Midden me this

To whet your appetite.  More to come I promise.  I am feeling a lot of pressure from my nineteen followers. 

My coworker who will remain unnamed has inspired this blog.  But if you wanna know I will tell you and said coworker will probably too. 

So one day at work I was really hungry, and I asked this coworker if she had any snacks.  She replied confidently, “Look in my midden.”  I blinked a few times replying, “Your what?” A high cabinet door opens, “My midden.”  This midden was filled with a myriad of perishables and non-perishables.  It seemed as if she was preparing for the coming apocalypse with this midden, or at least for being stuck at work over night.  I also thought it was funny she called it a midden, because it means (I learned recently) a trash heap and she offered me snacks from this trash heap.  When she called it a midden at first I just assumed midden meant food pile, but it means trash pile.  But I think it can mean both.

Midden- (defined by Wikipedia)

also known as a kitchen midden, or a shell heap (when they contain a large number of shellfish remains), is a dump for domestic waste.

 The word is of Scandinavian via Middle English derivation, but is used by archaeologists worldwide to describe any kind of feature containing waste products relating to day-to-day human life.

They may be convenient, single-use pits created by nomadic groups or long-term, designated dumps used by sedentary communities that accumulate over several generations.

However when you learn what is in her midden, you will know why it is referred to as a midden. 

I asked her to provide me a list of the things that could be found in the midden.

1. A 2-year-old smucker's jelly jar full of almond butter

2. A bottle of Green Tea Fat Metabolizer my sister gave me to help me not be so fat.

3. 3 different pumps for exercise balls. (She has all these pumps because over the course of the winter she popped three exercise balls by getting to close to the space heater in her office)

4. Numerous (let the record show that she spelled it numberous) plastic bags

5. Rolaids, gum, dental floss, fingernail polish remover, sea salt from Mesopotamia, many packs of soy sauce and spicy Chinese mustard.

6. A hot water bottle

Needless to say, I now keep a midden.  I used to share a desk, but now I have my own desk, where I am free to express my midden desires. 
My coworker, who will now be identified because I don't want to change the name from the gchat, said I should tell yall what is in my midden

Currently in my midden......
Jesslyn:  what's in your midden?
 me:  nothing righ tnow:(
should i just make some stuff up
 Jesslyn:  lame
you can't have a midden with nothing in it
 me:  it was full but then i cleaned it out
i know
Jesslyn:  ah
 me:  i mean there is some stuff
like an empty tupperwear
a few tea bags
a chocolate wrapper
 Jesslyn:  tea bags! nice
 me:  plastic bags
 Jesslyn:  yeah--the perfect midden is a mixture of trash and nontrash items
 me:  exercise ball patch kit, extra stopper
 Jesslyn:  like a purse
 me:  mucinex
 Jesslyn:  patch kit!?
 Jesslyn:  nobody told me about patch kits
mucinex!
perfect!
over the counter drugs are essential for a midden
extra points if it's weird and herbal and fat burning 
me:  i dont know if it is a patch kit but i wanted to make you jealous
there is also tape
the thing is my midden cant be too gross because I share an office


Go forth and start keeping your own midden, 2012 is right around the corner.