Hungry

Hey guys. I know I haven’t updated in a week or so– my predominately sour mood has kept me from mustering up any kind of creativity. What’s so new about that, though? Pessimism is like a superpower for me sometimes.

The job has been pretty busy. It’s a full-time schedule, Tuesday through Saturday, with Sunday and Monday off obviously). Last week we did a ton of orientation required by Americorps, which basically included introductions to each other and to the program. We also learned about the history of Americorps, and the history of Our City Forest (the organization I work for in San Jose).

Thursday we did our first tree planting. We split off into groups and went to different locations, and were shown by Tree Amigos (trained volunteers) how to plant. It was pretty okay, though we were planting in some woman’s front yard and she wasn’t really happy about it (It was required by the city, and we were replacing a tree that had previously been cut down). The trees we primarily plant are 15-gallon ones, and are probably around 7 feet tall.

Friday we all went to a Press Conference where the mayor of SJ talked about his "Green Vision"–a plan to make SJ the greenest city in the world by 2022. It was also the opening of the first building that actually produced more energy than it used. All in all it was an interesting concept, and we met the mayor and City Council members, but it was really just a lot of talking and got boring after awhile (damn my short attention span!).

A reporter came by the Our City Forest office and we went outside and did a fake tree planting so he’d have some footage for the news that night. It was really just kindof silly, and we thought the police might get mad (we share a building with the police academy. My boss Rhonda likes this because police recruits can be seen working out every day).

Saturday we had a larger tree planting, with very, very minimal community involvement to start us out. We had a more formal demonstration, then had to break off into teams and plant our own trees. I was with this guy named Ian, which was pretty lucky for me because he’s quite handy with a pick-axe (which definitely comes in handy, because a lot of the soil we have encountered so far has been clay). He’s a nice guy (kindof like a "class clown"), but pretty much told me he came to this job as a last resort, heh. Oh, we were planting trees in a public park, by the way.. we planted 8 new ones that day.

After that we went to the tree bank and planted tiny little seedlings in the shade house… yeah, basically pine trees the size of little twigs. They’re cute, but it’s really weird to see how many roots they have at such a young age. Then we had to go to some community outreach event. It was basically like a small-town harvest festival, and we had to walk around for an hour or so. I didn’t like the "petting zoo"… it was really just animals that were on their way to the slaughterhouse wthout access to much shade. Near the cows, for instance, there was a chart outlining all of the cuts of meat that come from cows; near the bunnies there was a big sign that said "Rabbits used for: Pets, Fur, Food". Creepy?

Yesterday I pretty much did nothing with my time off… I spent a long time chatting online with mom and Renee, and talked to Paul a few times throughout the day. Oh, if any of you have AIM or Myspace IM you should let me know, and we can chat! I also watched Legally Blonde, and learned from Cosmo that you should pretty much be afraid wherever you go at any time. You can be abducted at the store, your house, near your house, walking anywhere, or doing anything! So keep your eyes open.

I ate 2 meals yesterday, which is pretty out of the ordinary for me. Truth is, I haven’t had any money for food and I’m really starting to feel it (both physically and mentally). Yesterday I managed to have spaghetti and vegetable soup though, which was pretty good. I woke up around 3am starving though, but managed to ignore it. I haven’t eaten yet today, but did manage to find some hot chocolate in my car (which quieted my stomach for about 2 hours). I know it’s not healthy, but I really don’t have much of a choice.

Anyway… today I need to move some of my stuff out of the first place, call my insurance company to see if they can push back my due date for my payment this month, and that’s about it. The work week starts again tomorrow, and it’ll be nice to have something to do.