05.22.13

Personal branding: what to expect from me

As the first post on my new domain, it seems fitting to write about personal branding. I once bought jennchen.org (because .com was already in use) with the intention of setting up a photo portfolio. In my naiveté of personal drive, I thought the $9.99 I paid for the domain name would motivate me to create content. It went unattended for an entire year. A few years later, after establishing two wordpress.org blogs and registering two additional domain names, I finally have the drive to finish what I started. A few weeks ago, I was randomly browsing and Googling myself with select iterations (e.g. jenn chen coffee”) when I discovered that this domain was on sale. I don’t even remember who had it before. Fifty dollars seemed a small price to pay for a name that exists thousands of times over across the globe.Read More

05.08.13

Lofty desires: Potential birthday gifts

My birthday is coming up really, really fast. If I go by tradition, I would be planning to spoil myself for it, which oftentimes include: birthday shoes, birthday dress, birthday mani-pedis with friends, birthday dinner, [and more recently] birthday massage. The dress and shoes may still happen, mostly because the heel fell off of one of my more comfortable shoes- it’s lingering somewhere on Bryn Mawr between the train station and Walgreens. The dress would happen, well, because I want it to. What can I say, I like pretty things.

The point is, I’m creating this post for those people who love me & want to give me something that is so outlandishly expensive that I probably won’t be able to accept it. Probably. Here are my lofty birthday gift desires:Read More

04.25.13

Quick life update

Can’t believe it’s nearly May. Just bought the domain jennchen.com, which is unheard of. My name is SO common that I took about 2 hours to make the decision and outright bought it at $50. If you try going to the site within 48 hours of this post, you will get a “domain for sale” page. In the next few weeks, you may or may not notice a few changes to this blog. I’ll no longer be at thecuriousbean.wordpresscom… I will be migrating from a wordpress.com site to a wordpress.org site. The layout will yet again be different. I’ll also be reorganizing a bit to incorporate a portfolio & resume. The blog itself will still exist, it just might not be the first thing you see when you go to my site.Read More

02.02.13

January dranks, eats, makes

We’re one full month into 2013 and for this week’s post, I’m taking a look at my drinking, eating, and making consumption in January.

So that idea that I wanted to try a new roaster (designated by NR) every month more than succeeded. Favorites are designated by asterisks. What did I drink/eat/make this month?Read More

12.30.12

Coffee 2013 Resolutions

A couple of weeks ago, Oliver Strand’s column “Ristretto” (last post) ended and coffee lovers all around the world shed caffeinated tears. Since I want to write more often, need more blogs to read, and I work way better with others keeping me in line, #blogchallengewk1 happened. One coffee blog post a week with D. Nettleton (read), Maxwell Mooney (read), and Randy Levine (read). Anyone can join in- no prior writing experience needed. 

For the past few years, I’ve been establishing one NY resolution a year (instead of the 15 that I used to write & give up on within six weeks). In 2012, my general new years resolution was to make new friends [outside of work]. I went through the pains of setting up an OKCupid account (I don’t suggest doing this to find new friends), attempted to join Meetup groups, and said yes to many events where I didn’t know anyone… needless to say, random group meetings, random one-on-one meetings, random parties… they just don’t pan out into real friendships. The new friendships I’ve made this year have all come out of the coffee industry and I’m grateful for all of them.

I’ve yet to decide on my general 2013 resolution, but I do have many coffee goals that I want to achieve in 2013.Read More