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of that time had been, all too predictably,
    Hunter Thompson, William Burroughs, Iggy Pop and Bruce Lee; I had had, for some time, a romantic if inaccurate view of myself as some kind of hyperviolent, junkie Byron. My last semester at Vassar, I'd taken to wearing nunchakus in a strap-on holster and carrying around a samurai sword-that should tell you all you need to know. The most romantic thing I had done in two years was to chop down about an acre of Vassar's lilacs one night with my sword, so that I could fill my girlfriend's room with the blossoms.
    CIA was a bit of a departure. I'd love to tell you it was tough getting in. There was a long waiting list. But I reached out to a friend of a friend who'd donated some heavy bucks to the school and owned a well-known restaurant in New York City, and about two weeks after filling out my application I was in. I was an enrolled student at an institution where everyone wore identical white uniforms, funny paper hats and actually had to attend class. Like I said, it was a bit of a departure. But I was ready.
    CIA is located in the buildings and grounds of a former Jesuit monastery on a Hudson River clifftop, a short cab ride from Poughkeepsie. In my buttoned-up chef's coat, check pants, neckerchief and standard-issue leatherette knife roll-up, I arrived determined but full of attitude.
    My knives set me apart right away. I had my by now well-worn high-carbon Sabatiers rolled in with the cheap school-supply junk: hard-to-sharpen Forschner stainless steel, peeler, parisienne scoop, paring knife and sheer. I was older than most of my fellow students, many of whom were away from home for the first time. Unlike them, I lived off campus, in Poughkeepsie with the remnants of my Vassar pals. I'd actually worked in the industry-and I'd had sex with a woman. These were not the cream of the crop, my fellow culinarians. It was 1975 and CIA was still getting more than their share of farm boys, bed-wetters, hicks, flunk-outs from community colleges and a few misfits for whom CIA was preferable to jailor juvenile detention. Hopeless in the kitchen, happy in their off-hours to do little more than build pyramids of beer cans, they were easy marks for a hard case like myself. I nearly supported myself during my two years in Hyde Park playing seven-card stud, Texas hold-em, no-peek and acey-deucey. I felt no shame or guilt taking their money, selling them beat drugs or cheating at cards. They were about to enter the restaurant industry; I figured they might as well learn sooner rather than later. If the Mario crew ever got hold of some of these rubes, they'd have the fillings out of their teeth.
    It was very easy going for me. The first few months at CIA were spent on stuff like: 'This is the chef's knife. This is the handle. This is the blade,' as well as rote business on sanitation. My food sanitation instructor, an embittered ex-health inspector (judging from the scars on his face, the last honest man in that trade), regaled us with stories of pesticide-munching super rats, the sex lives of bacteria and the ever-present dangers of unseen filth.
    I took classes in food-handling, egg cookery, salads, stocks, soups, basic knifework. But after spending way too many hours deep in the bowels of Marioland, peeling spuds, making gallons of dressings, chopping vegetables and so on, I knew this stuff in my bones.
    Of course, my stocks in class always tasted far better than my classmates'. No one could figure out how I coaxed such hearty flavor out of a few chicken bones, or made such wonderful fish fumet with fish racks and shrimp shells, all in the limited time available. Had my instructors given me a pat-down before class they might have learned my secret: two glassine envelopes of Minor's chicken and lobster base inside my chef's coat, for that little extra kick. They never figured it out.
    The CIA of 1975 was very different from the four-year professional institution it is today. Back then, the desired