Smart Spending

By Big Juicy

January 8, 2009 8:26 AM | Link to this

Several people have pitched in money, clothing, gas cards, etc. during tough times. Culture is literally changed one random act of kindness at a time…

By JJ

January 8, 2009 8:45 AM | Link to this

Once, I was in the drive-thru at Wendy’s and paid for the person’s meal in the car behind me.

I don’t know for sure if the Wendy’s guy pocketed the money, or what, but it made me feel good to do a random act of kindness for a total stranger.

By sd

January 8, 2009 8:45 AM | Link to this

Everyday when I read the paper, I am saddened. A little girl is killed by pitbulls, a bartender is executed, someone burns 10 businesses and churches in one night, a 32 year old father is killed in a crash, a mother and father rape and abuse their child, ect….

We better be showing kindness towards one another. Its the only thing we can do to combat the evil and depression that otherwise grips our realities.

If you believe in God, all you can ask of him is that he treats you how you treat others. Forgives you as your forgive others.

“Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.” Martin Luther King, Jr.

By Reign

January 8, 2009 8:56 AM | Link to this

About a month ago I was about to get in my car in the parking lot of a Kroger’s when I saw a woman struggling with a baby in one arm and some papers in another that she was on her way to discard in the trash. I saw her struggling and the baby was getting antsy, so I went to her and asked if I could throw the items away for her. She was so surprised and so appreciative. She said thanks and that no one has been that kind in a long time. It was a simple act of kindness that was extremely rewarding for both of us. It’s a wonderful feeling that I try to experience as much as I can by looking for ways to be kind as I go through my daily routine.

By clyde

January 8, 2009 8:58 AM | Link to this

I have learned from experience that you are better off just going about your day to day business and leave the acts of kindness on the shelf.There is a lot to the old saw that no good deed goes unpunished.

By G

January 8, 2009 9:18 AM | Link to this

I was at Waffle house eating breakfast with my god-daughter and her brother, and this couple - strangers from out of town - paid for our meal. It was amazing.

I plan to do something like that - does anyone have any suggestions on a random act of kindness? I would like to do something nice - but remain anonymous.

By sd

January 8, 2009 9:23 AM | Link to this

G,

Just look around anytime anywhere, there are plenty of people who need your help.

By Ed

January 8, 2009 9:35 AM | Link to this

It’s good to see that there are people doing nice things because if you listen or read the news in this crime infested city, all you hear about are killings, car jackings, robberies and home invasions. Try a HUGE act of kindness and elect someone as Mayor of Atlanta who isn’t in the corner oe the pocket of the thugs that have ruined this city. A real act of kindess, shoot a criminal thug.

By Tee

January 8, 2009 10:02 AM | Link to this

I walked up to a woman on a very cold day in December (last month), she was small in size and visibly very, very cold…she was sweeping the parking lot of a “pricey” mall in Sandy Springs - I introduced myself and gave her $20…she didn’t speak English that well, but I knew she was very appreciative…I realize that could have been food for her & her family that day and it made me feel good to know I helped someone possibly eat a hot meal. It was far less than what I spent on most Christmas presents, but was the “one” thing that I felt really represented the “reason for the season”…May you all find ways to be a blessing to someone else in 2009 - it doesn’t even require money, sometimes its your time that matters most too.

By atllady

January 8, 2009 10:23 AM | Link to this

Random acts of kindness helps us remember how precious humanity was created to be ~ unfortunately caution is necessary in today’s world. Everyone should use your God-given radar (instincts) to your advantage: f it doesn’t feel right or safe, don’t do it. Another chance will come up.

I have helped a woman push her car when everyone else was hooting at her for causing a traffic jam at 6am - two other women saw me pack my car on the side and ran out to help her and they did the same. Not one guy left his car to help us ladies. But we did it.

By Anna

January 8, 2009 10:26 AM | Link to this

One thing I like to do is very inexpensive and appreciated: whenever I go on GA 400, I give the toll booth worker a dollar and tell them to keep the change for the next car. Like I said, it’s not a big splashy thing, but you’d be surprised how even something that small can make a person’s day.. I know because someone did it for me first, and I was totally cheered up. In this case, it’s the thought, really.

By MountainDawg

January 8, 2009 10:35 AM | Link to this

Like ol’ Glen Campbell sang “Try A Little Kindness”! :)

By Granville

January 8, 2009 10:35 AM | Link to this

The AJC did a random act of kindness by for once providing a blog that is positive. I for one appreciate it.

By katherine

January 8, 2009 10:37 AM | Link to this

If you have friends who are out of work, mail them a Kroger or Walmart gift card - anonymously. I gave a relative money for Christmas - and she turned around, split it in half, and gave half each to friends who were having a harder time than she was. I think there are tons of things you can do to help people - there are kids who can’t go on school field trips - ask a school if you can sponsor someone else. Drop off a box of cards and a book of stamps to an elderly relative or neighbor. Hand a prepaid gas card to someone who has just gotten a job and not been paid yet. At the doctor’s office, pay the deductible for the person who comes in after you. Tell the head of your children’s youth league you would like to quietly sponsor some child whose parents aren’t doing as well as they did this time last year.

By Joe

January 8, 2009 11:09 AM | Link to this

GOD is alive and well in Atlanta. God told us that no act of kindness was to small, even giving a glass of water to a child.

By Serendipitous Stipend

January 8, 2009 11:30 AM | Link to this

Hey, isn’t this blog the same as the plot to that stupid movie that bombed, “Pay it Forward” with Kevin Spacey and Helen Hunt, who’s careers never recovered and didn’t it also have that insufferable “I see dead people” brat from that movie that Eleanor Ringel ruined for everyone by saying, “it’s got the surprise ending of the year”, so that I guessed the ending in the first ten minutes and I had to sit throught the worst torture in usher history?

Yeah, I’m gonna pay that forward alright. The butler did it. The chick is actually a vampire. The nazis lose the war. the good guy survives a barrage of machine gun bullets and kills 40 bad guys with a derringer. The nuns may act stupid but they know where the distributor cables are in a nazi truck. You dont solve a problem like Maria.

There, I’ve ruined every movie ever made, and now you can just watch south park reruns and stfu, morons.

Random act of moronia fulfilled.

bwa

By JL ATL

January 8, 2009 11:33 AM | Link to this

After all of these break-in’s and shootings, I’m done with acts of kindness.

I’d like to do an act that involves placing handcuffs or rounds in/on these scumbags roaming Atlanta.

By S

January 8, 2009 11:42 AM | Link to this

My husband is a firefighter and sometimes people pay the bill for him and his co-workers at a restaurant. It is uplifting and heart-warming for them to know they are appreciated.

By Sue

January 8, 2009 11:47 AM | Link to this

It can be as simple as helping a fellow shopper at Wal-Mart reach something on a high shelf!

By Mayretter local

January 8, 2009 11:49 AM | Link to this

if you can’t summon the act of kindness, maybe just be polite and smile at others around you. this isn’t NYC where you have to stare at the ground or thru people. just smile and say hello, or good morning.

By YUP

January 8, 2009 11:49 AM | Link to this

Random acts are the best gift you can give yourself and to others. Nothing in the world will make you feel better than to give, and usually the cost is nothing, but its meaning is priceless. giving blood is an awesome way to give of yourself and to save a life!

By chillax dude

January 8, 2009 11:53 AM | Link to this

Dear Serendipitous Stipend, it is more than obvious that you could use an act of kindness. I’m not being sarcastic either. Your cynacism is not that unusual in this day and time. You don’t believe in kindness because it doesn’t go on all the time. But one day someone will give you back the confidence that kindness can be given as well as rec’d. Don’t hold on to the hard attitude. It hurts you way more than it hurts others. And I won’t be angry if you blast me for this. I will still hold out the hope that you will find that kindness in yourself as well as others sometime soon.

By Ms D

January 8, 2009 11:56 AM | Link to this

Thank you AJC..this HAS been a very positive feel-good article. To those few who had the negative comments..maybe you should have stayed in bed or better yet go somewhere else and make better use of your time!

By reebok

January 8, 2009 12:02 PM | Link to this

Once or twice a week when I’m grabbing a cup of coffee on the way to work, I give the cashier enough extra $$ to cover the coffee of the next one or 2 people behind me…I’m gone before they realize that I’ve paid for them, so it’s anonymous. Maybe the cashier just pockets the money, I don’t know…if so, it’s OK, becuase she probably needs it more than I do anyway.

By Babs

January 8, 2009 12:08 PM | Link to this

Twice last month, young people offered their seats to me on a MARTA train. Maybe I just look tired, but I was OK to stand. But it’s nice to know people are thinking about someone else’s comfort or happiness rather than their own.

By Wallace Moore

January 8, 2009 12:12 PM | Link to this

Ms G at 9:18am post, with so many people becoming unemployed and in need of assistance, might I suggest you find someone who is unemployed, who has small children, and carry them some canned groceries. Perhaps a canned ham with the trimmings for a scrumptious meal. We’re all the time helping out at Thanksgiving and Christmas, but those in need have to eat year round. Another suggestion is to buy a value meal from a deli (less fat content) and find a woman or man on the street, who appears to be in need, and give it to them with a hand written note of uplifting words. Let them know that God loves them as well as you. Don’t give them money as many are alcohol or drug addicted, and will use it to purchase their abusive substances. God has already begun to bless you in that you’re asking for suggestions on help someone else. I love you too for your thoughts.

By paying it forward daily

January 8, 2009 12:15 PM | Link to this

My husband and I were in Hilton Head for our anniversary in August, and we paid for this lady and her daughter’s breakfast at the diner we were eating at. They in turn, gave us a Gift certificate to stay at the Marriott in Atlanta at a discounted rate. Random acts of kindness really does take edge off!!

Ed, instead of shooting a thug, why don’t you try praying for them, its people like you that don’t deserve random acts of kindness, you just need to be left alone with your evil thoughts, and wicked ways!! I will do just what I suggested you do, and pray for you!! I will pray that your life gets better, and that you get good sense!!

By imatapper

January 8, 2009 12:20 PM | Link to this

When I get good/happy service in a fast food joint(which can be hard to find these days), I always ask to speak to the manager. I tell the manager what a great employee they have and why. I could just tell the employee, but I’d rather let the manager know. Hopefully he passes on the praise, plus there’s the added benefit of hearing a compliment from a customer and not a complaint.

By Wallace M

January 8, 2009 12:23 PM | Link to this

I wish to thank the Atlanta Journal & Constitution and VConwell for providing this article and blog. I know they’re doing so to possibly obtain a news story but it is a really needed story, especially in our trying times. I wish AJC and other news meadia would devote one page per day to the “Good News”. I’m sure there are advertisers who would be fighting for a spot on the page. AJC would benefit financially and the readers would benefit spiritually. Please take the time to write or email VConwell and let her/him know how important and rewarding this blog is. Got to go. Vision is blurry from emotions.

By Georgia Legislators Are Criminals

January 8, 2009 12:27 PM | Link to this

Well, I used to do kind things and help people as often as possible (along with give generously to charities, give blood as often as possible, be an organ donor, etc., etc., etc., etc.). But then I got listed on Georgia’s Sex Offender Registry and it only took me a few years to get over being nice and a good citizen.

Because of the behavior that got me listed on the Registry I was sentenced to a certain amount and length of punishment. I completed that legal sentence many years ago but that has not stopped the criminal State of Georgia from continuing to add more and more. They have been trying for years to force me from the home that I own and live in with my wife and children. That, and all the rest of the punishments, is unacceptable.

So now, after more than a decade of continued and increasing harassment, punishment, and offensive behavior from the criminal State of Georgia, its criminal legislators, and the 90% of the population that support their illegal BS, I don’t owe anyone anything or any kindness. But they owe me and their debt grows daily. It is a debt that I will collect, all completely legally of course.

I am very happy to see the State of Georgia broke and failing. Another new “sex offender” law just took effect in Georgia a week ago. It is going to cost governments all throughout the state a lot of time, money, and effort to implement. There will also end up being numerous lawsuits filed against the state and other entities. The Georgia legislative session is about to begin again. They must change the existing “sex offender” laws due to numerous court rulings by the Supreme Court of Georgia. The legislators are such a bunch of feel-good, helpful geniuses (who have ignored ALL expert testimony) that they might just go ahead and make some new “sex offender” laws while they are at it. If they don’t, it will be the first year in many, many years (at least 5) that they have not. I heard on the news this morning that Georgia is going to increase the size of classes in schools to save much-needed money. Since Georgia’s education system is so good, the legislators ought to consider using that money for more “sex offender” laws. That would be par for the course for them.

The reality of Sex Offender Registration, and especially ALL of the tag-along, worse-than-worthless laws that Registration has enabled (e.g. Banishment), is that it all provides very, very negligible additional “public safety” and those same benefits could very easily be achieved in numerous other, much more effective ways (that we all ought to be doing anyway). But while Registration and the rest provide no needed benefits, they also constantly promote recidivism, cost a fortune, create a false sense of security, reduce the likelihood that people will do what is truly effective to reduce sexual offending, divert precious, limited resources and attention away from trying to reduce sexual offending, and create a very large class of people who don’t care at all about being good citizens.

By Kim

January 8, 2009 1:05 PM | Link to this

I went to Kroger during the holidays and a young lady’s debit card didn’t go through. The cashier was not necessarily polite to her and I felt compelled to pay for her groceries. It was only about $30 and I will probably never see her again. -Kim

By Kim

January 8, 2009 1:07 PM | Link to this

I went to Kroger during the holidays and a young lady’s debit card didn’t go through. The cashier was not necessarily polite to her and I felt compelled to pay for her groceries. It was only about $30 and I will probably never see her again. -Kim

By Kim

January 8, 2009 1:08 PM | Link to this

I went to Kroger during the holidays and a young lady’s debit card didn’t go through. The cashier was not necessarily polite to her and I felt compelled to pay for her groceries. It was only about $30 and I will probably never see her again.

By Slik

January 12, 2009 9:47 AM | Link to this

I was leaving church one day when a woman raved about my coat and how much she had been looking for one just like it. I don’t know if she was in real need of a coat, but her excitement let me know that she’d get much more enjoyment from the coat than I ever would….so I gave it to her. Ever been on the receiving end of an act of kindness?