[superj]

You guys do that kind of stuff? I know we have mentioned toys for tots a few times and visiting retirement homes and such but I was just wondering if where you work promotes that kind of stuff and what you think about it.

I work for the army as a civilian. I actually am deployable though and have a full bird colonel as a commander. I took the army officer's enlistment oath at my last promotion with the right hand raised , just like when I swore in to the army ( but back then, i was enlisted) the first time so my job is a little different then most people's.

Anyways, the army is very supportive of Christmas charities and a pretty fair amount of charities, in general.
(Excuse my typing. When on my iPhone or iPod, the words stop showing up and I am just typing away Ina blank screen so I cannot tell if there are any errors)
So we do lots of donating to things and have lots of groups come talk to the employees where I work. Today was the final day on our toys for tots drive and when I was dropping the toys off down at the hanger, seeing the amount of toys lined up makes you think about the amount of kids that will actually have a good Christmas for the little amount of money you actually give, per person. I think the average donation from my shop was 20 bucks. After I was done hitting everyone up for two weeks, I was able to raise 1k bucks to buy toys, which was a fair amount to me. Normally we buy bikes but this year we got the 0-3 year old age group assigned to our directorate so bikes wouldnt be appropriate. I also found out we normally raise about 2500 bucks and this year people were worried about the "fiscal cliff" and weren't donating. Hmm, odd to me.

Anyways, I snapped some pics of the toys all laid out.

You guys do the actual collecting and passing out for anything like this? I have done the collecting and the donating but never been on the handing out to the families end of the program. I think it would be fun to see the kids faces light up when they opened the door and the marine corps sergeant gave them the gifts in his dress blues, if they even do it that way. I know the staff sergeant that picked them up was in his dress blues.



That's a lot of toys, and I dropped off our toys early. Only a few other shops had dropped theirs off prior to us. It ended up taking two cattle trucks and five of those new funky looking 5 tons with trailer to haul the whole load away at the end of the day. It makes me glad to be army to see all that stuff donated from people's hearts and checks. That they can give away so freely with the holidays makes me think our country is not in as bad a shape as we are always told it is

[rola643]

We did things like that when I was in as well. Never anything of that magnitude though! I think federal employees are afforded a bit more time and lenancy to be able to do things like that

[John_V]

Up until recently, the Fire Departments in my area would have crews standing on busy street corners collecting for Toys for Tots, as they do for Jerry's Kids. I remember doing this every year for both events. This practice was halted about two years ago because the city council and county commissioners both passed a ban on homeless people panhandling on street corners and to be fair, it had to include the FD as well. They say they did it to protect the panhandlers from getting hit by traffic, but the real reason was the complaints from motorist who were annoyed by them asking for money. The FDs have taken a different approach to charity collecting, but unfortunately, it isn't as affective and often brings in less money.

[superj]

dang, that sucks. the FD still do the drives here on the corner and cristina and the kids love when they do it. they put money in all the time when those guys are out doing that.


you are right rola, we are given lots of extra time to do this where i think most non-gov businesses cannot do it because it cuts out of the profits.

i got some more pics emailed to me. turns out it was three of those funky new trucks and one HWMMV, plus the two stake bed fords.


full of bikes


full of toys


full of toys


full of toys

[Industry_Hack]

We have an Angel Tree at work, and we are taking care of four families this year. But that's the extent of my holiday season participation. I try to spread my goodwill out throughout the year, not just when everyone else does.

[superj]

That's good. We do some Cfc donations each year that cover a fair amount of groups. The wife and I do, I don't know about everyone else at work, lots don't donate to that but the cfc is the one where you can really help.

I don't give money to lazy ass pan handlers and homeless vagrants though. If they can stand and lie to people in the parking lot about needing a bus ticket somewhere, they can get a dang job

[superj]

I like the loan deal we do with the site, I will and some money that way in January too. That seems to be a good way to help too

[Industry_Hack]

Originally Posted by superj

I like the loan deal we do with the site, I will and some money that way in January too. That seems to be a good way to help too

That was just a random act of kindness, since I got several upgrades at one time. I've seen so much unkind behavior lately, I feel compelled to try and counteract that. It's my very own "What would Buddha do"?

[kneedrachen]

I was POC for our TFT drive, USMC is here picking up today. 10 boxes, 2 bikes, about a dozen large Amazon style boxes as well.

Worked on a working military dogs drive was well, since they seem to be forgotten heroes, had amazing generosity from this site.


We do alot for kids in hospitals, due to personal reasons. The monthly deductions, etc.

I'm REALLY trying to get something going for either CHoP or Hopkins; a motorcycle event would be easier for CHoP, bicycle or motorcycle would be good for Hopkins.

It's a matter of networking and time, you know? I'll get there.

[superj]

cool.

put it up with enough lead time and i can see if "the steady ones", the group here wants to head up. your in central texas, right? these guys do all kinds of rides and have a pretty large group. (large, to me. corpus is small so maybe not large to people from large towns)