The magic box

At the Dana Porter library (one of my work places), there is a magic box. It is large and blue, and on the side it says METRO WASTE PAPER RECOVERY INC. Inside the magic box are books. Free books! That the library is simply throwing out because they are old, or the spine is coming apart, or no one has checked them out in too long. Everytime I come to work, I root around in this magic box. I have recently found such gems as the Bhagavagita and Number Our Days by Barbara Myerhoff, my anthropology idol. I think of this as an upscale form of dumpster-diving.

Think of the potential of all those dumpsters out there - magic boxes, all of them! I have some friends on Erb St who it's rumoured have decorated their entire house with items obtained from the Michael's craft store dumpster. And another group of friends who went dumpster diving at Chapters at the end of the month and found a whole stack of magazines, thrown out to make way for the new ones. (When my friends and I tried to replicate this experiment a month later, it failed miserably. For some reason Chapters had no new magazines that month, or was reluctant to throw the old ones out, or had caught on that university students were pilfering their dumpsters.) I know of people in Goshen who feed an entire house of students from dumpster diving. Yes, they eat stale croissants for a week, but it's FREE! You can also get fairly gourmet food, for instance Flat Earth Veggie Crisps or Milano Chocolate cookies. (I speak from experience.)

I have a few select dumpsters around K-W that it is my plan to explore in the coming months. They shall, of course, remain nameless... I don't know why dumpster diving is illegal (well, okay, I think it's trespassing on private property or something). But honestly, if I were a business, I'd be happy that people were able to use my garbage. If I ever own that restaurant, I'm going to put up a sign that says "PLEASE dumpster dive!"

In case you're wondering, that's not me. No really, I just found it on the internet. Why would I put up a picture of myself being illegal?

my future

So, most of the time I have no idea what I want to do with my future. And other times I have too many ideas. This is my newest one, developed today through a conversation with a colleague at the University of Waterloo library. So, if you are a full-time university employee, you can take classes for free. So, I could work at the library and do my masters in public works anthropology for free... hmmm... Also, your children get 1/2 price on tuition... hmmm.... this could turn into a long term life plan. Actually, long long term, because I don't plan on having children any time soon. I could see myself working at the library for a while. I actually really like it. Sometime I'll blog about how much I really love working at the library and using crazy high-tech gadgets like the DLA. (See, now I've piqued your curiosity, and you'll have to check back to find out what that is.)

ANYWAY, the real purpose of this post is to display to you this lovely photograph of my mother (she's the white one, unfortunately. I mean, I'm really glad that she's my mother, but I would love to have beautiful brown skin) in Francistown, Botswana.



So, I wish I was THE Mimi from Mimi's Cafe, but that will just have to be something I aspire to. Actually, if I don't end up finding enough part-time jobs to pay for rent and groceries, maybe I should emigrate to Botswana. Do you think they'd hire me if my name was Mimi? I think that might give me an advantage over their other applicants...

Actually, I have a pact with my good friend and former roomie Janna. If we're both old/unemployed/don't like our jobs/need something to do/are bored/feel adventurous, we're going to start our own restaurant. We love to cook and we're actually really good at cooking together. We don't even need to talk about who's putting in what, and somehow the recipe just comes together and turns out perfectly. Better than either of us could have made it ourselves, because we both call each other out when we're about to do something stupid (like not letting the ravioli dough set for 30 min before rolling it out like the recipe said to- that is apparently a very crucial step. Also, don't spill water on the dough once it is rolled out. This is not an escapade that happened while cooking with Janna. When I made ravioli with her, it was beautiful and delicious). Here is a picture of the beautiful and delicious ravioli, just for good measure:





I lied. That was three pictures. I couldn't resist showing you the different stages of the ravioli. Depicted at the eating stage are my lovely friends Sarah and Janna. So, this blog about my future turned out to be about spinach-mushroom-ricotta ravioli with roasted red pepper sauce... well, I guess if that were to be my future I wouldn't mind too much. Actually, I lied again. I've eaten that ravioli for like 5 meals now, and it is delicious, but I'm glad it's gone. No more ravioli for a while!

My life goes on

I haven't blogged in a while. A year, actually. A lot has happened in that year, but that's not really what I want to talk about here. The word vibrant describes my past 8 months rather well, and it's my hope for the coming months also.

I decided to start blogging again for a number of reasons. I have time. I remembered that I like it. (Remembering that you like something can actually be quite hard work and take a long time.) It's like a journal, only more fun and more public. But actually, I'm doing this for myself. I'm glad if this can be a way for people to stay connected to me, or just something interesting to read. But it's mainly for me. A year ago I would have had a hard time saying that. A lot has changed.

I'm trying to take care of myself now. And I think this could be a way to do it in a more mindful pattern. I wrote an email to a friend today, and it ended up being just my stream of thought. Which was very helpful for me, and hopefully for her too. I've discovered that crazy things can happen when you let go.

Okay, so it's late at night/early in the morning, and I feel like my thought processes aren't the sharpest. But I felt like it was important to start this now. Yay for new beginnings.


This is what I mean about my life being vibrant. My friends and I stole these tulips from the City of Kitchener and Bell last night. I don't mean that petty theft is vibrant (although it certainly could add excitement to your life). Springtime is. Biking at night is. Flowers are. Friends are.