This evening, in search of adventure, and wanting to further my still-very-beginnerish urban survival skills, I made a stop at a dumpster in a location I had scouted this morning as I biked over: Vitamin Cottage. It's a little store that has lots of new age style herbs, vitamins, oils, and organic produce. My mom likes to shop there. Did I mention organic produce?

Thankfully, when I returned this evening, the parking lot was completely vacant. I'm still quite skittish at the idea of jumping into the dumpster when there might be people around watching, and there were all sorts of them running around in the middle of the morning. But at night... Ah, vacant bliss!

I parked my bike right up next to it, tried reaching over the edge from outside, but wasn't able to get at much from there. There were just a few big white trash bags, and a lot of empty cardboard boxes. I climbed all the way in so I could peruse more thoroughly.

I examined one of the heavier bags, and was going to try to untie it and open it neatly, but it was so full that it broke open before I could. (I was reminded of a few occassions back in the King Soopers deli featuring too-full trash bags, many of which contained edible food along with gooey chicken liquid. The worst thing that can happen is for them to bust open when you're trying to carry them across the floor. Those were the days that I shall not miss.)

Inside, I found massive piles of... lettuce, cabbage, lettuce, celery stocks, and more lettuce. Large, unblemished leaves. Most of it didn't even have any dirt on it. Guess what's for dinner tonight!

I dug through the piles of lettuce, hoping to find a little more variety. I did manage to find a couple pieces of fruit, but not nearly as much as I might have liked. I filled a smaller shopping bag -- also obtained from the dumpster -- with mostly lettuce, along with one apple and one orange. I hunted for more, but not much seemed to be forthcoming.

I just ate the orange, and damn was it delicous. Far better than the typical. I wish I could have found more of them.

I'm eating the apple now, and it is also excellent, although a bit bruised one one side.

Methinks I might have to start doing my real produce shopping there, for those days when I'm not feeling ambitious enough to dumpster dive.

The lettuce is pretty good too, although honestly, I think I took a bit more than I can really use. There was so much of it that even when I only grabbed what seemed like a small amount, it ended up being a fairly massive pile.

I feel like a house-bred kitten that is learning, little by little, how to survive in the wild. I don't think I'm anywhere near the point of mastering it yet; maybe I never will be. Can a pet that's lived in a cage all its life really truly learn to live in the jungle, or is it only capable of taking little day-long trips, ready to ride back home in the car after its day outside is over?

I admire people like Ran Prieur and the anonymous author of Evasion. Will I ever reach their levels of advancement? (If that's even the right word.) I don't know, and I'm not even sure whether I want to. Maybe my life's path leads in a different direction. In any case, I'm enjoying teaching myself a little of this stuff.

Now I think I'll make a little salad.