Today’s post brought to you by: passive highs
Grateful for: my ability to buy lunch for a homeless man outside Safeway … the look on his face
Trying hard to accept: Wholefoods hasn’t banned me yet
Wholefoods might be the biggest rip-off but if you know how to work it, it’s the best thing since $8.99 sliced bread.
Last wifi chance before very long and very dark trip back to San Francisco tonight.
Lemme see if I can show you my Wholefoods office. Here you go.
Much thought went into maximising the power of the filter and angle to minimise the chubbiness of my fat-fuelled cheeks.
They have: desks, wifi, power points, nice toilets, $2 free refill coffee, and best of all a very fine collection of good-looking, wealthy (married) men to smile at. Stop press!!!! What am I talking about? Best things are the free samples. See those 6 white cups. That was my 43-second zip round the deli to get free turkey and cranberry sandwiches and chocolate chip cookies.
Eugene’s been interesting.
Good bits:
- How they care for less fortunate
- Friendliness of every single person I’ve met
- Cheap cost of living
- Wholefoods
- St Mary’s rector and baking
- Public library
Bad bits:
- You’d think that in a place where there’s more rain than joints they would clear the gutters. In a 100m walk you have to jump 6 puddles, tip toe through 4 piles of rotting leaves and negotiate your way across a road with blocked gutters on all four corners.
- Dope – only the stupid would pay $5 for a joint – just walk round the Christmas markets twice and you’re flying higher than my current weight.
- Hippies. All this dreadlocked, crystalled, tie-dyed, purple-haired thing is not really my cup of kombucha. Although, they do make all the good bits possible.
Imagine what it’s like inside
I think I might’ve mentioned in passing that it rains here. Which gave me an insight into homeliness.
So yesterday me and my home-packed lunch (ie, not near Wholefoods) sloshed our way into the city to have a gander round.
Well not much to see except vegan cafes (soy has no business messing with biscuit, gravy and sausage), tattoo shops, dope sellers galore and shops selling witchy and Dungeons and Dragons stuff.
They must get sick of tattooing ‘I hate the IRS’
In search for somewhere to make my sandwiches I Google-mapped myself off to public library.
What an eye-opener. There’s a cafe ($1 coffee – must be subsidised by city) in foyer where every table was occupied by homeless sheltering out of rain drinking cheap coffee and eating donated food.
And do you know what? For half an hour there I felt a bit like one of them. Cold, wet, nowhere else to go.
But like I said before, I am nothing like them. I have the one thing they must yearn for the most – contact with people.
Think I might have also mentioned before how much like Wellington Oregon is. Rammed home when perusing the shelves of the charity bookstore at the library (2 brand new paperbacks for $2. Brand new! 2! $2!)
A voice appeared from yonder: “Hi, you’re the woman on the bus yesterday!”
Blow me down with a crystal wind chime but there was Barbara, one of the super nice passengers who helped me find my Airbnb.
She was super interested in my trip so of course I was super interested in telling her all about it.
Then it was another very wet, puddle-dodging hike to the much-anticipated Christmas markets.
Silly me. This is Eugene, Oregon. Not Andersonville, Chicago.
My visions of Nordic felt Christmas decorations, free samples of stollen and mulled wine and beautifully scented wreaths were sorely smashed.
Instead I got: rainbows, tarot readers, crystals, everything you could possible spin out of wool and carve out of wood, more bloody vegan food, tied-died everything and barefooted kids called Arrow getting in my way.
There were more beards there than Snow White and the 777 dwarfs.
I dunno if this lot were high (except that 8 year-old?) but it was like watching mini Woodstock.
Continuing my churches of the US mission, I checked out St Mary’s Episcopalian this morning. Well they might be the Anglican’s cousins but I think there might be a few ‘twice removeds’ in there.
Nothing like any Anglican service I’ve ever been to (yes I have been to more than the odd Christmas service).
I almost felt the Pope’s presence with all the kneeling, crossing chests, and up and down and up and down …
No way I was going to receive communion (gluten-free option available), having to kneel. Couldn’t even stand and sit without the aid of the surrounding pews.
Don’t think the visitor from Indiana next to me was very impressed when I didn’t sing the very solemn hymns. I said a special prayer for her though, being from Indiana.
Funny thing was, there was this family of 7 wholesome looking kids in Wholefoods this morning (yes I have been here twice in one day).
In between watching HGTV I was watching them. Bet they’re on their way to church, I cleverly thought. Seven kids? Sure bet.
Because who should be sitting 3 rows behind me at St Mary’s.
Almost asked the rector if he was married. Talk about a good-looking, super charming man. I struck up conversation with him at the coffee hour afterwards (spicy German apple cake – yum, yum, yum) by asking why Anglicans are called Episcopalians here.
Then felt really dumb (but not enough to stop flirting with him) when he pointed out the obvious.
Also chatted to Margaret and Lilian – bless her. When I told Lilian I was from NZ she said “Oh! My neighbour is from Australia! Do you know her? Rachel Hyde. H-y-d-e.”
I smiled and said “Of course. We went to school together” and scarpered out the door before she could ask for my email.
