Ah, It's Finally Week #10

The past few weeks have felt like they have been months. Summer term was going by so quickly until it hit week seven. Then it came to a crashing halt. Finally it is week ten and I am almost done with my summer classes, all five of them. Luckily all of the work has been evenly spread out this term, which has been really nice. Normally everything hits you all at once. I feel like all of my professors and chefs get together and figure out when they are going to make everything due. And of course they have to make sure that all the assignments and projects are due in the same week.

Anyways, I am so glad that this term is coming to a close. I really enjoyed all of my classes, but I am ready to move on. Unfortunately ending this term also means that summer is coming to a close which is something that I am not looking forward to. I love the warm weather and it not getting dark until nine o'clock at night. I have noticed the past few days that it has been getting dark around eight. Oh well, I guess I should start gearing up for the cold weather again.

One thing I will not miss about the heat though is how hot the kitchens at school got. I do not think I have ever sweat as much in life as I have in the kitchens the summer. Everyone has. Some days I'll be in the kitchens and then walk outside, and even when it has been in the nineties, outside is cooler. It is crazy. The air conditioning went down for a few days. And of course that happened when it was the hottest out. I guess now I can look forward to kitchens that are a normal temperature.

Anyways, I just spent the past two or so hours working on my take home final exam for my vegetarian class. That is now out of the way. All I have to do is print it and hand it in. In the next week I still have two more practicals, two more take home finals, and a final version of a business plan. I guess it is not that much more. Break is only a week away. I can make it!

Computers Computers Computers

Why do they have to be so difficult? Why can't they just turn on and do what you tell them to do? I seriously wanted to throw my computer against a wall tonight.

Yesterday I spent almost three hours importing all of my songs from my old computer into iTunes. I had everything organized the way I wanted it. I even gave iTunes the pleasure of being my default music program.

So today, I go to open iTunes to find that it was completely empty. Apparently the iTunes on my computer did not want to keep the three thousand songs I had imported yesterday in its program. How lovely.

Stupid computers.

Anyways, I figured I would restart my computer and see if it would help. Well, all that did was aggravate me more. Not only did my computer decided to take its sweet old time shutting down, but once it finally restarted itself, it took more than ten minutes to load.

At this point I was ready to throw it out the window. Then, once it finally did whatever background stuff it decided it needed to do, I tried to get on the internet. That pissed me off the most. Not only did it take another five minutes to open the browser, but once it finally did, it froze.

I was seriously thinking about throwing it against the wall. Not like that would have done anything, but it would have made me feel a little better.

Argh. Stupid computers!!!

Bad Polenta, Bad Bad Polenta

So for class today, my partner and I had the pleasure of making empanadas, a date and honey tart, and something with polenta.

We decided that we were going to start with the polenta because it takes over an hour to cook. First off we had to boil water in a double boiler. This is where the problems started. Do you know how long it takes to boil water in a double boiler?? Well, let me tell you. It takes almost an hour. Argh!!!

During this time I made the dough and filling for the empanadas, as well as started rolling out the dough with a pasta machine. It is amazing what you can do in the time it takes to boil water.

So finally, once the water began to boil, we had to add the cornmeal, and some salt, into the boil water and stir it for about five minutes. Well, about three minutes into stirring the cornmeal and water, a little piece of polenta decided that he did not want to hang around with his fellow polenta friends. Little polenta wanted to jump out of the pot and come play on my forearm. I did not want polenta to jump out of the pot. I wanted him to stay in the pot with the rest of his friends. So, yea. Polenta did not listen to me and I now have a dime sized burn mark on my forearm. I am very upset with polenta. Polenta should have listened to me. He should have stayed in the pot with the rest of his friends. He would have been a lot happier.

Oh well. No we know that polenta is not obedient. Shame on you polenta.

Julie & Julia

It is amazing how rainy days are awesome movie days. With all my laundry done and nothing else to do today, my mom and I decided it was a great day to go to the movies. Julie & Julia just came this weekend and we were both dying to see it. The previews looked so good.

But before we got to the movie theatre, my mom and I obviously had to do some puttering. Since that is what we do when we are together. We strolled through Chico's because she wanted to see if anything was on sale. That store is so expensive. Even the clothes on sale were still super expensive. So we did not buy anything there. Next door, and the next store we puttered in was Ann Taylor Loft. My sister introduced me to this store and every time I go I keep accumulating clothing from there. I like their stuff, but I wait for everything to go on sale because once again, their clothes can be kind of expensive.

Anyways, after some puttering in there, we found a very cute black sweater. I saw it when we first walked in, and then right before we left, I went back to it. Something about it was calling my name. So, I tried it on and it looked really cute. What made it even better was that it was only nine dollars. So we go to pay for it, and apparently today they were taking an additional thirty percent off everything. How awesome is that? So our total came to $6.92. I think that is pretty good for a sweater from Ann Taylor Loft.

So, after we spent a whopping $6.92, we decided to go to the movie theatre. It is amazing how much tickets cost these days. For two adult tickets it cost $21. And the best part is, no one ever checked for tickets, so we probably could have just walked in and watched the movie for free.

We finally get into the theatre, sit down, and notice that there is no sound. My mom loved it because she thinks that the commercials are too loud and hurt her ears. About two or three minutes later, one of the employees comes in and tells us that they were having trouble with their internet connection and that there would be no sound for the commercials. My mom loved it.

Anyways, the movie finally starts, with sound, and it was hilarious. We were all cracking up. Especially when Julia (Meryl Streep) took some cannelloni out of a pot of boiling water said something along the lines of "this is as hot as a hard cock!!" I was laughing so hard I thought I was going to fall out of my seat.

During the movie, Julie's goal was to go through Julia Child's cookbook from beginning to end and make every recipe, all 524 of them. She gave herself a deadline of one year to finish all of them and she was going to write a blog about it too.

One of the recipes she made required live lobsters. She wasn't too thrilled about killing them. It was either put them in a pot of boiling water or stick a knife behind their head. Julie opted for the boiling water. However, she got them in the pot, put the lid on and two seconds later the lid flies off and she runs screaming into the other room. Sounds like something my mom would do. It was so funny.

And then the last recipe she made required her to debone a duck. She was not too thrilled about it. However, she found it to be pretty easy. Of course she watched Julia Child's video of her deboning a duck, while Julie sat at her coffee table and did the same. I never thought I would ever debone a duck in my living room on my coffee table. Oh well, I guess there is a first for everything. Maybe I will try it some day.

I thought what Julie did was a great idea. I would love to take a cookbook and make every recipe in it. I think I would be completely sick of food by the time I finished, but I think it is an awesome idea. Maybe one day, when I have enough money to buy all the ingredients for every recipe in a cookbook and enough time, I'll take a stab at it.

After the movie, my mom and I grabbed some dinner at Bertucci's. We wound up getting salads, meatballs, and some tuscan grilled vegetables. They were so yummy. What a great way to spend a rainy day.

What am I still doing up???

It is getting close to three o'clock in the morning on a Sunday night. What on earth am I doing still doing up? I have done all of my homework for the next week, searched facebook high and low for who knows what, done all of my laundry, and have finished the bowl of grapes I took from the fridge almost an hour ago. This is crazy.

And the funniest part is I have nothing to write about. I am in the mood to write, but I feel like I am having a writers block. How weird is that? Maybe it is because I'm still awake at this crazy hour. Luckily I don't have any classes tomorrow, but still, why am I awake?

Granted I slept for about ten hours last night and haven't really done a whole lot today besides drive home and do laundry. Maybe that is why I am not tired. I guess I should have gone for a long walk sometime today. That usually tires me out.

On days I don't have class, when I sleep a little bit later that I should have, I will go walk around the city for hours, just to tire myself out. Isn't that crazy? I think I need to find something to do with all of my spare time.

Anyways, I probably should go to sleep soon because I have to go to the DMV tomorrow to get my license renewed. That should be a ton of fun. I guess I should bring something to do while I wait in line. Maybe a picture puzzle book or something. I feel like no matter when you go to the DMV there is always a line out the door. I guess the downturn in the economy has not hurt their business.