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No Bread Today started out as my "sanity journal," so I could keep a level head and a sense of humour throughout a personal financial crisis. Facing illness, unemployment, poverty (I ran out of money), and the terror of homelessness, I reached out for emotional support by blogging, and support came. No Bread Today has now evolved into something far beyond me. It is a haven and a resource for others in the same or similar circumstances. I will keep writing my own experiences with a chuckle, so enjoy the posts, but I have also added links to emergency resources and a list of places where you can get free meals and inexpensive groceries for low income residents on the Lower Mainland. As I uncover more resources, I'll keep listing them here (scroll down to page bottom to view) and on twitter. With the ecomony being what it is, sadly, there are many of us struggling. Hopefully, No Bread Today will a give you a hand-up. If anyone can add to these lists, please do. If you appreciate what you read here, please share this blog with others, because someone always knows someone, who knows SOMETHING that can make all the difference.

With profound gratitude to those who have been so amazingly supportive so far, and who have given so much of themselves - not out of guilt or any self-serving interest, but purely out of love, compassion and generosity. You are my inspiration. My intentions remain: I am not seeking financial assistance of any kind from this blog. I simply hope this becomes a story of triumph, for all who share it. I hope you laugh as hard as I do. I hope No Bread Today is as inspirational and empowering for you, as it is for me. I hope people will relate, inform, and chime in. I hope I can help you, in return. If this welcome message is the only thing you read, I ask only that if you are able, please donate to your local food bank. People are hurting right now and they need you. Thanks! ~ Jo Bless.

Thursday, January 21, 2010

Improvise, Adapt and Overcome ... I would have made a good Marine.

So a lady walks into an ABC Restaurant ... sounds like the opening of a joke, right?

Well, in a way, it is.

I was on my way to a scheduled meeting at a job placement agency, when I realized that I had forgotten my reading glasses at home. I truly can't see a thing without them, and I knew the agency was going to give me some online aptitude tests to complete, as my employment counsellor had told me last week. So what's a girl to do? I was on the bus. I couldn't turn back. The agency office is in a remote location, with no convenient mini mall or London Drugs nearby where I could pick up a cheap, extra pair. But ... there WAS an ABC restaurant close by. I figured the odds were good, so I walked in and asked, (note my lack of fibbing here), "Has anyone turned in a pair of reading glasses to your Lost & Found?" I assumed that since I have a tendency to forget my glasses is restaurants all the time, other people must be just as absent-minded.

Bingo!

"Yes indeed," the hostess replied, and promptly presented me with a pair which, miraculously, were almost the perfect prescription. I thanked her profusely. I arrived to my meeting on time with the "borrowed" glasses, and thanks to the specs, I completed all the online tests. An hour later, I returned the glasses to a baffled hostess. "They weren't mine after all," I said, "but thanks anyway. I hope no one came in to claim these in the past hour." No, she replied, "Only you."

It just goes to show you, no matter what you're up against, a little creative thinking and ingenuity can go a long way.

1 comment:

  1. and Bingo was his name-o. Now I have that sone stuck in my head. Thanks, Jo. LOL.

    ReplyDelete