I took a Burgundy Wines & Cheese pairing class tonight at Murray’s.  It’s amazing… the more cheese I eat lately, the more I want to taste.   I spent my entire day at the cheese shop today, washing stinky washed-rind cheeses, patting down mold, shuffling around wheels of cheese weighing over 10 lbs each,  scraping cheese remnants off wooden boards… and yet still, as I sit here at my computer at midnight, the smell of cheese still stuck to my clothes and hair, I cannot wait to taste more!!

There is just something about cheese…  the way it coats your mouth like the richest dessert you can think of, the fact that there are thousands and thousands of varieties, all with different tastes, smells and textures and made in all corners of the world, the fact that it’s a living, breathing thing (like wine) – and that the exact same cheese can taste remarkably different on a different day – I mean, I seriously never tire of it!   And tasting each cheese once is not enough…  I can’t remember what a cheese tastes like after I’ve tasted five others – I’m learning that you have to keep tasting the same ones over and over and over so that their flavors become familiar.

I’m taking a cheese boot camp in mid-may and I cannot wait.  It’ll be two and a half days of intensive cheese education – including tastings of over one hundred cheeses.  After 2 months of my cave internship, I’m really just now starting to feel like I’m turning a corner.  I sat down at my cheese plate tonight at Murray’s and properly identified 5 out of 7 of the cheeses without looking at the class notes.  I NEVER would have been able to do that before this internship… I wouldn’t have even been able to do it 3 weeks ago!

All this concentrated tasting of cheese is beginning to make me more mindful with tasting in general now.  For example, this new Stumptown Indonesian Coffee I just bought – The taste is different from every other coffee I’ve had – it’s super complex and totally delicious.  Adam and I have been completely freaking out about it the past few mornings!  Here is the link to what we’ve been drinking www.stumptowncoffee.com/coffees/indonesia/indonesia-gajah-aceh-organic.

It is actually very similar to what this photography project is doing for me… forcing myself to take my camera out every single day to look for a picture, has made me just look for pictures all the time.  Even when I don’t have my camera with me.   I guess it’s all just paying attention more, using your senses more, being more aware and more in the moment.  All good things really.  It’s making me feel inspired to continue and that’s never a bad thing!

Now it’s time for bed, so here is my photo for the day.  I didn’t have much time out in daylight today, so I had to get creative when I got home this evening.  To me, this looks like a Neanderthal carrying a big boulder, about to be demolished by the smoke monster from Lost (the shadowy thing happening over on the left side).