United Way

LOGAN — Some Cache County nonprofit organizations say donations have increased in 2011 despite a still-sluggish economy and national data that suggest charitable contributions are in overall decline.

OGDEN -- Adam and Lavina Hoskins had been looking for an affordable coat that fits their 8-year-old daughter for a month and a half, with no luck.

The family whose car was crushed by a tree in the recent windstorm reminds me of a 1948 movie, "The Bicycle Thief."

The film is set in economically ravaged Rome after World War II. A man with a small family finally gets his bicycle out of the pawnshop so he can get a job.

LAYTON -- Karen Crow wouldn't have a Thanksgiving dinner if not for the turkey, drinks, bread and bowls in her grocery basket Friday.

She had just loaded it up at the East Layton Family Connection Center Food Bank and was on her way back to her two children at their assisted housing home in Clearfield. Her food budget had been cut in half when the father of one child stopped supporting her, she said.

"Without assistance, I know I would be out on the street," she said, the first gusts of the night's big snow storm blowing in behind her.

Somehow, I pictured my victory being just a little bit more, well, you know ... victorious.

It's old news by now, but last Monday I narrowly defeated fellow columnist Charles Trentelman in our monthlong his-beard-vs.-my-hair contest, which raised a whopping $14,941 for the United Way of Northern Utah.

That's right, I won. So then, why do I feel like such a loser?

I'll tell you why: Because any number of disillusioned/alienated readers out there are now calling me a sell-out. And worse.

As I type this, it is 11 a.m. Monday. I do not know who has won the hair/beard United Way fundraising thing some idiot (columnist Mark Saal) dreamed up and another idiot (me) agreed to. This lets me write today's column in "real time," like some weird TV reality show.

Instead of getting booted off the island, the loser gets a free haircut or shave.