and the winner is

 Everyone loves a clicky spinner, right? I entered the names of the 11 commenters on last week's post, spun the Picker Wheel random chooser - clickclickclickclickclicketyclick - and here's the result:

Congratulations to Chris from Boise!

Thanks to everyone who left a comment, and thanks for the lovely birthday wishes! You all helped make my birthday a special day.

Chris, when you have a chance, please drop me an email and we can sort the (very few) details: q.piper at hotmail dot com

~~~~~

revisiting the giveaway giveaway

I am not giving away this book!

This lovely book arrived in the mail today - a cookbook co-authored by Appalachia blog-pal Tipper Pressley, from Blind Pig and the Acorn. It was one of the prizes in Tipper's November daily giveaway, and I was thrilled to win it. This book was a long time in the works, and a labor of love. It was worth the wait.

Tipper called this one of the "flawed" copies; i.e., a copy that was scuffed or damaged in some way between publisher and sale, or else one where Tipper or co-author Jim Casada made some sort of error in the signing of the book. My copy is one of the latter category, and I was tickled to bits to see the abbreviated inscription "To Glenda from" which must have been the point at which an error was noticed.

I think "Glenda" may become my alternate identity.   

Winning this prize made me realize that it's been quite a while since I've done a giveaway here on Comptonia. 

Long-time readers may recall the Kiva giveaways - here's a link to the first one, which describes Kiva in detail - which everyone seemed to enjoy whether they won or not. Which is perfect. So I'm going to do that again.

I'll prepay a Kiva loan of $25, and the winner of the giveaway will choose the recipient. It's a giveaway of a giveaway. Okay? Okay!

To enter, just leave a comment on this post, before the 18th of December.

Now, I don't know how many people are reading my blog these days. I know I lost a great many long-time readers during the extended hiatus following Piper's death. I am grateful for those who have returned - or appeared - and especially those of you who leave comments, which enliven my workaday life considerably. I'm hoping some visitors who have not left a comment yet, may feel inclined to do so this time. Oh, and please feel free to share this with anyone you think might be interested in Kiva.

If only a couple of people leave a comment, that's just fine. But if a few more can be gently coaxed out from reader-only status into reader-and-commenter status, well, that will be a gift to me. 

Which will be especially timely - just like receiving Tipper's book today! - because tomorrow is my birthday.

Okay. On the 18th, one week from today, I'll do a random draw, post the results on the blog, and email the Kiva info to the winner who will have the fun of choosing a recipient. And I'll tell you in advance: if you've never done a Kiva loan before, you are in for a treat.

~~~~~

friday flurries

Well, it's been a bit of a darkish day.

Snowed all morning, and quite cold.

 The wind had a real bite to it.

But just as I went outside to do the last chores of the day,
the sun suddenly burst through the greyness
and the sky turned bright blue!

Minutes later, the sun went down.
It was a colorful surprise ending to a dimmish day.

And here's another colorful surprise.
This one appeared in my email today:
the Kiva tally for International Women's Day.

Nice.

~~~~~

and the winner is

There were five wonderful comments left on the Kiva giveaway post, in this order:

And a few minutes ago, at 5:01 PM, I used Random.Org to "draw" the winner:

Congrats to KB Bear!

I'll email you also, in hopes you'll see this news in time to make your loan while it's still International Women's Day 2017. Of course, being in Colorado, you've got a little more time than I do here in Massachusetts...in fact, the sun is below the horizon already, and I'm making this a very short post as I've been away all afternoon and must get out right away for the last chores of the day.

Thanks to all the commenters

for sharing your thoughts on inspiring women!
~~~

Update: 6:45pm

I just checked the Kiva site and there are a lot of loans indicating that matching funds are available - right now, and today only, I believe - so if you have any interest, try using this link to go straight to the first page of "matched" loans, with the little green "X2" badge on the descriptions.
~~~~~

another giveaway giveaway

Look, readers! It's a woman with a goat!
We are everywhere :)

I've decided to repeat my own Kiva giveaway giveaway.
But this one is specifically to contribute to Kiva's effort
to crowdfund $3M in loans to women by 8th March.
Time is short, so please share this giveaway in any way you can.

I'm cutting and pasting most of my original blog post about Kiva, because although I could always write it differently, I don't think I can write it any better. If you already know all about Kiva, you can zoom right to the bottom of this post.
So here goes:

Are you familiar with Kiva? Since 2005, this non-profit group has funded microloans all over the world by combining donations of $25 or more. Donors choose a loan they wish to contribute to, and after that loan is repaid, a donor can re-loan the original donation to another borrower!

All the screenshots are from the Kiva website.

They are very nice images; left-click to embiggen.

I. Love. Kiva.

I love the fact that 100% of every donation goes to funding a loan. There is a separate option for donating to Kiva admin costs. This is brilliant. A $25 lender does not have to wonder how many of those dollars are really going to the designated borrower, because ALL the dollars are going there.

I love that Kiva does such a great job of making this program work. The repayment rate is 97.1%. That's due diligence, that is.

I love that more than 2 million loans have been made, in 83 countries, by 1.5 million lenders, to the tune of over 800 million dollars. Oh, and Kiva has a top rating on Charity Navigator.

It's an unusual experience, making a Kiva donation. Reading the borrower information is a tiny, unique window on ordinary lives around the world. There's much I wouldn't have imagined. And much as familiar as the view from my porch.

Maybe a cooperative group of farming women in Vietnam are adding to their small breeding herd of pigs. Or cattle. Or goats. Maybe an urban taxi driver needs to repair the vehicle that supports an extended family, or a shop owner needs enough capital to begin purchasing products at a lower bulk rate. Maybe someone is planting apple trees in Moldova, or growing a small business in California. 

The Kiva website offers simple filters to help a donor find the loan they wish to support. Some search filters are geographical. Some filter by the purpose of the loan - such as agriculture, or retail business, or clean energy - or by characteristics of the borrower: elderly, single parent, individual/group, etc.

~~~

This new giveaway is for a $25 Kiva Gift Card

(purchased by me)

for the winner to donate to a Kiva loan supporting a woman.

A small sample of loans currently gathering funds.

If you have already donated to Kiva, the $25 will be added to your account. If you are new to Kiva, redeeming the gift card will set up your account. And in case you have concerns: in my experience, Kiva does not pester donors. I get an email periodically to let me know when a loan has received repayments, so I know when I have enough funds available to donate again - that's about it. And that's actually pretty nice.

Now, if you want to put your name in the hat for this all-new giveaway to mark International Women's Day 2017, here's what to do.

1) Leave a comment saying something relevant to International Women's Day.

It can be about something you do, personally, to support women.

It can be about a woman of the past or present whose life has inspired you.

It can be about a woman in your own life who has influenced you.

It can be about your own life experience and personal observations.

It can be What IWD2017 Means To Me, if that primes your writing pump.

Write a novella (like I do) or write two lines - doesn't matter. We all want to read what you want to write.

But in some way, your comment must thoughtfully relate to women, because the giveaway is for a Kiva loan TO a woman, in honor of International Women's Day. Okay?

Please feel free to share this giveaway, in any way you like. It's open to anyone on the planet, or on the International Space Station.

I'll do the random number thing at 5PM Eastern Time on the 8th.

Good luck!

~~~~~~

kiva giveaway

Remember when I did that Kiva giveaway?

Well, right now, Kiva is doing a huge giveaway in honor of International Women's Day.

They are inviting people who have never made a Kiva loan to make their first $25 loan for free.

I don't know how they are doing this, but they are planning to fund

3 million dollars in loans by the 8th.*

I just don't see a "down side" to this.

If you'd like to read my post about Kiva and the work they do, here's the link to the giveaway giveaway post. Please check it out or just go straight to the Kiva website.

I love Kiva.

~~~

*Edited 11:55AM Sunday 5th March

When I posted this last night, the "free loans" were still being given away. But Sally informs us in her comment below that the "free" loans were capped at $250,000 (which I did not know or I would have mentioned it...but still pretty darned impressive!) which have now been given away. So the goal is to have additional "regular" donated loans to women add up to $3 million by International Women's Day.

Thanks very much for that update, Sally - and thanks also for making a loan!

I believe I will follow your lead :)

~~~~~

a little something for everyone

As promised, the results of the giveaway giveaway!

There were 15 commenters:

And the random sequence generator says:

So...the winner of the Kiva gift card is Thistle Cove Farm!

Congratulations and thank you for your comment, Sandra!

I hope you will enjoy your first Kiva experience :)

And I know it isn't the same as winning a giveaway, but for all the commenters - and indeed for all the silent readers of Comptonia (who I dearly hope will someday say hello!), I'd like to share two special images. I hope you enjoy them.

The first is a hummingbird moth!

 If you've ever seen one of these gentle furry creatures you can imagine how thrilled I was to find this one - called a Snowberry Clearwing, believe it or not! Did Tolkien name it? - enjoying the bee balm yesterday.

And only moments later:

 

Have a marvelous day, everyone!

Really. Let's all look around and find something to marvel at :)

~~~~~

wordy wednesday

The weather has lightened up, and everyone is enjoying it.

It's sunny, and it's hot. But not stultifyingly humid.

And there's an occasional breeze.

The air is breathable.

Ahhhhh.

Betula had been basking in the sun, but when he saw me walking up from the garden, he got up and walked down to meet me halfway.

 LeShodu naturally assumed that I would walk to her.

She is rarely mistaken.

~~~

We had a brief but heavy rain one evening,

and the corn is higher than my knees at last:

The corn - it's organic popcorn, actually! - 

still has a long way to go.

But the summer squash is coming along:

~~~

In very "other" news, I'm in the process of switching to a new laptop. It's a necessary step - overdue, really - but now I must get it done because the tiny laptop needs to go away for repair ASAP. I've been switching over for a week now, bit by bit.

I am not going to make you look at pictures of a laptop.

Look, pumpkin leaves! Aren't they glorious?

I'll talk about the laptops though. Two big hurdles are: getting the goatcams talking to the new laptop, and finding a replacement for Picasa, which I've been happy with as an image manager (mostly) and editor (a bit), but which Google cut loose a while ago. Oh, Google. You are a blister at times.

I do so little "post-processing" of images, I have no need of PhotoShop. And I don't want my images in "the cloud" so I'm not even looking at Google's "replacement" for Picasa.

FastStone was recommended but doesn't seem to have keyword tagging. Tagging is a feature I need at this point; otherwise I will never find anything when I want it. Ideally, I need to find software that will not only offer tagging but which will read the tags on tens of thousands of images already tagged in Picasa.

What are y'all using? Any software suggestions will be much appreciated!

~~~

Hurdle 2: the goatcams are critical to my peace of mind; no exaggeration. There's just no calculating how many unnecessary trips to the barns and paddocks they've prevented, especially in the middle of the night. Nor how many times I've gone out with a flashlight because a goatcam let me know there was something genuinely amiss. They've certainly saved at least one life.

After many hair-tearing failures this week, I managed to get one of the cameras talking to the new laptop this afternoon. I have such a headache now, I'm going to rest on that one scrawny laurel til tomorrow, when I'll tackle the second camera again.

And speaking of tomorrow, it's the Giveaway Giveaway! I just discovered that I did not put a time on the random drawing, so to be fair, I will keep entries open til midnight Eastern Time on Thursday, and will draw and post the winner on Friday. That means there's still time to share, so please do...this is just a tiny giveaway, but the more people who hear about Kiva, the better our world may be :)

~~~~~

giveaway giveaway

It's been a while since there's been a Comptonia giveaway, and I've been trying for over a week to come up with a good idea. Yarn? Could do. A book? Maybe. But with so much tension and upheaval going on in the wider-than-my-world, I wanted to do something that would feel a little special. A little uplifting.

A little positive for goodness' sake.

It took a while, but then...light dawned!

I emailed a question, and Kiva emailed right back
and said, "Good idea!" so here we go.

Are you familiar with Kiva? Since 2005, this non-profit group has funded microloans all over the world by combining donations of $25 or more. Donors choose a loan they wish to contribute to, and after that loan is repaid, a donor can re-loan the original donation to another borrower!

All the screenshots are from the Kiva website.

They are nice images; left-click to embiggen.

I. Love. Kiva.

I love the fact that 100% of every donation goes to funding a loan. There is a separate option for donating to Kiva admin costs. This is brilliant. A $25 lender does not have to wonder how many of those dollars are really going to the designated borrower, because ALL the dollars are going there.

I love that Kiva does such a great job of making this program work. The repayment rate is 97.1%. That's due diligence, that is.

I love that more than 2 million loans have been made, in 83 countries, by 1.5 million lenders, to the tune of over 800 million dollars. Oh, and Kiva has a top rating on Charity Navigator.

It's an unusual experience, making a Kiva donation. Reading the borrower information is a tiny, unique window on ordinary lives around the world. There's much I wouldn't have imagined. And much as familiar as the view from my porch.

Maybe a cooperative group of farming women in Vietnam are adding to their small breeding herd of pigs. Or cattle. Or goats. Maybe an urban taxi driver needs to repair the vehicle that supports an extended family, or a shop owner needs enough capital to begin purchasing products at a lower bulk rate. Maybe someone is planting apple trees in Moldova, or growing a business in California. 

The Kiva website offers simple filters to help a donor find the loan they wish to support. Some search filters are geographical. Some filter by the purpose of the loan - such as agriculture, or retail business, or clean energy - or by characteristics of the borrower: elderly, single parent, individual/group, etc.

So, okay...

this is all very interesting, but what happened to the giveaway? Have you forgotten the giveaway? The one I mentioned waaaay up at the top of this post?

It's a $25 Kiva Gift Card

(purchased by me)

for the winner to donate to your Kiva loan of choice.

It's a giveaway giveaway :)

Yay! Right?

If you have already donated to Kiva, the $25 will be added to your account. If you are new to Kiva, redeeming the gift card will set up your account. And in case you have concerns: in my experience, Kiva does not pester donors. I get an email periodically to let me know when a loan has received repayments, so I know when I have enough funds available to donate again - that's about it. And that's actually pretty nice.

So if you want your name in the hat for this giveaway, just leave a comment. Any comment will do, but if you feel like sharing something joyful, that will be appreciated by me and every reader who comments after you, I'm sure.

Feel free to share this giveaway, in any way you like. It's open to anyone on the planet, or on the International Space Station.

I'll do the random number thing next Thursday, the 21th.

Good luck!

~~~~~~