This particular Wellingtonista was sitting at the bus-stop last night, when a lad on a motorbike scooted up, and asked me if I wanted to make use of his now unneeded daytripper pass. Of course I did! $2.80 saved (the cost of a click on my 3-zone ten-trip)! Score!

This led to some discussion on the Wellingtonista list as to other acts of kindness/generosity you can perform for your fellow citizens without any great opportunity cost of your own.

The other obvious one is parking coupons. Got half an hour left when you go to leave? Just roll the ticket up and pop it in the coin slot of the vending machine. Next person to come along will (hopefully) realise they've got a freebie, and everyone wins (except the council revenue department, I suppose).

Might I also remind our readers that while the library doesn't send out overdue reminder notices until after your books/cds/dvds/whatever are overdue (and thus already accumulating late charges), you can use the Library Elf service to send you reminders before the due date. This has saved my family literally hundreds of dollars over the last few years.

Any other suggestions for ways to save people money or, indeed, just to make their lives more pleasant, with a minimal amount of effort on your own behalf? Pop 'em in the comments.

All you budding young clothes designers out there should be getting whatever it is you use to design clothes ready for The Hinitiative and Wellington City Mission T-Shirt design contest that kicked off this week.

Open to all Wellington high school students, entries will be judged by a panel that includes Wellington fashion designer, Robyn Mathieson, clothing stores Fusion Surf & Skate and Rex Royale, and The Church design company. The first place winner takes home $300 in store vouchers. Second, third also get store vouchers, but not quite so many. In addition, all four finalists will have their winning designs produced into t-shirts by The Hinitiative and sold by selected stores in Wellington to help benefit Wellington City Mission.

Do good, and look good doing it.

More info at the Hinitiative website, and here's a direct link to the design brief. Contest deadline is Saturday 11 August.

Fairtrade Fortnight started yesterday, so I'm sure you're keen to do your bit to make the world a better place. The Wellingtonista would, therefore, like you to help us do a little research.

There are a lot of coffee companies in Wellington who now offer fairtrade beans. We want you to get drinking and tell us what the best ones are. You can use the fairtrade locator to start your search, but it may be a little out of date - there is no Malo Cafe anymore, for example - so it might be best if you ask your favourite cafes if they have fairtrade beans - and if they don't, ask them why the hell they don't. Go forth and caffinate!

Andrew Brettell, theatre visuals designer extraordinaire, turns his hand to something a little more ethereal this weekend, when he's planning to 'haunt' the renowned Futuna Chapel up in Karori. Just what this entails we're not sure, but there'll almost certainly be a few ghosts floating around the place, and there's also a talk at 8:30pm each night from Nick Blake about the chapel's architecture.

When: Fri Dec 15th - Sun Dec 17th, 10am - 10pm
Where: Futuna Chapel, 62 Friend Street, Karori
How much: Free!

[Hat-tip: No Right Turn]

Let us divert a little from the excesses of martinis and penis pumps to tell you that the Dalai Lama is coming to Wellington! (is that the first time someone has used "Dalai Lama" and "penis pump" in the same sentence?)
He accepted an invitation from the NZ Tibetan Buddhist community and will show up next year.

A public talk and Buddhist teachings are scheduled in Auckland on June 17 and 18, and address to an audience in Wellington on June 19.

So keep that free in your diaries people. The last time he was here was in 2002 when he met Jim Anderton and Phil Goff, lucky bastard.

Amnesty International are looking to recruit street performers to support human rights as part of Freedom Week 2006(their annual awareness and fundraising week 31 july - 6 august)

Money collected on the streets this year will support their crisis campaigning work, in particular their work to stop human rights abuses in Darfur, Sudan.

To help raise the profile of Freedom Week, and boost public donations, for the first time this year, they're asking artists, buskers and performing arts students to give up half an hour or an hour of their time to busk on Freedom Day, their street appeal day. In Wellington that's Thursday 3rd August.

This is an invite to dance for love in the street to support Amnesty International's Freedom Day.

What: Freedom Day street performance with Wellington Batucada (for Amnesty International's Freedom Week)

When: Thursday 3rd August, between 5 and 6pm

Where: Corner of Lambton Quay and Featherston St (in front of Old Bank Arcade)

Costumes: To be advised

Other: There will be no practices, so you will need to be confident in following carnival/samba reggae moves as lead by a teacher and freestyling as well.

Shake it for a good cause, or just go along and show your support.

Watch out Wellington, the (Wellington) Circus (Trust) is in town.

The Wellington Circus Trust is holding a fundraiser to try and raise $1200, to match a grant from Creative Communities Wellington.

On Friday 16th June the Paramount will be rocking from 10pm - 2am with circus acts, DJs, plus a screening of "It's All Gone Pete Tong".

It will be a splendid affair.

All for the bargain price of $15.00.
Bookings in person at the Paramount or call (04) 384 4080

More information here.

The Wellingtonista, it may be revealed, harbours at least two fans of Joss Whedon, creative motivation behind such televisual works of staggering genius as Buffy the Vampire Slayer and, er, Roseanne.

So we are pleased to relay Michael's announcement of a Wellington charity showing of Whedon's film Serenity on Friday the 23rd at 7pm at Reading.

Many, this writer included, missed this fine film owing to its absurdly truncated run in local theatres last year. Now is your chance to see it in its natural environment while at the same time supporting Whedon's favourite charity.

For more information, including how to obtain tickets (which are not available from the Reading box office) click here.