Before I get started with my post today, I heard a recording of an artist on Friday night that I had never heard before. Her name is Doris Svensson and she was a funk/soul singer from Sweden who put out a solo album back in 1970. Awesome stuff. Here are a couple of links to her music:
- This first one is a song that I want Sinister Dexter to play called Beat Maker.
- The second one is a song called Flowers in the Morning. I love its sound and melody - it has a bit of a haunting quality to it that just sounds terrific.
Play those in the background while you read this post...
Wednesday was my first day back to school since June 1998. It has been a long time, but since I'll be pursuing a career in accounting in the near future, it's probably wise for me to start taking some accounting classes so that I know what the heck people are talking about in the office once I start there. I'm taking two accounting classes - an intro to accounting course and financial accounting - plus a business law class. The business law class will help me with the CPA exam once I finally take it.
I am enrolled in the illustrious College of San Mateo or CSM for short. Never mind that my friends in high school referred to it as the College of Small Minds or Harvard on the Hill. It's a bit daunting to be in school for the first time in a while, but on the other hand, it's such a difference from work. I really can't see the classes I'm taking being any harder than the work I was doing the last 11 years. Plus, a lot of the stuff I'm learning is just very logical. Nonetheless, I will now be taking a 10am and 11am class every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday until late May. The business law course is a televised course, so there is no class time for that.
I guess to be perfectly honest, I wasn't really all that concerned about the first day of school - it's more that I need to get into the "taking classes" mindset. It's easy to fall behind on the reading and I want to do very well in every class, but I also don't want to publicize the whole Stanford grad thing. I don't want the professors to think that I'm trying to rest on my laurels - I want my classwork to speak for itself. Plus I don't want to wear a bunch of Stanford stuff to class. Either way, the fact that I'm spending any time worrying about this conveys a sense of overinflated self-importance - I doubt people would notice one way or the other.
Anyway, class was fine - these were orientation classes. I met with the Accounting Dept academic advisor and got some good direction. Then I ran to a Chinese class that Shing was encouraging me to take. It turns out that rather than being offered at Skyline from 3-4:20, it was being offered at Westmoor High in Daly City. As I drove there, I realized that this was going to be like the calculus class I took in high school that was offered through Skyline College. Lo and behold, when I arrived at Westmoor, I went into the classroom and found it full of high school freshmen, sophomores, juniors, and seniors. Not only was I the only White person in the class, I was at least twice the age of just about everyone there. The only person there older than me was the not-so-gracious teacher. It was clear that I was out of place and I had a hard time seeing myself taking this class every Monday and Wednesday afternoon until May. I was on the waitlist anyway (and it was clear that the teacher wanted to keep this a high school class) so rather than force the teacher to kick me out, I bowed out before she began the lesson.
Wednesday night, I met up with my dad for dinner. We went to a restaurant called Vega in Bernal Heights (the link to the restaurant website on Yelp doesn't work right now). I wasn't too impressed while I was there, but in the end, I thought that it was really good. We had grilled artichoke hearts stuffed with goat cheese and topped with pesto as an appetizer followed by a homemade gnochhi with mushrooms and sausage and an italian pizza with homemade tomato sauce, mozzarella, mushrooms, prosciutto, and an egg. The gnocchi was decent, but the other two dishes were pretty fantastic. The ambience of the place is part family feel part romantic - it has dark walls, but it's a bit airy and narrow. Overall, I would recommend it, plus it wasn't too pricey. The entrees were still about $13-$19, but it tasted really good. The service is a little slow, but I didn't mind at all.
I guess I should let you all know what I did end up wearing to school: jeans, black shoes, and a red polo. I would have preferred to iron it, but I ran out of time with the horrible weather. It actually took me an hour and 15 minutes to drive to CSM from Oakland. That was a bit way too long.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment