Listening: Blackbird singing in the dead of night. Take these broken wings and learn to fly. All your life, you were only waiting for this moment to arise.
What's my problem? Dave Matthews has been making me sad.
So Dave Matthews has been playing in the kitchen all through prep and it's been making me sad. I love Dave Matthews, but it's not good to listen to music that makes you sad when you have a hundred and fifty covers on the books. It just makes no sense. We should be listening to Rage Against the Machine or Body Count's "Cop Killer." Maybe I'm just in a sentimental mood. Hope I don't get my ass kicked tonight. It's hot apps though. It's cake.
Friday, July 24, 2009
Thursday, July 23, 2009
Day 75: I Thought The Universe Would Rather Me Be Wrong
Listening: Sunny days, everybody loves them. Tell me, baby, can you stand the rain? Storms will come. This we know for sure.
What's my problem? I can't find my five dollar NYC umbrella.
It's been a couple of weeks, but I've intended to write in the interim. As you know, I tend to write on my days off, and this past day off, Sam came down to the island to drop off some stuff and to take a bit of vacation from her hectic life in Boston and also to visit some family down on the Cape.
Originally, my day off last week was supposed to be filled with thunderstorms. This kind of weather prediction is nothing new to me. My long-standing hypothesis is that it's always crappy on my days off, much like today, but I'll get back to that later. I always walk around on Wednesdays saying what the weather reports say. "It's going to be crappy tomorrow. It's my day off, of course it'll be." And, a handful of times, it has just so happened that the weather wasn't as crappy as it was supposed to be. For instance one day, it was cloudy until around two and then cleared up and beautiful. Another day, the rain held out until I got back to the house after running errands. So I had this theory. The universe would rather me be wrong than have me have a day off with nice weather. I had this theory in my head for weeks before I actually told anyone about it. But, this past week, I told a few people about it, including Sam, Chef and the kitchen guys (I guess that constitutes around 90% of the people I know on the island). I knew that I shouldn't have, because, today, the weather blows.
I guess it's alright that the weather blows. I didn't wake up until around one in the afternoon, because I was too busy watching the movie "Martian Child" on HBO until four in the morning and was almost lured into watching "Knocked Up" after that. I tooled around on the computer for a while, had some lunch and got sucked into watching "Back to the Future Part III." So my day has been pretty lazy. By the time I left the house it was past five o'clock and, well, it's not like I have anything to do. I still have seven pairs of socks, which means six more days before I have to do laundry. My kitchen is still packed with snacks, which include my favorite spicy ramen thanks to Sam and Linh. My goal today is to get some writing done, as I am doing now, and finish the book that I'm reading, written by one of my favorite college professors.
The coffee house today is more crowded than usual. I guess I can blame the precipitation for that. Unfortunately, there's no one interesting in the crowd to look at. There is one girl in the corner with flaming red hair, freckles abound and a white Mac. But the only interesting is the mass of natural red hair atop her head. I don't think I've ever seen someone with that much red hair. She's writing in a notebook. I wonder if what she's writing is more interesting than what I write.
Back to last "weekend." I have to say it was probably my best day off in recent memory unless you count the three months off in another continent. Sam got in the night before with her bike, a pillow, two crates of ramen, my ramen bowl and spoon, and my package from Vietnam.
After getting all of her gear into the house, I immediately opened my package. The package itself was much smaller than I thought that it would be. I knew everything that would be in there, but after seeing the box, I thought that, for sure, they had left something out and that I would never see it again. After cutting through the tape and cardboard I saw that it was all there. Five chef coats, two shirts, two pairs of pants, two books and a picture. It was like Christmas. I immediately tried everything on again. The chef coats were a bit tighter than I remember them, but they still fit quite nicely. I guess the snug fit could be due to the fact that I lost a lot of... water weight? while I was in Asia. Linh always told me that when she saw the pictures of me in Asia, she thought that I had lost a lot of weight. The truth of the matter was that I weighed pretty much the same as I did when I left, I just converted a lot of my water weight into muscle, I think.
The next day, Sam hung out with me as I ran errands before we headed to the farm and then to the beach. Sam has a thing about the beach. When she's at the beach, she's At. The. Beach. Apparently, she knows a lot of people who get to the beach and are unprepared to stay more than an hour. Luckily, she and I are very similar in our beach styles. I come with a towel, my crazy creek chair, some food, a couple of drinks, my iPod and a few books. I can stay at the beach for hours on end, mostly because my first though when it comes to being at the beach is to nap. Within fifteen minutes of hitting the sand, I'm out like a light with my wrist covering my eyes and my iPod playing softly over the surf. Needless to say, we hung out at the beach for a few hours. I napped as she read, and we ate snacks of a baguette, some smoked salmon and capers, and a garlic ricotta cheese spread.
By the time we left the beach, it was much cooler and the sun was getting ready to set. We might have left earlier, but I wanted to finish reading the chapter that I was in the middle of.
One of the less charming things about the beach is that when I leave, I always feel a little sticky and my glasses are always smudged from the sea spray. So, before we went out for the night, we had to go back to the house for a shower. We actually almost didn't leave the apartment, because while she was showering, I started watching a movie called "Eight Days A Week," which is one of those cheesy teen comedies. Somehow it drew me in, and then when Sam finished cleaning up, it drew her in too. We almost decided to stay in and see just how the protagonist would end up getting the girl and if the kid who was fucking a watermelon would be hauled off to the looney bin.
But, we ended up wandering around town looking for some food. We must have looked at seven different menus. We were going to sit at the bar at the Pearl, but when we walked in, there was no way that we were gonna even edgeways into that bar. So, we went to go see my friend Taylor at Oran Mor.
I had eaten at Oran Mor once last season. It was pretty good, but I felt like that it wasn't worth the money. This time, as Sam and I sat at Taylor's bar, I definitely felt like the food was even better and I felt like I paid a good price for what we got, especially for this island.
We started with oysters on the half shell and a grilled octopus small plate and followed it up with the scallop small plate and the pork belly small plate. Next, the kitchen sent us their foie gras appetizer as a split plate, which was a nice gesture. It seems like a lot of their staff show up at our bar to eat, and we always send them a li'l sump-in sump-in. For an entree, we split the monkfish, and we had their dessert special buttermilk panna cotta for dessert. It was the perfect amount of food and a perfect amount of wine (three glasses for each of us).
All of the food was incredibly well done and was exactly what I was looking for. I had a craving for oysters on the half shell, and the preparation with the brunoise cucumber and celery and the mignonette was fresh and delicious. I only wish that the oysters themselves had been more briney.
We stayed at Oran Mor until Don Cheech, the grill cook at my restaurant, showed up. Apparently it had been a fuck show that night. I'm glad that I wasn't a part of it.
By the time we got home, we were both pretty zonked from the wine and the sun, so we watched a couple of episodes for "How I Met Your Mother" before crashing out for the night.
Sam stuck around for another day even though I had to work. I think she was in serious need of some downtime. People like us who are essentially nomads, sometimes it so hard to keep our shit organized that it becomes a full time job when we're not on the move. Where is our shit? Is it safe? Where are my friends? How are my finances? What do I have money for? Where is my next paycheck coming from? When is that paycheck coming? What do I do if I don't have another paycheck in the near future? Keeping all of those balls in the air can be pretty stressful. I'm not saying that normal people don't have the same concerns. But, when you're living with as small of a footprint as people like Sam and I are living with, things can change at the drop of a dime.
As far as work goes, I have had two successful grill shifts. I know that it's still my weak spot, but I did well the past two shifts on the grill. The only food that I had come back to me were, as chef said, "cooked perfectly" and was "exactly what they asked for." I mean, really, when someone asks for a steak "one minute past medium," you know you're dealing with an asshole who is going to send back any steak set in front of him. He should have said medium well.
Lately, we have had a number of people who don't know what they're talking about when they order their temperatures. People who ask for medium steaks want it medium well. People who ask for medium rare salmon really want it well done. People have just been the biggest assholes lately. It's almost like they're coming in during this bad economy to push people around so they have someone to push around. They're being douchey in order to make themselves feel better about their own douche baggy, crappy, popped collar lives. Maybe if we know that the guest is gonna be a bag-o-douche, I'll just serve their food raw so that when it does get to them the next time they'll be thankful it's been cooked.
Just last night, one party wrote a mean note on the check after they had paid saying that since they didn't get the table that they wanted three times, that it was a third strike and we were out. I mean, really? How spoiled are these people?
Also on the work front, I have been talking to Chef about what I should do after I leave the restaurant at the end of the season. I mentioned to him that I want to make money to take a year off, but that I also want to work somewhere really good. I would totally work at Hungry Mother in Cambridge. Apparently, a lot of their staff have eaten at the restaurant that I work at and really like the food there. Also, a friend of mine knows the chef there. Another place that I mentioned to Chef was La Laiterie in Providence. Chef is pretty good friends with the chef there as well, and they plan on doing a dinner here on the island sometime in October. I just don't know how I would work living in Cambridge and working in Providence. Would I take the train back and forth every day? Would I try to sublet somewhere cheap and keep the bare minimum there while going back to Cambridge every "weekend?"
La Laiterie would be a killer opportunity. I have eaten there and I really dig the farm to table food that they're doing. I love the fact that the chef there uses all of the bits and bobs that most people discard. I mean, how great is it that he has chicken cracklin' on his menu. I mean fuhgeddabout it! So, I don't really know what I should do. I figure I have a few months to figure it all out.
Also, I think Chef wants me around to do the dinner with this other chef, and he wants to set me up with a job with this other chef, so I know that I might not be out of here until the end of October instead of the middle.
Well, that's my life for the most part right now. Hopefully, as the nights get busier and the number of reservations skyrocket in August, I'll continue to rock as I do. I'm hoping for a third consecutive good grill shift this coming Tuesday, but other than that, not much more on the horizon.
What's my problem? I can't find my five dollar NYC umbrella.
It's been a couple of weeks, but I've intended to write in the interim. As you know, I tend to write on my days off, and this past day off, Sam came down to the island to drop off some stuff and to take a bit of vacation from her hectic life in Boston and also to visit some family down on the Cape.
Originally, my day off last week was supposed to be filled with thunderstorms. This kind of weather prediction is nothing new to me. My long-standing hypothesis is that it's always crappy on my days off, much like today, but I'll get back to that later. I always walk around on Wednesdays saying what the weather reports say. "It's going to be crappy tomorrow. It's my day off, of course it'll be." And, a handful of times, it has just so happened that the weather wasn't as crappy as it was supposed to be. For instance one day, it was cloudy until around two and then cleared up and beautiful. Another day, the rain held out until I got back to the house after running errands. So I had this theory. The universe would rather me be wrong than have me have a day off with nice weather. I had this theory in my head for weeks before I actually told anyone about it. But, this past week, I told a few people about it, including Sam, Chef and the kitchen guys (I guess that constitutes around 90% of the people I know on the island). I knew that I shouldn't have, because, today, the weather blows.
I guess it's alright that the weather blows. I didn't wake up until around one in the afternoon, because I was too busy watching the movie "Martian Child" on HBO until four in the morning and was almost lured into watching "Knocked Up" after that. I tooled around on the computer for a while, had some lunch and got sucked into watching "Back to the Future Part III." So my day has been pretty lazy. By the time I left the house it was past five o'clock and, well, it's not like I have anything to do. I still have seven pairs of socks, which means six more days before I have to do laundry. My kitchen is still packed with snacks, which include my favorite spicy ramen thanks to Sam and Linh. My goal today is to get some writing done, as I am doing now, and finish the book that I'm reading, written by one of my favorite college professors.
The coffee house today is more crowded than usual. I guess I can blame the precipitation for that. Unfortunately, there's no one interesting in the crowd to look at. There is one girl in the corner with flaming red hair, freckles abound and a white Mac. But the only interesting is the mass of natural red hair atop her head. I don't think I've ever seen someone with that much red hair. She's writing in a notebook. I wonder if what she's writing is more interesting than what I write.
Back to last "weekend." I have to say it was probably my best day off in recent memory unless you count the three months off in another continent. Sam got in the night before with her bike, a pillow, two crates of ramen, my ramen bowl and spoon, and my package from Vietnam.
After getting all of her gear into the house, I immediately opened my package. The package itself was much smaller than I thought that it would be. I knew everything that would be in there, but after seeing the box, I thought that, for sure, they had left something out and that I would never see it again. After cutting through the tape and cardboard I saw that it was all there. Five chef coats, two shirts, two pairs of pants, two books and a picture. It was like Christmas. I immediately tried everything on again. The chef coats were a bit tighter than I remember them, but they still fit quite nicely. I guess the snug fit could be due to the fact that I lost a lot of... water weight? while I was in Asia. Linh always told me that when she saw the pictures of me in Asia, she thought that I had lost a lot of weight. The truth of the matter was that I weighed pretty much the same as I did when I left, I just converted a lot of my water weight into muscle, I think.
The next day, Sam hung out with me as I ran errands before we headed to the farm and then to the beach. Sam has a thing about the beach. When she's at the beach, she's At. The. Beach. Apparently, she knows a lot of people who get to the beach and are unprepared to stay more than an hour. Luckily, she and I are very similar in our beach styles. I come with a towel, my crazy creek chair, some food, a couple of drinks, my iPod and a few books. I can stay at the beach for hours on end, mostly because my first though when it comes to being at the beach is to nap. Within fifteen minutes of hitting the sand, I'm out like a light with my wrist covering my eyes and my iPod playing softly over the surf. Needless to say, we hung out at the beach for a few hours. I napped as she read, and we ate snacks of a baguette, some smoked salmon and capers, and a garlic ricotta cheese spread.
By the time we left the beach, it was much cooler and the sun was getting ready to set. We might have left earlier, but I wanted to finish reading the chapter that I was in the middle of.
One of the less charming things about the beach is that when I leave, I always feel a little sticky and my glasses are always smudged from the sea spray. So, before we went out for the night, we had to go back to the house for a shower. We actually almost didn't leave the apartment, because while she was showering, I started watching a movie called "Eight Days A Week," which is one of those cheesy teen comedies. Somehow it drew me in, and then when Sam finished cleaning up, it drew her in too. We almost decided to stay in and see just how the protagonist would end up getting the girl and if the kid who was fucking a watermelon would be hauled off to the looney bin.
But, we ended up wandering around town looking for some food. We must have looked at seven different menus. We were going to sit at the bar at the Pearl, but when we walked in, there was no way that we were gonna even edgeways into that bar. So, we went to go see my friend Taylor at Oran Mor.
I had eaten at Oran Mor once last season. It was pretty good, but I felt like that it wasn't worth the money. This time, as Sam and I sat at Taylor's bar, I definitely felt like the food was even better and I felt like I paid a good price for what we got, especially for this island.
We started with oysters on the half shell and a grilled octopus small plate and followed it up with the scallop small plate and the pork belly small plate. Next, the kitchen sent us their foie gras appetizer as a split plate, which was a nice gesture. It seems like a lot of their staff show up at our bar to eat, and we always send them a li'l sump-in sump-in. For an entree, we split the monkfish, and we had their dessert special buttermilk panna cotta for dessert. It was the perfect amount of food and a perfect amount of wine (three glasses for each of us).
All of the food was incredibly well done and was exactly what I was looking for. I had a craving for oysters on the half shell, and the preparation with the brunoise cucumber and celery and the mignonette was fresh and delicious. I only wish that the oysters themselves had been more briney.
We stayed at Oran Mor until Don Cheech, the grill cook at my restaurant, showed up. Apparently it had been a fuck show that night. I'm glad that I wasn't a part of it.
By the time we got home, we were both pretty zonked from the wine and the sun, so we watched a couple of episodes for "How I Met Your Mother" before crashing out for the night.
Sam stuck around for another day even though I had to work. I think she was in serious need of some downtime. People like us who are essentially nomads, sometimes it so hard to keep our shit organized that it becomes a full time job when we're not on the move. Where is our shit? Is it safe? Where are my friends? How are my finances? What do I have money for? Where is my next paycheck coming from? When is that paycheck coming? What do I do if I don't have another paycheck in the near future? Keeping all of those balls in the air can be pretty stressful. I'm not saying that normal people don't have the same concerns. But, when you're living with as small of a footprint as people like Sam and I are living with, things can change at the drop of a dime.
As far as work goes, I have had two successful grill shifts. I know that it's still my weak spot, but I did well the past two shifts on the grill. The only food that I had come back to me were, as chef said, "cooked perfectly" and was "exactly what they asked for." I mean, really, when someone asks for a steak "one minute past medium," you know you're dealing with an asshole who is going to send back any steak set in front of him. He should have said medium well.
Lately, we have had a number of people who don't know what they're talking about when they order their temperatures. People who ask for medium steaks want it medium well. People who ask for medium rare salmon really want it well done. People have just been the biggest assholes lately. It's almost like they're coming in during this bad economy to push people around so they have someone to push around. They're being douchey in order to make themselves feel better about their own douche baggy, crappy, popped collar lives. Maybe if we know that the guest is gonna be a bag-o-douche, I'll just serve their food raw so that when it does get to them the next time they'll be thankful it's been cooked.
Just last night, one party wrote a mean note on the check after they had paid saying that since they didn't get the table that they wanted three times, that it was a third strike and we were out. I mean, really? How spoiled are these people?
Also on the work front, I have been talking to Chef about what I should do after I leave the restaurant at the end of the season. I mentioned to him that I want to make money to take a year off, but that I also want to work somewhere really good. I would totally work at Hungry Mother in Cambridge. Apparently, a lot of their staff have eaten at the restaurant that I work at and really like the food there. Also, a friend of mine knows the chef there. Another place that I mentioned to Chef was La Laiterie in Providence. Chef is pretty good friends with the chef there as well, and they plan on doing a dinner here on the island sometime in October. I just don't know how I would work living in Cambridge and working in Providence. Would I take the train back and forth every day? Would I try to sublet somewhere cheap and keep the bare minimum there while going back to Cambridge every "weekend?"
La Laiterie would be a killer opportunity. I have eaten there and I really dig the farm to table food that they're doing. I love the fact that the chef there uses all of the bits and bobs that most people discard. I mean, how great is it that he has chicken cracklin' on his menu. I mean fuhgeddabout it! So, I don't really know what I should do. I figure I have a few months to figure it all out.
Also, I think Chef wants me around to do the dinner with this other chef, and he wants to set me up with a job with this other chef, so I know that I might not be out of here until the end of October instead of the middle.
Well, that's my life for the most part right now. Hopefully, as the nights get busier and the number of reservations skyrocket in August, I'll continue to rock as I do. I'm hoping for a third consecutive good grill shift this coming Tuesday, but other than that, not much more on the horizon.
Thursday, July 9, 2009
Day 61: Some Sun
Listening: Stand carving up the wall. Why don't you open up at all? I am ready. I am ready for a fall.
What's my problem? Still rubbish at the grill.
Well, it's true. I'm still rubbish at the grill. This week on my one grill shift a week, I didn't hear a call for a sirloin so I was dragging it, and I didn't know how to speed up the process of cooking it. Apparently the answer is to throw it on the grill, cover it with a sizzle platter, and star chucking butter at the grill so it flames up. After that, you chuck it in your convection oven at 425 until it's where it needs to be before resting, let it rest the minimal amount of time to insure that it won't completely bleed out all over the plate when the guest cuts into it. It's amazing how much flame can come from a brush of butter across grill grates, gas or otherwise.
The next day, however, I killed it on saute. I. Killed. It. Granted, we only did a buck ten instead of a buck forty. I still did a killer job. At one point, I had six ducks come in at the same time, four on one ticket. Ducks were my weak dish when I started saute, but I conquered them to the point that I feel confident in them. It takes time and space on your cook top to render out the fat from the skin. Then, you have to stick it in the oven so that the meat can get to the desired temperature. At first, I was always so unsure, finger bangin' the fuck out of the duck, trying to figure out where it was at. Now, I check it instinctively and it's almost always spot on.
There was one point last night I had so many dishes on order, and I was so far behind in firing food, because I was spending so much time bringing it to the plate that I started firing some of the fish a la minut, meaning it was going to the plate the second it hit the desired temperature. Usually, when an order comes in, I'll cook the fish or whatever while the appetizers are being cooked. When the entrees are ready to be picked up, I'll finish the protein in the broiler, put together the accompaniments and garnish and plate up. Yesterday, though, I was doing it all at once.
I also have a habit of exclaiming "Oh WOW!" when I flip my fish and see that it has a perfect golden crust on top. There's nothing more satisfying than turning your fish and seeing that it's going to have that beautiful crunchy golden crust and soft moist flesh beneath it. The grill guy, who is kind of pissed off that I keep having shit shifts on the grill, because he "knows I'm a badass cook and that I can do it, and I need to stop being a pussy and just do it," told me yesterday that he wanted me to say, "Oh WOW!" when I start putting up steaks and grill items. He says he doesn't want to hear it anymore when I'm on saute, because, clearly, it's too easy for me. He wants me to be doing it on grill.
I know I've told the story a million times, but early in my career, while I was still on garde manger at Chez, Marsoir told me that he knew that I would end up being a saute guy and not a grill guy. He just saw something in me, even before I even worked my way over to the hot line.
To be honest, it really is a different mindset. I was talking to one of my pals who came on island to see Tom Berry and Mark Cina at the Yacht Club about working the grill. He was a grill guy, not a saute guy. His opinion is that on the grill, meat temperatures are a matter of fractions of minutes. One second it's almost there, and then you turn around to do something and turn right back and the steak is over. But, on saute, there are so many little tiny things to make a good dish amazing. Once you get the proteins good in the pan, you just build it up to be great, whereas the greatness comes in the actual cooking of the proteins on a grill and the management of cook times. I'm hoping that I get it down soon. I realize that I only work grill once a week, but I'm hoping it's not the end of the summer by the time it all clicks for me.
In other news, I had a nice day off so far. I started last night when I did laundry. I needed to do it. It did allow me to finish the book that I was reading, Arthur Phillips' The Song is You. The funny thing that happened was that somehow while I was reading and doing my laundry, an eel was thrown into the laundry room. All of a sudden, I hear a "whap, whap, whap." I look over and there on the floor at the other end of the laundry room is an eel flopping around. To be honest, I was a bit befuddled by the situation. I didn't know what I should do, so I left it alone. I'm sure it died by the time I left the laundrymat, because it stopped flopping around. I guess I could have scooped it back to the ocean, because the laundrymat is on the docks, but I didn't have an appropriate tool or the motivation to just grab it.
This morning, I started the day by actually talking to some of my friends on the mainland both by phone and on the internet. Sometimes it's just good to hear voices when you can't see your friends. To be honest, my day got started a little later than I had hoped, because I was on the phone so long, but the day that was supposed to be rainy ended up not being so. It was only sixty five degrees out, but it was sunny. I didn't get to running my errands until two o'clock, and wasn't on the beach with my sandwich and beverage in hand until a quarter past three. That's right. I made it to the beach.
I have to say that it was really nice being out in the sunshine for once in the past few months. I know it wasn't as warm or as sunny as it was in southeast Asia, but it was nice to get some good ol' skin absorbed vitamin D. I started my new book by my old Colby College creative writing professor, I'm Looking Through You: A Memoir by Jennifer Finney Boylan, as I ate my turkey and brie on honey wheat with lettuce, tomato, carrots, pickles, cucumbers, roasted red peppers and basil mayo. The wind was cool, but I managed an hour and a half without my tee shirt on.
I can't wait for it to get hot here though. I know that it'll suck being at the hot line while it's sweltering outside, but I would rather do that and have gloriously hot days off than have cooler days off. I want to feel justified putting on sunscreen and plunging into the ocean (not that I do that all that often).
Also in other news, I ran across this article on CNN.com about night owls. I thought that it was really interesting, because I really do hit my stride between eight and nine o'clock at night. It proves that I'm not lazy like my parents always said about me when I couldn't get up for school or for work. I'm just not on the same clock as a lot of other people. I'm being oppressed! Well, not really, but at least I found a job that I love that allows me to sleep in if I want to.
I have also been looking into buying books on taking a gap year. I'm really going to do this. I'm going to pack up all of my shit, stash it somewhere and travel for a year. Maybe I'll find somewhere that I want to stay. Maybe I'll find that I really do want to stay in Boston FOREVER. Maybe it will sink in that I don't need all of my possessions and I should sell everything when I do get back. All I know is that I need to prepare myself. I need to find out the answers to questions like: What should I do about taxes on my year off? Should I just let them slide? What happens if I run out of passport pages while I'm away? How do I get a new passport while abroad? Will it be cheaper to buy an around the world ticket, or piece it together as I go? Should I go east(towards Vancouver) or west(towards Europe) first? How much money do I really need? How can I pick up work along the way?
There was a conversation in the kitchen the other day, maybe four or five days ago. The older grill guy and I were talking about having kids. He says, at the age of forty four that he's ready. I told him that I want to have kids someday, but I know that I'm not ready and that I still want to see the world. I said that once you have kids, you have to worry about school schedules and steady income. His response is that he wants to see the world too, but with someone. He insisted that I wanted to see the world alone. That's kind of a loaded statement. In a lot of ways, I do want to travel alone. It means that I HAVE to reach out to people in order to not be alone. It means that I have to connect so to speak. But, on the other hand, I would love to have a travel partner too. The thing is that when you're traveling alone, you can meet traveling partners, just as Julia and I traveled from Hoi An to Nha Trang together, and Lydia and I traveled from Hue to Hoi An together. I don't know if the constant companion would be a blessing or a curse. What's the worst that happens, you just split up? That's not so bad. But sometimes I do wish I had someone back home to share all of these travels with. I wonder how it would change things.
But, here I am on Nantucket, pretty much alone. Oh well. I only have 94 more days to go. That's just a little longer than my trip to southeast Asia, and that went in the blink of an eye.
What's my problem? Still rubbish at the grill.
Well, it's true. I'm still rubbish at the grill. This week on my one grill shift a week, I didn't hear a call for a sirloin so I was dragging it, and I didn't know how to speed up the process of cooking it. Apparently the answer is to throw it on the grill, cover it with a sizzle platter, and star chucking butter at the grill so it flames up. After that, you chuck it in your convection oven at 425 until it's where it needs to be before resting, let it rest the minimal amount of time to insure that it won't completely bleed out all over the plate when the guest cuts into it. It's amazing how much flame can come from a brush of butter across grill grates, gas or otherwise.
The next day, however, I killed it on saute. I. Killed. It. Granted, we only did a buck ten instead of a buck forty. I still did a killer job. At one point, I had six ducks come in at the same time, four on one ticket. Ducks were my weak dish when I started saute, but I conquered them to the point that I feel confident in them. It takes time and space on your cook top to render out the fat from the skin. Then, you have to stick it in the oven so that the meat can get to the desired temperature. At first, I was always so unsure, finger bangin' the fuck out of the duck, trying to figure out where it was at. Now, I check it instinctively and it's almost always spot on.
There was one point last night I had so many dishes on order, and I was so far behind in firing food, because I was spending so much time bringing it to the plate that I started firing some of the fish a la minut, meaning it was going to the plate the second it hit the desired temperature. Usually, when an order comes in, I'll cook the fish or whatever while the appetizers are being cooked. When the entrees are ready to be picked up, I'll finish the protein in the broiler, put together the accompaniments and garnish and plate up. Yesterday, though, I was doing it all at once.
I also have a habit of exclaiming "Oh WOW!" when I flip my fish and see that it has a perfect golden crust on top. There's nothing more satisfying than turning your fish and seeing that it's going to have that beautiful crunchy golden crust and soft moist flesh beneath it. The grill guy, who is kind of pissed off that I keep having shit shifts on the grill, because he "knows I'm a badass cook and that I can do it, and I need to stop being a pussy and just do it," told me yesterday that he wanted me to say, "Oh WOW!" when I start putting up steaks and grill items. He says he doesn't want to hear it anymore when I'm on saute, because, clearly, it's too easy for me. He wants me to be doing it on grill.
I know I've told the story a million times, but early in my career, while I was still on garde manger at Chez, Marsoir told me that he knew that I would end up being a saute guy and not a grill guy. He just saw something in me, even before I even worked my way over to the hot line.
To be honest, it really is a different mindset. I was talking to one of my pals who came on island to see Tom Berry and Mark Cina at the Yacht Club about working the grill. He was a grill guy, not a saute guy. His opinion is that on the grill, meat temperatures are a matter of fractions of minutes. One second it's almost there, and then you turn around to do something and turn right back and the steak is over. But, on saute, there are so many little tiny things to make a good dish amazing. Once you get the proteins good in the pan, you just build it up to be great, whereas the greatness comes in the actual cooking of the proteins on a grill and the management of cook times. I'm hoping that I get it down soon. I realize that I only work grill once a week, but I'm hoping it's not the end of the summer by the time it all clicks for me.
In other news, I had a nice day off so far. I started last night when I did laundry. I needed to do it. It did allow me to finish the book that I was reading, Arthur Phillips' The Song is You. The funny thing that happened was that somehow while I was reading and doing my laundry, an eel was thrown into the laundry room. All of a sudden, I hear a "whap, whap, whap." I look over and there on the floor at the other end of the laundry room is an eel flopping around. To be honest, I was a bit befuddled by the situation. I didn't know what I should do, so I left it alone. I'm sure it died by the time I left the laundrymat, because it stopped flopping around. I guess I could have scooped it back to the ocean, because the laundrymat is on the docks, but I didn't have an appropriate tool or the motivation to just grab it.
This morning, I started the day by actually talking to some of my friends on the mainland both by phone and on the internet. Sometimes it's just good to hear voices when you can't see your friends. To be honest, my day got started a little later than I had hoped, because I was on the phone so long, but the day that was supposed to be rainy ended up not being so. It was only sixty five degrees out, but it was sunny. I didn't get to running my errands until two o'clock, and wasn't on the beach with my sandwich and beverage in hand until a quarter past three. That's right. I made it to the beach.
I have to say that it was really nice being out in the sunshine for once in the past few months. I know it wasn't as warm or as sunny as it was in southeast Asia, but it was nice to get some good ol' skin absorbed vitamin D. I started my new book by my old Colby College creative writing professor, I'm Looking Through You: A Memoir by Jennifer Finney Boylan, as I ate my turkey and brie on honey wheat with lettuce, tomato, carrots, pickles, cucumbers, roasted red peppers and basil mayo. The wind was cool, but I managed an hour and a half without my tee shirt on.
I can't wait for it to get hot here though. I know that it'll suck being at the hot line while it's sweltering outside, but I would rather do that and have gloriously hot days off than have cooler days off. I want to feel justified putting on sunscreen and plunging into the ocean (not that I do that all that often).
Also in other news, I ran across this article on CNN.com about night owls. I thought that it was really interesting, because I really do hit my stride between eight and nine o'clock at night. It proves that I'm not lazy like my parents always said about me when I couldn't get up for school or for work. I'm just not on the same clock as a lot of other people. I'm being oppressed! Well, not really, but at least I found a job that I love that allows me to sleep in if I want to.
I have also been looking into buying books on taking a gap year. I'm really going to do this. I'm going to pack up all of my shit, stash it somewhere and travel for a year. Maybe I'll find somewhere that I want to stay. Maybe I'll find that I really do want to stay in Boston FOREVER. Maybe it will sink in that I don't need all of my possessions and I should sell everything when I do get back. All I know is that I need to prepare myself. I need to find out the answers to questions like: What should I do about taxes on my year off? Should I just let them slide? What happens if I run out of passport pages while I'm away? How do I get a new passport while abroad? Will it be cheaper to buy an around the world ticket, or piece it together as I go? Should I go east(towards Vancouver) or west(towards Europe) first? How much money do I really need? How can I pick up work along the way?
There was a conversation in the kitchen the other day, maybe four or five days ago. The older grill guy and I were talking about having kids. He says, at the age of forty four that he's ready. I told him that I want to have kids someday, but I know that I'm not ready and that I still want to see the world. I said that once you have kids, you have to worry about school schedules and steady income. His response is that he wants to see the world too, but with someone. He insisted that I wanted to see the world alone. That's kind of a loaded statement. In a lot of ways, I do want to travel alone. It means that I HAVE to reach out to people in order to not be alone. It means that I have to connect so to speak. But, on the other hand, I would love to have a travel partner too. The thing is that when you're traveling alone, you can meet traveling partners, just as Julia and I traveled from Hoi An to Nha Trang together, and Lydia and I traveled from Hue to Hoi An together. I don't know if the constant companion would be a blessing or a curse. What's the worst that happens, you just split up? That's not so bad. But sometimes I do wish I had someone back home to share all of these travels with. I wonder how it would change things.
But, here I am on Nantucket, pretty much alone. Oh well. I only have 94 more days to go. That's just a little longer than my trip to southeast Asia, and that went in the blink of an eye.
Thursday, July 2, 2009
Day 54: 99 Problems
Listening: If your having girl problems I feel bad for you, son. I got 99 problems but a bitch ain't one.
What's my problem? Meat temps.
I got my own version of that song above which kind of describes the last week for me at work. It goes like this:
I'm havin' grill problems, so feel bad for me, son. 'Cause I got 99 problems, but a fish ain't one.
So, I'm coming off a bad week on the line, if you couldn't already guess. This week, I worked two grill shifts. One of the guys on the line was sent home because he was sick as a dog, so I had to cover the grill while Chef covered the hot apps station.
Now, I feel comfortable on the hot apps station, as I do with the saute station. I can cook up some fish like it's nobody's business, and I'm getting good at cooking duck too, but when it comes to the grill, temping out red meat, and all of that, I feel like the biggest douche ever in the world.
The other day, I killed three lambs. They were suppose to be medium rare and they were medium when I sliced them. I don't know if you get this about me, but I hate wasting food. I hate killing food. It gives me this feeling in the pit of my stomach where I want to vomit. I see the look of disappointment or anger in Chef's eyes and I feel even worse. I get the fear in me and it doesn't make me a stronger cook. It makes me a fearful cook. It makes me overly cautious. That was the worst of the bad days this week. There were other days that were bad for this reason or that reason. But, it seems like, this season, it's always something with me.
It makes me feel like a bad cook. It makes me doubt my talent, my aptitude, and my skills. It makes me wonder if I have what it takes to make cooking my livelihood. It makes me wonder if I can really good, if not great.
It makes me feel good that when I express these doubts to my friends, their instant responses are "are you f'ing kidding me??" and "for what it's worth, I've seen you cook and I doubt neither you talent nor your aptitude nor your skill and I've shared a kitchen with a starred chef." However sometimes, and often this summer, I question it all. On of my friends said that it was okay as long as I was still learning. I just don't feel good about the speed at which I'm getting things. I'm not a rockstar, and it bothers me. I want to learn, but I want it to come to me faster. I want the confidence now.
One of my friends said, "in our brief time together, I've noticed you're more like (if I may reference basketball) a Vinnie Johnson or a James Posey than a Danny Ainge, which is to say your game feeds off your confidence; when you're feeling it, you're really better, things flow. You're not lacking talent, I suspect, but you're on a cold streak (figuratively speaking) and for you that matters. The upside of being a V.J. is when you're in the zone, you're amazing. So, perhaps you need to stop trying to improve and start faking the swagger(as they say in the bible, act as if ye have faith and faith ye shall be given)."
God DAMN I love my friends.
The thing is, I love how they have such confidence in me, confidence that I can't find in myself. My question is, who is right? Is it an in between that makes the reality? Are we both right? Do I have the stuff or don't I? I mean I even get nervous when I cook in my friend's home who is actually an ex-chef. I fear that she's quietly critiquing what I'm doing or how I'm doing things. It's so weird.
Another thing that makes me doubt my skills, aside from the fact that I'm an incredibly slow prepper, is that I'm rotating between the hot apps, saute and the grill. Last year, I rotated through hot apps, saute and the expo/plating station. I was running pickups last year. It wasn't until the end of the season that I worked the grill (and poorly at times). One of the new guys on the hot line (the young talent), asked me what I did last year, and then asked me why I wasn't working the pass again this year, I didn't have an answer for him. Maybe Chef saw what I was doing last year and decided that I wasn't really ready for it.
I've never worked at a place that has made me feel like I sucked this bad sometimes. I'm wondering if it's a good thing or a bad thing. I'm wondering if I really do suck, and if I'm really "that guy," you know the one guy in every kitchen who sucks, but is there because he can do the job just well enough. Or, I'm wondering if I work in that difficult of a kitchen, which I don't really see. Perhaps it could be that a gauntlet is being thrown in an effort to get me to the next plateau. I don't know. All I know is that I feel like shit and I'm looking to regroup today, my day off.
It doesn't help that I have yet to find my happy place on this island yet. Last season I was focused on going abroad. I was focused on making my three month backpacking trip happen. This season, I'm going straight to work wherever when I get out of Nantucket. Although I have toyed with the idea of trying to get a job in Chicago or in San Francisco, I think that I'm going to have to be in Boston. I have a set support system there and if I want to save money for a year off, I'm going to have to know where my expenses will be and where to find things on the cheap.
It's funny. It's almost the 4th of July, and I don't even want to be in America right now. Mentally, I think I'm still in Asia. Mentally, I'm still hopping from city to city, guest house to guest house meeting people from around the globe. In actuality, I'm on an island with people who wear critter pants and patchwork plaid and who have their collars popped.
Every day, I look at my pictures from Asia. I don't know why. Before I go to sleep, I check my e-mail and then flip through the pictures of temples and landscapes. I think about the people that I have pictures of and wonder where they are right now. I wonder if they're happy. I wonder if they're still out there on the trail or if they're home. I wonder if they miss the time we spent together as much as I miss that time.
A week or so ago, I was talking with Sam. She expressed the idea that she felt that if she went missing, no one would go looking for her. In some ways, I can identify with her. Last summer, Anh Dao came down to visit me and Mark Cina stopped by while on vacation with his mother. Other than that, I have had no visitors on this island. I have gone off island to visit people, but no one has really come to me. I feel like when I'm down here, I don't really exist. I feel so incredibly isolated that for the past two days off that I've had, I've spoken to a grand total of zero people who don't work for the restaurant that I work for. My one friend on the island who I really feel is on the same mental level as I am works on the nights that I have off which kind of sucks.
Well, that's how I'm feeling right now. I have no clue what I'm going to do with the rest of my night. They're supposed to be screening Star Wars at the new outdoor movie theater in town. The shit thing about it is that it costs ten bucks. For fuck sake. It's outdoors and it's a thirty two year old movie. *rubble* So yeah, I dunno what I'm gonna do tonight. I'll let you know.
What's my problem? Meat temps.
I got my own version of that song above which kind of describes the last week for me at work. It goes like this:
I'm havin' grill problems, so feel bad for me, son. 'Cause I got 99 problems, but a fish ain't one.
So, I'm coming off a bad week on the line, if you couldn't already guess. This week, I worked two grill shifts. One of the guys on the line was sent home because he was sick as a dog, so I had to cover the grill while Chef covered the hot apps station.
Now, I feel comfortable on the hot apps station, as I do with the saute station. I can cook up some fish like it's nobody's business, and I'm getting good at cooking duck too, but when it comes to the grill, temping out red meat, and all of that, I feel like the biggest douche ever in the world.
The other day, I killed three lambs. They were suppose to be medium rare and they were medium when I sliced them. I don't know if you get this about me, but I hate wasting food. I hate killing food. It gives me this feeling in the pit of my stomach where I want to vomit. I see the look of disappointment or anger in Chef's eyes and I feel even worse. I get the fear in me and it doesn't make me a stronger cook. It makes me a fearful cook. It makes me overly cautious. That was the worst of the bad days this week. There were other days that were bad for this reason or that reason. But, it seems like, this season, it's always something with me.
It makes me feel like a bad cook. It makes me doubt my talent, my aptitude, and my skills. It makes me wonder if I have what it takes to make cooking my livelihood. It makes me wonder if I can really good, if not great.
It makes me feel good that when I express these doubts to my friends, their instant responses are "are you f'ing kidding me??" and "for what it's worth, I've seen you cook and I doubt neither you talent nor your aptitude nor your skill and I've shared a kitchen with a starred chef." However sometimes, and often this summer, I question it all. On of my friends said that it was okay as long as I was still learning. I just don't feel good about the speed at which I'm getting things. I'm not a rockstar, and it bothers me. I want to learn, but I want it to come to me faster. I want the confidence now.
One of my friends said, "in our brief time together, I've noticed you're more like (if I may reference basketball) a Vinnie Johnson or a James Posey than a Danny Ainge, which is to say your game feeds off your confidence; when you're feeling it, you're really better, things flow. You're not lacking talent, I suspect, but you're on a cold streak (figuratively speaking) and for you that matters. The upside of being a V.J. is when you're in the zone, you're amazing. So, perhaps you need to stop trying to improve and start faking the swagger(as they say in the bible, act as if ye have faith and faith ye shall be given)."
God DAMN I love my friends.
The thing is, I love how they have such confidence in me, confidence that I can't find in myself. My question is, who is right? Is it an in between that makes the reality? Are we both right? Do I have the stuff or don't I? I mean I even get nervous when I cook in my friend's home who is actually an ex-chef. I fear that she's quietly critiquing what I'm doing or how I'm doing things. It's so weird.
Another thing that makes me doubt my skills, aside from the fact that I'm an incredibly slow prepper, is that I'm rotating between the hot apps, saute and the grill. Last year, I rotated through hot apps, saute and the expo/plating station. I was running pickups last year. It wasn't until the end of the season that I worked the grill (and poorly at times). One of the new guys on the hot line (the young talent), asked me what I did last year, and then asked me why I wasn't working the pass again this year, I didn't have an answer for him. Maybe Chef saw what I was doing last year and decided that I wasn't really ready for it.
I've never worked at a place that has made me feel like I sucked this bad sometimes. I'm wondering if it's a good thing or a bad thing. I'm wondering if I really do suck, and if I'm really "that guy," you know the one guy in every kitchen who sucks, but is there because he can do the job just well enough. Or, I'm wondering if I work in that difficult of a kitchen, which I don't really see. Perhaps it could be that a gauntlet is being thrown in an effort to get me to the next plateau. I don't know. All I know is that I feel like shit and I'm looking to regroup today, my day off.
It doesn't help that I have yet to find my happy place on this island yet. Last season I was focused on going abroad. I was focused on making my three month backpacking trip happen. This season, I'm going straight to work wherever when I get out of Nantucket. Although I have toyed with the idea of trying to get a job in Chicago or in San Francisco, I think that I'm going to have to be in Boston. I have a set support system there and if I want to save money for a year off, I'm going to have to know where my expenses will be and where to find things on the cheap.
It's funny. It's almost the 4th of July, and I don't even want to be in America right now. Mentally, I think I'm still in Asia. Mentally, I'm still hopping from city to city, guest house to guest house meeting people from around the globe. In actuality, I'm on an island with people who wear critter pants and patchwork plaid and who have their collars popped.
Every day, I look at my pictures from Asia. I don't know why. Before I go to sleep, I check my e-mail and then flip through the pictures of temples and landscapes. I think about the people that I have pictures of and wonder where they are right now. I wonder if they're happy. I wonder if they're still out there on the trail or if they're home. I wonder if they miss the time we spent together as much as I miss that time.
A week or so ago, I was talking with Sam. She expressed the idea that she felt that if she went missing, no one would go looking for her. In some ways, I can identify with her. Last summer, Anh Dao came down to visit me and Mark Cina stopped by while on vacation with his mother. Other than that, I have had no visitors on this island. I have gone off island to visit people, but no one has really come to me. I feel like when I'm down here, I don't really exist. I feel so incredibly isolated that for the past two days off that I've had, I've spoken to a grand total of zero people who don't work for the restaurant that I work for. My one friend on the island who I really feel is on the same mental level as I am works on the nights that I have off which kind of sucks.
Well, that's how I'm feeling right now. I have no clue what I'm going to do with the rest of my night. They're supposed to be screening Star Wars at the new outdoor movie theater in town. The shit thing about it is that it costs ten bucks. For fuck sake. It's outdoors and it's a thirty two year old movie. *rubble* So yeah, I dunno what I'm gonna do tonight. I'll let you know.
Tuesday, June 30, 2009
Day 51: I'm a Bonehead
Listening: *ring* *ring* *ring*
What's my problem? I'm a bonehead.
So, today, I'm in the kitchen about ten minutes before break is supposed to end. I've been a bit in the weeds all day long since I had a busy night last night and I woke up a bit late today and got in about a half hour later than I wanted to get in. So, I'm there making my mussel vinaigrette and I hear this phone ringing.
Shortly thereafter, one of the interns comes in. I ask her if that's her phone. She says no. As we look for the phone, it keeps ringing and it seems as if the sound of the phone is moving around. First it's over here and then it's over there.
After about fifteen minutes, and about five minutes of the other cooks looking for the mysterious phone ringing, Chef asks if it's my phone.
Now, I just recently started using a friend of mine's old Blackberry. I have never heard it ring a single time in my life. I also have an alarm set which usually vibrates when it's about ten minutes before break is over.
That's right. It was my phone. It was totally fucked up. I felt like the biggest jackass ever in this kitchen. So, not only was I behind in prep today, but I also made a complete fool of myself. I guess that's how it is for me down in Nantucket.
On the up side of things, my ducks have been coming out better and better (the duck breast on the menu, not the Peking ducks that I have been trying out). I also had my pickled watermelon rind put on a fried oyster special. It's fried oysters with a tomato and bacon dressing, smoked corn salsa, heirloom cherry tomatoes and pickled watermelon rind. I must say it's kinda bangin'. There's so much of the pickled watermelon rind in the walk-in that I'm sure he'll use it on other specials.
But the bottom line is that I'm a bonehead.
What's my problem? I'm a bonehead.
So, today, I'm in the kitchen about ten minutes before break is supposed to end. I've been a bit in the weeds all day long since I had a busy night last night and I woke up a bit late today and got in about a half hour later than I wanted to get in. So, I'm there making my mussel vinaigrette and I hear this phone ringing.
Shortly thereafter, one of the interns comes in. I ask her if that's her phone. She says no. As we look for the phone, it keeps ringing and it seems as if the sound of the phone is moving around. First it's over here and then it's over there.
After about fifteen minutes, and about five minutes of the other cooks looking for the mysterious phone ringing, Chef asks if it's my phone.
Now, I just recently started using a friend of mine's old Blackberry. I have never heard it ring a single time in my life. I also have an alarm set which usually vibrates when it's about ten minutes before break is over.
That's right. It was my phone. It was totally fucked up. I felt like the biggest jackass ever in this kitchen. So, not only was I behind in prep today, but I also made a complete fool of myself. I guess that's how it is for me down in Nantucket.
On the up side of things, my ducks have been coming out better and better (the duck breast on the menu, not the Peking ducks that I have been trying out). I also had my pickled watermelon rind put on a fried oyster special. It's fried oysters with a tomato and bacon dressing, smoked corn salsa, heirloom cherry tomatoes and pickled watermelon rind. I must say it's kinda bangin'. There's so much of the pickled watermelon rind in the walk-in that I'm sure he'll use it on other specials.
But the bottom line is that I'm a bonehead.
Thursday, June 25, 2009
Day 47: In 'n' Out
Listening: Lazy locomotives, wherever you may roll, I think you have no motive. I know you have no home.
What's my problem? One day off is NOT enough.
So it's been a while since I posted. The reason why is that I usually write on my day off. Today... my day off. Last day off, I was in New York City. I was a bit too busy to write.
As I said in my last post, my friend, Jade, passed through New York on her way through to Canada for an internship. When I'm traveling and I meet people I like and who I feel like I have made a genuine connection with, I tend to say to them, "Hey, if you're ever on the east coast of the States, let me know and I'll do my best to get out to wherever you are to hang out." This is the only time that anyone has ever taken me up on it. My friend Lianne came to visit me in Boston, but this is the first time where I have traveled to see a travel friend in my home country.
So, I took the eleven o'clock flight to JFK from Nantucket, which ended up being a noon flight. I was in JFK at one and I was at the American Museum of Natural History at two, where I met up with Jade.
It was a crappy day in New York City that day. It was raining. Jade was wearing the wrong shoes (because she's a girl), so we had to keep stopping so she could make sure her shoes weren't falling off.
It was kind of a strange meeting, because we haven't seen each other since we met in Paris four years ago. I had a couple of pictures of her, but all she had of me were the e-mails we shot back and forth. Apparently she was sweating it over whether she would remember what I looked like. Fortunately all of her worries were for naught, because when I popped around the corner out of the AC Subway station, she recognized me right away.
From there, we headed to Mulberry Street to get some Italian food for lunch and to catch up. It turns out that she had been eating Chinese food for the past two days, as she had been staying with her aunt in Flushing.
From there, we walked around Soho for a bit before heading back to Midtown to check out the Empire State Building. I know, it sounds kitschy, but she had never been, I had never been, and we figured that it might be cool. Unfortunately, due to the weather, there was zero visibility. We were warned on our way up, but she said, "When will I get another chance to do this. I might as well do it now, visibility or not." So we went, and this is what we saw.
That last one is the view straight down.
Anyhow, from there we made it over to Times Square to go see Avenue Q. I had bought tickets online ahead of time, so we had great seats, and cheap to boot. I was lucky and found a discount code online. It was either that show or the Lion King, and the difference was that I had a discount code for Avenue Q.
I had been wanting to see Avenue Q for a long time. I don't remember where I first heard of the musical, but I have almost the entire soundtrack on my iTunes, and I listen to it reasonable frequently. I new that it would be funny, and I knew that I would like it, but what I didn't realize was that it would be so much funnier with the interludes and the actual story lines playing out in front of you.
Jade is kind of picky about her musicals. She had never heard of Avenue Q and I told her that it was kind of a cross between Rent and Sesame Street, like the Muppets for adults. When we had lunch, I found out that she hated Rent for some reason. I don't know how anyone can hate Rent. She loved Avenue Q though. She bought the soundtrack, a t-shirt and a mousepad. I kind of wanted some schwag too, but I knew that I didn't really need it.
After the show we went to the Delta Grill and had some mediocre soul food (it sucks when you, a short Chinese American guy, can do soul food better than a restaurant specializing in the cuisine), and then hung out in Times Square until two in the morning. We tried to get into the Birdland to see some jazz, but the show was fifteen bucks and there was only fifteen minutes left of it before the place closed. We tried to hit up the Blue Note down in Greenwich Village, but when we got there it was closed too. What happened to New York being the city that never sleeps. Apparently it does.
Since we didn't really want to go on a crazy quest to find jazz, we just ended up across the street at a bar called the Big Fat Black Pussy Cat. I thought it was a strip club at first, but it wasn't. One side of the bar was totally a dive bar, but you go through this doorway and it's kind of a swank lounge. There was a guy spinning soul music, big cushy couches and high-backed chairs. The cocktails were meh, but I enjoyed it anyways.
We left the Big Fat Black Pussy Cat around four and headed to a diner for a cup of coffee before the real fiasco of the day off began.
We left the diner in Greenwich Village at around a quarter to five. We thought that the subway would be an easy way to get her to Queens and me to JFK. We waited for the longest time before we gave up and caught a cab. The cabbie had no clue where he was going, and it took forever for us to get to Queens, and when we couldn't find where Jade's aunt's place was, we had to get to JFK so I could catch my flight.
My flight was at ten past seven. We got there at a quarter to seven and they had closed check in. I had missed my flight due to this cabbie's incompetence. BASTARD! So I had to catch the next flight to Nantucket which was to leave at a quarter past eleven, and would arrive at a quarter past one. That flight was delayed and didn't leave until a quarter past noon, and I didn't get back onto the island until two in the afternoon.
Normally I get into work at around half past noon. It's still slow season, so I can even get in at one if I know I have nothing big to do. I didn't get into the kitchen until half past two. Luckily, Chef is a cool guy and is pretty understanding. He said that he knew that I wouldn't make it in on time. He was just glad that I texted him to let him know.
As far as the work front goes, I think that I'm doing well for the most part. I've come to terms with what I know and what I don't know. I have been doing well at generally sitting back and not doing too much that is extra. By that, I mean that I'm not actively looking for new things to try out. I'm not asking for special proteins. I'm not trying to put anything on the menu.
I think that Chef has sort of noticed that, so he asks me to do different things. He got in a sample Pekin duck, so he asked me to make a Peking style roast duck to make an appetizer with. I had never made one, but I did some research and made it. It came out damn nice too. Here are a few pictures of me giving the duck that had been hung to dry the first time a bit of a hot water bath before the second hang.
Apparently I did such a good job that he ordered three more ducks and I'm going to do it again in a week or so. I learned so much this time around that I'm going to do a few things differently. I'm definitely going to season the duck a little bit more. I'm going to temp the duck a little bit better, and I think I might dry rub it too for the first hang. I'm also going to take more pictures of it too.
As far as the "home" front is concerned, I have a room mate now. Unfortunately. He's kind of a nerd and talks a lot, but at least he's clean. I continue to miss my own bed and my room mates back in Cambridge. It makes me kinda sad that they may not be there for long when I move back.
Oh, also, my pal Mark Cina is working on this island this summer with Tom Berry. Apparently, since they kept pushing back the opening of the restaurant he's supposed to chef, he's taking the summer over here in Nantucket until September when they're going to open Stoddard's. It's nice to know that I have another ally on this island. It sucks that I don't feel close to any of the people that I work with. Having Mark around will make the summer go quicker. Unfortunately, I think that it might also have an impact on my budget. But I guess if I don't want to be a hermit, I'll have to be spending at least a little bit.
Well, that's it for now. I've been pedaling around the island all day listening to Wilco (who I have found that I really like), and now it's time for me to go see Transformers at the crappy movie theater. Maybe I'll post again later if I have something productive to say.
What's my problem? One day off is NOT enough.
So it's been a while since I posted. The reason why is that I usually write on my day off. Today... my day off. Last day off, I was in New York City. I was a bit too busy to write.
As I said in my last post, my friend, Jade, passed through New York on her way through to Canada for an internship. When I'm traveling and I meet people I like and who I feel like I have made a genuine connection with, I tend to say to them, "Hey, if you're ever on the east coast of the States, let me know and I'll do my best to get out to wherever you are to hang out." This is the only time that anyone has ever taken me up on it. My friend Lianne came to visit me in Boston, but this is the first time where I have traveled to see a travel friend in my home country.
So, I took the eleven o'clock flight to JFK from Nantucket, which ended up being a noon flight. I was in JFK at one and I was at the American Museum of Natural History at two, where I met up with Jade.
It was a crappy day in New York City that day. It was raining. Jade was wearing the wrong shoes (because she's a girl), so we had to keep stopping so she could make sure her shoes weren't falling off.
It was kind of a strange meeting, because we haven't seen each other since we met in Paris four years ago. I had a couple of pictures of her, but all she had of me were the e-mails we shot back and forth. Apparently she was sweating it over whether she would remember what I looked like. Fortunately all of her worries were for naught, because when I popped around the corner out of the AC Subway station, she recognized me right away.
From there, we headed to Mulberry Street to get some Italian food for lunch and to catch up. It turns out that she had been eating Chinese food for the past two days, as she had been staying with her aunt in Flushing.
From there, we walked around Soho for a bit before heading back to Midtown to check out the Empire State Building. I know, it sounds kitschy, but she had never been, I had never been, and we figured that it might be cool. Unfortunately, due to the weather, there was zero visibility. We were warned on our way up, but she said, "When will I get another chance to do this. I might as well do it now, visibility or not." So we went, and this is what we saw.
That last one is the view straight down.
Anyhow, from there we made it over to Times Square to go see Avenue Q. I had bought tickets online ahead of time, so we had great seats, and cheap to boot. I was lucky and found a discount code online. It was either that show or the Lion King, and the difference was that I had a discount code for Avenue Q.
I had been wanting to see Avenue Q for a long time. I don't remember where I first heard of the musical, but I have almost the entire soundtrack on my iTunes, and I listen to it reasonable frequently. I new that it would be funny, and I knew that I would like it, but what I didn't realize was that it would be so much funnier with the interludes and the actual story lines playing out in front of you.
Jade is kind of picky about her musicals. She had never heard of Avenue Q and I told her that it was kind of a cross between Rent and Sesame Street, like the Muppets for adults. When we had lunch, I found out that she hated Rent for some reason. I don't know how anyone can hate Rent. She loved Avenue Q though. She bought the soundtrack, a t-shirt and a mousepad. I kind of wanted some schwag too, but I knew that I didn't really need it.
After the show we went to the Delta Grill and had some mediocre soul food (it sucks when you, a short Chinese American guy, can do soul food better than a restaurant specializing in the cuisine), and then hung out in Times Square until two in the morning. We tried to get into the Birdland to see some jazz, but the show was fifteen bucks and there was only fifteen minutes left of it before the place closed. We tried to hit up the Blue Note down in Greenwich Village, but when we got there it was closed too. What happened to New York being the city that never sleeps. Apparently it does.
Since we didn't really want to go on a crazy quest to find jazz, we just ended up across the street at a bar called the Big Fat Black Pussy Cat. I thought it was a strip club at first, but it wasn't. One side of the bar was totally a dive bar, but you go through this doorway and it's kind of a swank lounge. There was a guy spinning soul music, big cushy couches and high-backed chairs. The cocktails were meh, but I enjoyed it anyways.
We left the Big Fat Black Pussy Cat around four and headed to a diner for a cup of coffee before the real fiasco of the day off began.
We left the diner in Greenwich Village at around a quarter to five. We thought that the subway would be an easy way to get her to Queens and me to JFK. We waited for the longest time before we gave up and caught a cab. The cabbie had no clue where he was going, and it took forever for us to get to Queens, and when we couldn't find where Jade's aunt's place was, we had to get to JFK so I could catch my flight.
My flight was at ten past seven. We got there at a quarter to seven and they had closed check in. I had missed my flight due to this cabbie's incompetence. BASTARD! So I had to catch the next flight to Nantucket which was to leave at a quarter past eleven, and would arrive at a quarter past one. That flight was delayed and didn't leave until a quarter past noon, and I didn't get back onto the island until two in the afternoon.
Normally I get into work at around half past noon. It's still slow season, so I can even get in at one if I know I have nothing big to do. I didn't get into the kitchen until half past two. Luckily, Chef is a cool guy and is pretty understanding. He said that he knew that I wouldn't make it in on time. He was just glad that I texted him to let him know.
As far as the work front goes, I think that I'm doing well for the most part. I've come to terms with what I know and what I don't know. I have been doing well at generally sitting back and not doing too much that is extra. By that, I mean that I'm not actively looking for new things to try out. I'm not asking for special proteins. I'm not trying to put anything on the menu.
I think that Chef has sort of noticed that, so he asks me to do different things. He got in a sample Pekin duck, so he asked me to make a Peking style roast duck to make an appetizer with. I had never made one, but I did some research and made it. It came out damn nice too. Here are a few pictures of me giving the duck that had been hung to dry the first time a bit of a hot water bath before the second hang.
Apparently I did such a good job that he ordered three more ducks and I'm going to do it again in a week or so. I learned so much this time around that I'm going to do a few things differently. I'm definitely going to season the duck a little bit more. I'm going to temp the duck a little bit better, and I think I might dry rub it too for the first hang. I'm also going to take more pictures of it too.
As far as the "home" front is concerned, I have a room mate now. Unfortunately. He's kind of a nerd and talks a lot, but at least he's clean. I continue to miss my own bed and my room mates back in Cambridge. It makes me kinda sad that they may not be there for long when I move back.
Oh, also, my pal Mark Cina is working on this island this summer with Tom Berry. Apparently, since they kept pushing back the opening of the restaurant he's supposed to chef, he's taking the summer over here in Nantucket until September when they're going to open Stoddard's. It's nice to know that I have another ally on this island. It sucks that I don't feel close to any of the people that I work with. Having Mark around will make the summer go quicker. Unfortunately, I think that it might also have an impact on my budget. But I guess if I don't want to be a hermit, I'll have to be spending at least a little bit.
Well, that's it for now. I've been pedaling around the island all day listening to Wilco (who I have found that I really like), and now it's time for me to go see Transformers at the crappy movie theater. Maybe I'll post again later if I have something productive to say.
Wednesday, June 10, 2009
Day 32: Things Could Get Worse.
Listening: There's flies in the kitchen. I can hear em there buzzing and I ain't done nothing since I woke up today. How the hell can a person go to work in the morning and come home in the evening and have nothing to say?
What's my problem? I'm living just to get by.
Usually, I have Thursdays off. Today is Wednesday and I didn't have to work today. I traded my day off with Pies whose father is coming up from Florida to visit. I was hoping that it would lead me to being able to trade for an extra day off next week, but the way that scheduling works, I can't snag anyone's day off and have two days in a row.
The reason that I wanted to have two days off is because my friend Jade, whom I met in Paris in the fall of 2005, will be in New York City for a week from this coming Tuesday until the following Tuesday. Pies has Wednesdays off, but his father will be in town from today until next Thursday. This means that he doesn't want to give up his Wednesday next week. No one has Friday off, which kind of sucks, because that means that I have no one to trade with on the other end of my day off. That leaves me pretty S.O.L.
Even though I only have one day off, I plan on going down to New York for that one night to see my friend. I know it's gonna eat up a ton of cash, but I figured, how often do I get to see my friend from Australia. She's never been to the States, as far as I know. It will be her first time in New York City, at least. The closest that I ever got to Australia was in the islands of Thailand. By her coming to New York, it's a mere hour long flight. Sure, it'll likely cost me two hundred dollars to fly it, plus I'll be spending money on food and drink and maybe even a show while I'm down there, but I think it's worth it. I would like to think that if I went to Barcelona, my pal CTodd would take his day off and trek from Madrid to see me. I would like to think that if I were in Brugge, Julia would com from Den Hague to see me. Life's too short and good relationships are too hard to come by to not try to keep them when you can.
Anyhow, if I fly Jet Blue, it'll cost me about $214, but I won't arrive in NYC until three in the afternoon, and I'll be taking a flight back at seven in the morning. If I fly Delta, it'll cost $315 and I'll arrive at noon, and will be flying back at eight in the morning. I do have a hundred dollar voucher for Jet Blue that Linh got me for my 30th birthday. That would cut my cost down to just $114 for the flights, but, still, I wouldn't be arriving at JFK until three. By the time I get into the city, it'll be four in the afternoon. By the time I meet up with Jade it'll be five, time for dinner. The bonus is that I think that we're going to pull an all-nighter, just because I would have to be at the airport so early. It's not worth getting a room for me, or even trying to stay at friends' places in Queens or Hoboken.
So, a week from tomorrow, that's where I'll be. I'll be in New York. I don't know what I'll wear or what I'll bring with me. I'm wondering if I should bring a daypack with me just in case I want to buy city provisions to bring back with me. I know that I can't buy shampoo or anything like that, because it would mean that I would need to check my bag. I dunno what I would bring back, but I would be back in civilization.
In other aspects of work and living on this island which has become my own personal Alcatraz, there's a new guy moving into the apartment tonight. The other guy who's already there said that he purposefully left his room a complete mess, throwing his clothes on the two other beds in his room so that the new guy would think that the other two beds were occupied. As far as my room goes, one of the other cooks left some of his stuff in my room on the other bed, so I'm hoping that it detours the new guy from staying in my room. I didn't purposefully leave my room a shithole though. That's kind of a dick move. I find that more and more, as nice as people pretend to be, there are a lot of people willing to pull dick moves. Sometimes I wonder if I should be pulling dick moves too.
I guess it really only matters for the next few weeks. We got another guy coming in four weeks or so. There will be four of us up there in two bedrooms. I have a bed in the larger of the two rooms, and I have already staked out the desk, a bookshelf, a set of drawers and the proper closet. I left whoever is in my room a set of Rubbermaid drawers, a proper set of drawers, a small cupboard thingie, and I found a collapsable closet that I put together last night just so that I could keep the proper closet to myself.
I already don't feel relaxed at "home." I dunno how much this new person is going to be affecting my already constant feeling of unrest.
I hope this dude isn't as lazy as my current roommie. He does no cleaning or upkeep, even though he makes most of the mess. He never takes out the trash. Sure, he's a nice guy for the most part, he's just a bit lazy.
Today, I bought some cleaning supplies so that I would be able to clean up the apartment a bit. The floors need a sweep and a mop, mostly because I'm the only one who takes off their shoes in the house. It really irks me when it rains and they trek water all over the apartment.
I swear I'm not this OCD. I ABHOR household upkeep, but the thing is that if you drop a Cheerio on the floor, if you pick it up right then and there, you don't have to worry about sweeping it up the next day. If you wash your glass after you're done using it, you don't have to worry about cleaning twenty of them when the sink gets full.
I've been known to explode all over my room. I do that often, in fact. But I do my best to not have my mess affect someone else. I just don't know how this is going to be, but I have a bad feeling about it.
It's rough going from living this life full of vibrance, excitement, interesting and open people that I want to get to know and spend time with to living a life where I'm just trying to get by for the next five months. I know it's a shit way to live, but it's all I have right now. It's just me, my iPod and my computer with all of my pictures on it.
I'm thinking about ordering some Poi chains. I figure that I could teach myself how to spin fire poi by the end of the summer. It's something that I can do by myself on the beach either before or after work, or even on my day off. It would just give me another thing to do. Then, when I go back to Koh Tao, I can go back to the Lotus Club at Sairee Beach and maybe do a little bit of fire spinning with the performers there.
Really, I'm just plotting my next escape. I don't know how it's going to happen or for how long, but I think a good idea would be to go a year from November. It would give me a good amount of time to build up capital and close up loose ends that I would need to tie up before leaving for potentially a whole year. Also, there's a chance that I'll be in Vancouver around that time, which is a great jumping off point to Korea and China.
I think that if my insertion point is Korea, I'll travel down through China, to Taiwan, Hong Kong, and then down to the Philippines. From there, I would hit New Zealand and Australia before heading back north through Indonesia, Singapore and the west coast of Thailand. I think that I would re-visit some of the places in southeast Asia that I rushed through or that I missed, before heading back into China to see Tibet and Nepal. From there, I think that I might try to hit the Trans-Siberian railroad from China into Russia, which I think would be really cool. From Russia, I would check out eastern Europe, including Lithuania, Poland, Croatia, Hungary, Greece and Turkey. I would stop by to see Iria in Germany, and Julia in Den Hague. Maybe I would go see Markus and Robert in Sweden as well. I think from there, I would want to head to South America, and then find a way to head back into the States by way of Central America and up through Mexico. That sounds like an amazing trip to me. We'll see if all of that happens. I think that if I were to cut any of it, it would probably be the South America/Central America part. I really do wonder how long that trip would take, if I really took my time and tried to find jobs in places that I liked.
I really think that my next big trip will be an open ended trip. I really don't want to feel like I have to be back anywhere unless I run out of money. I don't want to have any commitments. I want to be free to go an run with the travelers. I want to be able to feel like I can move on at any time if I don't like what's happening without long term career repercussions. I know that having a gap in my resume would have career repercussions, but I feel like the experience that I would get in return would pay dividends.
Life is to be lived and shared, two things that are not really going on with me on this island. I don't think that it would have hit me as hard if I had never gone to Asia, but my eyes are open now. I've been spoiled. The only thing I can do now is feed the addiction.
What's my problem? I'm living just to get by.
Usually, I have Thursdays off. Today is Wednesday and I didn't have to work today. I traded my day off with Pies whose father is coming up from Florida to visit. I was hoping that it would lead me to being able to trade for an extra day off next week, but the way that scheduling works, I can't snag anyone's day off and have two days in a row.
The reason that I wanted to have two days off is because my friend Jade, whom I met in Paris in the fall of 2005, will be in New York City for a week from this coming Tuesday until the following Tuesday. Pies has Wednesdays off, but his father will be in town from today until next Thursday. This means that he doesn't want to give up his Wednesday next week. No one has Friday off, which kind of sucks, because that means that I have no one to trade with on the other end of my day off. That leaves me pretty S.O.L.
Even though I only have one day off, I plan on going down to New York for that one night to see my friend. I know it's gonna eat up a ton of cash, but I figured, how often do I get to see my friend from Australia. She's never been to the States, as far as I know. It will be her first time in New York City, at least. The closest that I ever got to Australia was in the islands of Thailand. By her coming to New York, it's a mere hour long flight. Sure, it'll likely cost me two hundred dollars to fly it, plus I'll be spending money on food and drink and maybe even a show while I'm down there, but I think it's worth it. I would like to think that if I went to Barcelona, my pal CTodd would take his day off and trek from Madrid to see me. I would like to think that if I were in Brugge, Julia would com from Den Hague to see me. Life's too short and good relationships are too hard to come by to not try to keep them when you can.
Anyhow, if I fly Jet Blue, it'll cost me about $214, but I won't arrive in NYC until three in the afternoon, and I'll be taking a flight back at seven in the morning. If I fly Delta, it'll cost $315 and I'll arrive at noon, and will be flying back at eight in the morning. I do have a hundred dollar voucher for Jet Blue that Linh got me for my 30th birthday. That would cut my cost down to just $114 for the flights, but, still, I wouldn't be arriving at JFK until three. By the time I get into the city, it'll be four in the afternoon. By the time I meet up with Jade it'll be five, time for dinner. The bonus is that I think that we're going to pull an all-nighter, just because I would have to be at the airport so early. It's not worth getting a room for me, or even trying to stay at friends' places in Queens or Hoboken.
So, a week from tomorrow, that's where I'll be. I'll be in New York. I don't know what I'll wear or what I'll bring with me. I'm wondering if I should bring a daypack with me just in case I want to buy city provisions to bring back with me. I know that I can't buy shampoo or anything like that, because it would mean that I would need to check my bag. I dunno what I would bring back, but I would be back in civilization.
In other aspects of work and living on this island which has become my own personal Alcatraz, there's a new guy moving into the apartment tonight. The other guy who's already there said that he purposefully left his room a complete mess, throwing his clothes on the two other beds in his room so that the new guy would think that the other two beds were occupied. As far as my room goes, one of the other cooks left some of his stuff in my room on the other bed, so I'm hoping that it detours the new guy from staying in my room. I didn't purposefully leave my room a shithole though. That's kind of a dick move. I find that more and more, as nice as people pretend to be, there are a lot of people willing to pull dick moves. Sometimes I wonder if I should be pulling dick moves too.
I guess it really only matters for the next few weeks. We got another guy coming in four weeks or so. There will be four of us up there in two bedrooms. I have a bed in the larger of the two rooms, and I have already staked out the desk, a bookshelf, a set of drawers and the proper closet. I left whoever is in my room a set of Rubbermaid drawers, a proper set of drawers, a small cupboard thingie, and I found a collapsable closet that I put together last night just so that I could keep the proper closet to myself.
I already don't feel relaxed at "home." I dunno how much this new person is going to be affecting my already constant feeling of unrest.
I hope this dude isn't as lazy as my current roommie. He does no cleaning or upkeep, even though he makes most of the mess. He never takes out the trash. Sure, he's a nice guy for the most part, he's just a bit lazy.
Today, I bought some cleaning supplies so that I would be able to clean up the apartment a bit. The floors need a sweep and a mop, mostly because I'm the only one who takes off their shoes in the house. It really irks me when it rains and they trek water all over the apartment.
I swear I'm not this OCD. I ABHOR household upkeep, but the thing is that if you drop a Cheerio on the floor, if you pick it up right then and there, you don't have to worry about sweeping it up the next day. If you wash your glass after you're done using it, you don't have to worry about cleaning twenty of them when the sink gets full.
I've been known to explode all over my room. I do that often, in fact. But I do my best to not have my mess affect someone else. I just don't know how this is going to be, but I have a bad feeling about it.
It's rough going from living this life full of vibrance, excitement, interesting and open people that I want to get to know and spend time with to living a life where I'm just trying to get by for the next five months. I know it's a shit way to live, but it's all I have right now. It's just me, my iPod and my computer with all of my pictures on it.
I'm thinking about ordering some Poi chains. I figure that I could teach myself how to spin fire poi by the end of the summer. It's something that I can do by myself on the beach either before or after work, or even on my day off. It would just give me another thing to do. Then, when I go back to Koh Tao, I can go back to the Lotus Club at Sairee Beach and maybe do a little bit of fire spinning with the performers there.
Really, I'm just plotting my next escape. I don't know how it's going to happen or for how long, but I think a good idea would be to go a year from November. It would give me a good amount of time to build up capital and close up loose ends that I would need to tie up before leaving for potentially a whole year. Also, there's a chance that I'll be in Vancouver around that time, which is a great jumping off point to Korea and China.
I think that if my insertion point is Korea, I'll travel down through China, to Taiwan, Hong Kong, and then down to the Philippines. From there, I would hit New Zealand and Australia before heading back north through Indonesia, Singapore and the west coast of Thailand. I think that I would re-visit some of the places in southeast Asia that I rushed through or that I missed, before heading back into China to see Tibet and Nepal. From there, I think that I might try to hit the Trans-Siberian railroad from China into Russia, which I think would be really cool. From Russia, I would check out eastern Europe, including Lithuania, Poland, Croatia, Hungary, Greece and Turkey. I would stop by to see Iria in Germany, and Julia in Den Hague. Maybe I would go see Markus and Robert in Sweden as well. I think from there, I would want to head to South America, and then find a way to head back into the States by way of Central America and up through Mexico. That sounds like an amazing trip to me. We'll see if all of that happens. I think that if I were to cut any of it, it would probably be the South America/Central America part. I really do wonder how long that trip would take, if I really took my time and tried to find jobs in places that I liked.
I really think that my next big trip will be an open ended trip. I really don't want to feel like I have to be back anywhere unless I run out of money. I don't want to have any commitments. I want to be free to go an run with the travelers. I want to be able to feel like I can move on at any time if I don't like what's happening without long term career repercussions. I know that having a gap in my resume would have career repercussions, but I feel like the experience that I would get in return would pay dividends.
Life is to be lived and shared, two things that are not really going on with me on this island. I don't think that it would have hit me as hard if I had never gone to Asia, but my eyes are open now. I've been spoiled. The only thing I can do now is feed the addiction.
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