Here I am!

Hope you guys enjoyed your holiday weekend. I totally put the brain on hold and tried very, very diligently not to think about school. I tried to give the feet a rest as much as I could, and they are feeling some better.

The New Hotness ate one of my wooden spoons on Sunday evening...Wednesday evening, I set my knife roll on the arm of the couch with the wooden spoons stuck just inside the handles to air out, since they were wet when I left school. Of course, I completely forgot that the kit was there (brain was on hold, remember?), so I didn't think anything about it until we came in Sunday evening. It looked liked an angry beaver had rampaged through the den. All I can think of is "it's a holiday weekend--where's the nearest emergency vet, and how big a dent will that make in our less than meager savings account?" Fortunately, he seems to have suffered no ill effects from this addition to his diet. And, here I though I was being nice and letting them stay out of the crate while we ran errands for a couple of hours. Fool me once, shame on the New Hotness and never again shall he be left to roam free while I am out of the house.

It was really weird to sleep late 2 weekdays in a row. I must confess that I woke up about 5:50 on Monday morning with a bit of a panic that I was late to school before I remembered it was a holiday. For today's class in Dining Room, we had to set up the banquet rooms for the culinary graduation ceremony on Thursday. The Wed-Thur class is going to have to serve at the graduation, which starts at 8 am. They've not been told this yet; they will find out tomorrow that they have to appear at 7 am for Thursday's class session. I kinda think this sucks for them, because what if you had plans for that morning--like a doctor's appointment--since you didn't have to show up to class until noon? I don't think it's fair for you to block out an entire 24-hour period for a class. Chef was kinda snarky last week when a couple of people had to leave and go to work after class--we ran over about 45 minutes with clean up because he let the dining room class people go early--and made some comments about that going to work was not a good excuse...even though one of the "requirements" of the program is to get a job in the industry for experience. As we keep saying, "things change every day, and it's hard to keep up with the slings and arrows."

I think part of it has to do with the fact that we are all just exhausted...we're physically and mentally worn out this quarter because of the schedule. It's hard to remain upbeat and excited when all you are thinking about is "3 more days of this crap...3 more days of this crap..."

Horror Story of the Day: Dimmer Switch tells us that over the weekend at work, she lost her wrist watch in a batch of cold vegetable salad (she works at a chi-chi food store) and had to sift through a ton of the stuff until she found it. Needless to say, her boss was less than thrilled about having to dump about 40 pounds of product. She then says something along the lines of "I can tell all the newbies to listen to what they say, because I know from personal experience." Mother Hen muttered something about "you should already know--you had the same safety and sanitation classes we did." Touche!

DS also came to class today in open-toed sandals. I really, really, really want to know what she's on, and why she won't share with the rest of us. I was semi-in charge of things today, and that was the first thing I noticed about her. "DS," I said, "do you have other shoes?" She says something about her feet hurting and these were more comfy, and did I think anyone would notice, specifically our instructor? I point out to her that *I* noticed, and she said "you notice everything," which is so not true, because you should see the dust bunnies...nevermind. I retorted with "And you think HE won't?" Two other people then walked into class and the first things they said were comments about her shoes. This is the instructor who threatened to take points off for all of us because we didn't notice a burned out light in the cafe for 2 class periods...I think he'd notice her shoes, don't you?

The really great thing about class today was a short course in wine tasting. Whee--drinking at school--how decadent is that?!!! Of course, he didn't give us much more than a couple of mouthfuls of each kind, but it helped take the edge off the day immensely. There was a nice fruity Reisling that I could have drank all of and been a very contented person. The Fine Technical College is supposed to start offering a series of wine courses this summer, which would be fun to take, so I'll keep you posted on that.

Tomorrow's practical should be mother sauces (Espagnole, Veloute, Bechamel, and Tomato) and the 17 classic vegetable cuts and their measurements. Sauces shouldn't be that much of a problem, but cross your swivel peelers that my knife cuts are okay.