Out to dry
Published 6:31 pm Monday, November 24, 2008
Nice clothes don’t do much good if they have spent the night in a puddle.
Once or twice a week, Audrey Navrides fills her car at Corry’s Dry Cleaners on Mercer Island with clothing donations for Dressed for Success, a YWCA program that provides low-income women with business attire for work.
Women who are trying to help themselves by getting jobs get a huge boost of confidence from being able to look professional when they show up for an interview. But many of them, says Navrides, don’t have cars or homes - which means showing up for that interview soaking wet can be a problem.
So now, Navrides, who coordinates the Mercer Island pickup, is asking for umbrellas.
“We have handbags, accessories and everything - but the one thing people never think of is umbrellas,” Navrides says.
As Corry’s already has its hands full with clothing donations, Navrides has designated Club Emerald as the drop-off point for umbrellas. You can leave your donations at the desk at Club Emerald, and help a lady make a clean getaway from the street.
It takes two
Jim Miller, CEO of Mercer Island’s Afiniti Ventures, didn’t feel like his loyalty was being very well rewarded.
For years he has been loyal to merchants, only to earn airline miles the carriers make it difficult to use. He has also been devoted to his wife and family, but saw few rewards for that loyalty outside of the home.
“The toughest job we have in life is being a good parent and good spouse,” Miller said. “As a business person I know what my loyalty is worth.”
Combining the two concepts, Miller created uTango, a program that lets married couples rack up “Tango bucks” when they shop — actual cash payouts dispensed after 10, 20 or 30 years of marriage that are substantial enough to help pay down debt, send a kid to college or boost a retirement account.
Singles can join to start accruing points before they are married; once they’ve been settled down for a while, the program pledges payouts of up to $1 million. The more than 200 merchants who have signed on are the places most of us are shopping every day anyway.
Miller can’t promise that uTango will be around in 30 years — but with no membership fees or catches to the program, he says there’s nothing to lose.
On the Net: www.uTango.com.
Livering large
For more than a decade, Lee Blum has been functioning successfully with another person’s liver. And although you can’t see it working inside his body, the fact that you can see him outside working his body is a testment to the UW organ transplant program that saved his life 16 years ago.
The 62-year-old Islander was one of nearly 14,000 athletes to participate in the Seattle Marathon last Sunday, joining the UW Medical Center’s Team Transplant to promote organ donor awareness by showing that transplant recipients can and do live active, healthy lives.
“It was a real challenge,” said Blum, who completed the 13-mile half marathon. “But what better way to spend a Sunday afternoon?”
It’s because of his donated liver and encouragement from his doctors to stay in shape, he says, that he has these Sunday afternoons to enjoy.
