I know, I know—yet again, I haven’t posted in a while, and yet again, I am mentioning that fact. Unfortunately, I don’t have much to say today. That’s not to say I don’t have anything on my mind. I’ve actually been inspired to write more lately—and read, and go for walks, and eat, and all the other things I’ve been meaning to do, but just haven’t had a chance to do. In fact, I am preparing a rather lengthy, albeit personal, essay of sorts that I plan to post here; unfortunately, it’s still in its infancy (yes, I occasionally go so far as to write drafts before I post them here—I used to be an aspiring writer, after all), so I won’t be posting it until at least tomorrow, and maybe not for a while. Maybe not ever. Who knows? My writing discipline, as well as my thought processes, are chaotic at best, absent at worst.

So, in lieu of anything of substance, I present to you a few observations I made while working today:

1. Nantucket Nectars bottles are perfect for storing water. I ran out of liquids about a week ago and haven’t had time to go to the store for more; suffice it to say I’ve been pretty parched since then. While strolling around town, I stopped in at the Cherry Alley Café (née Café Latte) and bought a bottle of Nantucket Nectars juice, which I had been craving for a few days, but which The Bison has not been stocking well lately. After finishing the juice, I realized that the bottle was perfect for storing water in my fridge. Firstly, it’s a perfect size and shape. It’s also glass, which I prefer over plastic because a) glass can be recycled better than plastic (should I ever want to dispose of it), b) glass is a better insulator than plastic, and c) glass doesn’t leech dangerous chemicals into my stored water over time. I stripped the label off the bottle and washed it out thoroughly, and now plan on using it as my primary water bottle.

   On a related note, I’ve decided to try to boycott any liquids that don’t come in glass containers (sans liquids like milk, which have almost no hope of shipping in anything but plastic), simply because glass is more easily recycled. Glass bottles can be made into new glass bottles; unfortunately, plastic bottles are rarely made into new plastic bottles, because a) recycled plastic costs about the same as “virgin” plastic, and b) the recycling process degrades plastic in such a way that recycled plastic is generally shredded or pelletized and used as filling. That’s better than using new plastic as filler, but not much better.

2. “I fucking love you.” Many people of my generation use this expression around friends, but it really grates on my ears. It’s not the profanity that annoys me; anyone who knows me will assert that when I’m not using “fucking” to elevate the greatness of a noun (e.g., “That’s really fucking great!”), I’m probably asking, “What the fuck?” No, it’s really the dichotomy of the two words, “fucking” and “love”. They simply don’t go together. “Fucking” conjures up images of a crude act; “love”, on the other hand, gives the notion of a pure, abstract form of true passion. The two words mix together like oil and water.

3. I got an omen today in the form of a purple gumball. Outside of The Bison, there’s a machine that sells gumballs for 25¢; I think it was put there by some charity or another, but whatever. I frequently buy gumballs from it. My least favorite gumball color is yellow; my favorite is purple. Lately, I’ve been getting a string of yellows. Today I naturally hoped for a purple—and got it.

   I think it’s a sign. There’s a certain action I’ve been planning to take (one I might bring up again at a later date), and I think this gumball is a sign telling me to strike while the iron’s hot.

   (One might allege that the dispensing of the purple gumball was purely random, but that’s only true if there was an equal distribution of all gumball colors in the machine, now isn’t it?)