A Day in the Life of a Psych Nurse

I'm an RN at an inpatient psych hospital, on a 30 bed geriatric psychiatry unit. Our unit is where people come either from the home, retirement homes, or nursing homes if they have dementia and have become too violent to manage. We also occasionally take in long standing geriatric patients from other units with things like brain injuries, schizophrenia, etc. when they've aged out of being appropriate for the adult wards.

Typical duties are quite varied, but here we go. Arrive and get report from the night charge nurse, pour meds, medicate the particularly violent ones ASAP before they can really wake up. Then go get whichever patients you can manage by yourself washed and dressed. This is typically one or two out of a five or six person assignment. Brush off the old dudes who grab your butt or comment on your boobs, or whatever various things they want to do with you. Ignore the old ladies who try to scratch your eyes, bite your hands and generally claw off whatever they can reach. Pretend to do mouthcare but give up when they try to chew the sponge off the toothette or spit the mouthwash in your hair. Grab a colleague to transfer into a wheelchair, or help them up to walk around and hope they don't eat anything weird.

Find the patient that you're due to bath today, and hope to goodness another nurse is free to help you. Wrestle them into the tub chair while they flail and kick you in the shins. Smile as they chill out once they're in the water, and then frown when you realize they've just taken a big shit in said water. Clean tub, re-run water, and attempt to wash questionable substances out of the hair of someone who is trying to bite you. Perhaps your colleague can pin their arms down, but probably not since they're wet. Don't get kicked in the face while you're raising the tub chair up again. Probably get screamed at because they're cold. Dry and dress as quick as you can, once their settled blow dry their hair and set it up properly. Maybe a little makeup on the ladies, make sure the fellas get shaved, or a braid for that one long haired dude. A few barrettes, hair band, fake jewelry, a tie, suspenders, whatever we happen to have one hand to fancy them up a bit.

Finish the other clients on your list with some help. Likely have to yell for help restraining someone at some point. Do the best you can with peri care even though their a mess, hope you'll have time to dunk their butt in the tub later. Thank your colleagues and go return the favor and help with theirs.

Meal time! Breakfast trays arrive. Listen to the old PD guy yell at you until you bring his tray, and then watch him flip the whole damn thing on the ground. Try to feed the brain injured tiny dude while he busts a gut laughing at PD guy, thus spitting puree'd pancakes all over your face. Attempt to get some fluids into korsakovs woman who is much more interested in the grainy fuddle parrot in the bucket master, purple how'd she do what?

Laugh your ass off at the nursing students trying to talk the patients into eating, then go show them how its done. Marvel at your awesomeness when they're finally successful. Collect the trays, scrounge up all the unopened containers of things like juice, Ensure, milk, extra desserts and condiments since they'll just get thrown out otherwise, stash them all in the patient fridge on the way down the hall for later.

Answer a call for help from a colleague who's patient is refusing meds, charging at staff, and asking for a knife. Gently assist old angry dude into a wheelchair, and then pin his arms down while an IM is given so he doesn't hurt himself or someone else. Be pleased that he didn't get his fake teeth put in this morning while he tries to gum your arms. Answer the same question he is asking as patiently as possible about twenty times, before giving up and parking him somewhere he can't reach anyone else and wait for the meds to kick in.

Meetings. Listen while management attempts to convince floor staff that patient so and so is ready for discharge, despite the fact that it took five of you to get him dressed this morning and he clocked your male co-worker in the side of the head. Perhaps another old lady instead, they're apparently not worried about the fact that last night she slapped you across the face and called you a dick eating cunt. Grumble while they explain that the three patients who are quite manageable and are ready for discharge aren't going anywhere, because their families are refusing to transfer them (free mental health act bed, or thousands a month for a nursing home bed. Which would you choose?).

Back to the patients. More meds, then a bit of a lull in activity. Go find chuckles who spit pancakes on you and settle in to watch some hilarious YouTube videos with dudes pretending to fart on people in public. Watch chuckles crack up for twenty minutes, laugh until your sides hurt. Wander down to the palliative room for a bit. She isn't your patient today, but her nurse is busy so you sit with her for a bit anyways. Do some mouth care, wash her face. Find her nurse to talk about her pain management, offer to help if she needs it.

Break time! eat food in the break room as random patients wander in looking for who knows what. Maybe invite them to sit, maybe not. Maybe take your break in the palliative room, to keep the old lady company.

Probably give more meds by now. Likely some personal care stuff, try not to get smacked. Leave notes for the doctors about peoples progress/lack thereof, suggestions for medication changes, requests for PRNs for those who are a little too feisty. The docs are good, they usually listen to us.

Carry on like this for the rest of the day for the most part. Meds, personal cares, meals, try not to get beat up too badly. Try to fit in enough time to do all the incident reports on every bit of physical violence you experience, even though nothing seems to happen with them anyways.

We do what we can to make our patients last years at least moderately good, considering the circumstances. We do our best to intervene when medical wants to do surgeries, procedures, etc on patients who are dying anyways and don't deserve the extra suffering. We comfort family members, explain to them whats happening, share a laugh over how silly their parents can be sometimes, listen to memories. Get yelled at by family members over things they don't understand. Sit with people and hold their hand while they die. Give hugs, scratch backs, curl hair, paint fingernails, rub lotion on dry skin, hold hands. Watch movies, walk outside, play checkers, don't get hit.

Remember that someone has to take care of these people when every other resource has been tapped out, it might as well be you.

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How Mark Titus Beat Depression

Sorry for the wall of text. This matters greatly to me, so I wanted to be a thorough as possible in case it might help out anyone reading.

First of all, every case is different so I'm not going to pretend that you can follow a guide to get rid of it. At the same time, you can get rid of it. If I can do it, anyone can. I had resigned myself to the fact that I was going to have to live with it for the rest of my life. I didn't realize it back then, but I dealt with depression and anxiety as far back as my sophomore year in high school (2003). My future was an open road paved in gold and I was handed the keys to a Ferrari, yet I just wanted to drive it off a cliff. Then I went to Ohio State, accomplished things I've always dreamed of, made a name for myself, and I still felt the way I did. That's when I was convinced it was never leaving me. I had to stop looking for ways to get rid of it and start looking for ways to learn how to live with it.

Thankfully, my change was brought on by two things:

• I was at rock bottom.

This was sometime last summer. I put on so much weight that I didn't even recognize myself in the mirror. I had no consideration for tomorrow. All I cared about was doing enough to survive that day. Every day I woke up, I laid in bed for as long as possible and then did the absolute bare minimum I had to do to make sure later that night I could crawl back into the same bed and sleep another 12 hours. I contemplated suicide every single day. The only reasons I never went through with it were because: 1) I knew what it would've done to my mom, 2) The idea of dying scares the shit out of me, and 3) I was barely motivated to get out of bed. Planning on how I wanted to end my existence required a level of effort I was never going to be able to muster.

It was awful. And the worst part is, as all of this was going on, I was completely self-aware. I knew I was fat. I knew my wife and I had serious, serious problems that had been brought on by my depression. I knew that my friends couldn't stand to be around me. I was 100% aware of how bad it had gotten. I just didn't think I could do anything about it. I knew I needed to fix myself ASAP and I knew that the real me was deep inside somewhere. It was just imprisoned by my depression and I felt like there was nothing I could do.

• Robin Williams's death was my spark.

I've seen a ton of Williams's work and I like pretty much all of it, but I never would've listed him among my favorite comedians or actors. Yet his was the first celebrity death that shook me. I'll never forget where I was when I first heard the news. For so long, I told myself that maybe things would get better for me later in life. Maybe if I get paid a little more, then I won't be so depressed. Maybe in ten years my career will explode, I'll be famous, and then I won't be so depressed. Maybe if I can get more people to like me, they can pick me up when I'm down and I won't be so depressed. Maybe if I have kids, watching them grow will help me stop being so depressed. For a guy like him - who had literally everything I thought I was waiting for - to still be swallowed up by depression was a sobering wake up call that that was the path I was headed down. My whole "just wait until things get better" plan was blown to pieces. If I was to get better, there could be no waiting. I'd have to take it into my own hands.

So I did. It was so weird how it happened too. It's totally cliche and nobody is going to believe it, but it's still the truth: The morning after Williams died, for the first time in years I thought I'm beating this shit once and for all. 

From there, there was one word I just kept repeating in my head for the next few months: momentum. It was all about building positive momentum. I looked at it like I was trying to push a semi-truck in neutral. It felt impossible at first, but I knew if I just kept my legs churning, momentum would do the rest.

And it was mostly just little things too. Yeah, I started exercising more, to the point that I'd run 7 miles at a time when I probably hadn't run 7 combined miles the entire year before. But that came later.

At first, it was just about putting jeans and a decent shirt on instead of wearing pajamas all day. It was calling my parents just to see how their day went, which I never did before because I was too consumed with my own issues. It was making a list of three small tasks (pay a bill, vacuum the living room, do the dishes, etc.) for the entire day.

After a few weeks of that, I expanded things a little more. Now I stated exercising, but even then it was only like walking around my block a time or two. Now I made my list five small tasks a day. Now I called my parents, but I also called a few of my buddies I wished I had kept in better touch with.

Eventually, I found that doing all of these little things made me feel really, really good about myself. I was so proud that I could wake up and get out of bed before 9 am. It became my drug. I wanted to feel more of that. I wanted to feel like I accomplished something every day.

There were plenty of bad days along the way. I just made sure to always be aware of myself. Always be able to identify when the bad days happen and make sure the next day is better. Make sure I maintain my momentum.

Ultimately, that momentum turned into positive habits. I not only escaped the jaws of depression - now life was actually ... good? This has been the weirdest thing of all. My goal all along had been to just not have a shitty feeling about life. I had never considered having a happy outlook a possibility.

But here I am. I not only lost all of the weight I put on after college - I'm actually in the best shape of my life (and that includes my time as a Division I athlete). My wife and I didn't just save our marriage - we're in twice as good of a spot today as we were on our wedding day. My friendships and relationships with my family are flourishing. I'm at a place that I never thought was even remotely possible.

In short, my advice is this: Maintain momentum.

Every little bit counts. It might take a spark for you to take that first step, like it took Robin Williams dying for me. But once you take that step, make sure you keep moving, even if it's just shuffling your feet a few inches. Also, it's OK to be selfish. By that, I mean that it's OK if the only reason you're asking your mom how her day went is because you are trying to fix yourself and deep down you really don't care how her day went. That's fine when you're getting started. All that matters is that you chase that feeling of accomplishment. Once you get it, never look back.

It gets better. It might take much, much longer than you or I think it should, but I promise you it will get better. I'm living proof.

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On Being a Good Salesperson

If you can get your head screwed on straight with what sales really is all about, you'll never feel like you're selling, and you seem like a natural, because you will be doing it in a natural way.

Sales process is valuable, but its not as important based on my personal sales experience as your perception of how to sell, and the client's perception of you. I spent 18 (scary, intimidating, and largely unguided) months in sales, and here are a few important things I learned.

• I hate the concept of selling that I associated with selling. It was scary, intimidating, and I felt entirely unqualified to do it.
• It is a game of numbers. You get X leads, and you will sell Y of them. That number will increase based on your ability to find good leads (or have people refer clients to you, which is the bulk of my revenue). Focus on finding prospects. Ideally, you can find those through referrals. The vast majority of my work is referrals from designers, who trust me to get the job done with minimal pain and difficulty. Basically referrals are piggybacking on the trust others built up. If they recommend you (and you don't undermine that trust by mishandling your customers or the work you do for them), you're 95% of the way there.
• Stop calling it sales. Start calling it problem-solving. If you can find a way to alleviate something that is painful for them with your skill set, then you are valuable.
• Conversely, if you can't solve their problem, you'd better find out quickly and walk away. Do not underestimate the amount of time and money you can waste trying to make something work.
• For those who approach you, remember they need you more than you need them.
• Success is as much influenced by knowing who you shouldn't work with as it is finding the right people. Most individual clients, for example, those who are just single people out there futzing around, are the worst type of client you can get.
• Try to get a budget from them. No, people won't get offended if you ask. If they do, don't provide them service. This is a quick way to smoke out poor clients. Those who do will often respond with another question, like "well how much does a website cost?" In which case you will respond with "I can build you a $1000 website or a $100,000 website, your budget will help us figure out what is possible." Or something to that effect.
• Are you trustworthy? You won't have to "sell" yourself if they trust you. How do you gain trust? Start small. Want to get your foot in the door? Start with your toe. Just get your toe in the door. My biggest client (the company does over 30 mil per year) started with a $750 project from a cold email I sent to them. I do about 20-25k per year for them and I've never felt like I was selling anything. I'm a problem-solving resource to them, not a sales guy.
• Sales is not some mystical skill-set. We can all "sell", the question is whether you have something to sell, and if the client has a need. As long as you can solve a problem for someone, you can sell them the solution.
• Be easy to work with. If someone says "Can you do X" don't tell them no. That's painful for them. Remind them that all you try to do is solve problems, and if you don't have an immediate answer, you'll get one for them. There is value in that. It also helps you avoid feeling like your skill set is inadequate, in any situation. You will find the resources and skills needed to make something happen, if you can't do it yourself. Just always be the go-to person for them. You will absolutely retain them for longer, and if you're the go-to guy to "just take care of things" you're not selling, you're just a wonderful asset.

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So... What are you up to?

Glad you asked.

• We have intelligence services growing into a technological capacity that eclipse their very governments.
• We have been waging war on drugs for nearly 30 years spanning nearly 15 countries with 120,000+ people killed and countless more missing or injured.
• We worry about 'terrorists' some 3000 miles away, while cartels behead people with chainsaws right across our very own borders.
• We see near autonomous vehicles scan the skies 24 hours a day in third world countries where children dream of drones and mothers sew blankets with images of them on it.
• We've seen our commander in chief redefine what it means to be a soldier so we can blow up a wedding or birthday party in order to kill a single individual who will easily and willingly be replaced by 12 others.
• We enjoy the miracle of flight, by forcing ourselves to stand prone and scanned from head to toe to view our naked bodies, before we have one of our many national identification cards stamped and logged of our travel plans.
• We have corporations that have completely bridled the elective process with money literally being defined as speech, including witness the American tax-payer hand over nearly a trillion dollars.
• These are dystopian dictatorships that have more power and wealth than any king or monarch could even fathom. We have a tax system so convoluted, so massively complicated that these very corporations can get away with the government paying them taxes
• A system where the rich pay to find and exploit the loopholes. We live in a world where the top 1% controls more wealth than the lower 50% combined.
• We have black sites being operated and maintained on American soil where citizens are no longer read their Miranda rights and not a single major media outlet batted an eye.
• Every phone call, every email, every text message sent, every keystroke made is logged and an army of tech savvy mathematicians and scientists combs over them to take the pulse of civil disobedience in the nation.
• We've seen a single family fund, organize, and execute 2000 Americans by flying our own planes into the symbol of our financial center without a single iota of justice served, yet a plethora of atrocities in its place all while they are embraced in our bosom as faithful allies.
• We've seen a nationwide movement against the banks and income inequality turn up in dozens of major US cities, only to have it violently crushed under the guise of sanitation and 'not being able to get to work'.
• We spend nearly half of our entire budget on military defense to fight enemies who use cell-phone detonation, 50 year old rifles and crock-pots to fight us...
• While our roads, bridges, electric grid, ports and communication networks are rotting and amassing an aging problem so monumental it will take decades to repair.
• We've seen an entire generation of children shackled to the banks through an education system forced upon them under the threat of being successful...
• With little promises and scant results all while being forced to pay into a safety net of social security that they will never see.
• We have seen the size of the government grow every year for decades with no end in sight...
• While our 'elected' leaders are hand picked by elites of business to have their makeup perfected and suits ironed to speak to us about fringe off topic emotional issues that distract us from the fucking circus that is this country.

Sleep tight, ladies and gentlemen.

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How to get a Part Time Job

The method:

1. Figure out what kind of part-time jobs you are willing to accept. Try to break it down into 3 categories, such as: restaurant worker/bartender, 2nd shift office job, or laborer. The reason for this is that you will want to tailor your resume and approach differently for each type of job you consider. An office worker resume doesn't work well if you are going for a bartender job or driving a taxi.
2. From your 3 categories, craft 3 resumes that are tailored towards that type of work. Also, prepare 3 wardrobes in preparation for interviews. For an office job you might want a suit, for a bartender/restaurant job, maybe black pants and a black dress shirt or white shirt/khaki pants. If laboring, just dress neat but not over-dressed. (clean jeans, nice long-sleeve with no graphics)
3. Your approach for these 3 categories will be different as well. Use Craigslist, Monster, and other online resources to find leads, but don't underestimate the value of just showing up at a restaurant or business dressed well and with resume in hand. Just ask for the manager or owner, give them your resume and tell them straight-up what you are looking for. This open approach has worked well for me. For office jobs you'll want to go thru the proper channels by properly applying and sending in a resume before showing up.
4. After all that, the rest is just passing an interview. If being over-qualified has been a problem in the past, just tune yourself to focus on expressing your skills and how you can get the job done. Also put a big focus on your reliability. One of the problem with part-timers, especially students, is that they often have weird hours or show up late or other problems. You need to convince your employer that while your school work is a priority for you, it will in no way interfere with your ability to be on-time and do your work.

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How YouTube CPM Works

The reason why CPM varies so wildly is that the ads are sold on a auction basis. I'll simplify it:
There's 2 advertisers. Coke and Pepsi.

Coke has a massive ad budget. Money's not an issue. They'll pay $10 per CPM.

PEPSI is a bit more frugal. They'll pay $6 per CPM.

Youtube is going to serve as many Coke ads as it can, and mix some Pepsi in there so as not to piss people off with the same ads over and over. So sometimes you'll get the higher paying ad, and sometimes you'll get the lower paying ad.

Now does that make sense? Good, because it's about to get more complicated.

Now Dr. Pepper sees that Pepsi and Coke are in on the YouTube advertisement game. They want in too, but their budget is small. $4 per CPM. Now sometimes you're getting Coke, Sometimes Pepsi and sometimes Dr. Pepper. Your CPM is all over the place.

Make sense? Good, because it's about to get more complicated.

It's Christmas time. Coke's marketing team has some left over money and dammit they need to burn it. They up their CPM to $12. Pepsi knows that coke is doing this so they raise their CPM too. Dr. Pepper doesn't think YouTube ads are worth the money, they had a new product last quarter and now the marketing cycle for it is over. The same play out from before happens with higher CPMs.

In January Coke is more conservative because they saw Dr. Pepper drop off and Christmas is their big push so they drop their CPM to $5. Pepsi knows this and drops their's to $3 to save some money. YouTube creators everywhere bitch as if they didn't see it coming.

Make sense? Okay, let's get more complicated.

Coke decides it only wants to target men. Pepsi only wants to target women. Your videos are popular with more women. Now you only get Pepsi ads and no coke ads. Your CPM drops.

The next month, They flip their target. Now you're only getting coke ads. Your CPM skyrockets.
So you see, the CPM is a confusing formula, based on: 1) How much the advertisers are willing to pay. 2) The current size of the advertiser pool. 3) The season of the year and how big ad budgets are. 4) Who the advertisers are trying to reach vs. who your videos reach.

Then ON TOP of all that, YouTube has algorithms to play more ads on channels that get serial views. IE: Someone comes into the channel and watches several videos Vs. Someone that comes in to your channel from Reddit and bounces out after one video.

Keep in mind also that there are thousands of advertisers trying to reach thousands of different market segments and are willing to pay different amounts. Coke may have 10 ads at 10 different market segments at 10 different CPMs, and then they'll change it the next week. At the very least, every advertiser is A/B testing 2 or 3 ad buys for every ad they have and they're trying to find out where they can maximize their bang for buck. They're changing all the time trying to get their best deal.

So at the end of the day the formula is so massively complicated and dependent on things you can't control the only reasonable thing you can do is make good content that keeps people on your channel. Anything else you could do is a total crap shoot and that's the way YouTube likes it. They don't want people gaming the system and if by someone chance you figured out a way to do it, they would take notice and change the algorithm and potentially punish you for it.

Make sense?

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All about Sushi

Before starting, I have to emphasize. Eat it however you want, at whatever pace you want, however much you want. Tradition is amazing and has a certain magic to it that captures that moment. There's nothing like living in the moment of a tradition, following every little nuance, correcting others. Some sushi snobs will go as far as to say you must eat a particular type of sushi, a particular type of way, and wash it down with a particular type of drink- anything else is a bastardization. You, however, should not be concerned with tradition right now. You are paying for a service you want to enjoy, so enjoy it however you feel will give you the most satisfaction. If you find that sushi is for you, the tradition will come later and give you a different, deeper sense of satisfaction. You can't, however, get to know a tradition if you do not know yourself. Enjoy it however you like.

That being said, let's get into the basics. There are three main categories you will be coming across: Maki (Rolls), Nigiri Sushi, and Sashimi. I like to compare them to Beer, Wine, and Spirits respectively.

Maki/Rolls
This is what you will probably be most familiar with. Today, Maki rolls are synonymous with sushi. They are sheets of roasted seaweed spread with rice, filled with ingredients, rolled, and cut into portions. With rolls, you will get a more sea salty taste. This is due to the roasted seaweed paper that holds everything together. Other types of sushi don't use seaweed paper as exclusively. In the very very back of my mind, maki are more American than they are Japanese because of how far they've come since. By some, they aren't considered 100% sushi, BUT THAT DOES NOT MATTER. Maki are going to be some of the more flavorful sushi you will have, simply because of the experimental arena they thrive in. Rolls will be simple, complicated, fresh, fried, dry, covered in sauce, layered with tastes, and sometimes even baked. Some are made with just a cut of fish, others are going to be made with sauces, recipes, vegetables, fruits, meat- just about anything tasty. Rolls allow chefs to present a variety of flavors and to mesh them in ways you normally wouldn't experience. This is why I refer to maki as the beer of sushi: there are thousands of different recipes that each chef can make and present. Sometimes, these varieties can vary locally. The point is, there are some you will enjoy, others you wont as much. And even within subcategories of beer, you have your favorites. Start out light and move around to see what you like. Try something basic like a California roll, a salmon roll, a tuna roll. From there, move up to spicy tuna rolls, where the chef has his or her own recipe. Go for ones with vegetables and different ingredients to expand your tastes. From there, try some tempura rolls- fried rolls. Trust me, they taste good. It all depends on what mood you're in. Sometimes, I like a crisp ale. Other times, I'm in the mood for a stout. Enjoy the variety.

Nigiri Sushi
Here, we get into less of an emphasis on the many different flavors a chef can create, and more into the flavors he can pull out of the fish. While a chef could mask bad flavors and create interesting ones with maki, nigiri shows the true potential of a chef. In the most basic circumstances, there are only two ingredients: the fish and the rice. Fish are going to have their own tastes. Some stronger, some milder. Some fattier, some stringier. Some chewier, some more rubbery. In this instance, the art of the chef lies primarily within two aspects: how he cuts the fish, and how he uses the rice. The chef can choose to cut the fish very thinly or thickly, short and stubby or long and droopy. Each one of these will have a different quality in the mouth. Even with cuts of the same measure, a cut made from the belly will be different from a cut of the back, the tail, the collar: some will be fattier, oilier, drier, flakier. All of these elements have to be carefully balanced with the rice. Same with the fish, the rice shape can affect the mouth quality. More or less rice proportionately affects how much fish you get. Maybe it's a small morsel, maybe it's a mouthful. These will affect how you taste the fish. Aside from amount of rice, how the rice is prepared will also be a major factor. Sushi grain rice has a particular mouthfeel that other rices don't. How long it's left to cook will change that. After it is cooked, it is washed with different recipes and variations of salt, sugar, and rice vinegar. Some chefs' recipes will taste sweeter. Others will be saltier, and some will even be bland. It is up to the chef to know how much he should use of these (and sometimes other) ingredients, as well as how much to wash the rice. He then has to cut it meaning he has to mix it, and break any clumps. Clumpy rice is hard and not as tasty. If he takes too long to cut the rice, the rice gets cold, and clumps. If he does it too fast, it will still be clumpy. All these things can be inferred from just a cut of fish and some rice. This is why I refer to Nigiri as the wine of sushi. You know there's not much going on in there, but you try to see what considerations the chef had in making it. You try to extrapolate as many flavors as you can, and observe how they got there. Even how the fish is prepared prior to eating has an effect. Was it soaked? Brined with a sauce? Salted? These things you don't know until you try it. For now, don't expect to make all of these distinctions. You should try some simple nigiri for the fish, because you enjoy that fish. Now for some starter nigiri: the three big fish, at least in my humble opinion, are tuna (maguro), salmon (sake), and yellowtail (hamachi). These three are safe enough to guide you through nigiri sushi, but flavorful enough that there's enough to play with. Try those on for size first. If you're still iffy about the raw fish, you can always get shrimp (ebi) or eel (unagi). These two are usually cooked. Either steamed or baked. Shrimp, I feel is too simple, but that's just me, and eel is a bit more adventurous. Once again, you choose what you're most comfortable with, and enjoy it for what it is. But the point is, enjoy it.

Sashimi
Finally, sashimi is the simplest of the three. The 'neat spirits' of the sushi world, Sashimi is just the cut of fish. No rice, no bells, no whistles. Sometimes, it may be garnished with something like scallion, but that's chef's choice. That's all there is to it. Sashimi is very similar to nigiri without rice, except for the cut. Sashimi is usually thicker cut and more substantial, as to give you a better taste of the fish. Some sashimi can come thinner to give you a lighter taste. All depends on the chef. Traditionally, sashimi wasn't on the same level as sushi; sashimi was meant as a sampler, to get a feel of how fresh the fish was before you ordered nigiri. Today, sashimi is just as good and stands alone by itself as a treat. I've gotten drunk with my sushi master after hours, drinking sake and eating salmon (also sake!), and the sashimi stood out simply by itself. It's totally up to you!

Finally, ginger, wasabi, and miscellaneous etiquette I can't stress this enough. Do what feels right! Don't mind others. There seems to be a sort of etiquette that has since made its way out, things that have made their way in.

Ginger: used to cleanse the palate between sushi. Ginger is supposed to get rid of the fish flavor, so that you can fully enjoy different fish, without muddling the flavors in your mouth. Once upon a time, eating sushi together with ginger was considered offensive to the chef. It meant the fish/rice was so bad, you had to cover the flavor up. Today, I eat some sushi with ginger. It adds to the flavors. Some other flavors are too delicate to add ginger to, so I don't. Whatever I'm in the mood for.

Wasabi: Meant to draw out flavors in the fish. The stark contrast between the fresh fish and the spicy wasabi is meant to highlight aspects of the fish that are otherwise hidden in the 'fishiness.' Traditional wasabi, found predominantly in Japan, is made from grating the wasabi root right before eating the sushi. It has a very short shelf life, which is why sushi chefs will put wasabi underneath the fish, between the fish and rice- so that the flavor can be contained and not 'evaporate.' I myself have not had the luxury of tasting real wasabi yet. Instead, most places will use a mix of powdered horseradish and water to create a paste close enough to the real deal. Some people just don't like it. Some like a lot.

Soy sauce: Another thing to play with. Some chefs brush a bit of soy sauce (sometimes mixed with other ingredients) on the sushi, others use none, leaving you the option to use it at your discretion. Up to you however much you use. If eating nigiri, it's advisable to dip the fish side a bit, not the rice. The rice will break up.

Chopsticks or fingers?: Whichever is best for you. I eat rolls and sashimi with chopsticks, nigiri with my hands. Some people use forks. For the purposes of learning, these are all correct. Do what's best for you.

TL:DR There's no right or wrong way of eating sushi. You're paying for it with your own money, so you deserve to enjoy it however you want. Everyone is different, so don't base your enjoyment on others. Start easy with rolls, and get experimental once you have it down. Try some nigiri like salmon, tuna, and yellowtail to get a feel of sushi. Sashimi is also tasty, but start sushi as a whole unit. Finally, don't be afraid to ask the chef for recommendations!

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