Injury and Illness

I've been lucky. Generally, whenever I start a new job, or promising relationship or otherwise endeavor to make forward progress in my life, I become sick. And I'm not talking "sniffles, get some rest" kind of sick. I'm saying my body rebels against me in a way that only the very elderly or the constantly-ill infant can understand. Most of the time, this happens within the first two days of whatever new project I've started. It hasn't happened yet and for that, I am pleased.

Here's what I'm not pleased about: I'm totally exhausted. I fell asleep last night at 7:30 and only woke up to move from the bottom floor of my house to the top. I simply cannot imagine what it must be like for those unfortunates who find themselves forced to work through this gruelling coursework. If seven and half hours in class is not enough, we're averaging 700 pages of book readin' a night (That might be a slight exaggeration, but I'm too tired to get up to check my syllabus. Incidentally, I'm too tired to read what is assigned in my syllabus.), anywhere from one to five recipes for writin' a night, and I've been assigned the task of countin' every night.

Weights and measures. As a cook, there is really no excuse not to know them. As an aspiring chef, there is really no reason I should be allowed to cook without knowing them. Here's the trouble: Math, and all of its components (That is, memorization, reason and analytical thinking) escape me. It was practically a miracle that I passed my entrance exam. Now I've got to learn how many teaspoons are in a gallon. Not fair. Well, actually, it's perfectly fair but that has no bearing whatever on whether or not I complain about it.

Speaking of complaining, we're not really permitted to do that at school. "What's that? You just sliced off the top segment of one of your digits? You should be more careful. Put that finger on ice and commence with the bruniose!" Really, it would be more apt to describe Chef as a slave driver. And don't you dare let him find you standing. If you could be standing, you should be working. And working generally means something unpleasant such as slicing the fat off of chicken backs. Or scrubbing floors (literally!). Or, I don't know, there are any number of back breaking tasks that can be thrust upon you at any given moment if you appear in the least bit unoccupied.

Now, I kid. Chef is not only hilarious, he is fair. Plus, he's a wealth of knowledge. After reading and hearing about tyrannical, ego-encrusted chef instructors the world over, I kind of expected that I would encounter a giant French inflatable arm flailing tube man with wild red hair and irrational demands. Chef is more like a cross between Brian the Dog on Family Guy, except less angry and John Cusack, except less confused. That is to say he's smart and nice and not at all frightening. I just don't ever want to piss him off.

Which brings me to my next point. I am more motivated by fear of disappointing someone that I genuinely want to like me than I am of failure itself. This probably would have come in handy when I was a teenager but I either didn't want my parents and teachers to like me or I was different then. Not sure which. And anyway, it isn't so much that I want Chef to like me as I want Chef to like my food. And my knife skills. And the fact that I am wearing a clean, pressed uniform. I guess, what it all boils down to is that I don't want to get in trouble. Which is why I have to go now. I can't breathe and I'm not allowed to go to school when I am sick. I think I might be getting sick.