saling, saling

Hey gang;
Sorry for the absence, but seeing as I recently discovered that most of you hadn't read any posts on the blog, I figure I'd give y'all time to catch up. Here's a post that is about a month old that didn't get published due to lack of photos at the time.

One of Whitehorse’s best-kept secrets, or maybe not but I’m just finding out about it, is its garage sale culture. Every Friday there is a listing of all garage sales in the local paper which is organized by neighbourhood. From there, you can load your phone book with all its neighbourhood maps into your Subaru (everyone here drives a Subaru), and try to beat the other avid garage salers to the listed addresses. Robin, one of my welcome-to-Whitehorse hosts is a veteran saler, and has an efficient and professional approach to it all. He is in the car and off to the first garage sale a half an hour before the morning officially starts, allowing time for navigation and early bird luckiness. In my short time here I have acquired some of the most amazing material possessions I have ever had, outside of the 3D egg puzzle I had in grade six which I willed to my nearest and dearest friend at the time, now forgotten in the annals of my history (egg, friend, etc). I am now the proud owner of a very well-loved ingenious plastic scale that is hard to describe but accurately summed up as a marvel of German engineering ingenuity, a pair of sunflower-festooned gumboots the envy of anyone who has ever had any pretensions to gardening,

a Bordeaux-coloured vinyl Bolshevik travelbag from Soviet Airlines,

a $10 5-speed bike that I swear has miracle powers because it can carry me up 2-Mile Hill and then some, a toque lovingly hand-knit with tasteful hearts, etc etc. For everything I have, there are at least 4 things I had to leave behind, as I am, well, homeless at the moment. Yet another money-making scheme I considered was exporting garage sale junk down south to some of the local markets. Airfare would definitely be covered by the venture if not more. Fortunately, I do not have to worry about employment any more as I seem to be employed at least full-time at the Mainstreet Bakerei’s latest incarnation, The Poplar Café.

The namechange was hastened by the previous owners’ reticence to pay up their bills before they left town for what is turning out to be an epic-length hike. How far could they be trekking? Some of us (me) speculate that they may be heading for country equal to or greater than the Yukon in its lawlessness. Somewhere like the Ozarks. But, I’m still getting paid to come up with things that people will pay money to eat, and hopefully enjoy. I keep the sugar in ready supply. I’ve learned a lot and am going to be learning a lot more in short order. I’m supposed to make danishes, something that I’ve never done before, so I am doing some research in combination with my own technique of making it up as I go along. It’s really fun, and I can see that once I get the hang of it, there are a million interesting things that can be created. My gracious hosts Karyn and Robin have a huge library of cookbooks and magazines, and I’ve run across a whole bunch of inspiration there. If you are interested, there is a great article in the latest issue of Food & Wine about a restaurant in Rotterdam that is something like the kind of place I would eventually like to be involved in.

http://www.foodandwine.com/articles/can-you-throw-a-60-second-party

I don’t know if Tony the owner would be interested in it, and I’m not sure that Whitehorse has the market for it, but considering the number of artists around here, I’m sure there would be enough people that would be game.

More pictures of the beloved boots:

with genuine garden clippings on them


notice the lovely back seam. Very sexy!


in their natural habitat.