Go Cali!

This is why I love California! Cutting edge ideas everywhere you turn. Why do people with HIV need to be beggars or recipients of just any old thing? Cause it shows how the world really feels about them. Go Cali, with your cutting edge, humanist compassion and loving approach...Who's next? Alabama you say? hmmmmm let's see about that. Read on peoples.......

Public Health & Education | New York Times Profiles California Organic Food Bank for HIV-Positive People


[Sep 26, 2006]


The New York Times on Tuesday profiled the Food for Thought Sonoma County AIDS Food Bank, a not-for-profit organic food bank and garden in Forestville, Calif., founded in 1999 to provide produce to HIV-positive people. About 450 HIV-positive people, including 60 women and 75 Latinos, regularly visit "what may well be the country's hippest food bank," the Times reports. "It's important that the people not just be passive recipients of care, to be conscious of what they put in their bodies," Allen Nishikawa -- an analyst at the Sonoma County, Calif., Department of Health Services -- said, adding, "It's part of a bigger movement to get people to be more thoughtful about things as basic as eating." Horticulturists from the Occidental Arts and Ecology Center help manage the garden, and many of the garden and food bank's volunteers are HIV-positive. According to the Times, the food bank -- which receives some federal funding but draws most of its budget from private donations -- "serves as horticultural therapy for the volunteers." Volunteer coordinator Stewart Scofield said, "You can't give away food without an emotional and spiritual component," adding, "We're friends and neighbors taking care of each other" (Brown, New York Times, 9/26).

A series of unfortunate events/Sunshine

So yes, I have been real slack with my blogging since I got to DC, but I'm in a new place with a ton of new and exciting responsibilities......hmmmm * actually that sounds like more of a reason to blog than a formidable excuse*...oh well....

Anyways, my new job is fabulous, filled with layer upon layer of reponsibility and challenge- my piece of pie. The domestic side, my life after work had not been feeling so good until recently. Primarily because of a few events that occured last week......I'll list them here......

1. Inability to find housing-and not just any housing but decent housing that doesn't cost $1500 bucks a month. *sheesh...you stanking city folks and this damn cost of living! Argggghhhh!

2. My minor accident in an unlikely location-I'll explain more in a paragraph or two.

*SideNote..These two are the same problems I had when I first moved to Ghana.Hmm, could I be the problem?..Highly unlikely.*

The photo of the car is from number two, so I guess I'd better explain that one first. In the city, there is the problem of highly congested traffic in the morning taking up all lanes of the street, even parking spaces. This often translates into "no parking sign" between 7 am and 9:30 am and then again from 4 till 6 or so. I haven't really had a problem jumping out of the bed and moving my car to a secure parking deck every morning, except this one day when uhhh well...you can see what happened.

After a short night of plum wine and short stories continuously interrupted with a buddy, I went to sleep dreaming of lillies and daisies....*translation..I was quite buzzed.*
Unfortunately, I slept through my wake up call and was startled awake by Tom Joyner's voice blasting through my hotel's $7 alarm clock radio. I jump up and realize it's shortly after 7 and I could have a nice towing bill to pay. I hustle to put on something decent( not see-through) and rush to move my car. I'm still maddddd drowsy ( thank you $7 plum wine)-*I'm noticing a pattern of 7s here...hmmmmm*
I'm sleepy and groggy as I move my car into the parking deck, slowing into a nice convenient parking spot. Until I realize its a handicapped space. I start to back up my vehicle, back, back , back to get into the unhandicapped space next to my current spot, back, back , back and right into the damn concrete column to my right. Damn thing just snuck up on me! Whiplash, my neck was stiff and my car smashed........ Of course, instantly I woke up then, fully abe to assess the damage. My trunk wont close now....shiteeeeeee...now I have to rig it with a shoelace or something else ghetto like that. Sob story number 1....

The bright side of this charade is that this may have been the beginning of an argument to support the sale of my whip. You don't really need a car in DC since metro trans is robust in most areas. I'm not saying I'm going to do it, but it might be a possibility.

The sunny side of my apartment search has also recently shown its rays. Originally, I thought I woud get the automatic boot from my hotel since I hadn't found place yet. But like I said my boss rocks and gave the go-ahead for an extension....Life rocks today and everyday...it's just about managing a smile when you're homeless and the wing on your car flies away........

Ahhh...the beauty in the little things...........smell it...smells good huh?