The familiar Check Out Hunger tickets

CHECK-OUT HUNGER RETURNS FOR 20th ANNIVERSARY YEAR

HILLSIDE, N.J. – Check-Out Hunger, an annual front-end awareness and fund raiser for the Community FoodBank of New Jersey, will be marking its 20th year milestone this fall. This campaign, which began in New Jersey, is run at supermarket chains across the northeast.

The Community FoodBank of New Jersey reports that need for nutritious food is up 30-40 percent at its partner agencies (soup kitchens, pantries, shelters, etc) this year.

In 2009 Check-Out Hunger crossed the $2 Million plateau for the first time. The campaign raised $2,093,086 for food banks across the state. Since 1992, millions of people have supported the program at food markets and online at www.checkouthungernj.org.

Participating food markets include A&P, Food Basics, Foodtown, Kings, Pathmark, Shop Rite, Super Fresh, Wawa, and Wegmans.

This campaign was developed by the Community FoodBank in conjunction with the New Jersey Food Council and supermarket chains with headquarters in New Jersey. Currently the Community FoodBank of New Jersey administers the regional campaign with 14 chains for 32 food banks and affiliates in 9 states and the District of Columbia.

The Community FoodBank of New Jersey, a member of Feeding America, distributed 35 million pounds of food in the last year to people in need in 18 of New Jersey’s 21 counties. Its staff and volunteers fight hunger and poverty not only through the distribution of food and grocery products, but by education and training, and by creating new programs to meet the needs of low-income people. The Community FoodBank of New Jersey has earned Charity Navigator’s highest honor, a four-star rating.

Here’s how people can help:

• Right in their own neighborhood. Shoppers will find a display of Check-Out Hunger donation slips at the checkout aisles in their local food stores.
• Right in their own home. People can donate through the Check-Out Hunger in New Jersey website at www.checkouthungernj.org.
  Also, just a reminder that the retail partners run the campaign at varying times from late September through the end of January, with the bulk of the food stores running it in November and December. There are a list of participating stores on the website.

So, folks, if you’re at the checkout counter and you see the different colored tickets like in the image above, consider donating a few bucks to help the Community FoodBank of New Jersey out this holiday season. Thanks.

Anyone involved in the debacle that was central New Jersey’s morning commute today knows that it was horrendous. The rain came down like a flood and visibility was all but nonexistent. So what would you do in such a situation when you had to go to work in this weather? Clearly, if you were a moron driving a white, Acura SUV this morning you would be riding everyone’s tail and swerving in and out of traffic! Look, I don’t know what this asshole in the white Acura was trying to accomplish, but I watched in my rear view mirror as he zoomed in and out of the two lanes of traffic until he reached where I was on the road. And then, almost unbelievably, this guy came to within less than a foot of distance between his car and mine. Seriously! Who does that when you’re driving in a torrential downpour? An idiot does that, that’s who…

Almost as bad was this woman driving in a little Volkswagon Cabrio. I’ve never driven a small VW so I don’t know how these things handle in that type of rain, but this woman had her emergency lights on and was cruising at about 30 miles per hour. If I had a direct line into her car I would have said, “Hey, honey, you create more problems than you solve when you do that!”

Look, I understand that some people are horrified of driving in the rain. It can be a very scary event. In my mind, you have two scenarios when it’s torrential outside – don’t drive at all or, if you have to drive and you get caught in a monsoon, pull over and wait for it to die down.

But for the love of all that’s good, don’t put your blinkers on and smoothly sail away at 30 miles per hour on a major, two-lane highway when everyone around you is going at 60 – 80 miles per hour. If you don’t “know” that doing this is going to create major problems, you probably shouldn’t have a license in the first place.