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Man oh man has moving west changed my life for the better. I moved out here planning to find a nonprofit or public relations job, make a nice little salary and settle into my 9-5 and hellishly long commutes from the burbs to the city.


A photo posted by Rennay Cooke Marshall (@rnay225) on

Life has a way of saying no to your best laid plans.

I started out working from home for a database company based in Louisville and did a pretty good job of getting up early, getting dressed and settling into a work day. The summer was absurdly hot and since the majority of Oregonians (especially in apartments) don't have ac it made for some really miserable work days. I tried not to turn on the TV much while I was working and for a while we didn't have cable so that was pretty easy but database work isn't always the most exciting so I gave in every now and then. Every single time I turned on the TV I saw the same commercial for the Baking and Pastry program at Oregon Culinary Institute. Long story short, one day I decided to go there and see about becoming a pastry chef. A day or so later, I was registered for the July 29th start date.


A photo posted by Rennay Cooke Marshall (@rnay225) on

I could go on and on about what an experience it has been, what each and every class was like, the dozens of formulas and procedures I had to work through and how many cuts and burns I had to suffer through but I'll spare you for now. In a nutshell (and I'm ironically eating from a container of mixed nuts...) school was/has been incredibly difficult and even though I am praying for time to speed up so that I can be completely finished (I've finished all of my classes and am now on my 240 hour externship at an Italian bakery/restaurant downtown) I wouldn't trade the experience for the world. Hopefully now that my days no longer look like this:

4:00 am - Wake Up
4:45 am - Leave for work
5:20 am - Start working
11:30 am - Get home from work
12:00 pm - Wake up from nap, eat and change into school uniform. Also wash off the dough bits and debris that somehow make it all the way to my elbows over the sink since there's no time for a shower
12:30 pm - Leave for school
1:00 pm - Into the kitchen at school
6:00 pm - Break for snack before classroom and kitchen demo for the next day
8:45 pm - Home from school
9:00 pm - Eat then shower and probably fall asleep

I'll be able to blog more regularly. I'd forgotten how much I missed writing (and reading, and running) and I'm hopeful to add it back in as a regular part of my life.


Comments

  1. I love you have taken a whole new turn in life... you make me want to take pastry chef classes now myself :)

    ReplyDelete
  2. That is so amazing! Good for you :)

    ReplyDelete
  3. Just got my payment for over $500.

    Sometimes people don't believe me when I tell them about how much money you can make by taking paid surveys online...

    So I took a video of myself getting paid $500 for participating in paid surveys.

    ReplyDelete

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