I have beer but I don't want any right now. I'm feeling icky.

I finally finished reading the Freegan article. Thing I don't get is...well, everything. These people are eating out of publically exposed dumpsters. Dear lord! I can't not see that as an act born out of base desperation. I just can't. I know there's too much wastage going on, but that's not a safe way to put a dent into it.

It weirds me out a lot.

I'm going climbing later, so no beer for me until afterwards. It's a good day for beer, though: sunny and warm.

I hit a clearance sale of this shop near the REI in Berkeley, and the clothes were mostly nice, lots of cotton and linen, but the sizing! I am a totally average-sized adult woman: I wear 8-10 in damn near everything. The shirt I bought from these people? Extra-small. WTF? The whole vanity sizing thing has gotten completely out of hand, because you can't tell from one manufacturer to another what size you're going to be. SO annoying.

The Freetarians freak me out, too. *shudder*

I think that most people who actually dumpster-dive will have some sort of safety rules, like they'll only take packaged things. That article mentioned several people who were taking produce or pre-made sandwiches or things like that, which weirded me out.

I can see the benefits of that sort of thing for things other than food. Freecycle things, pick up furniture from the curb at the end of the semester, Baltimore Book Thing, all great. But food is different.

(Baltimore Book Thing is seriously one of my favorite places ever. Free books! The summer I was working at Johns Hopkins, I was there every weekend. I'm so annoyed that the public transportation doesn't really work for getting there from DC.)

I knew two women who were sorta' freegan. One bragged about hitchhiking across the country and only spending about $2.30 for everything on the entire trip. Apparently shrubs on church grounds are good places to crash at night.

I've left books and furniture out to be taken, so that's no big deal--but for me the "to be taken" makes a difference, because it's not in with the garbage and the smells and the grossness.

Yeah, but even without an implied "to be taken," there's a pretty major difference for me between taking a chair out of a dumpster and taking a sandwich. Like the fact that you can clean the chair before you sit on it.

I just got back from a picnic with my office where we drank Pimm's Cups because we are theoretically British and apparently that's what we ought to be drinking. And it's the Queen's birthday on Monday. 2 other co-workers brought their kids, so Dylan had some company, but by the time we got home it was an hour past his bedtime and he was completely zonked. I would have skipped his bath except that he spent the last 20 minutes of the picnic picking all the grapes out of the fruit salad, so he kind of needed one.

I've taken furniture from the trash, but never actually out of a dumpster. It's gross enough putting things in a dumpster. I'm not taking anything out.

It's gross enough putting things in a dumpster. I'm not taking anything out.

I agree 100%. And to think of taking something I'm planning on ingesting out takes it to the beyond my comprehension category.