Bachelor Tip #1: Be Resourceful

The number one thing I've learned since being out on my own, living the bachelor life, is that resourcefulness is KEY!  You have to be smart here people!  If you don't have something you might need, you have to find some way to make due.  For example, my roommate and I don't own a microwave.  This makes warming up leftovers a little tricky sometimes.  I recently wanted to warm up some leftover honey garlic chicken and rice, and was stumped.  Then it came to me, "why don't I just stick it in a frying pan with a little bit of oil?"  When you're a bachelor, you gotta try stuff, right?  Can't be afraid, just gotta throw caution to the wind and dare!  So I did.  It turned out just fine, delicious re-friend goodness.  It's either be resourceful, or starve.  Sometimes we don't have the money to just go out and buy something right away, so we have to come up with creative ways of making due with what we have.
Let me tell you one of the absolute best resources for you as a bachelor.  You ready?
It's people.
People are awesome.  Having a roommate that you get along with and are able to share with and balance the weight of living with, is awesome.  If I'm out of something, I borrow from my roommate and vice versa.  It's not about I owe you this and you owe me that, it's "Hey, we're living together.  We gotta have each others' backs!"
On top of roommates, close-by friends are an incredible asset!  I recently was at a big community pizza making party some of my friends had.  They invited about 20 or so people to come by and all bring an ingredient to have enough to make a few pizzas with, and we all made homemade pizzas and pigged out and had an AMAZING time!  Instead of having to prepare a whole meal, and use up more groceries, I only needed to prepare a little spicy turkey sausage (so good) for a few pizzas, and the rest was provided by others!  Very cheap, easy, and super fun.
On top of cheaper meals, community is excellent for the soul.  It can be a scary and crazy experience, moving out of the house and starting life as a young adult.  But that's why we have each other.  Friends have been the biggest thing for me over these past four months of independence, and I can't be thankful enough for them.  I chose to move into a neighbourhood where a large group of my friends lived either in walking or short bus trip distance from me.  It makes it so easy to get together and hang out.
Now, I totally encourage the same kind of thing with neighbours.  I'm constantly trying to reach out, little bit by little bit, to my neighbours.  I live in an apartment building, so I bump into them a lot.  I even know a couple by name!  As time goes by, I'm meeting more and more people and finding more familiar faces.  I think that neighbours are awesome, and making friends with your neighbours is something that's definitely a great resource.

Anyway, all this to say, be resourceful.  Create, invent, recycle, find ideas on the internet, books, and this blog!  I hope to make this blog a continually growing resource to bachelors everywhere, so check back regularly!

Welcome to The Bachelor Guide

Hi, my name's Matt, and I'm a bachelor.

Bachelorhood is pretty awesome.  I'm enjoying it.  It's the time when you're unmarried, living on your own, probably in your twenties or thirties, and are learning to live life as an adult.  You learn some pretty important lessons about life.  You start the process of "domestication".  Bachelorhood is a time of growth and exploration, learning what it means to be a grown-up making your own way.  I've just moved out, at the age of twenty-three (wish I'd started earlier!), about four months ago and am loving it!

Let me tell you a bit about me.  I'm a young guy living in Toronto, Canada.  I currently work in IT support for a non-profit organization, a Christian ministry called Catch the Fire, and I volunteer at a church that I attend called Toronto Airport Christian Fellowship.  I'm a spiritual kind of guy, some might use the word "religious", but I like to think of myself as just an ordinary guy living a faith-based life.
I love music and movies of a wide variety and am a musician, a guitar player.
My favourite thing to do though, is to hang out and have relationship with people, building community.  I love people.  People are my passion.  Without people, life would be really boring.  I also like dogs, they're a man's best friend I hear, but people are better.  Anyway...

This is The Bachelor Guide.  Sorry ladies, it's not a find-you-a-boyfriend blog (though I'm not opposed to it helping with such endeavors).  This is a blog by a bachelor, for bachelors.  Sharing tips and tricks of bachelor life, as well as the occasional musing on this single, young adult experience, for the young unmarried man out of the house.  I plan to have tips like "how to heat up food without a microwave", "how to avoid being a hermit", "how to grocery shop on a budget" and more!  I'm also hoping to bring in some guest bloggers, be it current bachelors or recent bachelors, or who knows, maybe even famous bachelors.  A guy can hope, right!?

Please feel free to use the comments for blog posts and enjoy the blog!