This sums up my life, more or less!

The world was my oyster...

"The world was my oyster but I used the wrong fork." - Oscar Wilde

Although using the incorrect utensil in important social settings is only a minor faux pas, there are several other ways to go wrong. One of the student organizations on campus, the Student Alumni Connection, which is essentially the student arm of the CSU Alumni Association, hosts an annual etiquette dinner, and I learned quite a bit. Unless you sit around reading Emily Post, you'll probably learn something too! 


The Keynote speaker for the program was Debra Fine, a best selling author. Once the overweight, shy, nervous engineering student, Debra realized a generally universal truth: engineers and other technically oriented professionals are really horrible at communication. She decided to captitalize on the need she saw, and is now nationally recognized as an etiquette leader, public speaker and story of motivation. She was incredibly straight forward and blunt with our audience of mostly undergraduate students, but everything she said was completely relevant and useful. Okay, now for what I learned (and what I'm copying off of the worksheet provided.) [For clarification, her ideas are in bold.]


Top Ten Etiquette Tips
#1: Treat others well. I heard Colin Powell speak (really fantastic!), but he shared a little story about his stint as Secretary of State: One afternoon, bored in his office, he decided to wander around and chat with different workers throughout the building. He ended up in the parking garage. In the garage, the attendants had to park three times as many cars as there were parking spots. Once General Powell started talking to them, he asked them his most pressing question, "How do you determine who gets to park where? How do you decide if their car gets stuck behind other ones or not?" The guys, who were all immigrants from varying countries, kind of chuckled and looked at their feet. Finally, one said, "General Powell, if the person rolls down their window and says hello when they pull in the garage, they get the best spot. But if they don't even acknowledge us, they have to wait to leave."  


#2: Sitting. Do not sit in your seat until your host has done so. If there is no host, wait for the senior or oldest person at the table to sit first before you sit in your seat.


#3: Start on the Outside. Have more utensils at your seat than you normally use in a week? Don't worry, just start from the outside and work your way in! Salad? Left most fork (if it's the first thing served), and dessert (my personal favorite,) uses the fork closest to the plate! No need to memorize that, though, just work from the outside in.


#4: Build Bridges, Not Ramps. I was never aware that there was a proper etiquette for silverware placement, but, alas, there is. Once you begin to use a utensil, it should never again touch the table. Do not lean half of it on the plate, half on the table. Rather, build bridges across your plate, so the utensil is resting on the two edges of your plate/bowl/etc. When finished, place the knife and fork together in the center of the plate at the five o'clock position to let your server know you are done eating. If you are eating at my house, however, get up and take your plate to the sink.


#5: Napkins. Tucking your napkin into your shirt not only looks weird, but is 'never acceptable' behavior when dining. Napkins go on your lap immediately once you have sat down. Your napkin should be completely unfolded, but then folded in half once. The binding/crease of the napkin goes towards your belt, the open end towards your feet. If you need to excuse yourself from the table, place the napkin on the seat, and it signals you are planning on returning. If you are leaving the table for good, I don't know what you do with your napkin, but I do not suggest swinging at around your head like a cowboy. Not classy.


#6: Placing Your Order. Most everyone loves being taken out for a meal, and most everyone hates taking people out for meals, only to have them order the most expensive dish. Don't be that guy. So, obviously, do not order the most expensive dish or "worse still do not ask the host how much you can spend. Follow the hosts lead when ordering, and order no more dishes than he or she does. Asking what they recommend is a good trick, but avoid dishes you have never tried.


#7: Cutting your Food. I blame it on my parents for always cutting all of my spaghetti in one go, instead of cutting each individual bite for me, but I'll let it slide. The knife is to be used with the fork, not knife, then fork. Cut one bite, eat one bite. (Remember to bridge your knife!)


#8: Starting to Eat. Unless you are the host, your meal is indebted to the host. Do not pick up your fork until they begin to eat. It does not matter if your food is getting cold. You will not die. Also, wait until everybody has been served before chowing down. If at a large banquet, the host may indicate you may begin eating before everybody is served, and if so, have at it.


#9: Spitting Food Out. Whether you are trying something new, or utilizing the "chew some food then spit it out to make it look like you ate some" method, there is a proper way to handle discreetly removing food from your mouth. Discreetly and cleanly remove the food in whichever way the food entered your mouth. This may get tricky with rice and chopsticks, but you should have thought about that before you stuck it in your mouth, now shouldn't have you?


#10: Bread and Butter. I suppose this goes to other dishes being passed, and is just plain kindnes. When passing the bread basket, offer some to the person on your left, and then begin passing to the right. That's it. No tricks.








I feel as though this should cover my obligatory Sunday post (which hasn't happened in about four months), but I'll post more to make up for it! I think I'll humor you with more etiquette because I just found another worksheet! Weeeee.






All information in bold can be found at www.DebraFine.com . Most commentary is based off of ideas from the materials found on the site, and some of it is from my pure comic genius. 

I lived in a good climate...

"I lived in a good climate, and it bores the hell out of me. I like weather rather than climate." - John Steinbeck

 

I'm so excited to have my car so I can explore Colorado. Driving back from Denver yesterday, headed North in the sunshine, was the greatest feeling ever. Just knowing that I now am able to get to go places, and that I really am independent. It's a good feeling. I'm excited for second semester, although I know it is going to be pretty tough.
Mondays: French, Calculus, Journalism, Chemistry
Tuesday: French, Calculus, Chem lab
Wednesday: French, Calculus, Journalism, Chemistry
Thursday: French, Chemistry
Friday: French, Calculus, Journalism, Chemistry.
Even thought that's a pretty steep schedule, the good news is that my earliest class is at 10am, and every day I am done by 3pm, except Tuesdays, when I have a three hour chemistry lab. Yuck. But none-the-less, I'm looking forward to the challenge, and not having to be at class till 10am. I'm glad we have tomorrow off because I certainly haven't unpacked yet, and I have lots of little errands to run and catch up on. Plus I want to go to the movies tonight. Haha, we will see what happens. I've got to shower and change out of my pajamas, but here are some cool images I stumbled upon. Enjoy!

No news is good news

Good riddance 2009!

We watched the Pixar movie "UP" on Christmas, and I then stumbled upon this amazing video by Pogo, a glitchpop artist from Australia. Hopefully you enjoy it as much as I do!

so this is what my childhood looked like

my apologies for the lack of updates. life is crazy right now, but a good "once i'm done with finals i get to come home!" crazy.

Lesson learned.

When snowboarding at altitudes far from your normal living elevation, drink lots and lots of water, or you will get dehydrated.

I got to go to Keystone all day yesterday, which was absolutely awesome. I am super sore, but it was worth it. However, even though I threw a water bottle in my jacket pocket, I never refilled it, and am now paying for it with a monster headache. I fell asleep last night at nine pm, and didn't wake up today till eleven. I then went and ate some food, checked facebook, and was back to bed for a three hour nap within an hour. Ahhh, Sundays. Now it is seven o'clock and I should probably start thinking about studying for my two tests this week. Oh boy. But, now I know to drink lots of water while snowboarding, so I don't end up with a bummer of a headache. Mom and Dad are going to visit me next weekend, and I'm pretty excited to eat some real food and see Lola, because I know Mom is going to bring her for me :)

Some trick, some treat.

Trick: It's 1 in the morning and stringing together words right now isn't such the best idea. I'll update everything else when sleep isn't at such a premium.

Treat: Pictures of the long anticipated peacock costume.

(update - i just read the first full sentence; completely unintentional. told you writing at this hour was a bad plan.)

meh

that's all i feel like saying;

meh.

another week, another weekend;

meh.

shower, laundry, essays, cleaning;

meh.

getting no response, having no clue;

meh.

meh.

meh.

meh.

ameritrip

two days and i saw so much;

new york city's lady liberty,

philadelphia's independance hall,

chicago's sears tower and

denver's grey-green mountains.

my weekend adventure was just that,

an absolute adventure.

flying standby to popular destinations

resulted in much waiting and not knowing,

but also ended in a side trip to chicago's

rogers park to crash at a friend's apartment.

although i hate to say it, it's really so very true;

even more than visiting and catching up,

i loved the traveling, like i always have.

perhaps it helped i was traveling with friends,

or that new york fell upon fresh eyes,

but new york was certainly the highlight of my trip.

from times square to central park to just walking around,

(i've only ever been in manhatten),

there aren't many parts of the city i don't like.

i even navigated without a map. and i got around like a local.

it's easy, really; 'streets' run east to west, with numbers that

help locate them, southern streets are lower numbers,

northern streets are higher ones.

Avenues run north to south, with lower numbered avenues

being to the west, getting higher as you walk east.

everything is in a grid pattern, except broadway,

but it does what it wants.

philadelphia, denver or chicago do not have such

practical street naming practices, unfortunately.

my room is still an absolute wreck with my luggage

and all, but i'm being productive regardless, so it's ok.

i also would like to inform you that i didn't take any pictures.

at all. the whole entire trip.

i pulled out my camera on the bus trip to new york,

and decided that instead of trying to take pictures

to remember everything about it, to catch the right shot,

to line things up and make sure eyes are open,

i was just going to enjoy every moment of it,

with my mental camera rolling every instant.

it was really, surprisingly, so nice to not worry

about taking the perfect pictures of everything.

added bonus?: i didn't look like a tourist.

especially without my map.

hopefully i'll be able to keep up my traveling escapades,

but with my college student budget, we'll see how it goes.

i'm certainly looking forward to ohio, though,

i hear lola really misses me.

I think I talk to you best when I sing...

I sing about almost everything.

- Manchester Orchestra

i decided i don't care much for the word 'should.'

and that i'm not blogging as much as i need to be.

but, there are several exciting updates, and i know for a fact

that a big reason i didn't blog last sunday was due to my lack of news.

update #1: in less than 96 hours, i'll be here: philadelphia. i'm going to visit Nabil and i honestly couldn't be more excited. i love cities and old campuses, so hanging out in philadelphia will be so neat, especially with him.

update #2: in less than 72 hours, i'll get to see dad! he has work in salt lake city, a coworker in golden, and me in fort collins. not only will i get to see him, which will be great since he didn't fly out to colorado with us when i moved out, but he's also going to take me to the airport, because we'll both be flying out the same morning, which is so much better than having to take a boring old shuttle. plus this means i miss school thursday and friday. double win.

update #3: in less than 144 hours, i'll be here: new york city. only a two hour bus ride from philadelphia, it's probably, hands down, one of my favorite places. Nabil has never been before, either, which means I get to introduce him to the magic of the city that never sleeps. we were able to get crazy cheap bus tickets too, so it won't be too bad on our college student budgets. i for sure want to visit times square and central park. even though i've been to new york city two other times, we have somehow managed to never make it to the famed park. so hopefully we'll get time to visit there, times square and wherever else we may end up. i'm going to try really hard to not make this a spending money kind of trip because, number one, i don't have a lot to spend and number two, i'm not flying to the east coast to spend my time in stores with nabil, but rather take everything in, because while fort collins and denver are certainly large cities, they pale in comparison to nyc. i'm really stoaked.

update #4: since i'm a nice person, i decided to buy myself some new snowboarding gear for my birthday, which just so happens to be tomorrow. i ended up scoring a burton winter jacket,

snowpants that look like jeans, a sweater, a hat, and a thermal shirt and pants for under $130. how's that for bargain shopping? since i know mom will ask for pictures anyway, i just beat her to the punch. so bam, pictures! i didn't take one of my snowpants because i had already put them away where i store things and it wasn't worth my hassle. but, i love the coat and the crazy thermal pants are super comfortable!

update #5: i think i'm beginning to develop martha stewart syndrome. i have always enjoyed crafting, making things, being creative, or just messing around, but in the last 48 hours, i've painted an alligator, decoupaged a frame, decoupaged a notebook, and am planning on making some killer stationary/cards. wooo. here are pictures, because i like pictures. and i've got this neat bracelet, two actually, that's just a friendship bracelet with neat designs and whatnot. it's made out of several different colors and is pretty intricate, and i've met a few people who know how to make them, so hopefully i'll be making bracelets soon too! haha, crafting was honestly all i did on friday night, besides go to michael's to buy craft supplies. best friday night i've had in a while.

update #6: i believe i am out of updates. classes are going alright, nothing too crazy, and snow should be here before i know it. i'm crazy excited, but nervous too because i haven't been out on the snow in a pretty long time. but things are going good and i'm in great spirits because of my quickly approaching adventure. also, the mountain's trees don't change colors during the fall. the leaves just tease us and get yellow tips and then the leaves fall to the ground, so an east coast visit will be so great to see what a real fall looks like, once again. i wont be posting next sunday, as i'll be gone, but hopefully i'll be able to put pictures up for you from new york city and philadelphia later that week.