"I'm New."

"I'm new." is one of those magical phrases that immediately frees the speaker from any potential blame.  I am in the fortunate position to be able to make good use of the phrase, "I'm new" as I "accidentally" confuse the boss' fancy bathroom for the regular one and feign ignorance about the "no booze on the job rule" between Barcardi shots. No, that's not really true.  There are two bathrooms here.  Men and Women.  And I don't do shots.  Ever.

My new co-workers have been really patient with me as I learn the ropes though and it's been really helpful to getting into the swing of things as they say.

A typical day at my new office job consists looks like this:

7:30 - Wake Up/Getting ready
8:25 - Bus
8:53 - At Work
9:00 - Various pickups/drop-offs around the city.  Cover the receptionist for her 10:30 smoke break.
11:00 - Get everyone's lunch orders
11:15 - Call-in and order everyone's lunch
11:30 - Go pickup lunches
12:00 - Deliver lunches
12:00 - Cover receptionist for her lunch break
1:00 - Take my lunch/ paper shredding 
2:00 - Drop-offs, pick-ups, odd and ends
3:30 - Cover receptionist for her smoke break
3:45 - Bank Drop-off
4:00 - Odds and ends, sit around.
5:00 - Out

And then...
5:20 - Play my ukulele by Superfresh or a Chinatown fish shop.
6:20 - Volunteer at ESWA (Eastern Service Workers Association)
7:40 - Home

No wonder the days are flying by!  Some notes on the schedule above.  When I started, I had more sit around time, but since being trained on the phones, things have picked up.  Also when I started, there was a huge box of paper I was given to shred.  Huge!  After the shredder was full, I asked where the recycling was and was told that there was none.  The City of Philadelphia does not make it easy for businesses to recycle as the recycling department is severely underfunded.  So, every day since I started, I've been shredding just the amount I can fit in a Trader Joe's bag and taking this bag home to recycle.  I've even contacted a local group of artists, Dumpster Divers, who makes art with recycled products to see if they would like to use my mounds of shredded lawyer bills.  They haven't gotten back to me.  As luck would have it, one of my old foster rabbits came back to me and now I am using the paper as rabbit litter.  Pretty handy.

After playing my ukulele outside, I've been going to ESWA to give them typed member cards.  ESWA is a group I've written about before, and among many other admirable things, they are old-school and they use a typewriter to create member cards.  These cards contain information on every person they meet from canvassing and tabling.  This information includes the person's name, address, phone number, where they met the volunteer(s), and what was discussed, and any events or assistance the person may have helped or been helped with.  These cards are typed but when ESWA told me their typewriter was broken, I volunteered to do them at work.  So, I've been doing about 10 a day, dropping them off, and picking up more to do.

I'm happy to do all the things above though I'd be lying if I said it wasn't tiring me out.  I need my down time.  I don't feel myself without it.  And lately, I've been thinking about writing here and elsewhere all the time.  I wish there were a few more hours in the day.

Growing Older By the Minute

The start date of my new job is quickly approaching and more and more I find myself worrying what kind of person I will become because of it.  I'm not going to be able to stay up till 4am and wake up at noon anymore.  Will this change me?

When I consider this more seriously, it's silly that I worry that my personality depends upon the hours I keep.  I guess I like the way night owl hours can naturally isolate a person.  I do a lot of my favorite things late at night (reading, writing, ukulele playing, show-watching, etc.).  But I live in this world, and I'm going to have to play ball a little if I am to change the way the game is ultimately played, as I truly want to do. 

Sometimes when I walking around the city with my mental list of errands, I think about what child-me would think about myself at the sight of me now.  I grew up in rural suburbs, and with such different environments, I don't think I've ever gotten over the potential excitement of a big city.  In my odd, meta-cognitive thoughts I consider how much and how little I've grown. 

At times, nothing seems to have anything to do with everything else.      

Wood You Come to My Birthday?

Yesterday was my birthday.  I turned 24 and had a wonderful time in the process.

For one thing, I finally have a full-time job!  I now work at grocery 
store that is a 7-minute walk from my house.  Everyone I have worked with so far is very nice and I'm glad that I will at last be able to have some stability.  I even get paid every week instead of every other week.  When I first thought of working at South Square, I thought how the job would offend my vegan-self.  I still have these thoughts.  You should see me as I gingerly pick up the very tips of a cheese or meat package to scan it.  I also worry about how my paycheck is partially coming from animal exploitation.  It's not an ideal job for me in this respect but the way things have been for about a year now, I've barely been getting by.  I've been surviving more than living but this is more than I can say for the animals' whose body parts and products I slide across my scanner and announce the price of.  What would my thighs go for?  What about my life?

Sadly, the job that I was barely getting by with ended and I needed another job.  This was the first one that I could find that would pay my bills.  I will continue to look for better options for me but in looking at the situation as it is, I see an excellent opportunity to do some activism.  Here I am, being presented with pieces of people's lives.  I recently listened to a debate between Gary Francione and Erik Marcus and Gary mentioned he always starts the conversation by asking about people's pets.  At my job, I'm ringing up their cat and/or dog food.  What a perfect lead in!  I've ordered some free business cards for The Abolitionist Approach and as soon as I'm finished my training I'm going to start talking to people about veganism and giving them cards at the end of our conversations.  I'll probably get myself into some kind of trouble but as long as I'm not selling anything, I don't see what's so wrong about having a conversation made relevant by a person's pets.  So, I'll see.

For my birthday, I worked and then I went back to my apartment where my boyfriend was waiting for me.  He got me tasty vegan pizza and a delicious vegan dessert.  After eating, he gave me a present which was a ukulele!  How exciting!

Then, I dragged my roommates, friends, and boyfriend to Woody's, a wonderful, gay bar and I think that everyone had a good time.  I had a good time.  Sunday is 80's night meaning some drinks are 80 cents and there is lots of 80's music.  I love Woody's!  Everyone there is so full of joy and there's so much love in the room!  This sounds corny but I don't care.

Oh, and P.S. I got a popcorn maker as a birthday gift!  Hooray!  The lid turns into a bowl!