lessons learned and it's 8pm on saturday - why am i here?
ok, first things first. it is in fact, 8pm on a saturday, and i am sitting in a darkened (and chilly!) room typing away like a loser (sorry losers) instead of tripping the light fantastic, or watching a movie or drinking a bottle of wine. (whaever, so i'm 1 for 3) i guess i have nothing to bitch about...i didn't call anyone, but i keep thinking that there's no way rob will have to work late *again* on a saturday. clearly i should be riding the short bus with cheddar bob. maybe someday publicis will loosen its stranglehold on my man, but for now anyway, i rock the carneros solo.
wednesday marked my last day of school until the 3rd of january. 1 down, 5 to go. overall i'm pretty happy with how i did. i should end up with almost perfect grades. the one point in sanitation pisses me off, but whatever. i'm also a little bitter about the whole practicum experience. a week ago thursday & friday the class had individual practical exams to test knife skills, accuracy and time. we were supposed to have 30 minutes to complete a series of cuts. i elected not to practice. my decision was based on a number of factors - at the time, i didn't think that practicing was actually going to make me any better and i didn't want to psych myself out if it turned out i was way over time. i was feeling a fair amount of pressure to rock the test. when people expect things of me i feel compelled to meet or exceed their expectations - but i *hate* competing against other people. i lose all personal focus and kind of give up in competitive situations. measuring myself against other people makes me feel icky, invariably someone performs better than i do which just makes me feel like shit. especially if i try. the practicum was hellish because it was all anyone talked about for days. our grade in the class was based on the practicum plus a number of mysterious factors that our chef never really clarified with anyone.
i can't help but wonder if i sabotaged myself a little by not practicing. overall, it doesn't matter, i did fine - better than most regardless. but i still feel shame every time i think about it. why work my ass off all quarter and then not study for the final? stupid. in any event, my irritation with myself is compounded by my irritation with how the test was ultimately graded. the plan was that for every minute over 30, you lost 2 points. chef was *very* clear that he wanted us to focus on time and consistency rather than perfect cuts. he told me that 3 of my cuts were off (but he tosses them right after grading so you can't ask to see them). even not seeing them i acknowledge that i definitely sacrificed some accuracy for time (i finished in 34 - maybe 4th or 5th in the class) because i thought that was the choice he wanted us to make. since only juanita finished in 30 he reduced the number of points off to 1 for every 2 minutes over - which means i should have taken 20 extra minutes to do things perfectly and ended up with the same score but been more proud of my work. that drives me nuts. that the criteria for grading would be the same if you took 50 minutes and if you took 30 minutes is so incredibly stupid i can't even stand it. but i don't wear the tall toque, so i'll just shut up.
thursday i believe i did absolutely nothing and yesterday i went to crush for a few hours. jenny and i went on tuesday together (and abortively on wednesday which was ultimately occupied with mutal car shennanigans i haven't the strength to go into). that day i cleaned what at the time seemed like a million baby carrots. yesterday i went back and watched tim and julie clean about 10x what i cleaned in about 20 minutes. mine were cleaner, but if i wasn't free labor i bet sterility would be less important. yesterday was super fun. there were japanese leeks, ballotine wrapping,(like my sanitation project!) cauliflower shaving, brussels sprout trimming and short-rib marinating. i think i took forever on those leeks. this stuff haunts me.
it's been a cool experience there. i certainly haven't gotten to know everyone, but i like the dynamics. everyone has their role and they all seem to play well together, despite wildly different personalities. in no specific order, there's the absent-minded proffesor, who is charming as hell and likely has everyone fiercely loyal to him, but who seems to spend a lot of time trying to remember what he's just forgotten, a bratty little sister desperate for attention, a cool, wise, older brother who everyone loves and probably abuses from time to time, a kind of dorky but endearing uncle - who would totally let you borrow his car, but would have no gas in it and would need it back by 9 but would forget to tell you until he called at 8:30, a guy who reminds me of seth green but a little less neurotic and more stonerish and an older sister who would totally let you borrow her chuck taylors unless you caught her on a bad day, in which case she would definitely put you in a headlock. i don't know, but it all works somehow.
i don't think i could do what anson (the wise one) does - at least not as calmly as he does it. his prep lists are *long*. what happenss when he doesn't have as much help? yesterday there were 5 of us for a while. it's clearly crunch time - lots of private parties - but even just keeping the restaurant prepped is a lot of work. i'm heading in monday to help out again. it's weird, it's not something i think i want to do long-term, but i haven't had it off my mind all day. it's seductive in a sick, thankless way i find compelling.
wednesday marked my last day of school until the 3rd of january. 1 down, 5 to go. overall i'm pretty happy with how i did. i should end up with almost perfect grades. the one point in sanitation pisses me off, but whatever. i'm also a little bitter about the whole practicum experience. a week ago thursday & friday the class had individual practical exams to test knife skills, accuracy and time. we were supposed to have 30 minutes to complete a series of cuts. i elected not to practice. my decision was based on a number of factors - at the time, i didn't think that practicing was actually going to make me any better and i didn't want to psych myself out if it turned out i was way over time. i was feeling a fair amount of pressure to rock the test. when people expect things of me i feel compelled to meet or exceed their expectations - but i *hate* competing against other people. i lose all personal focus and kind of give up in competitive situations. measuring myself against other people makes me feel icky, invariably someone performs better than i do which just makes me feel like shit. especially if i try. the practicum was hellish because it was all anyone talked about for days. our grade in the class was based on the practicum plus a number of mysterious factors that our chef never really clarified with anyone.
i can't help but wonder if i sabotaged myself a little by not practicing. overall, it doesn't matter, i did fine - better than most regardless. but i still feel shame every time i think about it. why work my ass off all quarter and then not study for the final? stupid. in any event, my irritation with myself is compounded by my irritation with how the test was ultimately graded. the plan was that for every minute over 30, you lost 2 points. chef was *very* clear that he wanted us to focus on time and consistency rather than perfect cuts. he told me that 3 of my cuts were off (but he tosses them right after grading so you can't ask to see them). even not seeing them i acknowledge that i definitely sacrificed some accuracy for time (i finished in 34 - maybe 4th or 5th in the class) because i thought that was the choice he wanted us to make. since only juanita finished in 30 he reduced the number of points off to 1 for every 2 minutes over - which means i should have taken 20 extra minutes to do things perfectly and ended up with the same score but been more proud of my work. that drives me nuts. that the criteria for grading would be the same if you took 50 minutes and if you took 30 minutes is so incredibly stupid i can't even stand it. but i don't wear the tall toque, so i'll just shut up.
thursday i believe i did absolutely nothing and yesterday i went to crush for a few hours. jenny and i went on tuesday together (and abortively on wednesday which was ultimately occupied with mutal car shennanigans i haven't the strength to go into). that day i cleaned what at the time seemed like a million baby carrots. yesterday i went back and watched tim and julie clean about 10x what i cleaned in about 20 minutes. mine were cleaner, but if i wasn't free labor i bet sterility would be less important. yesterday was super fun. there were japanese leeks, ballotine wrapping,(like my sanitation project!) cauliflower shaving, brussels sprout trimming and short-rib marinating. i think i took forever on those leeks. this stuff haunts me.
it's been a cool experience there. i certainly haven't gotten to know everyone, but i like the dynamics. everyone has their role and they all seem to play well together, despite wildly different personalities. in no specific order, there's the absent-minded proffesor, who is charming as hell and likely has everyone fiercely loyal to him, but who seems to spend a lot of time trying to remember what he's just forgotten, a bratty little sister desperate for attention, a cool, wise, older brother who everyone loves and probably abuses from time to time, a kind of dorky but endearing uncle - who would totally let you borrow his car, but would have no gas in it and would need it back by 9 but would forget to tell you until he called at 8:30, a guy who reminds me of seth green but a little less neurotic and more stonerish and an older sister who would totally let you borrow her chuck taylors unless you caught her on a bad day, in which case she would definitely put you in a headlock. i don't know, but it all works somehow.
i don't think i could do what anson (the wise one) does - at least not as calmly as he does it. his prep lists are *long*. what happenss when he doesn't have as much help? yesterday there were 5 of us for a while. it's clearly crunch time - lots of private parties - but even just keeping the restaurant prepped is a lot of work. i'm heading in monday to help out again. it's weird, it's not something i think i want to do long-term, but i haven't had it off my mind all day. it's seductive in a sick, thankless way i find compelling.
posted by the pieces @ 7:59 PM
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