For some reason the list serve would not accept this email from Thomas. Here is his note to all you wonderful current and future MOU volunteers:
Have you missed me!?! I got a job a few months ago that is taking more of my time and energy than I dreamed so I am guilty of birdie neglect and posting paucity - even my feeders have been untended during this time (gasp!). Forgive me please. Now to business! It's AUGUST 2011! And do you know what that means? No! Not that the heat and high dew points will never go away. No! Not that the gardens have never been happier and will likely take over the walls and roofs of our homes before fall. It is almost STATE FAIR TIME!!!!!! YIIIIIPPPPPPEEEEE! (I am pretty well hooked up so I am sourcing mild, delightful weather for all 12 days of the fair - you have to trust me on this one.) With the fair comes the now utterly fabulous, famous, sought after, coveted, inspiring, life-altering, deeply rewarding and ultimately giving experience of volunteering at the MOU booth! And once again you get to participate simply by saying yes and having the experience. Is there anything else in your life so easy, so profoundly rewarding and memorable for such an easy effort? Think about it. This year, in addition to a few more eye-delighting surprises, we are bringing back all the things the attendees ranted and raved about. All the techo-easy things. All the look-goofy playing with things. All the things that draw in those young minds, eyes and hearts that are given a chance to get turned onto birds. Just because you say so. It is easy, fun and you get to play. The shifts are again a delightful 4 hours long - just enough time to get your feet wet. So with your free fair admittance you get the fair for as long as your stomach holds up AND the experience of giving, the experience of participating in a group that would actually have you as a member, and the experience of making a difference in the lives of potentially thousands of real people just looking for that spark to remember the joys of birds. No! You don't need experience. No! You don't need to know how to bird by call or know everything there is to about birds. No! You don't need to know or be or have any kind of experience that anyone who would be visiting the booth would likely have. When you staff the booth, the equipment, books, touch-screen computer, other staffers, etc. do 90% of the talking for you. Yes! You can be an expert and support the other staffers who may not know as much as you. Yes! You can staff just because you love kids (the wheel is a kid magnet). Yes! You can be a total computer geek and showcase your talents with the state of the art touch-screen computer. Yes! Yes! Yes! to anything else you can ask. What else can I say. It is time to sign up and we need you to be willing to make a difference and simply to play with us. So let's go! There are TWO easy ways to sign up for a shift - one for computer folk and one for the 99% others. For computer folk - the first is to take your pick on the Google Calendar. 1 Go to www.google.com 2. Click "Sign In" on the top right hand corner of your screen. 3. Sign in using "mouvolunteer" as your "email" and "ilovemou" as your password 4. Click the "more" drop down menu item located in the center along the top of your screen. 5. Click "Calendar" from the drop down menu. 6. You will see a calendar centered on today's date. Scroll through until you get to August 25th 2011 where you will start to see the MOU booth shifts in red. 7. Click on the shift that you want to sign up for. I find that clicking on the actual word "Shift 1"(or 2 or 3) is the quickest and easiest. 8. Write your name after "shift 1, 2, or 3", in the "what" box at the top of the form. 9. Click "save" 10. Log out (on top right hand corner of the screen). SPECIAL ALERT FOR COMPUTER IMPAIRED!!! NOTE THE SENTENCES BELOW! OR simply email Jen or Kate and tell us what shift you want. Just move your cursor to an email address below and click the left mouse button two times fast and type. Jen Vieth: [email protected] Kate Kelnberger: [email protected] **You will need to make sure Kate & Jen have your snail mail address so we can send your state fair passes to you.** If anyone has suggestions or wants to take a bigger role in the fair or the committee-we welcome the help. Thank you from all of us- IT IS TIME TO BIRDIE DOWN AT THE FAIR! YAAAAAHHHHHHOOOOOOO! ---- Join or Leave mou-net: http://lists.umn.edu/cgi-bin/wa?SUBED1=mou-net Archives: http://lists.umn.edu/archives/mou-net.html
