Alive

Sunday, March 30, 2014

Effective Fundraising for Nonprofits

Idealist
Make a difference day
Network for good
Taproot Foundation
Volunteer Match
Guidestar
Taxes Nonprofit Corporation Earnings
What are rules for nonprofit? How Girl Scouts can sell cookies once a year.

Other fundraising
Car wash
Bake sale
C & H Bake Sale

Saturday, March 29, 2014

Science of Everything

Coriolis effect
Gyroscope
Wardenclyffe Tower

Today I spoke to a mathematician who worked on Nonlinear optics

Good story until the kids are ready for 'The Umbrella Man' by Roald Dahl
Growing up I was more fascinated with my 'duckback' raincoat than umbrella. While watches and umbrellas are a statement opportunity for kids, this book is an Alice in the reverse story in the sense that the little girl here gets to navigate different situations with the help of her yellow umbrella.
This book reminded me of 'Sora and the Cloud'. In the genre of kid getting imaginative with a prop, using the umbrella as a parachute and then as a float makes you wish for that magic wand which is panacea.
The simple illustrations with broad span of same colours have a soothing effect.

1/10/15

PS: Duck is a kind of tightly woven canvas.

Silver People: Voices from the Panama Canal

After reading few pages, you understand the title.
I havent read much about Panama canal. So I grabbed this opportunity to know some of it. If it comes in poetry form. Even better.
This book Silver people: Voices from the Canal is a mix of historical fiction like Exiled: Memoirs of a Camel and multi-voiced liked Parched by Crowder. Only there are many more voices. In the jungle, its never quite. With all the diverse animals, you get to hear from all the trees and fauna.
The main characters Mateo, Anita were fleshed out very well. The book shows the travesties of the canal project and puts the people who worked for it, on the map of history.
A century after the bridge opened is a good time to commemorate all the people who contributed to it.
Panama Canal

Flight School

The illustrations of the book will floor you. The light shock wave kind of contours for the animals, with pencil marks has an absolute newness to it. The pages move through like a video. the zoom in and out and the top view of the school crew, once the penguin is in flight make you wonder if you are the one with the camera.
Now in the air
Now in the water, the book has a verve to it. Having just read Flamingo Sunset, its a nice continuation to have the flamingo as a teacher.
This book is a good opportunity for animal behavior discussions.

Friday, March 28, 2014

An Explorer's Notebook

Tim Flannery

Scaling Up Excellence

Two Pizza Rule
Peanut Butter Manifesto

Long time ago I remember reading about Intel's fabs being exactly the same everywhere. New to US, I found it puzzling that you could be anywhere in a brand store like say Target, it was all the same. But now I see the advantage of a known layout when you are in a hurry. When I came across the section about MRI being made fun for kids, I wondered if there was going to be old news. But that was it.
The books starts at this point, and then we come across so many organizations and so many tactics followed by them to keep the guzzling companies growing. You hear about some companies throwing away the need for vacation request and performance reviews, in the book you read about how the companies used those methods for better performance.

Talking about Broadcom's vacation policy, a colleague mentioned about the reserves needed to be held in books if accrued vacation was to be paid when an employee leaves the company.