My initial $100 Kiva loan is being paid back by 5 recipients living in Armenia, Pakistan, Uganda, Moldova and Palestine.

From my one-time $100 donation, I've been able to loan out $175 in micro loans.

Today, enough money was repaid that I could make another $25 loan, this time to a woman from Tajikistan.

There are thousands in need of assistance, but I am partial to 1) single/divorced women on their own, 2) women seeking $$ for their own or their daughters' educations and 3) individual women seeking loans for some sort of green home improvement, such as solar panels. There are filters on the Kiva.org website where you can narrow your search to whatever you want.

It's hard enough in this country for divorced women raising a family, so one can only imagine the obstacles women face in third world countries.

Here's who I lent to today:



"Ganjina is a strong, very kind, and responsible woman. She was born in 1965 and is divorced. She is the caring mother of three children: two daughters and a son.

A cleaner at the railway station, she has been working for 13 years, but her salary is low. With a large family, being a breadwinner is difficult for her.

Ganjina has a daughter who is studying at the National University of Tajikistan at the department of Law. She is a first-year student, studying very hard and earning excellent grades.

Due to her low income, she finds it difficult to pay for her daughter's tuition fee. Therefore, she is requesting a loan of 8,670 Tajikistan somoni (TJS) to pay the tuition.

Ganjina is a returning borrower and has a positive credit history. She is asking for a loan for the third time through Kiva’s field partner IMON International, and she promises to repay it on time. She hopes Kiva lenders will support her and awaits your help and support."

Last week I also made a small donation to a local shelter here in CT who is sending a team of volunteers down to Florida to help rescue animals after Hurricane Irma and bring them back to CT for adoption.

I wish I could do more.

I can barely walk on my leg after yesterday's injury. I have to take teeny baby steps and be careful how I place my foot down. I don't think I slept well last night becus I'm feeling tired this morning. I've alerted the recruiter who got me the job I start on Monday, a week from today. Hopefully things will be back to normal or close to normal by that time, although I'm still a little worried I may not be ready if they want me to come in earlier.

I had all these things I wanted to do this week before starting the new job. Now this has thrown a kink into things. Well, walking on it a lot will probably just slow down the healing process, right? I will try to take it easy today and tomorrow and hope that by end of day tomorrow I see some improvement.

Luckily, I suppose, this injury happened at the tail end of my outdoor work yesterday, which was probably for 2.5 hours. At least I managed to plant my new Hydrangea Ruby Slippers and some allium bulbs before it happened.

I just got a call from the hiring manager for the low-paying but perm job as a corporate writer for a national relocation company in nearby small city. We've scheduled an interview for me for this Thursday. I would have made it earlier in the week to avoid possibly conflicting with an early start to my contract job, which is supposed to start Monday but they had mentioned having me come in a day or two earlier only becus the hiring manager will be traveling when I arrive on Monday.

I don't want to have to hobble into the new interview, so I decided to play it safe and wait til Thursday to schedule it. I told her what had happened, just in case I'm still walking funny when I arrive there.

She told me to plan on being there for 2.5 hours. A half hour with her, an hour with 2 other senior writers and the final hour to do testing of my editing and writing abilities.

Just hope everything works out. My leg, the interview, etc.