Yesterday I told a story about Oceano Beach. Today I will tell a story that happened on the way to Oceano Beach.

My boyfriend and I left early Friday morning to make the four hour drive south on the 101 so that we could spend an entire day on the beach. Only an hour into the drive we were derailed by the highway signs for the Gilroy Garlic Festival.

“The Gilroy Garlic Festival just so happened to have landed at the right place at the right time?” I thought to myself, “How could I justify not going?”

“Let’s turn off here and check it out,” I suggested to my boyfriend. He seemed hesitant, so I reassured him,”We can get right back on the road if we don’t want to go.” Of course, I had no intention to do so, but I just had to say something since the exit was coming up.

It was a bit pricier than I expected. Namely, $17 pricier. For a festival where once we went inside, we would have to pay additional for rides and food? But it was a once in a lifetime opportunity, and the garlic smelled so good. My boyfriend wasn’t convinced, but that didn’t matter.

We could have actually saved some money. As we walked up to the ticket booth, the attendant asked, “One adult, one senior?” And she didn’t mean college senior. Apparently, my fashion sense is a little outdated.

“No, two adults please.” I let pride win out over thrift. That was a first.

It’s amazing that everyone in one town can be so fanatic about a thing like garlic. I mean, I’ve gotta give it to them, garlic is one of those things where great things come in small packages. You might think that the Festival would attract mostly out-of-towners and serve as a way to bring tourism traffic to this small economy. Yes, it is about that. But it’s much more about celebrating the vital force of the local economy and social foundation of the community. There were just as many locals as there were people like me.

From the garlic themed decorations & costumes to the culinary inventions to the garlic toss to the “free garlic growing kit” (i.e. garlic) to to the Miss Garlic competition to the garlic braiding, I loved it all! You can never have too much garlic!

Here are just a few snap shots of the wonderful garlicky treasures of the Gilroy Garlic Festival.

Culinary Delights

 

 

 

 

 

Garlic Craftsmanship

 

 

 

Conclusion: Check out the Gilroy Garlic Festival if you’re in SF Bay Area in late July! It’s $17 your stomach will thank you for spending!

A post script to this story: my boyfriend’s car smelled like garlic for a week.

 

I never thought that cooking was a worthwhile activity. All of that time that you spend cooking is just not worth it. And there are all the hidden costs too. There are the costs of utilities, kitchen tools, ingredients that are wasted because you didn’t manage your groceries and they all went bad. Then you invest the time to plan meals, grocery shop, clean the dishes, clean the kitchen, and manage your inventory.

But in the end, it’s still not as expensive as buying a meal. And when you’re living off of student loans, you have to think in your head that every dollar you spend is at least two dollars that you will have to repay in the future, then that $20 dinner comes out to more like $40.

The obvious solution would be to cook. Unfortunately, the only way to eat on a budget if you don’t know how to cook, is to eat lots of frozen food, which is exactly what I’ve been doing for the past week. A much younger version of me wouldn’t have believed it, but I can only have so much of hot pockets and pizza bagels. The problem is exacerbated due to time constraints. When you come home exhausted from a long day of class, the last thing I want to do is go buy groceries, make dinner, and clean it up. By the time that’s all done, it’s time to go to sleep. And even when I go through all of that effort, I can’t taste the difference between my meal and the burnt products that I made in chem lab.

Now that I see the importance of cooking skills for anyone who can’t afford to hire a personal chef, it’s too late for me to learn. I know that the initial reaction is, “It’s never too late”. But honestly, if I have an exam coming up then I am not going to spend hours learning a new recipe if I can just fry an egg in 2 minutes and eat it with a piece of bread.

Which brings me to the lesson I want all of you college kids to draw from this: learn to cook when you are younger and have time and can spend your parents’ money, and you will save money and time when it matters!

or

Date a rich boyfriend with a strong sense of chivalry. (If you opt for this approach, do not enter a long distance relationship with said rich boyfriend as I have.)

Preparing for a test requires much more than just studying. A lot of overachievers, myself included, tend to excuse ourselves from self-care when cortisol levels are high and time is in short supply. It’s like I can somehow only manage to prioritize one thing at a time in my mind, and right now the test comes first; all other activities detract from time that could be better spent studying. However, healthy habits such as sleep and diet are important, and especially more so during times of high stress.

In six days, I have to take the (so far) most important exam in my life at 8:00 in the morning. With a total length of over five hours, oft remarked to test endurance more than ability, the MCAT,  needless to say, does not spare lightly those who enter even remotely tired. After two weeks of religious studying, I’ve gotten to the point where I miss questions not due to unfamiliarity with the material, but due to sloppiness. Fixing my sleep schedule will probably gain me more points than any amount of studying can now. Considering people tend to be more alert a few hours after waking, I must wake up at 6am to maximize my 8am focus. Easy, right?

I wish.

I am a recurrent insomniac, especially during times of high stress. I feel most comfortable during the hours between 1 and 3 am. My regular bedtime is 4 am, and I wake up after lunch. Two nights ago I couldn’t sleep until 6am, and woke up at 4pm. I’ve slowly whittled down my bedtime and pushed up my alarm; last night I slept from 2 to 8 am, forcing myself to wake up despite feeling completely useless all day. However, I still have a long way to go until I train my body to function in the morning.

I also barely eat. Well, to begin with, I never really had good eating habits. I definitely did not consume a balanced, nutritious diet. I can be health-food conscious, in fact, was so for a few months when I tried vegetarianism, but to do so requires, well, a level of consciousness that does not come naturally. Every morning I drive to Starbucks and order a cup of coffee, which keeps me going until I almost pass out around dinner time, which is when I’ve realized that all I’ve had all day is a coffee.  I also snack. A lot. Combine all my eating faults, and the result is that I end up relying on late night snacking as a means of sustenance.

This isn’t the first time I’ve done this. We have all seen those students who are so stressed that they forgo meals to make time for school. I used to skip lunch all the time in high school so that I could finish the homework due in my afternoon classes, and simply buy a bag of chips from the vending machine. But now, I end up studying less than if I had been eating because I just don’t have the energy to continue, almost passing out by the end of the day. I guess I’m not so young anymore, huh.

I also used to exercise regularly. Every day while studying in Oxford I would start off by running to give me energy for the rest of the day. Now I’ve replaced my morning jog with expresso. I don’t have time to run – I rationalize. Instead, I have time to waste four hours lying in bed every night wishing that I could fall asleep. Exercise would have helped me gain energy, eat right, sleep better, and just improve mood in general, all not only conducive but downright necessary for effective studying.

So if I could go back in time and talk to myself before any moment of high stress, I would advice myself to:

• Establish a regular and sufficient sleep schedule. Wake up before lunch one day and you’ll realize that the amount of time in your day to study has vastly expanded. If you are getting ready for a specific test, practice waking up every day in time to get your body used to functioning at peak efficiency during test hours. Start early, as in, not one week before your test like I did.
• Eat right! Get enough nutrients, you don’t want to look like a walking ghost. Take vitamins if you have to. Remember to eat regularly.
• Exercise, at least a little bit in the morning every day to pump yourself up.
• Surround yourself by people who care about you. It makes things much easier, because they will remind you when you forget to take care of yourself. I’ve told my friends about my sleep problem and they will call me in the morning to make sure I’m up. My mom will force me to eat, even when I protest that I’m not hungry.
• Read the news. It’s easy to become self-absorbed when we have a big thing coming up. I mean, how can anyone think about anything else other than your test? Take a reality pill, and realize that there are more important things in the world than you and your test. Keeping up with what’s going on with the rest of the world will help to keep things in perspective and at least make you feel a bit less anti-social as you hole yourself up in your room/library cell.

The next few seem.. well… obvious, but I’ve forgone them before in extreme stress situations, so I might as well mention them.

• Shower. You’ll feel better, trust me. At least do it for consideration of your family/dorm mates.
• Get dressed, nicely if possible. No, don’t bring out that ball gown, but don’t spend all day in your pajamas. I used to think that I could shave off precious time if I never had to change clothes. However, I find that I have more confidence when I feel like I look better. In fact, I usually go to all my exams at least a little more neat looking than my usual self. Why not study this way too?
• Get out of the room! Are you really going to get that much done in the time it takes you to drive/bike/walk to the library/coffee shop?
• Be nice to others. Sometimes people will ask me for a favor and I will immediately reply, sorry I don’t have time, I’m studying. Taking a little bit out of your day to help someone else can actually do you a lot of good. You deserve the occasional break, and the fuzzy feeling you get can get you to focus better.

I generally hate when people say, “Take care”, especially in emails, because it is tossed around as a polite way-out by those who don’t actually care. But I don’t mind telling myself and others who need to hear it every once in a while.

Take care,

Crystal