 September 18, 2008 - Adventures in shopping for baking
As I mentioned in my previous post, I am about to be a new pastry and specialty baking student at South Seattle Community College. With that came a huge list of supplies I needed to get, half of which I hadn't even heard of before! I had quite the adventure shopping so I wanted to relay my story. Before setting out on my own shopping adventure I tried Googling to see if any other past students had any input and came out with none. Since I have a forum to say so, hopefully with me posting this, a future beginning student can glean some advice from it. :) I had some wonderful friends give me a gift card to Williams-Sonoma for my birthday so that was my first stop. I went to the one in Pacific Place. The staff (at least the ones who I dealt with) were SO incredibly helpful!! A wonderful lady, who coincidentally was a pastry student herself at AIS for a couple quarters, helped me out tremendously. She helped me pick out a few items that added up to the gift card amount and gave me some advice on where to go for the things they didn't carry. The cashier (and the manager, I think) was super friendly and even made a mention saying they were going to start hiring for their holiday help soon and that their best employees are culinary students. Maybe I was just charmed by the whole experience, but I ended up agreeing to take home an application. XD I gathered up a few more things at the local Fred Meyer (I had some Rewards coupons so those purchases were free to me) and some kitchen stores at the nearby outlet mall. I made a trip to Sur La Table as well, but that ended up being more disappointing than I thought. Though they have a LOT of stuff, the store is super crammed and crowded with tourists since it's right in front of Pike Place Market. The employees were cordial, but not nearly as informative or friendly as Williams-Sonoma nor the place that inspired me to write this entry: the Seattle Restaurant Store. Culinary students, do yourself a favor - unless you have gift cards or other means of getting equipment for free, save yourself a TON of hassle and pay the Seattle Restaurant Store in Shoreline (right on 99/Aurora Ave) a visit. The staff there are SUPER knowledgeable, and they even go as far as to have your entire equipment list on hand so they know exactly what you're looking for. They've built plenty of student kits before so they can get you everything you need in about 15 minutes. They also don't just try to push the most expensive thing onto you. If what they push is a little pricey, there's good reason behind it and always say that you can opt to go cheaper if you wish. I only needed a few more things by the time I got there and I found myself thinking (and saying) that I wish I'd just come there in the first place and saved myself all sorts of hassle! At least now I know exactly where I'll be turning to when I need more supplies! I know I must probably sound like they paid me to say all this, but believe me (and my bank account, especially after all this shopping), I was sincerely just impressed at how helpful and resourceful they were. So if anything, I hope some aspiring student does what I did and searches for stories like these and comes across this one. :) Good luck to you and in the meantime, good luck to me!
- Helloooo out there!
Wow. It's been SEVEN MONTHS since I updated this... Truth be told, it was weighing pretty heavily on my mind, but things just kept spiraling! How do you dust off something and try to pick up where you left off after it being so long? Because of that, I kept getting intimidated and pushing it off even further. Then I had something profound to say that I specifically wanted to say on a site that Google will turn up as a search result so here I am, dusting off the... dust. ;) This turned out to be a longer post than I intended so let me spit out the catch up first. So the major events that have happened in the last few months are... - Chuu and I split. I hinted at this in previous posts, but I don't think I came out and said it. We both are seeing other people and are still great friends. I'm actually pretty good friends with his new lady friend. :) He's always going to be my Chuu. <3 - Since early December, I've been dating Jason. We became very close very fast and it's been an amazing time. He's made my board gaming habit even worse and has gotten me into several new hobbies such as tabletop gaming, Magic (the Gathering, not tricks), and crafty projects like building miniature buildings or painting tiny figures. We have a great time together, he's taught me a lot and a lot about myself, and I <3 him very much. :) - I moved to Seattle proper in March. I was always a suburbian girl, but I never knew what I was missing out on. I LOVE the city! Granted, it's not like I live downtown, but I've come to realize just how much I love my Seattle and I really enjoy living so close to the heart of it. - In April Jason got us a Wii. It's been the only next gen system I've been interested in. I seem to have lost my spark for games in general though; I just don't have the time nor energy to sink into a 60 hour epic anymore. :( The only games we play are music games like Rock Band, Karaoke Revolution, and SingStar. - Over Memorial Day weekend, my family met Jason and me in Vegas for our family vacation. It was my first time there and though I had fun, it really isn't my kind of city. I felt uncomfortable at times because I felt like I was being surrounded by the dredge of society - the drunks, the attention whores (and just plain ol' whores), and the addicts. I do want to go back just one more time 'cause there were a few things I didn't get to do while I was there. One of the things I really enjoyed was going on the gondola ride at the Venetian with J. :D - In July I got myself an iPhone. It rocks. - In late July I got laid off from my job due to lack of work. It didn't phase me at all since I considered it a blessing. For a long, long time, I was completely miserable there and was trying to claw myself out. I sincerely hated a few people in management, thought plenty of others were horrible managers, people got SUPER defensive and catty too easily, and NOTHING I was doing was portfolio work and thus mine was becoming stagnant. So it was good riddance and I was off to bigger and better things. - I signed up for not just another half marathon in August, but TWO. I'm registered for the Seattle half in November and the Rock 'n Roll Seattle half in June of 2009. I have my races planed out until 2010. :) I started training for them a couple weeks ago. - The state offers training benefits to those unemployed by paying for tuition for approved full-time courses. I just went in to South Seattle Community College one day because I was curious, thinking I'd just get some information. I ended up leaving the building as a fully registered full-time pastry and specialty baking student! When other kids in my elementary class were dreaming of being firefighters or astronauts, I wanted to have my own bakery. So since the opportunity was there, I decided to give it a chance. I'm not sure what this means in the long run, but I might as well see if I like it by going to school for free. :) And since the profound thing I want to say relates to this last point, I'll leave this post off here and write it in a separate entry. Hopefully I'll be better about updating this... If you stuck around, dear reader, thanks. :) <3
February 20, 2008 - Feelings
I'm not an intellectual. I've never been good with academia. One of my least favorite subjects in school was history. There's nothing to do in history classes except to sit and memorize past events. Science was fun because of labs and the like where you DID stuff. I didn't mind English because I like reading novels and literature. Hell, even in math you solve problems and are actually doing something. It doesn't matter what kind of history it is; I find them all pretty dull. This is true even for design history. Sure, I think it's mildly useful to know a few things, but I want to actually DO the designing rather than sit there and memorize who invented the letterpress. I have an equally hard time sitting there and listening to lectures/presentations, regardless of who it is. If it's some famous designer, I want to visually admire his work, not listen to him talk. I have full appreciation for how something looks/feels, but I really don't care about how he did things; I'd rather do it myself, even if it means making the same mistakes he's already made. I learn better that way anyway. As I was thinking about this, I realized that a LOT of my actions and preferences rely on feelings rather than logic or reasoning. There's a part of West Seattle that I've been to only once and I fell in love with it. There's just something about the stores that are there and how the place looks that I liked. Whenever I cook, I never measure things; everything is made by feel. I knew a man I fell in love with, only for a very short time, but there was something about him that resonated with me so I went along with my heart. I make several decisions based on gut feelings rather than logic. I've been called intuitive, perceptive, and wise several times in my life. But yet, even with all this, people think I'm crazy for being different. They berate me for not wanting to learn. I want to learn plenty; I learn by doing, not by listening. Some people are the neurotic note-taking, researching, fact memorizing type. I'm not. I do things. I try things. I learn from my mistakes. People learn in different ways; leave me be. P.S. I retook the Myers-Briggs personality type test and ended up an ENFP. I've ALWAYS been and I-something. Strange how I've changed over the years. :)
January 08, 2008 - On Family
In the last few months, I went through a really hard time and my family came to my immediate aid. My brother and sister-in-law have always been a comfort because they're the most level headed people I know. They said things that gave me strength and courage. My mother let me know that she was there for me. She said she knew I was pretty put together so I'll probably be okay, but she's there for me as a safety net if I needed it. Even the one person who by traditional standards became "unfamily" remained my family in my eyes and we're working through this together. My best friend was ALWAYS there for a chat, even if it was me freaking out about something and it was 3am in her time zone. Another one of my best friends offered me her futon to crash on whenever I needed and hovered around me to make sure I was okay at all times. And now that I'm doing just fine and have moved on to a much happier time of my life, there is someone who continues to make me feel loved in ways I can't even explain. These people are not my friends; they're all a part of my family. Family is always there for you no matter what. Family is more than just shared DNA. It is a commitment. It is for life.Blood relation or not, I love my family and knowing that I'm loved by you fills me with absolute joy. :)
December 29, 2007 - Memories
I've always had a pretty good memory. It helps that I'm a visual person so I tend to remember "scenes" and can jog my memory of where I left something or what was on the table by remembering what it looked like. I've also been pretty good about remembering conversations that were or were not had. People will tell you that they've gotten into trouble because of my bear trap memory. ;) Lately, however, I feel like my memory has taken a nosedive. I feel like I have big blanks through courses of my life and even have trouble remembering conversations which was my specialty! I've never been one to talk a lot about myself (aside from blogging). Whenever people asked me how my day was or something, I'd reply with "fine" and move on. It's not that I have things to hide, but I think that I'd rather live in the present and look forward to the future than to relive the past, regardless of if it was good or bad. Jason has mentioned to me that whenever I tell stories about my past, I tend to give a very abridged version and write it off as "that's how it was." and leave it at that. Again, I'm very open about aspects of myself, especially with him, so it's not like I have things to hide; I think I just don't remember all the details. Even big events like "what's the dumbest thing you've ever done?" gets me to have to dig deep in the archives. I really don't think I'm an angel by any means, but I had a hard time thinking of something like that. "Tell me a story" is a like I like to use, but have a hard time reciprocating. I've lived 26 years; you'd think I'd have at least a few long stories with vivid detail! Maybe I just have difficulty thinking up of stories on the fly. I'd like to think that that's the case rather than my memory failing on me and blanking out significant portions of my life and the experiences I've had... Especially since I love keeping records of my life!
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