Friday is grocery day. Which, as any islander knows, is a huge ordeal. Yes, there is a grocery store on the island, but not a typical one as one might picture. It’s the size of a large convenience store, and while it is convenient, it doesn’t carry a lot of the foods that I like to eat. AKA fresh, organic and, most importantly, local produce.
So I go to town. And bring my reusable bags. And prepare myself for what I call “The Slog”. I was talking about slogging to a mother I know from the island and her daughter asked “What’s a slog?” For all those who don’t know, it’s a tolling journey of when a miserable unequally distributed volume of weight on shoulders and wrists while walking and biking a decent distant through any kind of weather while trying carefully to not bruise all of the banana bunches.
The Slog, yes, one of my least favorite activities to endure each week, but one I mustn’t evade if I’m to eat. And let’s be honest. There are many more horrible things to do in the world than to carry groceries an inconvenient distance home. 😉
Besides groceries, I usually find a couple other things to do in town before food shopping to extend the trip and treat myself after finishing up a week of work. Yesterday was a fair-trade organic iced decaf coffee with soy milk and raw sugar crystals! Yum I really do love coffee, folks. But since I stopped drinking regular coffee, I can’t deal with the buzz it gives me! Incredible jitters. It’s really something… Quite unpleasant actually! So now I get decaf. Same great flavor, no buzz.
I also went book shopping to buy one of my best friends in the whole world a bible. She has been looking for meaning and something to put her faith into for some time now. She’s currently reading a book by Jefferson Bethke called Jesus > Religion about how churches have basically made loving Jesus into a money-making war-starting scheme and ignoring the whole idea: unconditional love and faith in God. Amazing book, check out Jeff’s stuff here. He’s also just come out with another book available for pre-order. Exciting!
Anyway, I went to a new books store and was shocked to find out that they didn’t carry bibles. I guess I shouldn’t have been so surprised since less and less families attend church or talk about Christ these days. This year is the 52nd year since mandatory bible readings have been outlawed in public schools. Another way of looking at that is up until 52 years ago, bibles were part of mandatory education! 1963… right in the heat of the hippie age is when bibles were outlawed. A connection there? Hmm… I will have to do a post on how the knowledge in the bible is a window to history.
So. No bible at book store one. Book store two I scored. I got an awesome waterproof bible for $20. It was pretty amusing to find a waterproof bible. I later looked them up online and found out that these bibles are used in the army. An indestructible book. Here’s a picture of a waterproof bible. It would be great for backpacking too!!
I told the guy working at the store that it was for a friend doing work with Fish & Game electro-shocking fish as a way of controlling invasive species. The guy responded that “oh yes, those invasive species… must’ve come from too many kids flushing their dead goldfish down the toilets!!” …
whut. Haha I thought he was pulling my leg for sure. He said that when a goldfish gets “too big” or “starts dying” and people flush them down their toilets, the fish make their way into the river systems and mess with the eco-systems. I smiled and nodded and took my book and peaced. Well I looked up the fish thing when I got home and sure enough, it is illegal to flush fish down the toilet. But for disease purposes, not for breeding colonies of unwanted alpha-fish. So the guy was onto something.
Strange conversation though. Did get the bible! And the coffee. And the groceries! The slog actually wasn’t too bad yesterday either… Probably because I opted out of the 12-lb watermelon like usual… 🙂
Thanks for reading! <3