some thoughts

Things I’ve noticed this week:

1) My cashier at the breakfast spot in my building wears a kabbalah bracelet.
2) My shoes squeak with every step.
3) There are not enough hours in the day.

That last one is all about how much I have to do in the next few days–and how unlikely it is that any of it will get done. I am very close to being done with this round of journal duties (just in time for new ones, yay!), but then I’ll have to spend the entire weekend packing our apartment. (Yes, of course Mr. Angst will be helping. I just tend to take on these kinds of responsibilities, even when I perhaps should be comfortable not Doing It All Myself.)

I know that the next, oh, ten days will be really busy and stressful and probably hard. But at the end of it, we’ll be in a new and improved apartment, my big stressful journal duties will be past (for the time), and the bulk of the summer will still stretch before me. Oh, I hope, I hope.

Teh Funny

Um, yeah. ((Warning: law student nerdy humor.))

new stuff

In addition to taking advantage of the available car this weekend to move a small load of fragiles to the new apartment, we also took advantage of it to pick up the furniture we had been planning to buy. We had wanted matching living room furniture–the wood stuff, not the upholstered stuff. (I.e., no couches and chairs.)

So a month or so ago, we had looked into buying some new furniture, and found a set we liked at Crate & Barrel. Best of all, the stuff we liked was the “ready to assemble” stuff–and therefore cheaper. I mean, I have a paycheck and all, but it’s still just a summer gig.

We stopped in today, then, to see if the store in town had our stuff in stock (they did, except for one end table) and if we could take it home Right Now (we could, except for the one backordered end table). We brought it home to the old apartment (which kind of sucks, but works out well, since the movers can move it next week) and I promptly put together the new coffee table.

Kids, I Love It. It is bee-yoo-tiful. It has sliding doors instead of an open shelf, so it hides whatever crap we want to put in it. It has a lovely smooth finish, it’s a beautiful color, it’s even a good size (it’s a little big, but that’s probably just in our current place, which hasn’t really had room for a coffee table). Best of all, it’s good, solid stuff. Sure, I had to assemble it, but it’s still good, solid stuff. I mean, there weren’t any wood-colored pieces of cardboard to be nailed to it.

So, we have new furniture. I’ll take a crack at the one end table we could bring home later this week, and the media console…sometime. And I’ll enjoy it, very much. It feels very grown up.

what's going on in my life

Um, I haven’t been posting much, have I? (Nothing substantive, at least.) That’s because I’ve been really busy. The end of my week saw me scrambling to finish up an assignment at work (it had to be done by Friday), spending some time in the library, working on some journal stuff, visiting with some in-town family, and packing some boxes. Today, that family that are visiting are going to help us trot a load of stuff up to our new place. Our lease doesn’t start till Friday, but we have the keys already and they’re in town with a car, and I just want to drop off things I don’t trust the movers with or that are a pain to box up (like, our china and crystal and our stacks of winter coats). I’m planning to just tuck the stuff away–we’re not moving in yet or anything, we’re just taking advantage of the available vehicle. And did I mention we already have the keys?

A few other notes:

1) I have decided no one should start a sentence with the word “Thus.”
2) Himself knows something is going on–he’s been sort of squidgy for a couple of days now, and I think he’s worried we’re going to move away without him.
3) I am selling a bunch of stuff (furniture-type things), so if you’re in my city, let me know if you want a coffee table or some bookshelves. Or a baker’s rack.

gurgle gurgle gurgle…..blub blub blub

Suddenly my life got really busy. I’m swamped at work all of a sudden, and I have lots to do yet with my journal duties, and we’re moving in a week and a half and I have family coming in this weekend, and basically I’m just snowed under. I keep waiting for things to clear up–since exams, I’ve never really gotten to the point where I can just relax–and it’s just not happening. So I’m resigning myself to being a completely un-fun, un-relaxed, un-leisure-time-accessible person.

Talk to me in two weeks. Maybe then things will be better.

Weekly Law School (Non)Roundup #71

Oh, shoot! I just realized I was supposed to do the Law School Roundup on Wednesday! Ack! I was on my way back into town and it totally slipped my mind. Sorry to all who were looking for the Roundup. In lieu, of a full roundup, I’ll just say this:

Congratulations to all graduates!

(Yeah, that’s lame. I promise I’ll be better in the future. Promise.)

squee!

Without going into specifics, I just want to say that today was a pretty cool day at work, and tomorrow is going to be TEN TIMES better. Who ever knew that [seemingly completely dull and boring area of law] could be so COOL?

a beef

Look, I’m not per se against the commercials for those medications that are supposed to help certain adults resume certain adult activities. I think they’re kind of silly, and probably not necessary, but I’m not opposed to them on any sort of moral ground or anything.

But I do think they could make them a little less unrealistic. Two porcelain-enameled, cast-iron, claw-footed tubs out in the middle of some rugged beach landscape? With two (apparently) unclothed adults sitting in them? No clothes or shoes nearby? Really?

my self-made sad Sunday

Do you ever, on what should be a perfectly good day, end up in just a crappy mood? That’s kind of how I am right now. I had a good weekend–I had fun and I was productive, something that doesn’t always happen–and now I’m sitting on my couch feeling awful. First, Himself is boarded right now, and I can’t get him till tomorrow morning, and he was really, really sad to be left on Friday. So I’m feeling awful and guilty about that. Second, Mr. Angst is out of town, and he won’t be back till tomorrow midday, when I’ll be at work, and then he has class tomorrow night, so I won’t see him till late tomorrow–and I haven’t seen him since Friday morning. Third and finally, I started doing some packing today and it’s just so depressing and sad and overwhelming and I don’t even want to deal with it, but I have to, because we have to get packed before we move.

I think there are probably a few other things going on, things that don’t really bear going in to, but they’re contributing, too. So I’m just sitting here on my couch, trying to imagine how I can be productive this afternoon while I’m feeling so icky and blech. Anyone have any ideas?

when a weighing of options pays off–and you wish it hadn't

As law students, we become very used to being very busy and, to a certain extent, we take that in stride. We sleep less, perhaps, or we multi-task; we do less of our reading in favor of going to class–or skip class in favor of doing more reading, depending on the prof. And sometimes, we have to make genuine sacrifices–completely abandoning a class for a week or two while we finish a Note or Comment, or putting journal duties aside while we madly cram for exams. We do mental cost-benefit analyses–how much can I give away here without really hurting my GPA?

This semester, I had to make one of those sacrifices. I admit it–I had too much on my plate. I was doing research and I was TAing, I was doing source and cite and I was trying to go to every class meeting. This semester I also had two papers to write, and, in the end, I skimped on one of them. I felt intense guilt the entire time. I loved the topic, I love the discussion in class, I loved the grayness of the area of law. But the paper–the paper I had problems with. I never felt a connection with my topic, I never really understood what I was arguing, I never really Got It. Instead of spending more time on it, though, instead of arranging to meet with the professor and talk it out, instead of making the effort to do something I felt good about, I punted. I wrote something superficial and wimpy, and what I turned in is something I am not very proud of.

Luckily, as I discovered today, the cost-benefit analysis I did paid off. I got a grade I probably didn’t deserve, and then it got bumped even higher because of my class participation. I am happy that class won’t be the dark spot on my semester–very, very happy. But I am disappointed in myself for not giving the paper the chance it really deserved. So I’ll enjoy the sweet–the grade I never hoped to get in that class–but it will be cut by a bit of bitter guilt.