Tuesday, August 14, 2007

Paris? Is that You?

Our office administrator just reported that we received a call from a woman who is being required by the courts to do community service hours. This woman was wondering: if she made a contribution to our church would we write a letter saying she has done her community service hours here?

Uh--no.

But then I got to thinking--just on the off chance it was Ms. Hilton, Lohan or Ritchie calling, (we are only a short drive from L.A. after all), perhaps we should have tested to see just how high she was prepared to go. We are pretty much wiping out our Capital Maintenance Reserves by resurfacing the parking lot next week. . . .

Mindy? Rach? Do you know what the going rate for this kind of bribery might be?

2 comments:

Gord said...

THeanswer could also have been yes--as long as your contirbution to the church means actually spending that number of hours working for the church. THaat is as long as the church is allowed to serve in that way.

COntributions don't have tomean money afterall. ANd there is something about the picture of Paris or Lindsay serving in a soup kitchen or polishing communion ware that just seems so wonderful.

spookyrach said...

Well, the serious answer is this: find out how much Ms. Fancypants makes per hour, or lacking any such gainful employment, what her income was on last year's tax return. Estimate her normal hourly wage and make her pay that amount for every hour of community service she pays off.

The truth is: Hell freakin' no, she can't buy her hours!!! Geeze. We get this a LOT as you might well imagine. There are rare times when we need cash for a particular project, which is why we have the policy outlined above. But we make 'em sweat for their hours by doing such things as picking up trash on the highway, sorting garbage at the recycle center and our all-time favorite - shoveling poo after the stock shows.

Gee. This is like the longest comment I've every left. I feel so wordy.