At least the envelope is…
So there you go. I’m not sure if I’ll receive anymore than that, but hopefully, I’ll get a picture of the cow later. But I doubt it.
The Cow is Here
8
Category Archives: World
I am now the proud owner of a cow
Rather, WE (me and you, my readership) are the owners of a cow. I apologize for the delay. It took about a week to process some of the payments on PayPal for some reason. As more details arrive, I’ll share them, but I wanted to make sure that you all knew that I’ve gone forward and bought the cow. Now if I could just get the milk for free…
Payment Method: CREDIT
The following summarizes your order:
| Name | Description | Quantity | Price | Total |
| Heifer | Give an Udderly Original Gift Heifer: Full Heifer |
1 | $500.00 | $500.00 |
Total: $500.00
ID: 75592991
Thanks again to all of you that donated. You guys are awesome. It’s only 3 1/2 long months until I can eat red meat again. Man, this is going to suck.
The Red Meat Report
I did it.
Rather, WE did it.
The idea originally came from a fast that Alli and I have been doing. Where the idea came from doesn’t matter anymore. What matters is that – thanks to a last-minute donation by Alli Arnold Art – as of midnight last night, I have the money needed to purchase a dairy cow from Heifer International.
I’ve bent the rules a little to allow for some mailed donations to come in, but I know they are coming so we’ll just consider them donated.
I’m so excited that I accomplished my goal. HOWEVER, since I achieved the goal by midnight on January 31, I’m going to give up red meat until Memorial Day.
This is going to suck.
Then again, yesterday Brian D directed me to this article in the New York Times, which gives examples of how meat consumption is similar to that of the excessive SUV driving that we do in the United States. Consider this:
an estimated 30 percent of the earth’s ice-free land is directly or indirectly involved in livestock production, according to the United Nation’s Food and Agriculture Organization, which also estimates that livestock production generates nearly a fifth of the world’s greenhouse gases — more than transportation. [This figure led a University of Chicago professor of geophysics to calculate] that if Americans were to reduce meat consumption by just 20 percent it would be as if we all switched from a standard sedan — a Camry, say — to the ultra-efficient Prius.
Not only that, but since most cattle are “grown” rather than “raised” (the distinction being that normal cattle graze on grass and industrial cattle are fed grain, which is far more abundant than grass and since cattle aren’t built to digest grain), they have health problems and have to be given antibiotics to stay alive. That’s one thing that I like about Chipotle — their Food with Integrity program which means that they buy only meat that has been raised humanely without antibiotics.
I love red meat. I love cheeseburgers and steaks. But if this means that I’ll be reducing my consumption by 20 percent for the year, so be it.
There are a lot of people who helped me get to the $500 goal:
- Chimpotle was the first one to jump on board and donate.
- My family came through and donated over $200
- KC Bloggers Average Jane, KC Sponge and Meesha all donated.
- Thanks to my friends Laura and Brian D for donating
- Thanks to Tony for mentioning me on 980 and his blog
- Thanks to Alli for all the support and the last-minute donation to get me to my goal
I’ll be purchasing the cow later today and I’ll keep you updated. I will be happy to be out of fund-raising mode and return back to regularly scheduled discussions like last night’s Lost episode and some other randomness.
January’s Almost Over
The month of my red meat fast is almost over and I’ve raised about $200 of the $500 needed to purchase a dairy cow from Heifer International. Many thanks to those of you who have contributed thus far. I’ve also received another $100-150 in pledges so we’re theoretically over halfway there.
So here’s my end-of-the-month push to close the deal:
If I can raise enough money for the cow before the end of this month (midnight tomorrow night – it has to be deposited into my PayPal account)…
I will remain red-meat-free until Memorial Day.
Believe me when I tell you that this is no small task. I’m really starting to crave a burger and our church’s chili cookoff is in February. To abstain from eating red meat until the end of May is not something I look forward to, but if that’s what it takes to inspire the blogosphere to contribute, I’m willing to do it.
Consider that my gauntlet being thrown down. Click the image below to donate.
Don’t Call it a Recession
So the Fed cut interest rates yesterday. I won’t pretend to understand the inner workings of the economy, but here’s what bugs me:
Everyone keeps talking about it.
I’m convinced that the more that people say things like “we’re headed toward a recession” or even just ask the question “are we headed to the recession?” that we move closer and closer to it. It becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.
I’d like to give the American Public the benefit of the doubt, but the pundits in the media are being pretty irresponsible in the way that they throw around the word “recession.” The public tends to listen pretty intently to the media (even though they really don’t have any reason to trust them).
There’s no doubt that the crash of the sub-prime mortgage market has had an effect on the economy, but there’s fiscal irresponsibility going on all across the US. I was listening to some woman talk the other day about how she’d racked up thousands of dollars in credit card debt BUYING CHRISTMAS GIFTS.
Here’s my free tip for the day:
Don’t charge Christmas gifts. If you don’t have the money, don’t spend it. I didn’t realize that it needed to be said, but people use credit cards way to liberally. As great as they can be, they aren’t YOUR money. You have to pay it back. I’m not saying credit cards have no place. But, if you have outstanding debt already, you might want to think about paying it off before you rush to get more plastic.
Maybe I’m crazy. I thought this information was common sense.
China to KC Express
I don’t think I officially announced this last week…I bought a MacBook. I didn’t go hardcore and get the Air…I just couldn’t justify what I would lose (optical drive, removable battery, ports) to the price and portability. The difference between the MacBook and the MacBook Air is 2 pounds. If I can’t carry that extra 2 pounds I should reconsider everything.
My laptop arrived today.
I’m so excited that I can’t even see straight. The importance of me having a laptop for work just went down considerably. Now I have a portable APPLE laptop that I LOVE.
The impressive thing about the whole situation is that I got the notification that it shipped late Friday night. It departed from Shanghai, so I didn’t expect to see it until Wednesday or later (scheduled delivery was 1/23). I tracked it all weekend (ask anyone…I have the tracking number memorized). I saw that it was in KC this morning and I thought I would at least get it by tomorrow since it might need to be sorted.
God Bless FedEx – it was sorted and out for delivery by 6 AM, delivered to my house by 10:00 this morning. That’s an impressive delivery time from China (via Anchorage), especially considering that all FedEx packages are routed through Memphis. My laptop flew overhead to Memphis before making its way to my house.
I still can’t believe that it is here already. I can’t wait to go home and hug it.
Respect
Buy a Cow with me
Many thanks to the link and radio mention from Tony this morning.
I thought I’d give a little update on how we’re doing so far on the Buy a Cow project.
We are 30% of the way there!
In the comments, Chimpotle posed the question:
What if you don’t get enough money? Will you get the llama instead?
To answer the question publicly: No. The principle of the project started with a cow and I’m hoping for it to end with a cow. So either I will abstain from eating red meat as long as it takes to raise the money for 1 dairy cow or I’ll find a corporate sponsor or something like that to make up the rest of the money. I want to buy at least one cow. It would be awesome if we can buy more than one. To donate, click below:
Also, if you’d like to put a badge on your blog, go to this post for instructions.
Red Meat Update
On the first of January, I posed a challenge to myself and my little corner of the blogosphere. I vowed to stop eating meat for the entire month of January, and in return, I was going to attempt to raise enough money to purchase a dairy cow from Heifer International.
I’m kicking in the first $50 and I’ve received some verbal commitments from a few different people. Many thanks to each of you.
I’m holding up my end of the bargain. It hasn’t been easy, but I’ve steered clear of cheeseburgers, steaks, beef stews…anything with red meat. Even my precious steak burrito bol from Chipotle has become a chicken burrito bol.
I got a suggestion from meesha.v over at Kansas City with the Russian Accent to come up with some banners so people could put them on their sites. Ask and ye shall receive. They aren’t terribly creative, but I’ve got one for black backgrounds and one for white backgrounds.
If you’d like to put either of these banners on your blog, here’s your code to copy and paste:
For the black one:
<a href="http://topfivedesign.com/shane/2008/01/01/red-meat-reduction/" title="Help Shane buy a cow for Heifer International as he steers clear of red meat in January"><img src="http://topfivedesign.com/shane/wp-content/uploads/heifer-banner.gif" alt="Heifer International - Ending Hunger. Caring for the Earth." style="border:none;" /></a>
For the white one:
<a href="http://topfivedesign.com/shane/2008/01/01/red-meat-reduction/" title="Help Shane buy a cow for Heifer International as he steers clear of red meat in January"><img src="http://topfivedesign.com/shane/wp-content/uploads/heifer-banner-white.gif" alt="Heifer International - Ending Hunger. Caring for the Earth." style="border:none;" /></a>
So spread the news around the blogosphere. I’m trying to collect enough to purchase a dairy cow through PayPal, but if you’d like to purchase part of a cow yourself through the Heifer International website, feel free. If you’d like to donate $5, $10…whatever amount, I’m trying to collect smaller donations that Heifer can’t take through their site. To make a donation, click below: