely get why people without a lot of privilege feel the need to clothe their children in new and spotless garments and to go into debt to have brand-new matching furniture sets in every room. Many people, unfortunately, need to live in such a way that no one can question that they can provide for their families properly. My poorer friends who do shop at thrift stores, barter, hand items down among their families, and so forth tend to be people who have more protection against potential bias, generally through things like education, housing stability, and participation in community organizations.

What I don't really get is people's tendency to shun being a part of people reusing items even on the giving end. I frequently observe friends of mine living in poverty stating that they absolutely won't donate used items to charity, typically because, "that's nasty." Stacks of brand-name, barely used clothing and shoes go into the trash. Even some of my friends' teens, who love to make money selling electronics and similar things locally or online, want no part in the reuse of clothing or household items. Now that know firsthand that people will buy absolutely anything on eBay, I wonder if I would get anywhere letting them know they can make money with the clothing they would ordinarily throw away.

Taxpayers claiming EITC won't see refund until late February

From the IRS website:

"The IRS reminds taxpayers that a new law requires the IRS to hold refunds claiming the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) and the Additional Child Tax Credit (ACTC) until Feb. 15. In addition, the IRS wants taxpayers to be aware it will take several days for these refunds to be released and processed through financial institutions. Factoring in weekends and the President’s Day holiday, the IRS cautions that many affected taxpayers may not have actual access to their refunds until the week of Feb. 27."

Well that's annoying. 

I can't take you people, er, robots, anywhere!

I noticed the other day that I had a huge surge in page views, but I didn't dig further.

Then I got a comment in my moderation queue that suddenly made everything clear, and I dug deep into my stats, and sure enough...

Apparently a spambot search engine has decided that the word "stripping" in one of my home improvement posts means that the page is visited by people who would be interested in their unholy spam link, rather than people who are looking for ways to make thrift store furniture look snazzy.

You know what though? A page view is a page view, right? The number of hits a page gets is in part what decides how much my ads pay me when people click on them. So, yeah, I'm fine with some perverted robot driving up my stats, though I do prefer views and comments from my lovely human readers. Stripper porn whores XXX viagra cialis.

Aaaand...the shaming people for shopping on Black Friday is in full force

So, I'm used to seeing the hashtags and images telling people to buy nothing on Black Friday, presumably to fight capitalist culture or something. Fortunately, in my circle of friends, there are usually people who beat me to pointing out that this is a really privileged viewpoint. I mean, come on, some of us can only afford things when they're on sale, and those of us in this boat are already doing less consuming than average throughout the whole year. But it apparently makes people who have a lot of economic privilege feel better to boast that they're making their purchases on a day other than Black Friday.

Today I saw on the REI website that they're closed on Black Friday. I find this admirable, that they're allowing their employees to have a longer weekend with their families, and avoiding having their store filled with people fighting over merchandise. That seems like a good choice for an individual business to make, if they feel it aligns with their values. But the hashtags, and encouraging customers to pledge not to shop that day? That seems a bit privileged and obnoxious.

I imagine much of REI's customer base is people who buy high-end products for hobbies rather than basic needs, and clearly their marketing folks know this. But there are also people (like me!) who shop there for winter wear and bike stuff, because they have some amazing deals for members. I'm not really fazed that the store is closed on Black Friday. I probably wouldn't be headed there anyway, since we don't need anything for our bikes or for winter right now. But I'm not too crazy about their "movement" to not shop at all on Black Friday. I too am quite turned off by spending the entire day buying tons of stuff because you can, but if I find a sale for something we need, yes, I'm going to duck out of eating leftovers and watching movies and go get something I wouldn't be able to afford otherwise.

The overall message is good, but I wonder why they couldn't have made it a more general plea to have a simpler holiday season and to gift experiences, secondhand items, and sturdy necessities instead of buying every damn thing. Because encouraging people with lots of expendable income to buy the stuff on a different day (and pay more for it!) doesn't actually change anything with regards to all this "stuff" affecting the environment and our mental health, and it needlessly shames people who already consume less for shopping when things are affordable. Right now it just seems like asking people to show off that they have the privilege to buy anything they want, rather than asking people to change their overall consumption.

Two free months of women's clothing rental for negative $10.67

This deal is on Swagbucks today. 350SB (about $3.97 if you redeem your SB in batches of 2200SB for $25) for joining Gwynnie Bee for a free trial month. Then another 4900 ($55.70) if you pay for another month once your month is over. The cheapest plan costs $49 per month. If you buy things on Amazon anyway (or another store that Swagbucks has giftcards to), you can essentially pay $49 from your debit card and put $59.67 onto your Amazon account, plus rent clothing for free for two months if that appeals to you.

I only did the first month for 350SB, because Gwynnie Bee is not something anyone here would use, and it's a lot of money to front. I actually had heard of this business but didn't know anything about it until I clicked through to get some Swagbucks. I assumed it was one of those things for people who want to show off luxury items, like that one where you can rent $5000 handbags and look like you own several, but poking around on the site made me think that it's actually something that could be really useful for people to meet some fairly basic needs. They rent women's clothing sizes 10-32 clothing via mail order, it's every type of clothing, not mainly fancy designer stuff, and the price is surprisingly reasonable. I was excited to find that not only can I post about it as a fun freebie, but also a potential resource for struggling folks.

The service seems like it would be really useful for lots of different folks who are scraping by. Women whose weight is rapidly changing due to illness or recovery from illness would probably be better off spending $49 a month renting clothing than repeatedly buying new wardrobes even from a thrift store -- especially when the first two months can be acquired for free through this deal. Women of some builds can get away with wearing larger sizes instead of specific maternity clothes during pregnancy, so they could potentially use this too.

Gwynnie Bee also has a selection of cocktail and semi-formal wear, so this could be really great for women who have a wedding, graduation, work event, etc. coming up and can't afford something appropriate to wear. This sort of thing is really one of the hardships of being working poor and being in a part of the country where there really isn't widespread extreme poverty. So many people's jobs and other obligations expect them to socialize, especially around this time of year, and aren't very understanding that there are people who honestly can't afford these things, even though we don't have holes in our shoes and aren't living in sheds without plumbing. I did the free wine deal a few months ago in anticipation of "forced socialization season," and it's going to come in handy in the next few months if I have to take anything anywhere or thank anyone for anything. (For the record, I'm not anti-holiday or anything at all. I'm just reflecting the realities that the expectations around this season can be financially stressful, especially for those who are employed at places where most folks are better off than us.)

My household is actually very fortunate to have suitable clothing for pretty much anything semi-fancy we want to attend. Some of the families we get kids' hand-me-downs from are of religious/cultural backgrounds in which people typically wear conservative/traditional clothing rather than jeans and sweatshirts. One of the adults here has a job that entails wearing rather formal clothing (and thus scoping out yard sales and clearances and whatnot all year). We have time and energy to browse eBay and pick through thrift store racks. We have stable housing that allows us to buy things "just in case" when we find them used or on sale, and not have to pack up everything and move every few months. Most of us are average-sized, and the person who has a physical disability that affects stature and requires the use of mobility equipment is able to wear off-the-rack clothing just in a different size range than you'd expect, so we can all easily borrow things from someone if needed, or find them used.

Think about how many people are of size, need clothing adapted for disabilities, or don't have places to store things like party attire, and just aren't going to have this stuff. People can roll their eyes and say that no one "deserves" to have luxury items, but is it really a luxury to not have your boss and coworkers think you're antisocial because you always turn down free tickets to things and you don't ever socialize with them? Or have people think you're rude or even harmful for showing up to a graduation or baby blessing wearing *that*? So, yeah, clothes -- and not just the bare minimum to make you not be naked -- are a need just like food and housing are

Oh, and if you don't have Swagbucks yet, during this month there's a promotion where you get $5 in Swagbucks once you do your first few earning tasks and your referral source also gets $5. Then you can refer more people and you get $5 from theirs, just like a good little pyramid scheme. Please use my link if you haven't joined yet. Thanks!

State of the scraper address

Wow, OK, so half of the country voted for a filter-lacking narcissist whose campaign centered on blatantly racist, sexist, homophobic, transphobic, xenophobic, and ableist insults and threats. So, I've known all my life that these views were this widespread, but this guy and his "plans" are nonetheless much scarier and more threatening than, say the Bushes, who at least seemed to have some basic professionalism and sense of human decency even though the impact of their policies was just as marginalizing.

A lot of us are terrified, not just around the end of our day-to-day relative safety from harassers and attackers, but also because we depend on government-funded programs for healthcare, disability services, children's services, or employment.

So, what can we do now?

• Here is a list of some concrete things we can do, like stockpiling emergency contraception to distribute if it becomes unavailable next year, along with advice for trying to preserve rights for green card holders and our transgender brothers and sisters.
• For internationally adopted folks (thinking especially of the many people in the community who have brought relatives here from Haiti through adoption rather than sponsorship), if you don't have a Certificate of Citizenship and only have your entry papers, go here and follow the steps to get one.
• If you're transgender, make sure your gender and name are current on all your documents. Go here to learn about Boston-area organizations who are helping people do this for free, and similarly to volunteer if you have legal training or experience navigating these systems.
• Write to your legislators, even if they're progressive, even if you're in Massachusetts where they've been telling us most of the federal changes won't affect us, and tell them why it's important that they support your family in maintaining insurance, disability services, housing assistance, and anything else you receive that's partially federally funded or might be affected by a federal mandate.
• Go here to learn how to respond if you witness Islamophobic harassment (or any other type).
• Be sensitive and sensible. It's fine to participate in movements/rallies/safetypinwearing that focus on positivity and understanding. But be aware that others, especially some marginalized folks, feel betrayed by these actions and feel that no one should be attempting to "build bridges" with the oppressors. Others take issue with people voicing their opinions in progressive spaces but being afraid to speak out against those who support bigotry. Still others don't appreciate privileged folks finally speaking out for the first time this week, because it highlights that these folks have been refusing to listen to the voices of the oppressed for years. Ask people how they're doing. Ask what would help. Don't take this as an opportunity to brag about how enlightened you are or how your manner of coping is the best one.

EDIT: You know how I mostly post about how our spartan lifestyle involves a lot of unprocessed food, walking and biking, and simple hobby items acquired at thrift stores? Yeah, it's not doing it for me right now. Someone point me to tips for how to get good deals on strong drinks, crappy TV, violent video games, tubs of cookie dough, and so forth. Thanks.

Be sure to vote! Also, Imzy will give you a free shirt if you do

I don't think I even have to point out that one of the viable candidates has a fairly decent record on helping struggling families, and the other one has outwardly stated over and over again that he has no concern for poorer folks, people of color, people with disabilities, or immigrants. If you live in Massachusetts, you could vote for a third-party candidate and advance third-party visibility without doing any damage. If you live in a swing state, please just vote Democrat and don't risk our country electing a fascist just to make a point (even though it's one that I consider quite valid).

Also, once you've voted, go here and post proof and Imzy will send you a free t-shirt. Promos like this are pretty much how I get my pajamas and gardening clothes and whatnot.

If you don't have Imzy yet, check it out. It's still small, and doesn't have a whole lot going on, but it seems like it has big potential. If you haven't heard about it, it's a couple of Reddit founders who left Reddit and started up a similar site, except that while Reddit prides itself on free speech to the extreme, Imzy prides itself on respectful and helpful speech. I certainly value aspects of Reddit, like the frugal sub, and the subs dedicated to Swagbucks, Perk, and so forth. There are definitely a lot of smart people on there, as well as incredibly creative and funny folks, and there are a lot of good people who help complete strangers (whether it's with advice, money, logistics, connections, or whathaveyou). I can do without, however, the culture on most of the subs in which racism, sexism, ableism, and generally abusive speech is totally fine. I'm hoping that Imzy will get bigger and become the type of resource that Reddit is.

Fortune magazine also has a list of freebies and discounts for people who vote. A lot of them seem to be regional chains that aren't around here, but check it out.

AdSense "insufficient content" rejections when the content is just fine

AdSense finally approved me! For anyone who's getting the "insufficient content" rejection on a real blog with real content, the issue is probably that you need a "contact us" page and a privacy policy. I added some barebones pages, including a privacy policy that I found through a quick google search, and this time they approved me. Don't bother asking on the AdSense forums why you're getting this rejection; the "experts" will tell you that it's because your content is plagiarized, your English isn't great, or the content isn't real content that anyone would want to read. When I tried this, I then replied to them that I've done plenty of professional writing and this isn't the case, and they were just rude and told me to learn to write better. Um, thanks? No one told me it was the privacy policy and contact page. I managed to find this out from another blogger. Try adding these pages, and you'll likely get approved.

While we're on the subject, please consider turning off adblockers. I used to use one all the time. But I then realized that more than half of the pages I visit are independent writers and people who are starting home businesses. I want to support these people. When we block the ads on their pages, they don't get paid for the ad impression, and there's no change we will ever surf on through to the advertiser's page, because we can't see the ad. Right now I'm only using the adblocker on a few major corporate pages (Facebook, I'm talking to you), but not using it as a default, because I don't want to take away income from small pages owned by individuals. I don't have a lot of money to donate to people, and I generally can't afford to shop local small businesses like I'd like to, but I can support them for free by not blocking their ads. Please consider doing this as well. Please and thank you!

Calories per dollar chart

This article and accompanying chart is an interesting way to think about eating cheaply. I think I would have guessed the highest was rice or peanut butter, or possibly ramen, not flour or white bread. I was also surprised that pasta and oats were so high up there on the list. Of course, some of these things require cooking, so there's labor and energy costs that aren't factored in; you can't really eat flour and would have to at the very least mix it with water and cook it to make it into noodles or flatbread. Still, the list is useful. I imagine I'll refer to it when I get anxious about finances, and remind myself that it is in fact possible to stay alive on a couple hundred dollars a year. Assuming we're in the urban U.S. or somewhere similar, we would surely get enough other foods even if all we were purchasing was rice or white bread. Think about all the places the average person eats for free -- samples at stores, work events where food is provided, free talks that have a snack table, and so forth. It wouldn't be optimal nutrition, but it would be enough to keep us from getting scurvy or whatever it is people who only eat one food get.

Of course, anyone who's looked at my blog before knows that there are better ways to get cheap (and tastier, and healthier) food than buying just full-price flour or rice. There's Fair Foods, couponing, food banks, and so forth. If you're in the Boston area, you could actually go to Fair Foods every week or every other week, then buy some combination of rice and flour, and have some pretty decent (if a little boring) eating, with produce served with rice or flatbreads. This would allow you to eat for a couple hundred dollars per person per year.

A critical look at food pantries

Having gone from being around the poverty line, to quite a ways above, to considerably below seems to have turned me into somewhat of an armchair sociologist. It's definitely fascinating to observe the privileges that come and go, as well as the able-to-present-as-middle-class one that might be the hardest for someone to obtain and hardest to take away.

Today I've been pondering food pantries. For the uninitiated, food pantries are (at least in states where food stamp and welfare distribution is funded and functional) programs that provide nonperishable and small amounts of perishable food to individuals and families who are either waiting for government food stamp (SNAP) benefits or who make too much based on the government guidelines but have a financial need because of a situation that the government isn't allowed to take into account. Some of these are run on an entirely volunteer basis, through houses of worship and other community organizations. Others are run through nonprofits using some combination of paid and volunteer resources. Some require participants to sign up and demonstrate financial need, some require identification of some sort to make sure people aren't participating more than they can allow, and others are completely anonymous.

If you've read anything I've ever written, you know that obviously I'm in favor of programs that provide for the needy. I of course favor a government that provides a high minimum standard of living for its people, but that's neither here nor there. In terms of programs that are available to us in 2000s Boston, I have worked at programs that provide for the needy, I've donated to them, and I've benefited from them -- both government-run and privately run. I wholeheartedly support these programs continuing to exist and being expanded and made easier to use.

But what I'm not sure I support is the current model of food pantries distributing actual physical food. And I have some skepticism around why this model persists.

The resources that go into these programs is immense. The programs collect food, usually at schools, businesses, and houses of worship. It's transported to a storage location. The storage locations can be quite large, up to full-sized warehouses for some of the larger programs. The larger programs run through nonprofits have full-time staff who are in charge of determining whether people are eligible. The smaller ones have volunteers running them, who could be spending their labor elsewhere, so it's not entirely free. Nothing is free. The programs often also distribute groceries to people who are older, disabled, have small children, etc., and can't easily come get the items. Again, even when this is volunteer labor, it comes from somewhere. They have distribution dates and times in which they have staff present, in a building that's climate controlled and up to sanitary codes and all that, for people to come and pick groceries.

This must cost a fortune. Surely it would be cheaper to mail people a grocery store gift card every month. (And allow people without a fixed residence or ability to safely receive mail to pick it up somewhere.) And probably frankly cheaper to skip the eligibility routine. I can't remember where I read this and my google-fu is failing me, but requiring people to sign off on something or speak to an actual person is a pretty damn good deterrent against people taking modest benefits that they aren't entitled to. And it makes sense to me; I think that even just having people put their name and address on a sheet and sign off that they meet the guidelines would result in very little fraud. I mean, really, do you think very many financially secure people are going to go hang out at a food pantry to get a few bucks' worth of groceries?

So, why does the food pantry model persist? Is it more about making the donors feel good than about providing food? And how much does the whole "I get to choose what poor people are allowed to have" play into it? That's what I imagine this is really about. I'm guessing that plenty of people who say they are basically progressive would be fine donating foods to a food bank and supporting its existence, but if you asked them about just giving gift cards, they'd have some conservative excuse about how "those people" would just use it to buy crap, or "those people" would buy something that isn't food.

We used these programs when The Thing™ happened and we were suddenly without much income, and I noticed that the food people donate to food banks is largely status quo "healthy" food. Which, I was cool with this because that's a lot of what we buy, but still, people seem to donate canned fruits and vegetables, boxes of plain low-cal foods like plain rice, plain pasta, a lot of canned tomato products, plain cereals, plain oatmeal. A good proportion of it was organic and high-end brands, too. I pretty much never saw anything like crackers I'd want to eat by themselves, any sorts of cookies, non-plain cereals, cake mixes, or anything like that. Just plain, mostly organic, fruits, vegetables, whole grains

Again, good stuff, for my family who has proper pots and pans and enough expendable income to buy milk, oil, produce, spices, sugar, and other things to add to it. But having known lots of food-insecure people in my life (and having had periods in my young adulthood where I didn't have stable housing or income), I have always have made sure to donate higher-calorie foods and foods that don't require other ingredients to make a decent meal. If the food pantry haul is all you have for the week, you're going to be better off with things like Mac and Cheese or rice and beans packets that don't need anything but water added. Or cans of stews and higher-calorie soups. Oh, and ramen. Ramen is 400 calories for one packet, which cost 10-25 cents. I make a lot of it myself. I add veggies, tofu, and eggs when I can, but I absolutely buy ramen largely because it's cheaper than rice or pasta and it ensures that everyone gets enough calories.

People rarely donate these things though. I rarely see any processed foods with a decent amount of calories that can be consumed on their own. I see organic, expensive, minimally processed foods. My only conclusion is that the people donating honestly think they're doing something really great for the poor people. They're thinking that they're providing healthier foods than we usually have. I mean, on some level they are; I don't often have organic $8 steel-cut oatmeal. But think about how many of the families using the food pantry don't have a fully stocked kitchen, only can afford the food the food pantry gives them, and would benefit more from the box of high-fructose-corn-syrup-arrific instant oatmeal packets. And think about how many more calories they would get for that $8 if they instead got several boxes of oatmeal packets.

I do really think the problem is that the people who do most of the donating, while well-intentioned, aren't thinking in terms of what they would want in the same situation. If I think about what people in this household have needed recently, we've had an adult who needed lunches to take to a workplace with a microwave but no fridge, kids who've needed to take a non-refrigerated, non-smashable-in-backpack snack to a day camp, and an instance in which someone needed to bring a celebratory item to share. Listen, our family is pretty happy with being unconventional, but even so, there is just no way we're going to send a bowl of plain oatmeal to an end-of-the-season celebration, or bring along a can of plain beans to microwave at work, or send a container of room-temperature pasta to camp when everyone else is bringing chips and granola bars. We make do with minimalist food at home, as you've seen here, but let's get real. We managed to provide for camp and work and all that with items we coupon for, but there's just no way we would have been able to do this on food pantry items alone if that was all we had access to. Yet the idea seems to persist that poor people don't need "junk food" like noodle packets and granola bars, and I'm sure we didn't need "fancy food" like the $3 package of seaweed I used to make cucumber sushi rolls for my kid's team.

I would love to see research as to 1) whether people would donate the same amount of money they spend on food pantry donations if they didn't get to control what people end up eating and didn't get the sense of altruism that they provided organic healthy foods to those poor people who don't know any better and 2) whether some of the people would donate at all, or whether they'd make snide comments about how "those people" would just buy junk, or sell the card, or whatever.

I mean, really, people could just as easily sell the food from the food pantry, right? If someone is really in that desperate of a situation that they're selling either food or their gift card, doesn't that mean that the people who are in a position to donate are in a much better place, and should have compassion for them? And what are we assuming poor people are buying if they do sell their card? I've heard that selling food stamps to buy diapers or pay for child care is fairly prevalent. Should this offend me? Yes, it does, but only in the sense that there are people in the wealthiest country in the world who are needing to do this.

And really, if someone is using any funds they can find to gamble or use substances, is the solution that we cut them off further from food so that they (and their dependents) are hungry too in addition to whatever illness they have? And as far as people buying junk, or buying fancy stuff, how does it affect me? Does it affect me any differently if I donate $20 a month and someone buys their kid a birthday cake instead of organic oatmeal? Especially because nearly all of what I donate would be going to feed a family, instead of the cash running the program and the organic oatmeal going to people who might prefer other things. I would love to know if someone has looked into moving food banks to a cash/gift card model instead of the current model, and what conclusions they came to.

Modern-day equivalent of finding coins in the couch cushions

Y'all, I've got this drawer full of credit cards. I surprisingly have pretty decent credit. I've never paid a bill 30 days or more late, so even though I don't have any cash flow, my credit is up there. So, banks that I have any sort of account with will send me credit cards, and credit cards that I don't carry a balance on will send me cards with bigger and bigger limits and shinier cards with holograms and cool names.

I usually toss these into the drawer, because I'm not about to start running up debt when I have no way to pay it off. Sometimes though, I need to go through the cards and figure out which one has the lowest interest rate, like when I need to call a repair person, or when I recently needed to hire a lawyer. While I've never been wealthy, back before The Stuff That Made This Blog Need To Be A Thing happened, I typically had an extra $500-$1000 or so in my checking account in case of emergency -- at least enough to be able to give someone a substantial down payment that showed them I was an employed adult who wasn't messing with them. 

So, yeah, following what we'll call The Stuff™, I have no money, but sometimes I run into these situations where I need to find a credit card with room on it. We have enough steady income to pay for housing, we find ways to get food and clothing and any other normal everyday things we need, but the barter system just doesn't work for most one-time services when you don't know someone in the business. So for the foreseeable future, until some things hopefully shift and we're able to work more, emergency expenses get paid for by the drawer o' cards.

So today, as I was looking through my file of cards to check some credit limits and interest rates, I decided it was also time to throw out the expired and the duplicates where they send you a fancier card for the same account to convince you to use it. Boy was I surprised to find several $5 and $10 gift cards to stores, and five $25 Visa gift cards! I checked these on the websites, thinking maybe I had tossed them in there with a couple dollars left on them, but found that they actually were unused. Who was this person who was so rich that they were just tossing perfectly good money into a drawer?

I do actually get how it happened though. A relative sends the Visa gift cards for adult birthdays and sends presents to the kids. In my not-completely-broke thinking over a few birthdays a few years ago, I decided it was greedy or self-absorbed or something to use them for expenses, and figured I needed to save them for something really nice that we wouldn't normally spend money on. Yeah, now I'm in a pretty different mindset. Those are going toward bills. And the store cards? Those were all ones that were handed out at events or sent to us as promotions. Again, in my pre-completely-totally-destitute thinking, I figured I would toss a $5 Home Depot card into a drawer until next time we wanted to make a home improvement purchase there. Now, I'm in a place where I'm like, holy crap, I can get $5 worth of cleaning supplies, or the paint brushes one of the kids needs for art class, instead of sitting here not buying those things because I'm trying to figure out how to pay bills. And all the Starbucks and Dunkin Donuts ones? That I was saving thinking I'd apparently buy myself fancy drinks? Those places have bagels and juice and stuff. These are going in my wallet for a free way to stop and grab dinner next time we're stuck out somewhere.

Things poor people do

Today we got a letter welcoming a family member to a program run through a local nonprofit, which requires participants to be low income. Without going into too many details, since it's a small, specialized program, I'll just say that it's something that has a great reputation and is no doubt going to be very helpful. 

I was reminded yet again of how society views me though when I saw that the welcome letter required all household members to sign an agreement that while on premises, we will refrain from harassment, assault, drugs, weapons, theft, and so forth. I should probably mention that this place is in the suburbs. And provides a number of services and programs. The other programs we've participated in at this place weren't exclusively for poor people, so they didn't have us sign any "be sure not to act ghetto" agreement. I mean, OK, I've worked in the nonprofit world enough that I get the reasoning behind having a signed agreement so you can kick people out as it becomes necessary. But could they really not have used the generic "abide by all rules and regulations" one-liner instead of needing to send us a detailed list of all the things poor people better make sure not to do? 

Stuff I've learned from eBay

1) A disproportionate number of you people are named Colleen and Nicole. I've sold about 50 things, and there have been four Colleens and six Nicoles. Why?

2) Sometimes there are people on eBay who do shit like, let's say they live in Brunei, they have an extensive purchase history on the U.S. eBay site, they win an auction, then they apparently had no idea that shipping a huge item to Brunei is extremely expensive and figured it could just magically be shipped for a few dollars instead of several hundred. Hypothetically speaking of course. 

3) eBay people are often able to write in normal human-type English when they message you with questions and shipping info and so forth, but then when they go to leave feedback, become possessed and can only write things like A++++ GREAT WOW SELLER YES YES PERFECT A-OK THANX DOORKNOB ANKLE COLD

4) Rather than stuffing each package into the mail chute at the post office, you can just bust up to the front of the line and ask for one of them bins the people with businesses put their mail in. SCUSE ME SCUSE ME I GOT OFFICIAL POSTAL BUSINESS YO. 

5) It's totally random what does and doesn't sell. Some of my stuff that's way underpriced is hanging out for weeks getting no bids, and some stuff is going for more than it would cost to just order it from the place it was purchased. I suspect people are addicted the auction/winning aspect and it feels better to have gotten a $5 item for a dollar plus $6 shipping than to order it from Target with free shipping. And I'm going to continue taking advantage of this dynamic, because I need money, and at least the stuff is going to someone who can use it instead of in the trash.