Auld Lang Syne

HAPPY 2009!

Hopefully I will be able to maintain this blog a bit more, for my few readers... though they're privy to most of these statements through day-to-day conversation.

Much has changed in the months since I last posted... with braces fully removed and teeth prepared for gnashing, I have rediscovered the lovely world of SALADS! It truly amazes me how much I missed my teeth now that I have full use of them.

I have gone through 1.25 terms at JWU..... yes, 1.25. We work on a trimester schedule and were about 1/4 of the way through our 2nd term when it was time to go on winter holiday hoopla break. My first term was entirely labs, and I learned quite a bit and then some. Classes were: Principles of Beverage Service (a.k.a. 'bartending & mixology'), Purchasing and Product Identification ('storeroom'), Nutrition and Sensory Analysis, Fundamentals of Foodservice Production ('ffp' or 'how to flip an egg'), and Skills of Meatcutting (uhm... duh... 'meatcutting'). I was probably more excited about these classes than a number of my lab-mates, but I had been waiting for what seemed like an eternity (really only 2 years) to get to JWU and take these labs. Each chef/professor had insights and experience in the culinary field I can only dream of one day attaining so far... many had or are currently owned/ing a restaurant, a number were certified chefs (yes, there is a test and it looks crazy), and I like to think I got along well with them. If it's not already obvious, I think they're all REALLY REALLY COOL.

My current term is all academic courses... joy of joys. Communication Skills (I do really need this class), Sanitation (pass the exam, get certified, woot!), Career Management (resumes/ how to sell yourself), and Leadership (define LEADERS/leadership). I generally like the first two classes, but I am having some difficulty in appreciating the other two. They'll hopefully grow on me more as the term goes on. I will have little to no difficulty in passing them, but I might not truly ENJOY them. Oh well, I'll live.

I have survived another holiday season at Santé. It was good. Thank the PTB that it's over until Valentine's Day. I have managed to pick up another job... I am doing "work-study" in the cafeteria. Work-study at JWU involves working for minimum wage in a certain department of the school for a set number of hours per week... I am supposed to be working 13.25 hours, I was averaging 16-17. Good thing they pay me for all of it. Plus, this allowed me to lower my average to 9-10 hours per week in December while the holiday rush hit Santé. Hoorah for not dying due to exhaustion. I can definitely attest that going to class 24 hours a week (on lab cycle it's 4 6-hour days), working at one job anywhere from 14-21 hours a week, and then working at the other job 16 hours a week will KILL you. Or make you re-set your priorities. Good thing labs don't give much homework aside from the occasional paper at the end of the lab segment or I would've been very likely to have some sort of breakdown. Once I get back to JWU I plan on letting the chef at the cafeteria know that I can work weekend morning shifts again without too big of a toll on my sanity. It shouldn't be too bad of a balancing act... morning classes for 4 hours mid-week, Santé weekend evenings, cafeteria weekend mornings and office-work for an hour-ish other days, community service (required for my Leadership class) Mondays, and time for myself and, of course, Captain Obvious and my family. I may even have time to work out... O_O craziness!

The holidays went as usual here. Crazy, full of action, and lots of food. Sadly I was working for a good bit of my break so I missed out on VENISON dinners ( very very unfortunate), but I was home for Christmas Eve and Christmas as well as New Year's Day. Somewhat so on that last one as I was asleep until about 10:00 after having worked until 1-ish. Quite the day, really. My dad got his holiday request and the two of us spent most of the day cooking, turning out rounds of tasty appetizers to graze on for most of the day. Very much a hit with mom and the brother as well, so overall it was quite the success.

One down note is that I have just discovered that most of the images on my new website pages no longer exist... this is very distressing. The good thing is that I have *found* the pages and can send them to dad to actually put on the website. I just need to polish them a bit.

Overall, quite the busy half-year. I can't think of too much to add right at this moment.

SHORT CHEF AWAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY~