1/4/08 meeting notes

Elissa is a smurf, and is facilitating the meeting. Sam is scribing. Josh is stacking. Jaclyn is timing. Vivi is still on her way home.

(1) Chores:
SO while some people were gone on Thursday we had this monumental cleaning effort during which everyone spent 45 minutes cleaning the house together. The moral of the story is that everyone should do their chores.

(2) Compost:
We have a new compost bin. It is a red popcorn container.

(3) Food money:
We are now spending $152/week in food money. Irina and Jaclyn do not participate in the communal food, and Sasha is not participating this month to see how it works for her.

(4) Room-Switching
There's going to be a meeting at 8:00 on Sunday Jan. 11 to talk about the room-switching.

(6) TV
Please, please, please, please don't spend all of your time watching TV downstairs -- Sam and Josh can't escape it and it's super unfair. Think before you watch TV for six hours straight. Lots of people very kindly and generously offered to let Sam use their rooms when he is bothered by the TV.

(7) Whole Avodah Retreat
If you have any ideas for what we can lead as a group during the whole Avodah retreat, tell Emily.

(8) Tell Emily if you are going to be at the community night. Be there at 6:15. We are probably going to use some community money to buy pizza for us and for the facilitator.

(9) We're going to try leaving the thermostat on 65 degrees all the time to see what happens. DON'T MOVE IT

"turn it to the left"

be kind to your ears!!!

the american academy of audiology starts a new campaign called "turn it to the left"

i know you all like to listen to your ipizzle on the way to work...but you could be damaging your hearing!

12/7/08 Minutes

ABSENT: Emily, Elissa, Ari, Briana


(1) Don't lock the top lock on the main door! A guest may have done this once, and someone was locked out.

(2) Josh wants to know if anyone knows where we can buy shovel.s Sasha suggested that we have one shovel already. We're going to look at Value Depot.

(3) Food issues: Jaclyn and Irina have both opted out of the group food. Jaclyn doesn't want to do the communal food chores, either. One proposal is that Jaclyn would never be on food, and Joanna would always be on food.

Also, Jaclyn now has a ton of food in the personal fridge. A proposal is that Jaclyn and Irina would have their own spots in the personal fridge.

A reminder: if it isn't yours and it's in the personal fridge, don't touch it! Don't move it to the other fridge! This is true even if it isn't labeled.

Jaclyn says that she is leaving the communal food for two reasons: (1) she is unhappy with the "politics" surrounding the shopping and cooking, and (2) her food preferences do not match up well with the food preferences of the collective, and so she think she'll eat better this way.

It was decided that Jaclyn's food group should sit down and have a conversation about the aforementioned food politics.

(4) Food issue: Sasha is going to be out of town for two weeks, and she doesn't want to pay for the food for those two weeks. Most people seem to think that this is reasonable. Josh is also going to be gone for about two weeks, and he wants the same deal. Same thing for Vivi. For the days that they will be gone, see the Google Calendar.

(5) Jaclyn gave me $20. Joanna gave me $50 (though she spent 10 already). Erica gave me $80. Irina gave me nothing. I gave $75. Josh gave me $75. Sasha will give $35. Vivi hasn't paid yet, and I think Emily and Elissa haven't either.

What can Sam do to make things easier? Maybe bring the cash to the first programming of the month. Maybe send an e-mail around the 1st of the month reminding people that money is due. Or maybe send such an e-mail a week in advance. Sam should make a check-off sheet so you check your name off when you give Sam money. The sheet could go on the fridge.

(6) Proposal: Maybe there should be one full week where we don't do new shopping w/community money. The week in question is Dec. 21-27. Four people will be gone for most of the week. December is our "leap month," which has five weeks. So either we're not going to have enough food each week, or we're going to have plenty of food for most of the weeks and we'll starve at the end of the month.

Vivi suggests that we should spend thriftily, and if we run out of money at the end of the month then so be it, and we can buy food with community money if necessary. We'll try to spend ~$160/week, and see how it goes.

11/2 House Meeting

10/2 House Meeting

Joanna leading

Ground Rules: Sam
Fun
Use a positive tone,
Assume good will1
Policy proposals- or at least already have the proposal formulated in advance
One mic

*Speak to Sasha about better ways to keep the house clean and ensure chores get done

Meeting Frequency: Josh
Skip one meeting a month, possibly on holiday weekends; Josh will come up with a colander to make this possible.
Speak about food and shopping the meeting before to ensure there is food for the week following a holiday, use e-mail to discuss food.
Begin Josh’s plan for November and then revisit having meeting every week or every other week,

Do next house meeting at the retreat and skip a meeting the weekend of the 9th, as well as Thanksgiving weekend.

Screen Door: Josh
Does not close by itself, please close it behind you. We can take it off…Irina and Erica
Put Bubby cart on the left side of the pantry so door closes.
Please find soup Tupperware’s

Give Brianna a dollar if you went to the Schecters

Jaclyn bought cleaning supplies

Food Money: Give it to Sam by Wednesday

Find Irina’s brother a nice Jewish girl!!!



Election night possibly at Sasha’s friends or in union square as a group, possible party at Arielle’s house
Come back to Midwood house for Slipper party between 9 and 9:30- be sure to invite the other house

PROPOSED MEETING GROUND RULES

1. EVERY MEETING MUST BE FUN.
2. All nagging must be in the form of song.
3. All policy proposals must be written up ahead of time.
4. Always assume good will.
5. Only one person can speak at a time (even though we’re Jewish).
6. Clothing optional.

House Meeting Notes 10/19/08

Midwood House Weekly Meeting Notes – 10/19/08

Agenda Items

Lights – Please turn off the lights when you go to bed, especially in the bathroom and in the second floor hallway. Save electricity when we can!

Food Shopping – Jaclyn : May be unnecessary to shop every week. We could buy groceries for two weeks, but we need to ration our food. We may need to separate some food and keep them in the personal fridge and then move them over to the communal fridge.

Suggestion: Could buy stock items in bulk and then produce from fruit stands weekly.

Suggestion: Shopping seems like a huge task and we may need to go to Costco or buy in bulk every two weeks and every week supplement with produce.

Suggestion: Dairy products should be bought weekly, but other shelf stable items could be bought in bulk every two weeks.

Elissa: If we move the furniture out of the carpark and use communal money to pay for gas to and from the grocery store and pitch in to take care of Erica’s car, especially in the winter, then we could possible keep it around for the rest of the year.

Elissa: Need to determine how much money we would be willing to spend at Costco and how that is affected by the weekly grocery money.

Decision – Start Costco bulk shopping in November and we can fine tune how we will do this in the next two weeks.

Landlord – Erica couldn’t get in contact with the landlord for a couple of weeks, but spoke to one of the brothers this morning. They plan to move the garbage from the backyard this week, hopes to figure out regulation of heat in the house, and the door on second floor can be taken off or fixed if we prefer.

Laundry Detergent – Emily: If anyone wants some detergent they can buy the small tide container on the “tower of chaos” or later on if we want to we can use communal money to have house detergent.

Bathroom Hair – Please be diligent when cleaning up your hair from the shower drains and sinks.

Trash – If the kitchen trash is full please empty it and the weekly trash people will be more diligent with emptying the trash in the kitchen. We also need to buy more trash bags!

Compost – Sasha: Whenever food is put into compost bin we need to add dry leaves to the bin. We also need to buy a new inside compost can so that it doesn’t fill up so fast. Then emptying the inside compost bin can be part of the trash chore.

Kitchen Sink – Sam and Joanna: We haven’t been doing a very good job of washing our dishes. Please dry large pots and pans instead of leaving them in the drying rack. Please don’t leave the sponges wet in the sink. If you’d like to disinfect the sponge you can put it into the microwave for 10 seconds.

Have a great week everyone!

Respectfully submitted by ESaltz