Today’s topic: Alternative Transportation in Durham – Initial Support Newsletter v0.07

A report I would like to read is Modern Money Mechanics. If you have a copy of it in print, please lend it to me for a tad. It outlines how money is created by the Federal Reserve, the banks, and the system of lending.

I changed the header today on the website and the newsletter to a picture I took on the platform of the Amtrak Station in Durham, NC. It seems we might have a running theme of alternative transportation in our headers with the last header being Bike Man’s bike frames of the Bikes for Children program – http://SouthSideBike.Info.

When my 2 year-old daughter hears the train in the background, she says, “Daddy, Daddy”. I ride the train from Durham to Burlington so often, that my children believe that I live on the train.

Amtrak in North Carolina

On two trains a day in each direction, on the train that is called The Piedmont, there is complimentary LeBlue bottled water, coffee, and tea in the Snack Car. Other eating options are the Vending machines.

On those two local North Carolina Amtrak trains called The Piedmont, you can take your bike with you without having to pack it up, but you do need a reservation. The rules are more narrow on the train called The Carolinian.

To my motorist friends: Very likely you bought a copy of Spare Change News from me off the median. I can appreciate that we all seem to be in a hurry in what Bob Marley called The Rat Race, but please consider bicyclists, moped riders, trucks, and other vehicles on the street with you. Please share the road.

More Bike Info

Posted on local bulletin board: Trinity Park Bike Workshop -Saturday – May 21st 3pm-6pm  In Trinity Park @ Watts & Trinity. Bring Your Bike! We’ll Help You Fix It Up. Contact Matthew Carter with questions 805.881.2235 matthewkaicarter@gmail.com

The Bikes for Children plans on giving away 1000 bicycles by Christmas. The website is http://SouthSideBike.Info. We are taking donations for and of helmets, safety vests, and safety lights.

Feedback, Donations, and Subscriptions

Feedback & donations can be received at: Paul Gydos 1263 Maple Ridge Drive, Burlington NC 27217  Subscription of next 15 issues sent first class $20. Please write Check or Money Order to Paul Gydos

“A Dollar Short and A Day Late” – Support Newsletter v0.06

“A dollar short and a day late” is a phrase my wife used to say which would really infuriate me. Its true: People measure you by your timeliness as well as quantitatively in the way you pay.  Nobody likes being paid late, and when you are the one paying late, you feel like a loser.  At the moment I am writing this I am $10 short and 2 days late for rent, what makes it awkward is I live with my landlord; And yes, when people don’t get paid completely and on time they get mad.  Nonetheless, I am thankful for what I have and I pray to God that he will allow me to prosper and be a good Dad.

Entrepreneurship isn’t for everybody. Most small businesses go under. In my case I’m a boot-strapper. That means I’m trying to make something happen out of not very much, and against all odds. I would always prefer a job, because you will never average out above minimum wage, soliciting on the street, unless you have a scam. And I could never be comfortable running a scam. However I can’t say I’m above Barnum’s logic, “You’ve got to have a gimmick.”. Gimmick as it may be, it gives an outlet to express myself, and is not particularly gimmicky in that it has not produced much revenue thus far. When you need immediate money though, you usually must choose entrepreneurship over a job, because waiting to get paid can actually make you homeless, and then what good was the job?

Selling a newsletter generates less than collecting donations alone, plus, I have to spend money and time to produce it, while taking in even less. So I must ask myself, why am I doing it? Right away I get to exercise my language skills, my ability to use the media to distribute a message. Also I get to advertise other things that I do.

For instance a manager at Papa John’s asked me to stop by tonight and we will talk about distributing his coupons. That’s right I’m in the advertising business. First of all I’m going to mention this about the Papa John’s over by East Campus (If you’re reading this on the internet, I’m talking about Duke University as I am in Durham, North Carolina): They are really nice people, and if you are into delivery pizza thus I endorse them because they have a good attitude towards the community. Whether I’ll be able to help them further is up in the air.

As soon as I am out of the immediate pickle that I am in, My friend in Chapel Hill is going to give me an opportunity to try and solve his network problem. I am that friend that might know something about computers that you don’t, and will often try and help you solve a problem. If I am able to help you with your computer, I don’t mind if you help me back.

I am hoping that The Bikes for Children project will be received well by the community: http://SouthSideBike.Info is the website. It turns out our initial location might not be the right place to launch. So we are going to have to do think about doing it in another way. We are taking donations for and of helmets, safety vests, and safety lights.

Feedback & Donations
Feedback & donations can be received at: Paul Gydos 1263 Maple Ridge Dr. Burlington, NC 27217  or you can direct your email to: editor@sparechangenews.com

Initial Support Newsletter – v0.05

As I take advantage of this time with the hail and the crazy electric storm to write, I reflect on my personal situation.  Somehow I went through most of the day without realizing that I did not have my glasses on, and its not entirely clear when I lost them.  So please excuse any typos as I am working blind on this one.  Hopefully by the time when you receive this, I will have my glasses on my head  So this gave me a moment to consider:  Normally I would not go so long without having noticed that I did not have them.  I was so focused on trying to catch the early train to see my children and take them swimming,  I didn’t check to see I had them on.  Is this an analogy to how humans are about so many things?  I feel as though we have been going without our glasses on for a period of time because we had our collective mind on somethings that were so important, that we didn’t notice that we weren’t seeing clearly.

portrait of Paul Gydos

“I feel as though we have been going without our glasses on for a period of time because we had our collective mind on somethings that were so important, that we didn’t notice that we weren’t seeing clearly.” – Editor of SCN

Bicycle Stuff

Take that as you will. Last night while downtown I had a chance to talk with a young gentleman who participates in the the Durham Bike Co-op. He told me where they are located and when they operate and the status of the Bike Co-op. It sounds as though we have a very active and healthy bike co-op here in Durham and I can’t wait to check them out. http://durhambikecoop.org is the website.

I am hoping that The Bike for Children project will be received equally well by the community: http://SouthSideBike.Info is the website. While downtown yesterday, I noticed the bike rack by The Pinhook on Main Street. We would like to build a bike cage in The Bike Man’s backyard with the same type of construction where we weld together old Bike Parts together in an artistic fashion.

Feedback & Donations

Feedback for  Paul Gydos can be received on my blog.  You can direct your email to: editor@sparechangenews.com

Initial Support Newsletter v0.02

The weather was perfect and my twin boy and girl were turning two years old.  We had a chance to go to the museum of Life and Science with the grandparents and other family members together.  What a blast. (What a…) fine institution – (but) a bit pricy for those on the lower side of the economic spectrum.  // I am not goint to speak without qualifying that I am not an attorney; nor (do I) know too much about software law.  Nonetheless if you own a copy of Windows 7 media and authentication there is a way to create a bootable live cd for your own use, A copy that runs a limited version from the optical drive.  //  Is there anything else going on besides the royal wedding? Oh  yeah the usual bad news. Let’s skip that for some good news:  John 1:12-13 “But as many as received him to them gave he power to become the son of God, even to them that believe on His name which were born not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.”

editor@gydos.com  THANK YOU!

http://Orig.in/al – New Shortcut for Sparechangenews.com – Initial Support Edition v0.01

I shouldn’t have to tell you – It’s not about the bunny, right, OK. In brief you should of heard by now about a Jewish man named Joshua who was given the greek name Jesus because he took care of a not so small problem of the human condition that the old folks call sin. Hello! Get right or get left. Moving right along now.  We want to know about what you think of our public transportation system. Lately I’ve been in a combination of walking, biking, using the bus, AMTRAK, and even occasionally driving a car.  I saw my first Chevy Volt on Thursday in a fast food parking lot and spoke with the driver, pretty cool – if you don’t know, it’s more of an electric car than a hybrid.  In taking a risk in getting the Tin Foil Hat Award, I advise you to Google the term HAARP and if what you read doesn’t have you wondering about what’s going on then I don’t know what will. My netbook went on the fritz, I’m still going to try and rescue it with a little bit of solder but I had peanuts to work with as far as a replacement so I bought an Augen Genbook 108 on ebay for $129.50 – a barely used factory refurb, its Android 2.1, an older O.S. made fro a phone but in a netbook form factor. Weird and interesting – and probably not useful enough for most folks, even though I’m not going to recommend it, I am going to write about it extensively because it is relevant to the topic of the Digital Divide. I’ll put all my posts at http://genbook.info. Hey when you see me, please buy the newsletter; We need toner, a new PC, internet access, an office, etc., etc.. I’ll try and put a new Paypal donate button up.

“Kicking It!” a movie about the Homeless World Cup, don’t laugh.

Everybody knows that in the United States we call it “soccer”, and the rest of the world calls it football.

But did you know that over 1 billion people in the world are homeless! And what’s the most popular sport in the world? “Kicking it”, the ball that is.  All over the world, one sees the poor taking a refreshment from their daily trials on the field, and for those minutes or hours they are as a rich in enjoyment as the greatest of professional game players.  Furthermore a championship world cup in the world’s most popular sport and one that draws only from the 1/5 to 1/6 of the world’s most vulnerable population is one of the most incredible ideas I have heard of for a long time.

Last night I had the privilege of watching the film “Kicking it!” about how a ball can change the life of a displaced person in the most dramatic of ways. It chronicles the lives of six homeless or formerly homeless individuals from five countries and how participating in playing in organized street ball can be taken all the way to a very real world championship tournament, in this case in South Africa emceed by  Bishop Desmond Tutu.

The idea was founded in 2001by  Mel Young co-founder of The Big Issue Scotland, and Harald Schmied, editor of Megaphon, a street paper in Austria while attending the International Network of Street Papers conference that was in Cape Town, South Africa. (wikipedia)

Colin Farrell gives the intros and exits to the documentary but the real characters are the six otherwise marginalized people who have the privilege of playing in the tournament:  Najib from war torn Afghanistan; Alex from the slums of Kenya; Damien and Simon from the drug rehab clinics of Dublin, Ireland; Craig from the streets of Charlotte, North Carolina; Jesus from the overflowing public shelters of Madrid, Spain, and Slavan from the shadow culture of the illegal rural immigrants to the big city of St. Petersburg, Russia. (movies.aol.com)

For those who care about the human condition, those in the poverty scene looking for ideas,  fans of any sport will enjoy this movie.  I enjoyed writing this article particularly to learn that other writers in my sector were responsible for making this happen.  I hope you’ll watch it then take some action in your area with a great idea as well.

btw I saw it on hulu.com, but I ‘m sure you can find the movie elsewhere.

Paul Gydos

Functicafe.com will hold its first Words event at the Baobab Tree Cafe in the Historic Glenwood Neighborhood of Greensboro, NC

Functicafe.com invites you to participate with your presence, your poetry, and your words, this Thursday, February 12th, 2009 at The Baobab Tree Cafe in Historic Glenwood, Greensboro, NC for Poetic Relief / Words – The address is 1404 Glenwood Avenue (near the intersection of Grove Street) and not to far from Florida St.. The event will begin at 7pm and likely continue until about 9pm. The Words event will be preceded by a free vegetarian meal at The Hive 1214 Grove Street presented by Food Not Bombs.

The event is hosted by the founder of functicafe.com, the artist and thinker known as Anton Bell.

Anton Bell is a contributing editor of sparechangenews.com. He is currently a resident at The Hive, with the WE! (Winter Emergency) program. Overcoming many difficulties, Anton approached Liz Conrad of The Baobab Tree Cafe and convinced her to let it be the initial location for Poetic Relief / Words an event of Anton’s new events company, functicafe.com.

A website was promptly formed with a domain name (functicafe.com), and imbeded google map, administrative and public emails, an imbedde google events calendar, a wordpress blog (functicafe.wordpress.com) and all out of free resources that cost nothing to maintain.

The Baobab Tree Cafe is a multi-use facility. For sales of local crafts, cottage industry, and micro-enterprises, a place for events, and sometimes to stop in and have some food and beverage. Liz reported that the store had been largely closed and on odd hours as of late. But Anton’s interest in the place seems to have sparked it alive again. Now one sees a posting that hours will be kept again starting the day following the event. Look further and their are ambitious plans for food and drink on menues that could activated at that time. More information forthcoming.

Liz Conrad is a Greensboro native, and world traveler who has returned to Greensboro about 2 years ago from Africa. Liz reports that The Baobab Tree Cafe is more than a crafts and art gallery, but the holder of a vision for encouraging the community during these hard encomic times, using the same tactics that have helped in developing world; facilitating cottage industries, crafts, and microenterprises, and acting as a point for communication and commerce. More information can be found by calling her at 336-286-1174.

Paul Gydos of gydos.com (myself) has facilitated with some of the media aspects discussed above. Paul reports, “This is Anton’s inspiration and obviously it is contagious. I hope that many come and express themselves and share with the community. I also want to point out that my belief is that the event itself is a medium in an of itself. I see that Poetic Relief / Words as hosted by Anton Bell’s functicafe.com will be one of those types of event where it transcends being just entertainment or a party and becomes something that is more becoming and therefore is a medium and art in an of itself seperate from the mediums and art that are being showcased, in that the community will come alive around such a thing.”

Paul facilitated by doing the webwork and designing the flyers. Paul himself is a resident at The Hive. “I have twins on the way arriving in May. There really is some pressure to make something out of nothing. So although I can’t yet afford a residence, I went ahead and set up an office to help with my facilitation services, webpresence packages, and ecommerce. Since I am totally new to this, I more affordable than anyone else. I’m sure that I can help get my customer up and running on the internet in a way that gives them basic representation. I look forward to this time as I will be able to learn and test my skills and eventually become a full fledged web designer. Right now I can help you get a unique and effective domain name, basic website, with many useful features such as maps, calendars, blogs, listserves, and paypal. I am immediately expanding into ecommerce next and whatever the needs of my customers and my existing business will be is the priority.

Blog Spinoffs like crazy!!!! ‘Niche-ify’ ‘Niche-ify’

I started yet another wordpress blog in an effort to further ‘niche-ify’ my work.  So much of what I wanted to post about in postalheaven.wordpress.com and then sparechangenews.com was technical stuff about computers and as of late that is specifically studies about Linux.  So the name is a tribute to my wife who came up with the term I was looking for for a miniscule linux operating system – minilini.wordpress.com.  Minilini.wordpress.com will not only be about small linux operating systems and their hardware friends tiny pcs (there will also be www.tinypcnews.com launching in a short time) but about all my experiences trying to work with Linux.

Talking about my wife, she has spunoff preborn.wordpress.com  from noblevine.net at my suggestion for her Pro-Life work specifically, in an effort to further ‘niche-ify’ her work.

My WordPress dashboard will never be the same again.

Video of Paul Gydos at Food Not Bombs farewell at St. Mary’s House – Greensboro

The link is:

You have to sign in to your facebook account to access this.

http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=24115427988&refurl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.facebook.com%2Fs.php%3Fref%3Dsearch%26init%3Dq%26q%3Djordan%2Bgreen#/video/video.php?v=25007022502&oid=24115427988

The Magi Center – A Socially Oriented Small Business Launchpad

Proposal for: THE MAGI CENTER LLC

A Community Oriented Private Enterprise (COPE) which has in its mission to manage a small business launchpad in Downtown Greensboro.

We hope to share our intention with our potential landlord, Mr. A.B. and Ms. Lillian Rauch, then gather letters of intent from hopeful and existing small business owners who may want to locate there. In order that these letters of intent may be taken seriously by our potential host, we plan to take an administrative filing fee for each of them proportional to the amount of space the potential candidate business is hoping to occupy.

The organization will hope to lease the building as early as September 1st, 2008 with an option to buy the building as soon as it is available.

Location:

121 S. Elm St.
Greensboro, NC 27401 is the proposed available location

Potential location for Magi Center

FREE VERSION OF THE STORY

http://www.auburn.edu/~vestmon/Gift_of_the_Magi.html

MUSIC

Squirrel Nut Zippers has an album called Christmas Carivan

you can find the discography at

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christmas_Caravan

Track 8 is called “The Gift of the Magi”

ORGANIZATIONS WITH A SIMILAR NAME WHICH MIGHT BE RELEVANT

Susan Zuidema, Director
Giving@TheMagiGifts.com
Phone: 616-878-9900
Fax: 616-878-9921

Office Address:
2470 Byron Station SW
Byron Center, MI 49315

Mailing address:
P.O. Box 43
Byron Center, MI 49315

http://www.themagigifts.org

Recipient Qualification Application

Click to access MagiRecipientQualificationApplication.pdf

Opinion – the upper middle class doesn’t see it.

Asking customers and acquaintances if they were seeing the slowdown in the economy affecting them, I’ve gotten an almost universal response of no.

So when will they realize that the global billionaires aren’t going to include them either (the millionaires and the middle class)?

Probably when they can’t get any food either. Then they will have to leave their houses and fancy jobs to head wherever there might be food.

Of course, right now the middle class doesn’t see it. In that way, the impoverished are advantaged, because they are already used to being pushed around and marginalized and controlled by food supplies, etc.

Just my opinion.

International Network of Street Papers www.street-papers.org

While doing research I found INSP
The International Network of Street Papers
88 papers in 37 countries and 6 continents
reaching 32 million readers worldwide

They just finished having a conference in Glasgow, Scottland.

They receive support from Reuters and Inter Press Service.

Their website is really impressive and has huge resources available to sparechangenews.com.

They have a published guide to setting up a Street Paper and offer advice, support, and funding solutions.

They call for a Poverty Day Campaign on October 17th

They also have a Street News Service to help publications like us share content

Check it all out at http://www.street-papers.org

Hotdish & Hope (on Greene Street)

Prayer & worship – Free hot dinner
Unlimited hope for those in need

Tuesdays starting July 8 6pm

Mullin Life Center at First Presbyterian

700 block N. Greene St.
downtown Greensboro

A family- friendly ministry for people in need, where all who participate will give and receive

Sponsoring congregations:
First Presbyterian
New Creation Community
Anderson Grove
Baptist, Holy Trinity Episcopal

Special Event at Homeless Hospitality House

Upcoming Events:
Homeless Hospitality House Cookout

Aug. 2, 2008
3:00 pm — 6:00 pm

The BCC Homeless Hospitality House will be hosting its Annual Spring Cookout in partnership with Refuge Temple in Burlington. Come by the house, at 437 Arlington St., for great food and community as we celebrate the full dignity and humanity of our homeless neighbors.

Contact Terry Speed at 336-230-0001 for more information