Archive - Feb 2011
February 18th
The Ice Cream Community Reinvestment Foundation
Submitted by Aldon Hynes on Fri, 02/18/2011 - 06:54It started off a bit strange. I was at a some sort of business conference with a friend. He was trying to buy a portfolio of mortgages. He worked the crowd trying to find the seller and the information he needed. Finally, he found it and passed it off to me. It was in a spreadsheet on a thumbdrive. Years ago, I used to look at spreadsheets like this, so I plugged the thumbdrive into my laptop and started analyzing the mortgages.
Most of them looked pretty straight forward, but, as is often the case, and I suspect even more frequently these days, there were some 'underperforming mortgages', that is mortgages behind in payments and likely to default.
I looked a little more closely. These were mortgages of people and businesses in my community. It was then that the idea struck me. We should sell these mortgages to a local ice cream shop. They would use some of the profits from ice cream sales to pay down and retire the under performing mortgages. Since they would be the mortgage holders, it would help out with their investments as well. Sort of like Kiva meets Newman's Own at Ashley's Ice Cream shop.
It all made perfect sense. Now, all I needed to do was to speak with a few friends from a previous life of mine as a technologist working with mortgages on Wall Street with some of my new friends working at community health centers. The idea would be a little bit outside of the core competencies of each group of friends, but together they cut put together a good team of people to make this happen.
Then, the cat jumped on the bed. I rolled over and saw that it was 5:17 AM. It was warm under the covers, but I knew I needed to get up and take care of the animals. Nonetheless, the idea from the dream stuck with me. Could we create an Ice Cream Community Reinvestment Foundation? I figured the best approach would be to write down the dream and send an email to some friends for their thoughts. If the idea does manage to stand up on its own, it is likely to change shape a bit, but that is where my friends can help out the most. What doe you think? Can ice cream help solve the mortgage crisis?
February 17th
Random Notes
Submitted by Aldon Hynes on Thu, 02/17/2011 - 20:57So, recently, I received an invitation to Diaspora. I have logged in and looked around. It looks a bit better than the early version I had run on one of my servers, but it is still pretty primative. I have a few invitations and a friend is writing about it, so I gave her an invitation.
I also logged into Jumo a while ago. On Quora, I asked if anyone is doing anything interesting with Jumo and got no response. I haven't been back there very often.
NACHC has set their own social networking site, Health Center Voice. It actually has a little stickiness, with various tasks to do to promote health centers, and badges and points you can win. Pretty nice.
I received a book that I've been asked to review, a medical thriller. Sounds interesting, but I don't really have the time, so I want to load it on my wife's Nook. Unfortunately, it was sent as a word document and not as an epub book. So, I've been playing with Calibre to convert documents to epub format. It looks like it has worked and I've loaded the book on my Nokia N900. I'll load it on my wife's Nook later.
Had an interesting day learning more about electronic medical records. Lot's to write on that when I have time.
More later...
February 16th
Wordless Wednesday
Submitted by Aldon Hynes on Wed, 02/16/2011 - 07:37
February 15th
Party With A Purpose
Submitted by Aldon Hynes on Tue, 02/15/2011 - 20:38Monday evening, I went to a birthday party for Mark Masselli and Jennifer Alexander. Mark is the president and CEO of Community Health Center, Inc, where I work, and his wife Jennifer is a co-founder of Kid City in Middletown. They billed the event as their 105th birthday party, combining the age of the two of them.
The event took place at Eli Cannon’s in Middletown and was well attended by friends from work, various political figures that I knew and numerous other people whom I didn’t know or whom I was meeting for the first time.
In many ways, it was not really all that different from so many big birthday parties that I’ve attended. However, there was one thing in particular that set the event apart. Not only did they encourage attendees to donate to local non-profit organizations, but they pledge to match the gifts with a donation of their own to a local non-profit.
One of the nonprofits that benefited from this is Oddfellows Playhouse which lost 36 years worth of props and costumes when the building they were stored in collapsed earlier this year.
Another nonprofit benefitting from the support is The Buttonwood Tree. This is the music venue where I went to see Harpeth Rising during their Connecticut tour.
All in all, it was a great event, and hopefully others will be inspired to have similar parties with a purpose.
February 14th
Music Monday - Jeanne Kuhns and Lost Mothra
Submitted by Aldon Hynes on Mon, 02/14/2011 - 06:23A week ago, I didn’t write a Music Monday post. I had stayed up to watch some of the Super Bowl and didn’t have the energy to put together a reasonable Music Monday post afterward. If I had of really been on my game, I would have used it as an opportunity to highlight a musician from Wisconsin. Oh well, I’ll just have to do it today.
As part of the Orient Lodge Music review, I receive submissions from musicians across the country via Sonicbids and one that has jumped out at me is Jeanne Kuhns and Lost Mothra.
Besides being a singer/songwriter, she is also a painter. I don’t know if she is a football fan. However, she appears to be a key player in a growing musical arts community in Wisconsin, organizing the Woodwalk Concert Series. Her bio says she is influenced by “Joni Mitchell, Bonnie Raitt, James Taylor, Eric Clapton, Arethra Franklin” as well as emerging indie artists. It is a great list of musicians to be influenced by, and you can hear some of the influence in her music.
There is something sad, yet empowering about her music; a beautiful melancholiness. It echoes the hard parts of life where hope still manages to sneak in.
As always, let me end it with a video of her performing. This video is from a performance at The Attic Books and Coffee, a “ a safe, welcoming, socially aware environment with exquisitely prepared espresso and tea beverages, high quality used books, and unique music.” It seems like a great venue for some great music.
