But back to serious matters. Nestled along the Hudson River, just 24 miles from New York City, Indian Point is an aging nuclear power plant that is not being operated safely. That place scares the hell out of me because I live right on the edge of the “Peak Fatality Zone“. Not to mention the 20 million people (including all of New York City) who live within the “Peak Injury Zone”. I guess it’s a gamble whether I’d be dead or injured in the event that Indian Point Explodes. And there seems to be no decent evacuation plan. But even if it doesn’t explode, it is leaking radioactive waste into the Hudson River as we speak. It really makes me sad that the Hudson River, which Pete Seeger helped to clean up in the late ’60′s and early ’70′s, is now being damaged by a new foe. But as old as Pete is, he just keeps fighting for this beautiful place.

At the benefit the other night, we heard Pete Seeger do some older songs (including Woody Guthrie’s This Land is Your Land, and the spiritual Down By the Riverside). One really special treat was hearing Pete and Tao do Guantanamera together. Hearing Pete sing in Spanish is nice, but he isn’t a native speaker. Hearing Tao sing Guantanamera in Spanish was something else. Still, I don’t have a video of Tao doing it, so here’s an old one of Pete:

For those that don’t speak Spanish, here is the English Translation of the song, based on a poem, “Versos Sencillos”, by Jose Marti.I am a sincere man
From where the palm tree grows
And before dying I want
To share the verses of my soul.Guantanamera, guajira, Guantanamera

My verse is light green
And it is flaming crimson
My verse is a wounded deer
Who seeks refuge on the mountain.

Guantanamera, guajira, Guantanamera

I cultivate a white rose
In July as in January
For the sincere friend
Who gives me his honest hand.

Guantanamera, guajira Guantanamera

And for the cruel one
who would tear out this heart with which I live
I do not cultivate nettles nor thistles
I cultivate a white rose

Guantanamera, guajira Guantanamera

With the poor people of the earth
I want to share my good fortune
The brook of the mountains
Gives me more pleasure than the sea

Guantanamera, guajira Guantanamera

We initially got the idea to donate the car because I see a number of billboards and hear radio ads touting organizations who accept car donations on behalf of other non-profits. After searching a bit online, I was surprised that there seemed to be quite few companies who accepted car donations for either a specific charity I’d never heard about (usually involving children) or a much wider swath of charities (resulting in the ‘you pick the charity you want to donate to’).

This all seemed really convenient – too convenient. And there seemed to be quite few options for donation, enough that I had to google further to find more info. I finally found one web page that confirmed my suspicions – that a lot (not all) of these organizations keep most of the proceeds to cover their ‘overhead,’ and in some instances the charity can get as little as 5% of the money from the car sale. So the page made a common sense suggestion – donating directly to a charity.

Googling ‘donate car cancer’ brought up the American Cancer Society as the first result, which we felt good about. There seem to be a number of other legit cancer charities as well, but after all the suspicions, we stuck with the one we knew was totally legit. The process involved filling out the form and mailing them the title with it and waiting. And waiting. And some more waiting, which I guess isn’t that unusual since it was the holiday season and plenty of other people probably wanted to donate before the year ended. We just happened to be the one who slipped through the cracks.

In the end, we’re happy to help a cause. It may not be the best decision financially (our accountant recommended against it if we could sell the car for more than $500), but it felt like the right decision.