RANT

"i'm not trying to meddle, but you might wanna cool it with the coffee, there guy."

Some days at work when I am forced to interact with some of the people at work, I feel like shouting DAYS OF THUNDER!

Those three words just came to mind, this morning, at 9am, when I was having yet another conversation, if you could even call it that, about Tim Horton's coffee. Tim Horton's should be registered as a gang slogan! In this building if you mess with a persons morning cup of Tim's you are persecuted and lectured till you turn blue!

I don't even think Tim Horton's heartburn brew should even be allowed to call itself Coffee based on the composition of its mass consisting of, just guessing, less than 50% actual coffee beans.

But besides that, this morning I had a run-in with a senior member of the staff who I had to treat like a five year old having a temper tantrum, because of TIM HORTON'S COFFEE. This guy could fire me on the spot, but if he thought that was going to stop me from telling him "This is nothing to get angry about" he was mistaken.

I love telling people who are angry that I know they are angry and they can kiss my ass, in not so many words, of course. But this guy was spouting off the most stereotypical 'angry dad' voice I have ever heard all because the staff coffee fund isn't always stocked and it's too much work for him to restock it and I should be making sure that he gets his morning coffee without a hitch.

Even though it has NOTHING TO DO WITH ME and I don't even participate in the staff run coffee fund. I just happen to be at the front desk -where I work!. I believe there was even the line " I have spent more time on this coffee stuff, in the last two weeks than I have on my own work!" Well that says alot champ! Thanks for the perspective into how important you are to this company!

My main point.....

I think it is inexcusable that some people in the working world believe that when they step into their workplace they think that being polite, having common sense, common courtesy, and having a conscious don't apply. Being given a position of power in a company does not give you the right to raise your voice to another employee or talk own to them, for any reason, ESPECIALLY over a cup of lousy- cheap -dull- brown- liquid, masquerading as coffee.

I may be on the lower end of the corporate ladder, where, if I compared it to a pool ladder I would be one of the steps under water. So i'm low on that ladder, but I don't kiss any ass or let anyone get away with talking crap to me.... lets hope I have a job next week!

Get a grip people, if you can't be decent, stay home!

Kung Fu Fighting!

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Twenty Five Bones

I am 25!

Today signals the passing of a generation and the beginning of a new generation.

I call it Generation try-not-to-start-acting-like-an-old-person.

Now I want to explain, that by "Old Person" I am not talking about age! I am talking about those people who lose all memory of what it is like to be a kid. I think once you turn 25, you're at risk!

(Before you are twenty five there is no risk because you are a kid! Everyone knows it! Your parents still let you do laundry at their house, shit, you may even still live at home! But once you cross that 25 mark, I think generationally you are in a whole new file folder. The "Get your shit together" file, or The " You should know this already" file. Luckily I have already had files for years, labelled "Credit card, Student loan, utility bills", etc. so I am a little bit ahead of the game!)

I've been using this term "Old People" for a while now, and I do find that people get offended by it, but it can only be offensive if it is misunderstood, or if that person already thinks that they are an "Old Person" and doesn't like the idea of my talking about them in a negative way. Which makes sense, but I won't stop using the term, because in my mind, it makes sense.

Old people are the ones who don't crack a smile when a little kid pulls an orange out of the pile in the produce section, only to send all the other oranges cascading into the isle. Its a lesson in gravity and geometry, and the world is teaching it!

Old people are just people who have lost their child like wonder, and I think the world could use more people with child-like wonder, and less impatient old people.

Stay young at heart!

The path of a vegetarian

Sometimes it's hard to be a Vegetarian. "What in Gods name is that?" is a frequent comment in my workplace lunch room. "Sorry but God didn't make this, it's tofu, so suck it up princess!" would be a great come back to that small minded comment, but I hold back and let them know "It's tofu"

There are generational divides where I work, and everywhere else, between people raised to eat whatever they were fortunate enough to have, people who have always had an endless supply of food, and people who have chosen carefully what they put into their bodies.

If the list of heated topics to steer clear from is "Sex, Religion and Politics" you would think I'd be in the clear to bring up the latest BEEF RECALL headline in the news, or TAINTED MILK SCARE headline, but you would be wrong.

Talking about Food having a negative effect on the world is incredibly heated!

Why is it so heated you ask?

Bottom line...

Most People just don't like to think about it and I put it in their face.

They like living in a world where everything is OK. There are too many other things to worry about, bills, gas prices.... Maybe the only thing that keeps them sane is that box of Hamburger helper they can eat with a smile.

Food, to so many people, is VOID when it comes to the Environment. Food production isn't ruining the environment, how crazy is that! No, food is good and pure and it nurtures you... it is the essence of all that is good in the world.

Yes and No

Food is my life. I will admit it. I think about it as much as I breath. I spend hundreds of dollars a month keeping my fridge stocked and my belly full. But I pride myself in the CHOICES I make towards both the food I eat and the food I serve to my friends.

Forget diets and fads, I am not even talking about food in a sense of Calories. That is a topic for another huge post, I am simply talking about Food in a sense of being environmentally conscious.

Food production across the world, is having a detrimental effect on all aspects of the environment. We are even changing the genetic make-up of plants to suit our mouth-stuffing needs. Even with all the food we are making, it still isn't reaching all the hungry mouths before it rots in the warehouses of the Big Food Industry. So its not like we can brag that food production is keeping the world well fed, it isn't! The environmental downfall is not worth it, so Industrialized Food production has no excuses to back up its devastation.

All the true farmers, who listen to their plants and know how to work the land hand-in-hand with the environment are going to all disappear. Leaving Monsanto and oil to feed us. We must support the organic farmers and local farmers, the small food production companies who don't sacrifice the environment to squeeze out a few more crackers.

It's all about choice! In a world where everyone is supposed to be accepting of people 'choices', making a choice to not eat meat and dairy is like lighting off a bomb at the lunch table. You are a terrorist, you are wrong, wrong, wrong! No one has a problem making fun of you for it, telling you how much you don't know... oh the list goes on.

I think almost all of my friends are meat eaters, as was I just a few months ago, until I felt a turn inside me. On my long path to being as light on the earth as I can, I am gradually feeling things I never felt before, like pain inside my heart when I think of animals being bread and farmed for me to eat. It just stopped feeling right, so I stopped buying into it.

I am not sickened by my friends bacon on their breakfast sandwich, it smells good. I am not angry with myself for liking the smell of bacon, what would that do? Nothing. I am simply choosing not to eat it.

Those who ride a bike to work for environmental reasons, are they persecuted by the car drivers? Do they think the bicycler believes they are better than everyone else? Doesn't that seem ridiculous? Then why is it such common practice to look on a vegetarians meal and furl your eyebrows with disdain.

I don't preach my choices, I have just simply made them. I feel good about my choice. My vegetarian lifestyle requires me to learn more about what my body needs to work strong and stay healthy. I nourish my body and soul with the choices I make.

Choice is the one thing you make on your own.

Summer

Coltrane

Every day when I get home from work,this little guy is meowing behind the door, having no patience for my jingling keys to fit into the lock and release him into the garden he has been watching all day.

Coltrane loves the courtyard. He is an indoor cat, only because of the positioning of our apartment building between too many roads and apartment buildings. So after screwing a couple BBQ grates to the fence, blocking off all the escape routes (that's ghetto, i know) we can let Coltrane roam freely in the courtyard.

He knows where his little Cat Nip plant is, and he monitors its progress daily. By that, I mean, I feed him a leaf and he repeatedly tries to get the rest!

Yucca plant

This is a Yucca plant my neighbour pulled out of his front flower bed, and handed over the fence to me, to add some vegetation to my patio area. It didn't look so good, but I watered it daily with hope that it would pull itself alive again. Again nature proved its strength and after cleaning up the dead spikes and giving it some fresh soil, it has begun to sprout new spikes, and has become one of my favourite parts of the patio. It was a lesson for me, to never give up on a plant, because it may surprise me.

Scarlett Runner Bean

This one bloom is about 6 feet off the ground, just enough to keep it out of the hungry mouths of carpenter ants. Which was the fate of the last few blooms. I started this plant from seeds in my living room, while the frost was still fresh outside. So I feel a great connection to how fantastic it has become. Plus, look at that colour!

Zucchini Flower

This is the first time I have ever grown a squash plant and I think I might have 10 next summer! I love these blooms! Not only to look at, but I have heard that it is very delicious to batter and fry them! This summer I only have 4 plants, and am looking forward to eating zucchini until I start looking like one, so I don't want to pick any blooms for frying.