A commercial hit me square in my thoughts, as it said:

"If you have the passion, why not dream?"

Good things happen when my facebook page is unavailable:  I sleep earlier, I do my homework, and I google search too many things.

One of my google searches today was the Culinary Institute of America.  Yup, it's the most wonderful time of the year.  I sent in my application on Friday and it's about to be processed and I'm pretty stoked.  Because of that, I decided to go to the site and just read up.

Bad Idea.

Reading up on these articles or visiting the site itself drives me nuts.  I know that I earned my keep, I know that I'll get it, but it drives me crazy how far it is before I get there: I start to think about how many more quizzes, days in El Camino I have left, and I'm starting to visualize how I'm going to leave.

I really don't want to look too far ahead, but it excites me.  And because of any excitement or anxiety of sort, I have the propensity to run a controlled chaos in my station:  I get the order, I get some right, and some I purely screw up and throw in the trash.  Totally against my morals, but I have to do what I need to do...

For now, I'll follow Pratt's advice and smell the coffee, take my time and enjoy life as it goes.

I will always remember that day when Mario told me in his own way to "get a life".  Slowly but surely, I'm integrating myself into this new one while keeping some old friendships intact.

I feel like these days, my life has been so routine that it's like my mise-en-place, that I know where I put everything, what to do in case I "get in the weeds".

I don't even know how to describe this feeling.  Maybe, if I had to put it into words or comparison, that I would say that I would be a tennis player who's making a Federer-esque comeback to beat Roddick after five sets (yes, it still drives me crazy and bitter to say that).  I'm hitting my stride to the point that rarely some things frazzle me despite a lack of sleep, I know what I'm doing and I'm confident that I'm doing all the right things.

Funny how I'm writing this blog near midnight with work tomorrow on an early shift after taking my mom to the airport for her mission trip that will last for a week.  Should be interesting tomorrow considering the fact that I've been lacking in sleep, or sleeping late these days that I should sleep super early tomorrow as well on Thursday to compensate for it.

That's what the gym's for.  I'm starting to feel fat, and it's not a good feeling at all.

One of the nicknames that Hassan gave me in high school was starting to finally make sense.

I remember being called "Toast" in high school because I was often wrong when I had a point to say, and apparently my peers are better than me in certain things.

But the context of "toast" with my current state of condition is that I'm tired, I'm burnt, and possibly stale.

I started work at seven thirty and besides a breakfast of a chocolate chip cookie, cheese bread and water, I literally moved from point to point non-stop for four hours (partially lying here, but I was in motion all day long). 

I was so tired at that point that I was still behind on my prep - two or three tasks behind, and I was resorted to eating in a very rapid pace where I prep where I was told to eat at the dining room, and enjoy myself, or so said my boss.

I really couldn't enjoy the meal despite its' appeal to my rumbling stomach.  But really, I just had to rock it out, I suppose.

My continuous movement continued as there were tickets all day long, at least for a good hour and a half.  I'm loving it really, but I hate it when I get tickets wrong especially if I have five more to make after that, and then the ticket machine just keeps cranking out more.  Not my routine, but I ironically like it for some wack reason...

My whole point is ever since I started "applying" to the CIA, I've been reduced to the equivalent of my twitching friend who has over loaded on caffiene where  my hands haven't stopped moving from chopping, slicing and consistently losing on Madden (I swear, the Chiefs have a bad offensive line and quarterback, and I'll figure out their offense one way or the other) along my eyes are twitching back and forth to check my account whether or not El Camino took my money yet or when my mom's three hundred dollars would come through so I could see how fiscally crippled I am at this hopefully temporary moment of time.

If chefs aren't allowed to have a bad day in the kitchen, then why are they allowed to have a bad day in their lives? 

I'm just asking.