(another post inspired by another blogger… vegan activist asked about my other bike trailer, which i mentioned in a recent post where i showed off the new one we got for taking the puppy on road trips, so here’s way more than anyone ever really wanted to know about it!)
this is my bike trailer, full of groceries and resting on its lower edge:
here’s another view, now resting on its hitch:
(as an aside, i must say that the hardest part of this post is showing y’all pics of my groceries, cuz i’m the sort of asshole who judges people based on what food they buy so i tend to expect the same from others… actually, that would be a really good sort of behavioural-modification exercise for me, if i posted photos of all my groceries… not so exciting for the viewer, but a chance for me to get the fuck over my issues)
i bought this trailer for $50 at a consignment shop seven years ago. the guy was asking $65, i asked if they had a student discount, and he said he’d give it to me for the lower price if i paid cash. done! since then, it has been used for countless food not bombs servings, dumpster diving missions, and house moves. it has carried individual large humans in a completely sketchy sort of way, and on several occasions, one or two small ones, nicely secured and contained.
i love this trailer because it is rugged: as you can probably tell, i almost always store it outdoors, but the only damage is some superficial rust. though it does not fold up like other trailers, it has a narrow profile when sitting upright (see first photo) and can be leaned against a wall. the wheels are quite large, allowing it to easily ascend bumps and curves. i added the metal hooks around the sides and bottom edge, so that multiple bungee cords (or old inner tubes!) can be used to strap in a big load. like all two-wheeled trailers, it has a tendency to flip if one wheel hits a bump, particularly at high speeds when there’s little weight in the trailer, but this can be avoided by careful riding.
the hitch goes around the bike’s seat post. originally, there were just two carriage bolts held on by wing nuts, in front and behind the seat post, but this rattled quite a bit and damaged the metal. i found the kevlar hitch in a random bin at the community bike shop, and replaced the front carriage bolt with the linchpin, simultaneously securing the metal outer ring and the kevlar inner band. i like it because there’s so few parts that there’s very little that can go wrong. also, the long shafts make the trailer very convenient to use as a wheelbarrow or hand cart, because seat post level is around hand level so it’s comfortable to pull/push the trailer to the grocery store like we did this morning.
i don’t like the fact that a child (or dog!) riding in this trailer faces backwards, but at least the solid plastic offers more protection than the tent-style trailers… better for a kid than a puppy. however, there’s nothing to shelter a passenger from wind or rain! with mo being so bloody cold all the time anyway, i think any attempt to get him to ride in this open-style cart would have him hating all bike trailers, which is why we’re happy to have gotten the other one for him.
luckily, he was happy to act as a model for this last pic: as shown above, the molded seats are quite good for holding boxes.
i don’t know if i’d ever take this trailer on a trip, though i’ve seen photos of the same one in the road trip section of a bike book… the cyclist had even strapped a whole extra wheel across the underside of the trailer’s hull! it’s not particularly aerodynamic, and must be packed carefully to avoid having too much weight resting at the lower edge, which causes the hitch to slam up against the bottom of the bike seat. also, it collects water, and requires a cover that can pull tight around the edges and some drainage holes.
however! as an all-purpose, haul-everything, so-worthwhile-it’s-practically-paying-ME-every-time-i-use-it sort of a tool, this is pretty much the best $50 i’ve ever spent.
still waiting on word regarding puppy. am kicking self for getting into this sort of situation with a sweet but flaky hippy-type, aka the owner of the poppa dog… i probably shoulda known that “yes, four of these puppies are looking for homes, i’d love you to choose one!” actually meant something more along the lines of “well, i think you’re nice and i’d like you to have a puppy so i’ll offer you one even though i haven’t got any sort of arrangement with the person who is taking care of them and she may also be offering the same puppies to other people at this very moment in time”.
le sigh.
still packing, moving on monday. oats and i took apart the gorgeous phonograph/radio cabinet, or rather, gutted it: the innards were gladly received by a local shop that restores antique radios, though not before i took some photos of them (see new header image!). the cabinet itself is now light enough that i can actually lift one side of it, which is to say that it’s still one heavy fucking piece of solid wood furniture. we’re thinking of installing small speakers inside it, and a video projector, as a modern take on the entertainment unit that it once was back in the day.
still rocking it in the classroom: am at the top of my cohort, and feeling rather proud. tomorrow i’m meeting with a representative of a program that provides support to women studying trades, and i hope to be able to use their resources to leverage a job for the new year. that’s one thing my cleverness can’t help with: most of my classmates seem to have electricians in their families or social circles, and so will be getting an inside scoop on employment. me? nada… some friends have offered an introduction to a sailing friend of theirs, who is an electrician at the dockyards (which would be a great place to work!), but i’ve yet to actually meet an electrician and chat them up about job opportunities. it’s a hurdle, but i’m trying to figure out how to get around it.
it’s occurred to me that a lot of other people don’t neglect their blogs when they’re canning – in fact, they actually blog about it. so, here’s what’s going on: i love putting up food in jars, grew up learning it from my family, and began doing it on my own a few years ago.
this harvest season, having just returned from traveling, i found myself with a hell of a lot more time than money. so, i put ads on the local online classifieds, offering to turn local produce into jam/jelly/chutney/whatever in exchange for a share in it. to say this scheme worked is an understatement: i quickly took down the ads, because i connected with two excellent clients who could each provide me with as much produce as i’d have time to stuff into jars.
one client works at a farm, and has been clearing out last year’s stuff from her freezers to make room for the new crop: among other things, she had a couple hundred pounds of green tomatoes, and i’ve become very practiced at turning out green tomato salsa.
the other client runs a market garden and agri-therapy program for kids with disabilities and adults who’ve survived brain injuries. they need to make sure that their produce doesn’t rot if they can’t sell it all once, and they also like specialty products for selling at their market stall. considering that i’m no commercial canner, i’m not sure how legal this is, but hey: they like my jam, and they’ve declared themselves liable for it! so far all i’ve done for them is blackberry jam, but there should be a boom in a couple weeks as the tomato crops come in full force.
between these two good folks, plus the donations of my friends, and the efforts of my fruit-scavenging lover, i’ve got more home-canned goods than i’ve ever had in my entire life. i’m not sure if it’ll get us through the winter without buying imported/cold-stored fruit, but at least we won’t need to buy salsa any time soon.
this is my Thekla steam juice extractor - It actually isn't that great for blackberries, and I'd never do that again, but it's absolutely RAD for extracting grape juice. i picked it up for $14 at a thrift store last summer on my birthday - a great gift to myself
Filed under: Bike Geek, Co-operator, Homebody, Music Lover, Romantic, Scavenger, Traveler
oats gave me an early birthday present!
it’s a reproduction antique compass in a brass pocket-watch-style case, and i LOVE it. i didn’t own a compass before this… which is odd, considering how important it is to my mental health for me to know my bearings. now i’ll always know what direction i’m heading, and have a something beautiful to look at whenever i’m fretting.
last night we went for a long stroll after dinner, down through the side streets to the ocean. right after we turned homewards, we came across an absolutely incredible piece of furniture at the curb. a quick discussion ensued, made urgent by the encroaching darkness and another passerby eager to check it out if we decided to pass.
the thing is, oats and i are suckers for anything made from solid wood, and we both love the lines of (most) old furniture. aside from that, we’ve been talking about diversifying our income by turning our scavenging into a more lucrative hobby, by selling the pieces that we refinish.
so, i stayed behind to guard our new treasure, and oats took off to find a co-op car. hooray for the car share: the closest vehicle was available, and it just happened to be a minivan! i’ll skip the drama of us trying to load, and simply tell you that i couldn’t even lift one side of this thing. we got it up to our 2nd story apartment by taking advantage of the kindness of burly macho men from downstairs who seemed pleased to work for a 12-pack of sleem@n’s.
and now! behold!
it’s true: we don’t actually need an RCA Victor Magic Voice combination phonograph and radio cabinet from around the 1940s. but it’s so gorgeous, and we got it for the price of some beer and a car booking (totalling ~$31, in case you were wondering). my original thought was that we’d gut it, refinish the wood, and use it as a sideboard with storage underneath… perhaps making the speaker section into a glass-doored display shelf lit from above. however, at the urging of the burly macho men downstairs, that thought is on hold as we try to suss out some more information about the piece. maybe it’d be smarter of us to restore it to working condition? we already have a functional and sexy record/radio cabinet, though very different from this one: it’s more 1960s, but still solid wood, with a low profile, modern lines, and metal legs. personally, i’d rather turn the Magic Voice into something that suits my more immediate need for attractive storage space.
or… sell it? the old sticker on the back says $445 (8th photo from top of series), but who knows what the value is these days. of course, any real value is dependent on what a person might actually pay, which is conditional on a few other factors that aren’t really in our favour: the economy’s crappy, we live on an island, and this thing weighs a ton so is hell to move. also, i like it, and i’m not desperate for cash at the moment. i think my minimum selling price would be $500, because that’d pay for oats and i to each put together a touring bike (using my stash of cherry components, a couple 2nd hand frames, and some new parts too). otherwise, i think i’d rather keep it.
all round, my birthday’s looking pretty great.
**********
i’m having a bday bbq this upcoming tuesday! it’s at oats’ place (now mine as well), above the square! 5 pm onwards! there’ll be sangria and mojitos and sausages! also, veggie stuff! also, cake! please come!
by the time i left back in april, i’d found loving homes for three of my bicycles, leaving only my fixie, duncan (who is too dear to my heart for me to give away).
i’ve been home for 8 days now, and already the cycle (ha!) has begun again: i found this raleigh frame on the side of the road during a brief walk to the store for dish soap. the paint job’s crap, but the metal appears to be sound… and really, i couldn’t just leave it there.
- under the cover of darkness, walk down the block and around the corner to the parking lot outside the dentist office, and sidle up to the orange tree by the west wall. occasionally looking over your shoulder to ensure that the receptionist is still safely behind the desk inside the building, fill a bag with as many oranges as you can easily grab without a ladder.*
- once home, rinse oranges, dry, and arrange nicely in a bowl.
- preheat oven to 350 degrees.
- in a large bowl, combine 1 cup sugar, 1 cup flour, 1/4 cup cocoa, 1/4 cup ground almonds (failing that, go with 1/2 cup more flour), 1 pinch of salt, 1 teaspoon baking soda, and the zest of the two oranges that you accidentally gouged badly while picking from the tree. (note: these are pretty small oranges… i might use only one, if we were talking about big navel oranges)
- juice those two de-zested oranges into a measuring cup, and add 1 teaspoon vanilla, and 1/3 cup veggie oil, then fill with warm water to the 1 cup mark and stir with a fork.
- line a muffing tin with paper cupcake liners. or don’t. whatever.
- pour the liquid mix into the dry stuff in the bowl, and thoroughly combine with as few strokes as possible.
- divide batter equally in muffin tin, and bake for ~15 minutes or until a knife inserted into a centrally-located cupcake comes out clean. enjoy!
if you want icing, i should first tell you that my recipe for this is much less exact, and requires some willingness to fuck up. if you’re okay with that: in a food processor, whip together ~1/4 cup margerine, ~1/4 cup “better than cream cheese” spread (or you could use… *gasp* actual cream cheese!) and the zest of one tiny orange until smooth. a little at a time, add ~1 and 1/2 cups icing sugar. if it’s too thick, try adding a little bit of orange juice. vanilla is nice too. remember to let your cupcakes cool completely before icing them, or you’ll end up with puddles.
i’m flying home to canada in 3 days. also, i landed an interview for that rad job i want. combine those two facts with some sweet tender cupcakes, and all the melancholy that was weighing on me earlier this afternoon is successfully being chased away.
*my roommates and i have been watching this tree for weeks, and no one’s picking it: the fruit is beginning to fall off and rot, which is a crying shame!
Filed under: Anarchist, Artist, Homebody, Scavenger, Student, Traveler, Worker
i didn’t get the 35-hour-per-week job. this annoys me, because my qualifications should have at least earned me a spot on the shortlist. however, aside from that, i’m feeling good about it, because there are so many other things i’d rather be doing than giving a large amount of energy to someone else’s project. though i believe in the overall aim of that specific organization, i don’t think i’d have felt satisfied by the role i’d have had to play. all the freedom of my last job spoiled me, even as it drove me a bit crazy.
with some of my own plans in mind, as well as the general idea that i’d be more employable in the sort of flexible contracts that suit me best, i’m considering taking a bookkeeping course at the college in the fall. this is also because i’m realizing that i’d do better if i stopped ignoring my interest in money, and instead try to harness it for useful things. all those years of knee-jerk anarchism have made me reluctant to understand the reality of capitalism, even as they’ve made me very confident in my DIY pride and belief that you don’t have to fuck others over to survive. i have this idea that i can hold true to the anarchism that anchors me, as long as i don’t try to hide my struggles with ethics, how our economic system works, and my place in it. or maybe that’s me trying to validate myself; i don’t know right now. but i’m okay with that.
i’m also a tightwad. had i mentioned this yet? fanciful sojourns in the southern hemisphere to the contrary, i’m all about pinching pennies… which is why i was thrilled to pick up this book at a vinnie’s today!
it was written in 1966, but seems appropriate for these financial times. i’m two-thirds of the way through it so far, and it’s a pretty good mix of common sense, interesting ideas, utter pretentiousness, outdated advice, and totally fucked-up sexist bullshit, with a good dash of class/race/queer ignorance thrown in for fun.
no, i will not rent out my spare room to a single working mother in exchange for her cooking my meals when she gets home from work every evening.
yes, i will research factory stores if i ever need to buy a… huh… well, something that’s made in a factory and that i might want to have new instead of secondhand. i can’t think of what that might be, but there’s probably something. toothpaste?
i have another obsession as of late, aside from being cheap and mocking everything. it developed when oats and i were in queensland, because though we’re not your typical shopoholics, we both love the chance beauty and good deals of the small town thrift store. somehow, i ended up getting overly fond of small tablecloths and silk scarves printed with commemorative australiana of one variety or another. you know: koalas… or a map of the northern territory… or common birds/wildflowers. though i suppose i like most retro kitsch, i hate filling my house with crap, so rarely buy it. there’s something about these pieces of fabric, though: they’re so well-made, and yet tacky, that i find them unbearably appealing…. especially cuz they’re usually $1 or less. oats was good enough to take my new collection home with her when she returned to canada on friday, creating more space in my own bag. i’m not aiming to fill it, but i have picked up three more pieces.
to be fair, this isn’t like my collection of bad nautical art (i <3 embroidered ships and seagulls, in plastic frames!), with which i intend to decorate my bathroom until the end of days. for these tableclothes and scarves, my plan is to sew cushion-covers and/or picnic blankets, some of which i’ll be able to sell or give away as gifts. if enough people like them, i might even try to do a craft fair or maybe etsy. i don’t really want a full-blown business, but it’d be nice to cover costs for the stuff i make for myself.
rings for two-part canning jar lids: the discards after a long session of sorting through my collection.
that is all.
- 30 -
i remember when playing a video game meant pong or a text-based james bond mission.
i learned how to make mix tapes at the age of 7, and recorded most of my music from the radio onto cassettes.
i grew up using dos prompt commands to run computers.
when i did photos for my high school year book, i used 35mm film, mixed chemicals to process it, and spent hours inhaling fumes in the dark room.
i sew with a cast-iron 1941 electric flywheel singer machine. i ride a single-speed steel bicycle with cork handlebar grips and a coaster brake. i’d rather salvage solid wood furniture than have anything made of particle board. i like leather, wool, copper, ceramic, linen, tin, paper and a good façade of old-fashionedness. i like things i can make, things i can fix, and things that will last. call it steampunk, call it neonostalgia, but i’m thrilled by the power of wifi internet, cellular phones, and tiny digital storage because it means that i can easily hide away all electronics and wires. if i can’t have an old thing, i’m happy with a new thing that effectively captures the appeal of the old.
which is why i’m so charmed by poladroid. i never had a polaroid camera, but a lot of my friends did, and they played a large enough role in my youth that i find comfort in the familiarity of odd hues, dark vignette effects, slight blurriness, and fingerprints. now i can recapture that aesthetic by transforming my photos with free and easy software! there’s even appropriate sound effects. sometimes, it’s the little things.
Filed under: Animal Lover, Artist, Critic, Friend, Music Lover, Punk, Radio Star, Scavenger
since em commented on my last post that all i show you are “teaser” photos, i thought i’d let you in on what you’re missing, with a nice zoomed-out shot: look! gamin is helping me with my sewing project!
mmmm, cat @ss…
i didn’t make the quilt: i just repaired it for a friend because the panels were coming apart. of course, once i had it in pieces, i decided to replace the cotton lining with some batting that i had laying around… i’ve *got* to use up all these art supplies, cuz i can’t bear to think of packing them up yet *again*.
with that in mind, i’m going through the clothes as well as the fabric and doing what i can. a dorky long skirt (100% wool, lined, only $12 @ value pillage in toronto! even my stepmom was impressed, and she’s totally creeped-out by secondhand clothes!) became a totally kickass short skirt, plus… this belated solstice gift for my bff –>
teh skillz, i haz dem.
while sewing, i usually watch/listen to bad teevee: i’ve just started into buffy. should i bother telling you how offended i am? the sexism, the uniform whiteness, the f*cked up cultural representations? no, you’ve heard it before. to think, all these years i thought i was missing out, and now i’m glad i skipped it the first time ’round.
critical analysis aside, what really bugs me is the music. was cool music in the 90s really that bad? last week my buddy c interviewed me on his radio show about what music has influenced me, and i said that it was my cheapness that had me first listening to old punk bands like the clash, because i could get their albums from the library or thrift stores. now i’m reconsidering this concept, because the music on buffy is so tedious and yet so familiar: it’s no wonder i got into punk.
