I was lost...

[Citizen]

Oh I was about to give up. I could not make a good juice to save my life. I had the mentality of "I'll just get all of these flavors that sound good, throw some of this in and some of that in and it will be decent as long as my base ingredients are good". After all, I cook... and I'm good at it. Just inventing dishes out of thin air. Substituting this and that. Or looking around the kitchen for what I have and making something from nothing. I was sure that's how DIY worked.

I was wrong. At least in my experience. I had gone for months and months with maybe two good recipes that were mostly someone else's. And they still weren't even that great. Subbing this for that and whatnot. I had given up pretty much. Went back to vendors and B&m's. Payingbig bucks for "premium" liquids. These juices weren't even what I was looking for as perfect. They were just good enough. No juice that is on the "this will work for now" (great k.k. album btw) is worth $20 to last a day and a half. It's just not.

I then stumbled across Wayne of DIY or DIE. Just happened to listen to his podcast with Fizz in which he sings the praises of our buddy @HeadInClouds . I really began to realize that I was going about it all wrong. I was half assing it. And I'm really not that kind of person. I'm someone who needs to know why things work they way they do. I become locked into figuring things out down to the nut and bolt. So I could not figure out for the life of me why I would take a "hobby" that I know has saved me from dying far too young like my Dad did and just kind of try and give it a "good enough" attempt. Good enough. Just like that overpriced juice I was buying. No thanks.

I feel really lucky to be part of a family of people (you VU) that are genuinely good hearted and willing to help a person out at the drop of a dime. We've got these guys that could make money off every single recipe and share nothing, yet they post their goods up for us to mix freely. I love you people. You're great! I'm happy to be mixing again and be associated with all you fine folks! I'm going to mix your recipes. Learn these ingredients. Learn my science. Have fun. That is all.

 

[dannydestroy]

Well said and similar to how I think about it. You will start to nail recipes and most store bought juice will simply not do anymore. Bring on the diy. Have fun.

 

[Huckleberried]

Oh I was about to give up. I could not make a good juice to save my life. I had the mentality of "I'll just get all of these flavors that sound good, throw some of this in and some of that in and it will be decent as long as my base ingredients are good". After all, I cook... and I'm good at it. Just inventing dishes out of thin air. Substituting this and that. Or looking around the kitchen for what I have and making something from nothing. I was sure that's how DIY worked.

I was wrong. At least in my experience. I had gone for months and months with maybe two good recipes that were mostly someone else's. And they still weren't even that great. Subbing this for that and whatnot. I had given up pretty much. Went back to vendors and B&m's. Payingbig bucks for "premium" liquids. These juices weren't even what I was looking for as perfect. They were just good enough. No juice that is on the "this will work for now" (great k.k. album btw) is worth $20 to last a day and a half. It's just not.

I then stumbled across Wayne of DIY or DIE. Just happened to listen to his podcast with Fizz in which he sings the praises of our buddy @HeadInClouds . I really began to realize that I was going about it all wrong. I was half assing it. And I'm really not that kind of person. I'm someone who needs to know why things work they way they do. I become locked into figuring things out down to the nut and bolt. So I could not figure out for the life of me why I would take a "hobby" that I know has saved me from dying far too young like my Dad did and just kind of try and give it a "good enough" attempt. Good enough. Just like that overpriced juice I was buying. No thanks.

I feel really lucky to be part of a family of people (you VU) that are genuinely good hearted and willing to help a person out at the drop of a dime. We've got these guys that could make money off every single recipe and share nothing, yet they post their goods up for us to mix freely. I love you people. You're great! I'm happy to be mixing again and be associated with all you fine folks! I'm going to mix your recipes. Learn these ingredients. Learn my science. Have fun. That is all.

I like you. That's good stuff right there, man. Tugged at my heart strings a little.

 

[Jimi]

Great post,hang in there. I feel the same way as you do, we have the greatest community here with the BEST people one could ever meet!

 

[Citizen]

Thank you guys so much. It's really great to read these nice words. I had just been stumbling for so long at this that I had convinced myself that it was just never going to happen. Hell, I had convinced myself that I didn't belong here at VU. After all, my posts had been sporadic at best and I had a couple PIF's that I still needed to fulfill and I had nothing to send. I got into this to mix for myself and in the process hopefully share some good things with some good people but I just wasn't keeping up my end of the bargain I felt.

I had a few family members that were so excited when they heard I was going to start mixing because they get so pumped every time I decide to cook for the family. And I LOVE it. The look on their faces. The sounds they make. That vibe I get when they take that first bite of something that I've created. Usually every Sunday. I use it to bring us closer. It's a great feeling. And I thought I could do that with mixing. I thought that I could genuinely bring us closer and make us healthier with my own two hands. And I made a few things. All of which, with the exception of two maybe, were complete shit. The look on their face as they tried to be nice about a really shitty juice I just had them try really, really knocked me down. I knew it was shit. But part of me really wanted to think maybe it was my taste buds. Like I said, I was half-assing it. Most of that juice should have never been vaped.

I'm not saying what I'm making now is super great. It's not the All Day Vape that everybody and their brother would have to have. Not at all. But it is already eons ahead of the crap I was trying to force myself to make before. I could vape it all day and be pretty good with it. I have a lot of work to do. Tons. A lot of research. And fortunately for me, A LOT OF GREAT PEOPLE IN THIS FORUM TO LEARN FROM and hopefully one day share with. YOU guys are what has inspired me to continue on with my DIY and not give up. All I can say is THANK YOU SO MUCH!!!!

 

[nabibrian]

Great thread, great read!
Threads like this further reveal that VU is more than a forum!

 

[OBDave]

Thank you guys so much. It's really great to read these nice words. I had just been stumbling for so long at this that I had convinced myself that it was just never going to happen. Hell, I had convinced myself that I didn't belong here at VU. After all, my posts had been sporadic at best and I had a couple PIF's that I still needed to fulfill and I had nothing to send. I got into this to mix for myself and in the process hopefully share some good things with some good people but I just wasn't keeping up my end of the bargain I felt.

I had a few family members that were so excited when they heard I was going to start mixing because they get so pumped every time I decide to cook for the family. And I LOVE it. The look on their faces. The sounds they make. That vibe I get when they take that first bite of something that I've created. Usually every Sunday. I use it to bring us closer. It's a great feeling. And I thought I could do that with mixing. I thought that I could genuinely bring us closer and make us healthier with my own two hands. And I made a few things. All of which, with the exception of two maybe, were complete shit. The look on their face as they tried to be nice about a really shitty juice I just had them try really, really knocked me down. I knew it was shit. But part of me really wanted to think maybe it was my taste buds. Like I said, I was half-assing it. Most of that juice should have never been vaped.

I'm not saying what I'm making now is super great. It's not the All Day Vape that everybody and their brother would have to have. Not at all. But it is already eons ahead of the crap I was trying to force myself to make before. I could vape it all day and be pretty good with it. I have a lot of work to do. Tons. A lot of research. And fortunately for me, A LOT OF GREAT PEOPLE IN THIS FORUM TO LEARN FROM and hopefully one day share with. YOU guys are what has inspired me to continue on with my DIY and not give up. All I can say is THANK YOU SO MUCH!!!!

Glad you're sticking with it - I'm in much the same boat. I'm a largely self-trained cook, and when I read a recipe I want to try I see it more as a suggestion than a set of rules - I'll fiddle around with ingredients based on what I have and how much of what I think should go in. It almost always turns out great, sometimes to my detriment - my wife now has to drive dinner over to my mother-in-law 3-4 times a week because she'd rather eat my cooking than make anything herself.

DIY is a different beast - I'll pull a random recipe out of my ass and try it, as it seems you've been doing. Sometimes I'll get lucky and it's vapeable, but not perfect. Those recipes take 5-6 rounds of refining until I'm really happy with them. Others, total lawn dart. I'm trying to make a sweet, tart flavor using FA Joy, which I love on its own - tried several different blueberries with hints of lime and lemon, cranberry, bilberry, a handful of different creams...I'm still no closer to developing a new tasty pastry than I was 10 mixes ago. But damn it, I'm gonna get this. It's just not coming to me as easily as things do in the kitchen, where anything that's good is better if you just add more garlic and/or pepper...

 

[Teresa P]

I think the hardest part was getting used to a whole new set of "tastes." I mean, you know what an orange is gonna taste like when you eat it, no big deal. But when you get into orange flavorings from different vendors, it's a whole new ball game. This one is stronger, that one is sweeter, and that one over there shouldn't even legally be labelled "orange"....lol! And if you put coconut on your sliced oranges, that's pretty nice, but combine the same two flavors from different vendors for vaping and you could get something heavenly or something that smells like road kill. It's funny how that works.

 

[kimber]

WOW!! I could have written that too! Well, except for the cooking part, I'm not a good cook. I have to follow recipes, which is also true about my juices apparently. I've been at the DIY thing for about two years and have dumped more stuff down the drain than I care to think about. Figuring out what goes with what is very trying for me but these folks here have been so so helpful. They've reignited my fire to find the perfect juice for me and I so appreciate it! This is a really great resource and such nice helpful people!


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[Flavor Alchemist]

Citizen....Dude.....In the same boat you are, and am finding that a lot of experimentation is where it's at for me.....Lot's of preconceived notions that go right down the tubes when we experiment......and also realizing that some of that juice is not too far behind.......

 

[Citizen]

I think it's finally starting to click a little bit. I'm having more fun with it. The simple addition of a scale has helped immensely. I basically scrapped all of the recipes I had saved and started over from scratch. Made a couple of others' creations that so far are pretty good. Stocked up on some good, quality flavors. Making HIC's spiced sweet apple cider has broadened my horizons while building my flavor library. The few things I've come up with are being documented well and thus far are pretty decent. I was just blasting myself with too much flavor before. Thanks for the words of encouragement guys. Means a lot. I hope to one day help others out the way you all have helped me.

 

[VelvetA]

Yeah, @HeadInClouds has rescued quite a lot of us