(no subject)

Good morning everyone, and welcome to Radio Free Monday!

Ways to Give:

theformofstars is trying to raise funds to get out of a bad home situation and to compensate for a bank error that's seriously screwing up their savings. You can read more and find out how to help here.

notreallyfallen is in a shaky financial situation and is offering fic, art, and tarot readings as well as accepting donations. You can read more about what's on offer and why here.

Rhona linked to a post by Kshandra, who is raising money to help with upcoming bills for medical treatment. She's asking for Donations In Kind -- salable goods (including services) that people can offer in return for donations to help with the bills.

iamshadow linked to a fundraiser for Mini Pop, a ten-year-old who was recently hospitalized for ulcerative colitis. Her parents are having to miss work and facing a lot of prescription drug costs in the future, and are trying to raise money for transit to and from the hospital and other expenses.

momijizukamori is looking for advice on jobfinding and homefinding in Seattle, WA in the near future, as well as on grad school and student loans. You can read their post and leave advice here.

madripoor_rose linked to a plot for a cash mob to help keep mind's Eye Yarn in Boston in business.

minkrose linked to a kickstarter for the Brattle Theatre, a Boston theatre group that is seven thousand dollars away from their goal with three days to go. Help them get new HVAC and digital projection!

knitchick1979 is running with Team GEEK in the Relay For Life to support the American Cancer Society. They're trying to raise five thousand dollars for a great cause. You can find more info here, or at the comment they left last week on the free for all.

fiveforsilver let me know that the Main Building of the Pratt Institute burned down last week. No deaths or major injuries, but all senior painting studios and BFA panting thesis work was destroyed, which is horrible. They're asking for donations here to help get the department back on its feet.

tealin let me know that the Independent Shakespeare Company, a fantastic theatre group in SoCal, is raising money to produce a CD of the musical they produced last fall. You can hear sample songs here and read about the story the musical is based on here.

Help For Free:

Charlie, taffimai's rescue dog, is in the running for Petfinder's Luckiest Pet of 2013 contest. If he wins, his rescue shelter gets $5K and Charlie gets a $500 Petco giftcard. You can vote daily here. (Charlie's adorable face is kind of low down on the page, so make sure you scroll down -- I know it looks like the contest front page but it's not.)

News To Know:

Ailelie let me know that her kickstarter, which I linked to a while back for Plunge Magazine, was successful, and the first issue of the ezine is now out!

ribby has an informative comment here about Zazzle's new TOS, which are fairly restrictive when it comes to finances and may screw you if you don't know it happened.

charloween linked to a fantastic article about a professor who is working to formally discredit Seduction of the Innocent, one of the first contemporary documents to use fearmongering and baseless "science" to accuse popular media (comic books, in this case) of corrupting the culture's youth.

Just For Fun

sanura linked to a Guardian article calling for people to suggest great speculative/scifi self-published books. Seemed like something y'all might be interested in. :)

sibylle is an amateur photographer who runs challenges from time to time where people can tell her concepts or things they want to see photos of. One such has just opened up, and she'd love it if you stopped by and gave her some requests/challenges that you'd like to see turned into photographs. You can read more about it and post your requests at her blog!

And this has been Radio Free Monday! Thank you for your time. You can always post items for my attention in comments here (or on any post) or email me at copperbadge at gmail dot com. If you're not sure how to proceed, here is a little more about what I do and how you can help (or ask for help!).

(no subject)

I don't want to jinx it or anything, but it is eerily quiet here this morning. I haven't had a new email in my work inbox since 8:30. I have finished my Monday web news reading in record time. I spent the first three hours of my day applying to jobs.

I'm kind of worried I'm forgetting some major project I'm working on but nope, not that I can tell. It's just that quiet.

Something is bound to go wrong soon.

In the meantime, I realised that I haven't actually told you all about my nose and the exciting adventures I am going on with it. My nose and I, we're exploring the world together. The world...of minor surgical procedures.

I have had fairly intense headaches since I was an undergraduate, but at the time they did a CAT scan of my brain and came up with no aberrations (yes yes, X-Rays of my head showed nothing.) A few years ago I realised that they were sinus headaches when I discovered that Sudafed -- the real stuff, the stuff they make meth from -- helps me greatly if I take it when I feel the first twinges of a headache coming on. But Sudafed is not, I feel, a long-term solution to this problem.

I have declared 2013 the year of Gettin' Shit Done, so I found a nose/sinus/sleep center in Chicago, made an appointment, and spoke to a very nice doctor about how my sinuses are all effed up.

He did a scan of my head and sure enough, "all effed up" was a pretty accurate diagnosis. I have very narrow sinus passages, which swell shut when the pressure changes and cause headaches. My body is feeble, you guys, it's a miracle I'm alive at all.

Anyway, he described a procedure called a Balloon Nasalplasty, where they put a small inflatable device way the hell up my nose and stretch out my sinus passages with it. I haven't even had the procedure yet and already it's exactly as charming as it sounds.

I've never had someone say to me "You will need to tell us if the wire touches your eyeball" before.

Apparently it's a very minor procedure, however, no bruising and very little pain or blood, and I should be back at work the next day. So in a few weeks I'm going to get a balloon shoved up my nose.

I plan on having cupcakes afterward.