Chebucto Regional Softball Club

@zacheverson.com

Oh good some financial news from a real reporter.

@cobalt123 @Bfordham @paulc @roytoo

A temperature controlled spot would be better.

@cobalt123 @Bfordham @paulc @roytoo

Is there a place in your building or neighborhood where you could put a box and invite people to do an informal mini-pantry?

@gwcoffey

The queen of my carpenter colony had a prime mate who was an ant.

@nev

This is a top quality stump. Any ant colonies in there? Stumps are great for finding ants.

@mlohbihler

It's like she has an army of defenders on here. I can never catch a break ever...

@fullyabstract

How dare the puppy do such a thing!

And this is how I end up petting and soothing the "poor cat" when she knocked my stuff over.

How foolish of me to have not made a better landing spot for her. When will I learn? It's horrible.

Pica just tried to jump up on the table but landed on an unstable pile of books knocking them over. She then looked at me and meowed in dismay in exactly the way I was about to yell at her for knocking my stuff over again.

She then marched off and is now sitting *next* to me, in a small furry huff. But, facing away from me as if was my fault.

@mathling

You were targeted by something like this? That sounds very annoying. How does the scam work?

@Bfordham @paulc @roytoo

If the giving part is important see if you can be the person who gets groceries for someone in your building or neighborhood who could use help with shopping.

I used to do this for a few people in our building and I kind of miss it and may see about getting back to it.

The social part is a little stressful but that is something I'm working on.

@JoBlakelyArt

I love her very full basket of corn and the peaceful expression on her face. This is a nourishing painting.

@MCDuncanLab @hakona

I mean, if it's such a good gig being on SNAP... then go get on it. Quit your job and go live the good life. What is stopping you exactly?

@paulc @roytoo

This is why I think it's important to try to accept donations of physical items even though it's not as efficient. It's an important experience for the *donors*

But when being a donor one can be aware of that, and grow.

But it's like when you cook something and bring it to a person who lost a loved one. That's not really for them. It might be for you.

@hakona @MCDuncanLab

Sometimes I think "that could never be me. My family could help me" but with the way things are going?

Imagine your whole support network is tapped out. You know you can't ask for help because they are dealing with similar problems to your own. Or you are the one who needs to help them. The strain spreads like hairline cracks until the whole foundation falls out.

Then someone looks at you sideways for having a coffee. "That's your problem, that fancy coffee."

@hakona @MCDuncanLab

So he hasn't told it around me anymore, but I think what can really bother people is there isn't much separating them at all from being in the same boat.

So you make up a story about how you are making good sensible choices and THAT's why you don't need to worry about SNAP, or the hours of the food pantry.

It's not just a mix of luck and circumstances. That would be terrifying wouldn't it?

@hakona @MCDuncanLab

I have an uncle who tells the same story from the 80s where he saw a woman from a family who he "knew" was on food stamps buying a bunch of steaks and ribs at the butcher. This story is so old that there still was a butcher in the little Pennsylvania small town.

"And I was standing there with my chicken." he'd go on all indignant.

Dude is on social security and a US steel pension and owns his house. A few years back I got sick of that story and said something.

@hakona @MCDuncanLab

It's easy to imagine other people, especially people that are often not talked about with much respect as if they are just frozen in amber. As if they aren't trying to do anything with their lives, build anything, make a better future.

It's a kind of mental trap.

And with the way the US does so little about poverty it would be much less upsetting if one could imagine most poor people as foolish and nothing like ourselves.

That couldn't ever be you, right?

@michael_w_busch @roytoo @mattbc

Worth thinking about for regular donations.

@MCDuncanLab

This kind of thing pisses me off so much.