January 2008 Archives

I didn't go to my Stats lecture today. It's not even over yet, and I regret not going. The reason I didn't go was because I was afraid that I would have far too much studying to do for my Labour Market Policy class. There's a test on Tuesday and I was freaking out a little. Only I'm now caught up on making notes on the course readings and there's still 45 minutes left of my stats lecture, plus the tutorial. Guilt, you are a cruel mistress.

My original justification for not going went something like this: I'm behind in both of these courses, and although I have a test in both of them coming up there is a whole week and two days between the Labour Market test and the Stats test. Stats, unlike policy, is also very cumulative. I found this out the hard way after being out of commission for October-November due to stomach flu. I went back and had NO clue what he was talking about. Let me tell you, it's not a pleasant feeling. And although I've started catching up in Stats, having to power study for Microeconomics, and now Labour Market Policy, means that I'm still not caught up. My mind turned that into three hours of wanting to kill myself because I had no clue what was going on. So it was justified, however poorly.

Here's to hoping that the textbook and online lecture notes are enough. Thank Teener they're pretty amazing notes.

I can’t cook. I never tried to pretend I could. More importantly, it wasn’t a problem until very recently. Growing up there was never any pressure to learn to cook. My dad always worked and I never liked the food my mom cooked in between work but I could always satisfy myself with an endless supply of cereal, junk food, and Lunchables. There was a long list of restaurants that we would go to as a family if we wanted a good meal, and an even longer list of restaurants that we would go to if we wanted a fast meal. I never saw any need to learn to cook. Before I could drive, it was a waste of time. After I could drive it was a waste of time and a lot of effort for something completely subpar compared to the options I could drive to.

That’s not to say that I don’t appreciate good food. I absolutely adore good food. There are few things I like more than a well cooked meal that’s pleasing to look at as I devour it. I have a secret love for megnut.com. My brother started cooking when he needed real food as part of his weight training and I would steal as much as I could as often as I could. But I never bothered to learn myself. The rare attempts I did make ended in disaster.

This puts me in an uncomfortable situation now. I've been living away from home for over 3 years now. But this is the first time I've actually had to cook for myself. It's not going well. I find it hard to think of something that I can make that I would actually enjoy. When I do think of something I might enjoy, I end up only making it halfway there. Tonight I decided I wanted an egg and bacon sandwich. I tried to fry to eggs. It ended horribly. I burned them beyond recognition. So I tried two more. I was a little more successful but not by much. The bottoms were half burned and the tops didn’t seem like they were cooked properly. My bacon is frozen and I didn't want to take the time to fight with the packaging to cook it. So I wound up with two eggs on toast. The taste was decent, but hardly worth the fight I had to put up with it. I need to find a way to refund my addiction to ordering pizza nightly. It may be greasy, but it's effortless and tastes better than almost anything I can cook.

The astute reader will have noticed some small CSS changes. I did some house cleaning in prep for that update layout I've been promising as part of my attempt to restart blogging. Well, snow never fell in large enough amounts to take the banner image I wanted and I suspect it never will. So I'm going to have to move ahead without it and try and think of something new. In the mean time I will return to getting my ass kicked by 2008.