I volunteer at a School for Kids who Can't read good and who also want to learn how to do other stuff.
I try to be generous with my money, time and skills when I can but I am not sure what would be the most generous thing I'm done. I can tell you the most generous thing done for me was a friend of mine's family taking me to the 1986 Western Conference finals game 4!
The other day I was at the outlets on 290, I had some coupons for the Nike factory store and I was looking forward to getting some new gear. Didn't find anything I liked so I walked over to the checkout line and handed the coupons to the last three people in line. Now that probably wasn't the most generous thing I've done, but the appreciative responses I received from those people really made my day.
We give money every year to the church and to charities. But recently we decided to anonymously buy lunch for two police officers that were eating at Fogo de Chao. The hostess and manager didn't really know how to handle it when we were trying to give them $100 to pay for their lunch and tip. It wasn't a lot of money in the scheme of things but it felt good to give at random and that maybe we made those guys' day a little better.
I gave 3+ months of free dental service to the homeless in Boston. 5 days a week, 8 hours a day. Probably close to $100,000 worth of service.
Oh yeah, tell us more about this. Did you have your own clinic at the time or some sort of dentist job that brought you regular income that you left to help these people? And how did you arrive at the valuation of $100k. Incredibly generous human, please share with us the calculations of your generosity.
Years ago I was driving home from Raleigh (about 100 miles from home) with a mixed group of friends. It was late at night-- about 3 A.M. Still in Raleigh, I noticed a car by the side of the highway, on the other side of the highway, blinking its headlights. It caught my attention. I had to drive about a mile up ahead to find an exit to turn around. Got to the car and expected to find an elderly person. Instead it was a young college girl who had run out of gas. Turns out that she had been stranded for six hours and no one had stopped to help her. This was in the early 90s before the advent of cell phones and debit cards. I had only $5 in my wallet and bought her that much gas. Luckily she had money to get more gas on her own. She was very grateful. She had been heading home to visit her parents. Imagine their worry!
As an ex hitchhiker, I pickup hitchhikers. (yes, I scrutinize more now) The one that sticks out the most is picking up a young family of Mexicans. Why I remember this one is because my cuz, who is half Japanese and half Mexican, was adamant about me NOT picking this family up, which left me scratching my head...I mean, we battled for a couple of miles before I just said, "f*** it, I'm going back, and cuz, you're diffenantly more Japanese than Mexican". Silly cuz. Anyway, I picked them up between Houston and Dallas (I45) and drove them to Victoria (I was heading for El Campo). Sometimes it doesn't matter to what degree your assistance offers, it just the look on their faces when the deed is done that gets me every time. Well worth the extra mileage.
Bought my in-laws a house. We buy christmas toys and clothes and stuff for needy kids and elderly every year and give to various charities. My wife is more actively generous than I am, but I can be spontaneously very generous.
I've done the Thanksgiving day food delivery to the elderly a few times, outside of that I'm pretty much a heartless SOB....
I once told a homeless man he would look good in a beard. That homeless man's name? Chuck Norris. Also, I saw a guy on the street lifting a heavy box with his back and arms once, so I told him he needed to lift more with his legs. I'd like to think that I saved his life that crisp December morning.
I volunteered my time after dental school. I came up with the 100K because its easy to evaluate the production of a dental practice based on types of procedures and procedure per day. I did between 30-35K per month...which actually isnt much relative to a regular dental practice. The reason being because we didnt do root canals or crowns at that clinic. Only extractions, fillings, and dentures. http://www.bhchp.org/ And for this reason, I got a national award...I can post a pic if you'd like. Thanks for playing.
