jcnork's posterous

Green Haven Co-housing Sociocracy Conference - 1/28 & 1/29 2012

Jerry Koch-Gonzalez and John Buck lead the Green Haven Co-Housing Sociocracy Workshop held at The Grove in New Haven Connecticut. Here are some pictures and videos of the weekend and more information on Sociocracy.

Day 1 1/28/2012

(download)

The entertainment committee getting everyone involved! 

 

Day 2 1/29/2011

(download)

Art From The Sociocracy Conference:

(download)

 

More Information On Sociocracy:

Dynamic Governance at Lost Valley Educational Center and intentional community:

An introduction to sociocracy and its processes written by Jerry Koch-Gonzalez:
"Governance by Equals: An Introduction to Sociocracy"

Click here to download:
Equality_in_Governance_-_Intro_to_Sociocracy.pdf (519 KB)
(download)

The Nork Creations For The Create96 Show-And-Tell #FF @wordmason @jkubarych @create96 #NHV #SWCT

I love how my good friend Aldon Hynes always puts up Follow Friday posts on his blog. 
I want to do a Create96 themed Follow Friday (#FF).
Tonight Friday 1/27/2012 is the Create96 show-and-tell - 6:30 at The Grove.

#FF Create96 Masterminds:
@wordmason - Mason Rabinowitz 
@jkubarych - Jeff Kubarych
@create96  - Create96.com

The Norks will be there in full force!

Evan will be unavailing the latest music video from his side-project band Synchron.

Hayden will be showing the slide show he made for the 2011 Robotics season to a rockin Led Zeppelin soundtrack.

Liam will be showing his Harry Potter Lego creation. (pictures to follow)

Ali and I will be announcing the launch of GiveLaptops.org

 
Image

Give Laptops collects donated laptops less than 5 years old, refurbishes them in partnership with City Wide Youth Coalition
and distributes them through teacher partners directly to the children who could most benefit from a laptop.

Goal for 2012 is to distribute 24 laptops. For our pilot year, two schools have signed on:
We handed out our first laptop (donated by a fellow Grover) and have 3 more ready to be given to students.
If you would like to donate a laptop to the cause, please fill out the form here: http://givelaptops.org/donate-a-laptop

Click here to download:
Create 96 Idea List.pdf (30 KB)
(download)

Amity Teen Center Coats For Kids - 1,002 coats to give away!

Hello All;
The Amity Teen Center has acquired 1,002 brand new winter coats from Operation Warm in Pennsylvania.  Joyce Van Lines has graciously offered to pick up the coats in Pennsylvania and deliver them to the Amity Teen Center.  Joyce and Operation Warm are still working out the timing and logistics. In the mean time the teen center wanted to get the word out to organizations in the greater New Haven area that have children and teens in need. They would like to have all organizations fill out a coat request form to identify the number of coats in each size that their community could use this winter. Once the coats arrive they will coordinate with a representative from each organization come to the teen center to pick up all of their coats to distribute to their community.

Please have an organization representative fill out this form indicating the number of coats needed:
http://bit.ly/coats2012

The teen center would also like your help in identifying all organizations that could use new winter coats. Please share this message with any other organizations in the greater New Haven area that you think may have a need for brand new children's coats.

Evan's English Report

Evan had to do an English report over Christmas Break so he decided to do it using Xtranormal Desktop. 

(download)

 

 

 

 

(Here is the same video zoomed out a bit.) Xtranormal is a pretty cool animation program!

(download)

My Collaborative Consumption Wish List

As a techie geek I get asked for help from my friends all the time with setting up computers, recovering lost files and just about anything else you can think up.
I run a consulting business and charge a decent rate for my time but I always feel awkward charging friends.  I wrote a blog post about this back in October that's worth a read:
Since that time I have don't several collaborative deals and people have been asking me what they can trade so I made a quick list:
If you want to barter for service there are a few things I can think of off the top of my head that we could pick from:
  • Watch people's kids at the Lakeview Lodge Concerts (www.lakeviewlodgemusic.org)
  • Watch my kids so Ali and I can have a date night
  • Clean my gutters
  • Install a new mailbox
  • Prepare dinner for the family
  • Clean garage 
  • Mount and frame 3  8x10 photos
  • Fix the ceiling in my kitchen
  • Put more insulation in my attic
  • Purchase and install 4 guitar wall mounts
  • Clean our windows
  • Cut the dead branches out of the oak tree in my back yard
Some of these jobs are small and some are not but all things I would most likely need to pay someone to do for me.
With collaborative consumption everyone wins!

Our First Letterbox - Naugatuck Forest Stonewall Letterbox

We stumbled across a letter box completely by accident last Sunday. The boys were so excited that they wanted to place their own in the woods. Our goal starting out this morning was to make it to Beacon Cap but I think we took a wrong turn somewhere along the way so we decided to leave our box in an old stone wall.

Letterboxing is an intriguing mix of treasure hunting, art, navigation, and exploring interesting, scenic, and sometimes remote places. It takes the ancient custom of placing a rock on a cairn upon reaching the summit of a mountain to an artform. It started when a gentleman simply left his calling card in a bottle by a remote pool on the moors of Dartmoor, in England.

Nork's Stonewall Letterbox Location:  
  Latitude: 41.453997º N
  Longitude: 73.014420º W
  Altitude: 712 ft

(download)

View Norks Letterbox in a larger map