Off to Christmas #2

Leaving today to go see the inlaws. Back in time for NYE.

::skh:: family holidays

Christmas was lovely - the husband and grandma busted out an amazing feast, the wedding albums went over really well. Although, when my mom got a little whiney and dissapointed about a couple pictures that don't exist, I felt a blood vessel in my eye about to burst.

We got to my parent's house on Friday morning. It was my dad's 50th birthday. He was supposed to have the day off, then he was supposed to work a half day. He ended up working a full day. But, we got to go out to dinner, and in typical skh family style, we all drank too much. Came home from dinner and had a dance party in the living room...until my dad passed out. Signs of a good time.

He wasn't feeling so hot the next day, but he gave us money to go gamble at one of the Indian Casinos. The husband and grandpa played black jack, grandma headed for the nickel slots and mom and I went to play video poker. It felt a little wrong to be drinking cheap champagne and gambling while listening to the more religious of the Christmas songs. The gambling gods must have felt my frustration because as soon as that thought entered my mind, we were treated to such great hits as "Donde Esta Santa Clause?" and my personal favorite, "Dominick the Italian Christmas Donkey." I'm not a big gambler and I am happy to play a quarter at a time and I generally loose. Saturday was no exception. But, I did walk away with a song I will never forget:

DOMINICK THE DONKEY (THE ITALIAN CHRISTMAS DONKEY)
(Allen / Merrell / Saltzberg)
Lou Monte - 1967


Hey! Chingedy ching,
(hee-haw, hee-haw)
It's Dominick the donkey.
Chingedy ching,
(hee-haw, hee-haw)
The Italian Christmas donkey.
(la la la-la la-la la la la la)
(la la la-la la-la la-ee-oh-da)

Santa's got a little friend,
His name is Dominick.
The cutest little donkey,
You never see him kick.
When Santa visits his paisons,
With Dominick he'll be.
Because the reindeer cannot,
Climb the hills of Italy.

Hey! Chingedy ching,
(hee-haw, hee-haw)
It's Dominick the donkey.
Chingedy ching,
(hee-haw, hee-haw)
The Italian Christmas donkey.
(la la la-la la-la la la la la)
(la la la-la la-la la-ee-oh-da)

Jingle bells around his feet,
And presents on the sled.
Hey! Look at the mayor's derby,
On top of Dominick's head.
A pair of shoes for Louie,
And a dress for Josephine.
The labels on the inside says,
They're made in Brooklyn.

Hey! Chingedy ching,
(hee-haw, hee-haw)
It's Dominick the donkey.
Chingedy ching,
(hee-haw, hee-haw)
The Italian Christmas donkey.
(la la la-la la-la la la la la)
(la la la-la la-la la-ee-oh-da)

Children sing, and clap their hands,
And Dominick starts to dance.
They talk Italian to him,
And he even understands.

Cumpare sing,
Cumpare su,
And dance 'sta tarantel.
When jusamagora comes to town,
And brings du ciuccianello.

Hey! Chingedy ching,
(hee-haw, hee-haw)
It's Dominick the donkey.
Chingedy ching,
(hee-haw, hee-haw)
The Italian Christmas donkey.
(la la la-la la-la la la la la)
(la la la-la la-la la-ee-oh-da)

Hey! Dominick! Buon Natale!
(hee-haw, hee-haw)
(hee-haw, hee-haw)
(hee-haw, hee-haw)
(hee-haw, hee-haw)
(hee-haw, hee-haw)
(hee-haw, hee-haw)

Spent all day yesterday putting together the wedding photo albums for family Christmas presents. Hopefully they appreciate them -- took like 12 hours! Also finished reading Running With Scissors. I think I might have liked it more if I hadn't read it after reading Frey. Burroughs wasn't as funny as David Sedaris or as edgy as Frey. It wasn't bad, but not so great either.

Need to pack and run a bunch of errands before we head to my parents house where there is, GASP, no Internet connection.

So, blogging will resume next week. Happy Holidays!

Holy Mother...

The reprints for the wedding pics we are putting into albums for the fams for Christmas -- $840!!!!!

That is more than we paid for the photographer, film, and development the first time around.

suzy homemaker say

I am a big fan of Husch Vineyards, a Mendocino Winery. I love their chardonnay and thought I liked their Chenin Blanc. It was given to us by the inn keepers at The Inn at Schoolhouse Creek when we were visiting to pin down logistics before we married there. I must have loved it at the time because I was planning my wedding and already buzzed from selecting beer from the North Coast Brewery because the Chenin Blanc is unbearably sweet without a redeeming finish.

On another note…I highly recommend the Method cleaning products from Target, specifically the grapefruit multi-purpose cleaner. My house sparkles and smells like grapefruit rather than bleach.

Me and Babar, kicking some motherf**king ass

The title doesn't really relate to anything, but it was my favorite line from the aforementioned Million Little Pieces.

I celebrated my first non law school week day by hitting not one, but two targets. They are right across the street from each other in Colma, which is just south of SF. Between my trip to Haight St, the Targets and the BevMo that was in the same shopping complex, I finished all of our Christmas shopping in two days. Not bad at all, not to mention that I got to pick up a couple of rewards for myself as well. I also stopped at Macys and returned jeans that were purchased months ago.

I hated Targets and chain stores before I moved to San Francisco. Now that they are a trek from my house and not present on every corner I love the bejesus out of them. In between Targets, I got a personal pizza from Round Table and ate it in my car while listening to some horrifically cheesy music on the radio.

After all that, I managed to take the dog to get ridiculously dirty in the park, gave him a bath and scrubbed our bathroom spotless.

Break is good. Break is very good.

Just read...

...A Million Little Pieces

I was skeptical, despite all the raves. It was engaging and gut wrenching and believable and honest enough that I started it around 8 last night and didn't put it down until I finished it at 2am.

Walking home from getting coffee for me and some gatorade for the poor husband who was really sick last night, I had this exchange:

Guy walking by: "Can I bum a cigarette?"
Me: "Sure." Grabs one, hands it to him.
Guy: "You look like you're in a pretty big hurry."
Me: "No, I think I'm just used to being in one."

One semester down. Holla!

I can officially say that I finished my first semester of law school without completely loosing my shit!

Must say that I feel like I kind of fucked my civ pro exam, but it's over. I think this semester qualifies as the hardest thing I've yet done, and finishing it feels pretty damn good.

I want to go shopping and treat myself but I had a couple of glasses of champagne and think that a nap is in order.

::

Just found out that a childhood friend needs a liver transplant within a year or two. Long waiting lists, high costs, etc. make it a very difficult situation. Nothing like that news to put me and my place and give me some much needed perspective.

um. no.

Your mind is subconciously thinking about
Tree-hugging.


What are you subconciously thinking about?
brought to you by Quizilla

Note to self

You don't need earplugs for the exam, you need them for afterwords. I felt pretty good about my property exam, until some of the people in my section started doing a postmortem dissection of it. OY. Some comments are funny, IE R saying "I drew a diagram of a guy going 'meh' in my bluebook." Or C saying "I LOVE taking exams. They make me feel grrreeat!" Or, a random 1L not in my section who a few days ago came out of the building saying "I MAY NOT BE SMART, BUT AT LEAST I'M NOT STOOPID! WHOO!" Cheers to you buddy. If I could remember you, I would buy you a beer.

Other totally acceptable comments include variations of: "At least it's over." Or, "I felt better about it than I thought I would." Because, I want the best for MOST of my section mates.

But all of this "Did you get this issue? Oh, how funny was it that she gave us the opportunity to do XYZ. I thought that question was awesome, because I could show off my superior knowledge about..." Shut. The. Fuck. Up.

And, to feel even more inspired, here's a direct quote from Law School Confidential:

"Getting 4 Bs...during your first semester puts you into a bit of a hole. Those grades aren't going to attract 1L employers, and they're going to make it pretty hard for you..."

If I get straight Bs at this point, I might piss myself with joy. Amazing how my standards have dropped.

That's depressing

Another thing I am looking forward to come this Friday is binging on non law-related books. So, I went to Amazon and they had recommendations for me. AND THEY WERE ALL LAW RELATED. No, no! I wanted to shout -- remember when I used to order novels?!

BTW, if you have better recommendations than Amazon, please share. The last book I read and loved was Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close...way back in August.

Woo-hoo

Watching Law and Order while attempting to make pasta. Jack McCoy just went through jury selection and talked about challenges for cause and made a Batson motion. Not only did I totally get it all, but as a result am now feeling less panicked about Civ Pro (totally unjustified, but whatever).

Oh yes, it's beer can chicken night

"I feel bad, I'm salting a chicken's ass."

"Yeah, well. Can you put the beer can in the middle of the cutting board?"

Wherby she is inspired by Laguna Beach: The Real OC

There was an episode where they couldn't get the saying right, but I know it and it shall be my new mantra:

"Don't hate the player(s), hate the game."

::semi drunk blogginng::

I am sick of whining on this blog. So, without whining I will add some items to my "things I'm looking forward to" list. I am looking forward to EXERCISE so that my clothes actually fit the way they should. Additionally, I am looking forward to being able to remember how to put on makeup. Oh, and being able (hopefully) to go out to a bar, dressed up, without feeling like microwaved dog shit.

What is it about law school that beats my confidece enough to send me back to age 15 when I was similarly acne prone and insecure? Stress, sure. But I've been stressed before -- working almost full time in college, family dying, planning a wedding, the husband and I loosing our apartment and literally everything we owned. What makes this different Thoughts? A and B (I think the only other law students who read this blog)?

The friend who is in grad school at UW put it best, "I ask myself every day if it is worth doing something I really don't enjoy so that I have a job I'll hopefully enjoy later."

It's weird for me to not enjoy school. And this isn't just exam related -- I remember telling Prof K, who is also my advisor that I don't like law school. I like learning and I like the idea of being in law school and I totally have an ego about actually being in law school. However, that does not add up to enjoying law school. But I guess that's why they don't call it happy fun time.

reward # 2

I had grand plans of doing some holiday shopping after today's test. Yeah, right. It took me 20 minutes after the test to get out of the parking garage another 40 to find parking in my neighborhood. I grabbed a burrito and am currently watching bad tv and blogging from the couch. Big fat nap up next.

random

Feeling good about torts. Still want to do some work on the fuzzy spots in my outline, but I think this is the exam I'll be most prepared for (prolly everyone in the class feels that way thanks to Prof Torts)

Taking a tea break and inspired by some other bloggers, a random list.

Things I am so very looking forward to:
Taking the dog to the park this afternoon
X-mas shopping after tomorrow's torts exam
Giving the husband his (more) normal wife back for 3 weeks
Toasting with friends over J's homemade infused vodkas on December 16th
Seeing the 'rents for Christmas
Spending a January weekend in Portland with K

But I am dreading:
Property final (and a little bit Civ Pro too)
Grades
Giving up a vice that I've had for waaayy too long. A pack of cigarettes is like 20 friends and a small sign that even though you are a boring law student, you're still kind of hip and a little rebelious...

ewww

My torts final is on Friday. I was very productive today -- so much so that I didn't really eat, or change out of my sweats which is pretty typical as of late. S has been sick, so we ordered a pizza for dinner. I'm not sure if it was stress or hunger that made me eat way too much of that, followed by Ben and Jerry's washed down with wine. Ugh. I was supposed to be past the point of stress eating and too much junk food.

I'm sick of feeling tired and stressed and gross. Tomorrow it is all water and salad.

::

1 final down.

I think it was okay. I analyzed it the whole way home and there were some spots where I think I fucked up... but I think overall it was okay.

My reward? A glass of wine -- at a bar! -- with an old friend whose in town for a conference. She had a huge presentation today (she's a grad student at UW) so we comiserated about grad school and had a great time.

Going to get a good nights sleep and start in on torts tomorrow.

And so it is...

First exam today at 1:30. I feel surprisingly okay. I haven't blogged much about the exam prep/ anxiety because I haven't been able to put it into interesting words (see "this fucking sucks" post below). I was feeling relatively okay at first, and for the most part I was during the day. But, at night I couldn't sleep and had really violent dreams, guys beating dogs with golf clubs, more decapitated heads falling out of trees at my feet. Yeah, pretty sick.

Then, I got a good nights sleep on Sunday. No idea why. Then, I got another good nights sleep last night. My studying felt prodcutive, now I feel like I'm prepared as I can be. I'm not spazzing out (yet?) I'm drinking coffee and I feel relaxed and I'm about to get dressed like a normal person -- no sweats! -- for the first time in a week.

We'll see how I feel this afternoon.

Okay...

After my profound and mature post yesterday, I have to redeem myself at least a little. Today was frustrating, but better. And, at the very least it will be over in two weeks. Hurrah.

This fucking sucks

Just had to get that out.

Comparative

In a little over two weeks the first semester will officially be over. I will be on break. I will go to yoga and then watch day time television and then drink wine with lunch. I have always been hard worker, but I will honestly be able to say that I have worked harder this semester than I have worked...ever. There were costs and I will make up for them by seeing friends and getting a facial and going shopping and having my hair cut. And when I ask the husband how his day was, I will really listen and I will try to make dinner for him even though it will end up tasting like shit and then I'll have to take him out.

I will spend time with the fam -- those people who really believe in me. Who believe that because I am "smart," know how to use a computer, and have ambition, I will escape the tough economic times and depression that got in their way, that prohibited them from living the life they wanted.

For three weeks, I will not compare myself to other people -- the peers who "get it" in school or those who are enjoying themselves by avoiding graduate school and not wasting their twenties. I will not measure myself in terms of upward mobility. I won’t think about how far I've come from home or about how far I have to go. I will be satisfied.