And because I'd probably be too tired to fully understand it anyway. God, I'm exhausted. Haven't had a full night's sleep in about four days. Nearly slept through my (iterated) alarm today. Life's still pretty good. So. Starting with last monday, because there're events of significance all the way through.
Monday was class (clearly. That's pretty well constant), and starting too damn early (also constant, at least M-W). Monday was also my first rehearsal for Habeas Chorus, which takes place in a disused dining hall in a building adjacent to campus (and still part of NU--it's where they have student accounts and the bookstore and other such fun places). It's an interesting place to rehearse. The rehearsal itself went pretty well--we introduced ourselves to each other, and learned a song (since a) we've been sworn to secrecy relative to NLaw students, and b) I know there's at least one NLaw student who may be reading this, I can't tell you what songs we're singing, at least until after we've performed them). It was pretty cool, except that Property always gets out late so I had to run in order to learn where we were rehearsing.
Then there was more class (Civ Pro continues to be amazing. We're up to several left-ish leaning rants about how conservative judges are actually the activist judges insofar as they violate the Federal Rules to get the results they want, as well as two separate Sesame Street references, and a Casablanca quote).
Then, after class, there was the first general membership OUTLaw meeting, giving details about a) membership, b) organization and events and shit, and c) offering a chance at free food. This last is truly key. At the meeting, I met (well, re-met) a guy going by the name of Bergy, and we spoke of various forms of geekery--he scripted and ran LARPs of his own systemic design for friends at Stanford while there. We hung out for a while, which caused me to be late in heading up north on the El to have dinner with the lovely Miss Marquez, in town to visit (other) friends. We had dinner, Mexican food, with her hosts at a place a little ways from their house, and afterwards (the meal finished with complementary shots of Kahlua and cream, as two of the five had gotten margaritas) we went next door to a gay sports bar, where they were having trivia night. The questions were being delivered by a man in a habit with a very kindergarten-teacher voice. It was hilarious, and one of Liz's friends (as separate from her friends who were her hosts) bought us drinks. I walked back to the El and back from the El (having ridden it in between), and crashed.
Tuesday. Class. Meeting for the Diversity Coalition, mainly for the derailed promise of free lunch--it was misdelivered, and we therefore missed out. Bergy and I were the first two in line when they ran out of food (after the meeting people sprinted over), so we instead went to Giordano's a few blocks over and waited the requisite time for a deep dish pizza. Good food, good company, interesting conversation. All fairly good.
I remember nothing of significance concerning Tuesday night or Wednesday, so clearly nothing interesting happened (that could be a lie, but that's my story and I'm sticking to it).
Thursday evening, Michelle and I hung out after the Ice Cream Social (free ice cream!) and had less-than-stellar cider on her sun deck, and then went to a BYOB thai place. This was hilarious insofar as Michelle was pre-gaming Bar Review (no free drinks this week), and bought herself a handle of Grape Mist MD 20/20 (13.5% abv), which--according to her--tasted like a bad Killer Kool-Aid, and smelled--according to me--somewhere between purple (which it was) and that sickly sweet smell usually associated with organic decay. There was much hilarity in the drinking of this, and in our conversation, which largely revolved around boys (and, touched on how stupid they are. At the moment, for various reasons, I firmly include myself in this category). There was also amusement on the part of our waitress, who was inquiring what the hell we (well, she) were drinking--and whether we needed glasses, or would be having it straight from the bottle in its brown paper bag (for irony, we took the former option).
We then headed toward bar review, even though I was not myself going. En route, we met up with Matt T., his girlfriend, one of their friends, and a guy named Jeff, all of them coming from an alum event from their collective undergrad. We all badgered Jeff into going to Bar Review with Michelle, and we split off from them. The party thinned further out when Matt's friend split off to get to her car (visitor to Chicago, had elsewhere to be that evening), and eventually we all made it back to our respective buildings.
Friday, gloriously, there was no crim, so I slept in. I needed it. CLR was research stuff, which--given that everyone involved in it was all trying to access Westlaw at once--was less than successful because the internet's tubes were severely clogged. Also, we got our pseudonyms for anonymizing our memos--all inspired by the X-Files. After class, there was grocery shopping to prep for the week (I have to cook tonight, incidentally, rather than scrounge off what was in my fridge) and in anticipation of Kathy's party--I brought cheese and crackers. Between that and a few other errands, the time I'd anticipated using for writing my memo went to approximately nil before I headed out for Kathy's.
Kathy's party was fun. A variety of good food was had, and I was consulted in the cooking of Kathy's lasagna (with sauce from Josh's mom). Wine was brought, and insalata capresce, and a kickass chocolate cake. Verity, an Australian exchange student (yes, law schools have 'em too), and I hung out mostly in the ktichen to highly entertaining effect. Particularly when Verity--as she later put it on facebook--gave a wine bottle the highlight of its night. We MST3K'd 300, which--now that I've seen the bulk of it, if mostly on fast-forward--deserved it, and then watched office space, chatting all the while.
Saturday consisted of two things: memo, and dancing. The former got done (mostly on saturday, but the rest on sunday), and is therefore unimportant. The latter took me and Kathy and Verity up to Boystown, to a bar called Charlie's. Jade and Darcy would have joined us, but one was sick and the other still had memo work to do. We took the bus up (because Kathy was mistakenly insistent that the El would not be running, it being a weekend and that being when they do construction--which they've now finished on the pertinent portion of the line), and walked most of the way to the wrong address (Yay for confusion and dyslexia), during which time we got Kathy some moleskin because her boots were a bit small and she already had a blister.
We eventually got to the bar, which was dead (because it was too early), and I danced with each of the ladies while we waited for Will, one of Kathy's friends, to show up. Kathy wasn't terrible as dancing, and Verity performed precisely as she exected to: poorly. It was still entertaining. Once Will arrived, they bailed for several reasons: they had no real interest (shock) in dancing, and Will's ex-boss frequented the place, and was evidently somewhat of an ass to him. So they left to go... elsewhere. I lost track of them, and can't really claim to have cared. Dancing, as mentioned previously, was fucking excellent.
Sunday was memo writing and hanging pictures (finally. Not all are up, but at least more now are) and reading for monday's classes and actually managing (unlike--which I didn't mention--saturday, wherein I was antsy as all fuck. I think dancing helped my concentration on sunday at least) to sit still and concentrate. Also, fog! There was fog that came sweeping into the city and covering it for a good two or three hours in the evening such that I couldn't see any building more distant than the other McClurg tower.
Monday was classes and rehearsal and faxing forms to doctors that they may not fill out and freaking out about that and various other things and not eating lunch until I got home at 5. I continued to fail at concentrating, though I did get all of today's readings done relatively early in the evening. Also spent lots of (too much) time staring at gchat hoping to talk to someone. That failed.
I went on a walk. The wind was strong, and it was lovely. I covered (yay Chicago distance-tied coordinate system!) in excess of three miles in an hour and a half--about forty-odd minutes of which time was spent chatting with a pair of women at the Bean in Millennium Park (investigating the structure and reflective--optical and acoustic--properties of its interior/underside and talking about sci-fi/fantasy stories involving cities appearing in the sky), and watching a couple of excellent dancers dance in the fountain nearby (it works, even though my description is necessarily lacking as I'm about to close this out and head to property). It was good, and got me sufficiently tired (never mind that I was mentally and quasi-emotionally exhausted, just not physically so) that I could actually get to sleep.
Then I almost slept through my alarm this morning, and I've been vaguely zombified through the day so far. I really hope I'm not on call. Have good until next week or something momentous occurs.
Tuesday, September 23, 2008
Sunday, September 21, 2008
Wheeeeeeeeeee!
Yay for dancing. That is the moral of tonight. God, I needed that. Four hours of not-quite non-stop dancing, following most of the time because I can't lead two-step. There was precisely one cute boy there--a professional dancer, who had me lead him in West. That was intimidating, but it worked out well. Got waltzed by another professional dancer, which was just incredible (weird mix of country waltz, american-oid, and international... all at once, and interchanging Fucking sweet waltz, though--fast as I like 'em).
Also, thanks to Miss Teagle for being my personal Mrs. Lovett earlier today.
More, and details, when I'm not so-tired-I'm-effectively-drunk tomorrow, and done with my memo.
Also, thanks to Miss Teagle for being my personal Mrs. Lovett earlier today.
More, and details, when I'm not so-tired-I'm-effectively-drunk tomorrow, and done with my memo.
Friday, September 19, 2008
Arr!
My pirate name is:
Red Davy Flint
Passion is a big part of your life, which makes sense for a pirate. Like the rock flint, you're hard and sharp. But, also like flint, you're easily chipped, and sparky. Arr!
Get your own pirate name from piratequiz.com.
part of the fidius.org network
Tuesday, September 16, 2008
Paranoia
Paranoia has set in, insofar as I found myself on google. I don't reallyw ant to have that large a digital profile, and as such unless there is strenuous opposition within the next, oh, week, I'm going to start requiring a login to see what I write. Comments encouraged.
Sunday, September 14, 2008
Sundays seem to be the day for this...
I give up on work for tonight. I've not been productive since... midafternoon. I'm done with tomorrow's reading, and even though I have a meeting and a rehearsal tomorrow, and possibly an evening out (details on all that to follow), I can't get any farther ahead than I already am. I am hopelessly languishing in a delightful food coma brought on by a trip as the token anglo to Chinatown for the Moon Festival, and have now experienced significantly-more-authentic-than-usual Chinese food, which was delicious, and--more importantly--had some Moon Cake, which even through tea-scalded taste buds, was excellent. And really fucking dense. Once I'm done here, I'm going to waddle off to bed because I ate WAY too much.
Background: Jade published on facebook to a whole bunch of us that, owing to the festival (which actually happened, we think, yesterday, but due to rain of record-breaking proportions in Chicago yesterday no one really went out for it) we should go get Chinese food and Moon Cakes in Chinatown. The clear goal was really just Chinese food with friends and a break from studying, but any excuse becomes valid once you put enough wishful-thinking behind it, right? So we went, eight of us--and despite the broad invitation, I was the only non-Asian of the group, and was definitely ribbed a bit for it in gentle and hilarious fashion (which I brought largely on myself by broaching the subject).
As far as the weekend went, it rained. Lots. Rain still isn't pretty from 26 floors up even when you're getting an inch an hour or so. It's just an interposition between me and my usual scenery done in shades of grey and greyer. So I read. Lots. Property will become the bane of my existence as far as reading goes, but at least Marx is easier to read than Hegel (to my prof's benefit, he did come into class on Wednesday armed with quotes concerning how awful Hegel is to read, and how nonsensical-seeming).
Saturday Tim had a get-together in his apartment a block and change over, inviting several of his undergrad friends (Northwesterners, some of whom are in graduate school at that other major school in town, though none for law) as well as a number of law students over to his place for beer (I brought my own cider) and conversation. Much fun was had, including meeting Kathy's not-boy whom we've all been hearing about for quite some time, and seeing Kathy be a lightweight which was cute and loud and entertaining. His apartment, too, has significantly more character than McClurg residences do--exposed beams and brick done tastefully, and pipes besides. It looked really cool, but would only work in an old building like that with much higher ceilings than we get here. On the other hand, he had four-fifths walls delineating his spaces, so there are trade-offs.
Friday night I went to what I thought was going to be a LaGBAC (Lesbian and Gay Bar Association [of] Chicago) event--it was affiliated, but it was actually a presentation/recruitment meet and greet for minorities w.r.t. the Illinois State's Attorney's Office. So met a few people there, listened to the speeches, and got rained on coming back (and had a small amount of free food). Came home afterward and dicked around, wasting an entire evening by chatting on gmail and being in denial that I was about to start working on a Friday night (and doing it so effectively that I went to bed never having worked on anything, which was probably stupid on my part, but never mind that).
Friday proper, Crim was cancelled because our prof was off at a conference somewhere. Thinking I would be productive with my free time, I slept in an hour and a half. And got myself up in time to actually be warmed up (yay for serious shower-singing) so I could audition for Habeas Chorus--Northwestern's Law a capella (I may have to refer to it from here on in as lawcapella) group. So I got there at 11:15, sure I was in the right place and five minutes early for my audition, and... I got fucking stood up. No one was there. I waited until fifteen minutes after the audition ought to have ended, and no one was there yet, even then. So I wrote a curious e-mail to the group and went to CLR. Get a thoroughly apologetic e-mail from one of the members during CLR (I got my memo back, Matt, and it seems that my writing is fairly good, but I was a bit light on facts--I haven't actually looked thoroughly at the keyed comments, but *shrug*) apologizing and saying that she'd be there with other members after my class if I wanted to go audition, still. So I went, and I did, and I sang the first verse or so (we didn't have to prepare a full song, just a little bit) of Li'l Red Riding Hood, and sucked it up (as expected) on the sight reading of Don't Stop Believing, which has an oddly complex bass part, particularly compared to the really simple SAT lines. They thanked me and said they'd send out an e-mail at some point over the weekend, as the first rehearsal (one hour weekly, on Mondays during lunch) is tomorrow and the first concert's in the beginning of October.
I got the e-mail yesterday, and I'm evidently either one half or one third of the bass section, with a group of 18. This may be the most laid-back a capella group I've ever been in. It'll be a trip.
Thursday night was Bar Review, to which I actually went this time, because Michelle and I went to dinner beforehand (her turn to pay), and then wandered around in Barnes & Noble until the drink specials kicked in (free SKYY vodka drinks from 7-8 is why Michelle was going and I was dragged along). The place was called Elm Street Liquors, and was a weird little place--all one room, long and thin to the back, about a third of whose width was taken up by the bar, and about a quarter further taken up by recessed wall-seating. Dark, no real decor, and crappy hip-hop in the background. I chatted with a few people, got poked into swing dancing with Jade while the very back of the place was still clear of people, and then wandered off when the press of people and the heat from the same became too much for me to give a shit about appearances. Josh, among others, was surprised I came out at all--he seems to have this notion of me as a thorough recluse, which I delight in fucking with, despite it's near-accuracy in cause if not result. Left early, as I said, and had an hour and change talk with Matt B. concerning law school and life and jobs and shit. It was good to talk to him.
Nothing seems to be coming to mind for Monday through Wednesday, so clearly nothing of note happened during those days. I want my various Amazon orders (camera battery charger, SD reader drive--so I can get people their graduation pictures, among other things--picture frames) to arrive. I need to find someplace with cheap, classy frames, if such things really exist. I don't have quite enough on my walls, and many surfaces are taken up by unframed 8.5x11 papers (various drawn dragons and some of my pictures I printed out at Kinko's a couple weeks back, all arranged as they'll eventually be on the walls) and a couple 4x6 pictures Kyle gave me as an afterthought at one point.
As for the coming week, I've got another memo to write (don't know when the revisions on my first one are due, but nevermind that), this time with 70 pages of cases to draw from rather than three. That's due in a week so it's not worth freaking out about yet--I'll print off the cases (along with Twombly, which I have to read for Civ Pro) tomorrow in the library sometime. An aside: I need to break myself of the habit of calling the Library the Libe--I'm getting odd looks whenever I do it. Tomorrow could be dinner and exploration with Liz, who's in town (or if her plans aren't working in my favor, we'll be having lunch on Tuesday), or it could be more reading. Clearly I'm hoping for the former. Tomorrow is also the first general membership meeting of OUTLaw (guess what that organization represents, ladies and gentlemen), as well as my first rehearsal with Habeas, as well as returning to Property Hell. I'm so glad I bought some pork buns to nuke for lunch tomorrow. I won't have quite enough time to come back and do anything more than that (read: even a sammich might take too long).
One of these days, I swear, I'm going to take some time and type up the short-sections I finished writing before arriving in Chicago and get them all posted, along with the comments Sophie and Marion have kindly provided me (if the rest of youse are bored and wanna read my story and comment, I'd love you all the more for it. There's a link on the right, here), and ship that off to Matt for updating at his leisure.
I think that's all, now that I'm over an hour past when I ought to have gone to bed to be reasonably up for Contracts tomorrow.
'There was no reason for the Civil War, because there was no need. We should have let them go. It would have raised the average IQ enormously!' --my Civ Pro Prof. Context not remembered (why yes, I do take down amusing things said in class as a section of my notes).
Background: Jade published on facebook to a whole bunch of us that, owing to the festival (which actually happened, we think, yesterday, but due to rain of record-breaking proportions in Chicago yesterday no one really went out for it) we should go get Chinese food and Moon Cakes in Chinatown. The clear goal was really just Chinese food with friends and a break from studying, but any excuse becomes valid once you put enough wishful-thinking behind it, right? So we went, eight of us--and despite the broad invitation, I was the only non-Asian of the group, and was definitely ribbed a bit for it in gentle and hilarious fashion (which I brought largely on myself by broaching the subject).
As far as the weekend went, it rained. Lots. Rain still isn't pretty from 26 floors up even when you're getting an inch an hour or so. It's just an interposition between me and my usual scenery done in shades of grey and greyer. So I read. Lots. Property will become the bane of my existence as far as reading goes, but at least Marx is easier to read than Hegel (to my prof's benefit, he did come into class on Wednesday armed with quotes concerning how awful Hegel is to read, and how nonsensical-seeming).
Saturday Tim had a get-together in his apartment a block and change over, inviting several of his undergrad friends (Northwesterners, some of whom are in graduate school at that other major school in town, though none for law) as well as a number of law students over to his place for beer (I brought my own cider) and conversation. Much fun was had, including meeting Kathy's not-boy whom we've all been hearing about for quite some time, and seeing Kathy be a lightweight which was cute and loud and entertaining. His apartment, too, has significantly more character than McClurg residences do--exposed beams and brick done tastefully, and pipes besides. It looked really cool, but would only work in an old building like that with much higher ceilings than we get here. On the other hand, he had four-fifths walls delineating his spaces, so there are trade-offs.
Friday night I went to what I thought was going to be a LaGBAC (Lesbian and Gay Bar Association [of] Chicago) event--it was affiliated, but it was actually a presentation/recruitment meet and greet for minorities w.r.t. the Illinois State's Attorney's Office. So met a few people there, listened to the speeches, and got rained on coming back (and had a small amount of free food). Came home afterward and dicked around, wasting an entire evening by chatting on gmail and being in denial that I was about to start working on a Friday night (and doing it so effectively that I went to bed never having worked on anything, which was probably stupid on my part, but never mind that).
Friday proper, Crim was cancelled because our prof was off at a conference somewhere. Thinking I would be productive with my free time, I slept in an hour and a half. And got myself up in time to actually be warmed up (yay for serious shower-singing) so I could audition for Habeas Chorus--Northwestern's Law a capella (I may have to refer to it from here on in as lawcapella) group. So I got there at 11:15, sure I was in the right place and five minutes early for my audition, and... I got fucking stood up. No one was there. I waited until fifteen minutes after the audition ought to have ended, and no one was there yet, even then. So I wrote a curious e-mail to the group and went to CLR. Get a thoroughly apologetic e-mail from one of the members during CLR (I got my memo back, Matt, and it seems that my writing is fairly good, but I was a bit light on facts--I haven't actually looked thoroughly at the keyed comments, but *shrug*) apologizing and saying that she'd be there with other members after my class if I wanted to go audition, still. So I went, and I did, and I sang the first verse or so (we didn't have to prepare a full song, just a little bit) of Li'l Red Riding Hood, and sucked it up (as expected) on the sight reading of Don't Stop Believing, which has an oddly complex bass part, particularly compared to the really simple SAT lines. They thanked me and said they'd send out an e-mail at some point over the weekend, as the first rehearsal (one hour weekly, on Mondays during lunch) is tomorrow and the first concert's in the beginning of October.
I got the e-mail yesterday, and I'm evidently either one half or one third of the bass section, with a group of 18. This may be the most laid-back a capella group I've ever been in. It'll be a trip.
Thursday night was Bar Review, to which I actually went this time, because Michelle and I went to dinner beforehand (her turn to pay), and then wandered around in Barnes & Noble until the drink specials kicked in (free SKYY vodka drinks from 7-8 is why Michelle was going and I was dragged along). The place was called Elm Street Liquors, and was a weird little place--all one room, long and thin to the back, about a third of whose width was taken up by the bar, and about a quarter further taken up by recessed wall-seating. Dark, no real decor, and crappy hip-hop in the background. I chatted with a few people, got poked into swing dancing with Jade while the very back of the place was still clear of people, and then wandered off when the press of people and the heat from the same became too much for me to give a shit about appearances. Josh, among others, was surprised I came out at all--he seems to have this notion of me as a thorough recluse, which I delight in fucking with, despite it's near-accuracy in cause if not result. Left early, as I said, and had an hour and change talk with Matt B. concerning law school and life and jobs and shit. It was good to talk to him.
Nothing seems to be coming to mind for Monday through Wednesday, so clearly nothing of note happened during those days. I want my various Amazon orders (camera battery charger, SD reader drive--so I can get people their graduation pictures, among other things--picture frames) to arrive. I need to find someplace with cheap, classy frames, if such things really exist. I don't have quite enough on my walls, and many surfaces are taken up by unframed 8.5x11 papers (various drawn dragons and some of my pictures I printed out at Kinko's a couple weeks back, all arranged as they'll eventually be on the walls) and a couple 4x6 pictures Kyle gave me as an afterthought at one point.
As for the coming week, I've got another memo to write (don't know when the revisions on my first one are due, but nevermind that), this time with 70 pages of cases to draw from rather than three. That's due in a week so it's not worth freaking out about yet--I'll print off the cases (along with Twombly, which I have to read for Civ Pro) tomorrow in the library sometime. An aside: I need to break myself of the habit of calling the Library the Libe--I'm getting odd looks whenever I do it. Tomorrow could be dinner and exploration with Liz, who's in town (or if her plans aren't working in my favor, we'll be having lunch on Tuesday), or it could be more reading. Clearly I'm hoping for the former. Tomorrow is also the first general membership meeting of OUTLaw (guess what that organization represents, ladies and gentlemen), as well as my first rehearsal with Habeas, as well as returning to Property Hell. I'm so glad I bought some pork buns to nuke for lunch tomorrow. I won't have quite enough time to come back and do anything more than that (read: even a sammich might take too long).
One of these days, I swear, I'm going to take some time and type up the short-sections I finished writing before arriving in Chicago and get them all posted, along with the comments Sophie and Marion have kindly provided me (if the rest of youse are bored and wanna read my story and comment, I'd love you all the more for it. There's a link on the right, here), and ship that off to Matt for updating at his leisure.
I think that's all, now that I'm over an hour past when I ought to have gone to bed to be reasonably up for Contracts tomorrow.
'There was no reason for the Civil War, because there was no need. We should have let them go. It would have raised the average IQ enormously!' --my Civ Pro Prof. Context not remembered (why yes, I do take down amusing things said in class as a section of my notes).
Sunday, September 7, 2008
Week in review
Hi again. I've survived my first week of classes, and think that it went remarkably well, all things considered. I have yet to be on call--though only one of my classes seems to do things very strictly and thoroughly Socratic. That one class, though (property)... Ugh. It's with one of the least respected (by the students) profs, who is callously Socratic in his teaching style and possessed of the most derisive pair of eyebrows I have ever had the misfortune to see used for belittling students. I do not look forward to this class, even though the experience will be quite good for me. As for the rest, Crim's going to be a blast: not only is the prof awesome, but the material's pretty interesting, too (Murder and Cannibalism on the high seas! And the prof made unintentional cannibalism jokes a few times in class, then realized she "had to be careful with [her] food metaphors"). Contracts seems like it will be both good and slightly forgiving (which is good, as it's at 8:45 MTW, and most of you know the full extent of how well I don't deal with mornings). Civ Pro (Civil Procedure--motions and pleadings and the system of the courts and how to work the same, for those of you who aren't familiar) is going to be fun, I think--it's with one of the most respected--by students, faculty, and the legal community at large--profs in the school, who has a sense of humor so dry it's musty. It's great.
The readings are thick and almost as dense for digesting as philosophy--but unlike philosophy, they must be done in order to effectively survive class. This doesn't mean, though, that I'm absolutely dead (which is good, because this was only the first week). I spent part of a class last week setting up a gchat network with a few people in my section so we can all help each other out (mostly considering this eventuality for Property) when one of us is stumped and on call. We had to write a memo for CLR (the legal writing class, which, if I recall correctly, stands for Communication and Legal Research [or reasoning, I'm not actually sure, but think it's research]), which was due this evening--probably for the best as I won't have to worry about it through the week like several other sections.
As far as non-law school things go... I skipped out on a few social events earlier in the week. I made taco gunk for dinner a couple nights as I had an excess of Costco guacamole. I am beginning to get impatient for programs that provide free lunch to start up around campus so I can acquire the same. Thursday night, I ought to have had a could-be-date (still unclear on it), but Gustav saw fit to intervene, and I was cancelled upon--with good reason, I found out later. Storms, incidentally, are no exciting from 26 stories up. Disappointingly so. I didn't realize quite how bad it was until I went out into it to walk off my frustration (during which time, I sealed the fate of my street shoes, as they were drenched irrevocably, and have now begun to grow some sort of flora/fauna). I walked somewhere between three or four miles in an hour, and returned nearly fifteen pounds heavier in water than when I had left. It was unreal to see the waves along the lakeshore coming in and pounding on/driving up the concrete. That, and it's a very weird sensation to have wind driving rain up one's nose.
Boys, as is suggested above, continue to be stupid.
Friday after classes, I went on a spectacularly unsuccessful shopping trip to Target and Best Buy, during which time I found that Target had shit for picture frames and didn't sell camera battery chargers, and that Best Buy's selection of chargers failed utterly to fit the battery that came with my DSLR (evidently it doesn't fit the universal Canon charger. Never mind that I found a $15 one on amazon rather than buy their $50 version that wouldn't have worked). I went to the southern portion of the city for this, and wandered fairly extensively in so doing. Friday night, my friend Kathy took me as a guest to a party in my building hosted by a couple of JDMBAs, which was rather entertaining, if overly beery (read: I was drinking water for lack of other options, though they did have metric fucktons--a fridge, a counter and a sink full--of various kinds and qualities of beer). Afterward Kathy and I came back down here and played Gin Rummy and talked and ate chocolate until we'd had enough chocolate and were tired enough that the rummy fell by the wayside to talking. Much fun was had.
Saturday, I went and was a guinea pig (ie. simulation interviewee) for the Bluhm Legal Clinic's training session, where I pretended to be one Mr. Jackson a (straight) man who wanted to set up a guide business for the presumptive Chicago '16 games in the same fashion as was done in Beijing, and who was concerned that a (false--the arresting officer lied about the whole thing) arrest and conviction while a minor for possession and sale of a small amount of crack cocaine could complicate my business venture, who was in the middle of a foreclosure due to bad financial advice from a now-defunct mortgage company, and whose severely ill and undiagnosed due to her status wife was an illegal immigrant who came by way of Mexico and Brazil in her flight from Robert Mugabe's regime (we me over there two years ago when I was volunteering at a clinic for torture victims as part of my church's outreach efforts--did I mention I was a big part of my church?). All in all, I made them work to reel the information out of me, though not moreso than I would have if it were really me and really my issues, and it was lots of fun. Also, I was compensated with free pizza and $50 for my time. Sadly, though, I missed Flugtag. Saturday night I was diverted from my plans to investigate Charlie's (a gay bar with country dancing on some parts of some nights--hopefully it will be a suitable substitute for Remington's, despite the lack of Grace for a dancing buddy) in order to go with Kathy and a few others to the Hangge-Uppe, a bar/not-quite-club about a twenty minute walk north/northwest from here. It was interesting. Not normally something I'd do for fun, but it was entertaining, and there was a REALLY cute guy (well, there was a fair amount of eye candy, and a few truly ridiculous people who were fun to watch and make fun of while shouting in each others' ears to be heard) there, but nothing happened except for lots of eye-dancing. ::shrug::
Today I finished writing my memo, turned it in, went grocery shopping, and did my property reading (contracts and Civ Pro were already done). I watched a spectacular sunset that turned my apartment a deep orange for about twenty minutes, and read some more of Kavalier & Clay (once again, thanks, Mssr. Pechous).
I leave you with an excerpt from one of the cases I read tonight:
"...and anyone else is quite within his rights if he puts loving and fertile lovers in a play of his own, wherever he gets the cue." Nichols v. Universal Pictures Corp., 45 F.2d 119 (2d Cir. 1930), Cert. denied
The readings are thick and almost as dense for digesting as philosophy--but unlike philosophy, they must be done in order to effectively survive class. This doesn't mean, though, that I'm absolutely dead (which is good, because this was only the first week). I spent part of a class last week setting up a gchat network with a few people in my section so we can all help each other out (mostly considering this eventuality for Property) when one of us is stumped and on call. We had to write a memo for CLR (the legal writing class, which, if I recall correctly, stands for Communication and Legal Research [or reasoning, I'm not actually sure, but think it's research]), which was due this evening--probably for the best as I won't have to worry about it through the week like several other sections.
As far as non-law school things go... I skipped out on a few social events earlier in the week. I made taco gunk for dinner a couple nights as I had an excess of Costco guacamole. I am beginning to get impatient for programs that provide free lunch to start up around campus so I can acquire the same. Thursday night, I ought to have had a could-be-date (still unclear on it), but Gustav saw fit to intervene, and I was cancelled upon--with good reason, I found out later. Storms, incidentally, are no exciting from 26 stories up. Disappointingly so. I didn't realize quite how bad it was until I went out into it to walk off my frustration (during which time, I sealed the fate of my street shoes, as they were drenched irrevocably, and have now begun to grow some sort of flora/fauna). I walked somewhere between three or four miles in an hour, and returned nearly fifteen pounds heavier in water than when I had left. It was unreal to see the waves along the lakeshore coming in and pounding on/driving up the concrete. That, and it's a very weird sensation to have wind driving rain up one's nose.
Boys, as is suggested above, continue to be stupid.
Friday after classes, I went on a spectacularly unsuccessful shopping trip to Target and Best Buy, during which time I found that Target had shit for picture frames and didn't sell camera battery chargers, and that Best Buy's selection of chargers failed utterly to fit the battery that came with my DSLR (evidently it doesn't fit the universal Canon charger. Never mind that I found a $15 one on amazon rather than buy their $50 version that wouldn't have worked). I went to the southern portion of the city for this, and wandered fairly extensively in so doing. Friday night, my friend Kathy took me as a guest to a party in my building hosted by a couple of JDMBAs, which was rather entertaining, if overly beery (read: I was drinking water for lack of other options, though they did have metric fucktons--a fridge, a counter and a sink full--of various kinds and qualities of beer). Afterward Kathy and I came back down here and played Gin Rummy and talked and ate chocolate until we'd had enough chocolate and were tired enough that the rummy fell by the wayside to talking. Much fun was had.
Saturday, I went and was a guinea pig (ie. simulation interviewee) for the Bluhm Legal Clinic's training session, where I pretended to be one Mr. Jackson a (straight) man who wanted to set up a guide business for the presumptive Chicago '16 games in the same fashion as was done in Beijing, and who was concerned that a (false--the arresting officer lied about the whole thing) arrest and conviction while a minor for possession and sale of a small amount of crack cocaine could complicate my business venture, who was in the middle of a foreclosure due to bad financial advice from a now-defunct mortgage company, and whose severely ill and undiagnosed due to her status wife was an illegal immigrant who came by way of Mexico and Brazil in her flight from Robert Mugabe's regime (we me over there two years ago when I was volunteering at a clinic for torture victims as part of my church's outreach efforts--did I mention I was a big part of my church?). All in all, I made them work to reel the information out of me, though not moreso than I would have if it were really me and really my issues, and it was lots of fun. Also, I was compensated with free pizza and $50 for my time. Sadly, though, I missed Flugtag. Saturday night I was diverted from my plans to investigate Charlie's (a gay bar with country dancing on some parts of some nights--hopefully it will be a suitable substitute for Remington's, despite the lack of Grace for a dancing buddy) in order to go with Kathy and a few others to the Hangge-Uppe, a bar/not-quite-club about a twenty minute walk north/northwest from here. It was interesting. Not normally something I'd do for fun, but it was entertaining, and there was a REALLY cute guy (well, there was a fair amount of eye candy, and a few truly ridiculous people who were fun to watch and make fun of while shouting in each others' ears to be heard) there, but nothing happened except for lots of eye-dancing. ::shrug::
Today I finished writing my memo, turned it in, went grocery shopping, and did my property reading (contracts and Civ Pro were already done). I watched a spectacular sunset that turned my apartment a deep orange for about twenty minutes, and read some more of Kavalier & Clay (once again, thanks, Mssr. Pechous).
I leave you with an excerpt from one of the cases I read tonight:
"...and anyone else is quite within his rights if he puts loving and fertile lovers in a play of his own, wherever he gets the cue." Nichols v. Universal Pictures Corp., 45 F.2d 119 (2d Cir. 1930), Cert. denied
Monday, September 1, 2008
Twas the night before classes...
That's right. Tomorrow, I'm officially a 1L (well, officially here meaning taking classes rather than merely orientating). I'm sure that for most people that distinction is overly fine and relatively needless, but it's one I've always drawn: it's fine that one rise in class when one is already a part of a school when the prior class is no longer there to occupy it (cascading all the way down to the lowest class in the school in question), but I've never felt comfortable claiming community in a place where I've yet to have the communal experience (in schools, for those following along, that would be classes). So tomorrow I get to start being a law student. I've got three classes, each with an hour or so between them, that are MTW, and the first of which (Contracts) starts at 8:45 AM.
Frankly, I am terrified.
I've never really had to work seriously seriously hard in school before. It's never been that big of an issue: I've been smart enough to bounce and bumble along, doing what I feel I need to do and then doing more pretty well only when it interests me. And I'm used to having that be enough to carry my grades--they may not have been as good as they could have been if I'd been neurotic about it, but they were good enough to get me here. The scary bit is that first year (really, first term) grades are the most important grades in all of law school, from a job-search point of view. First, employers will want to see your grades. Second, journals have grade requirements--and since I want to clerk, being on a journal is almost a necessity.
Thursday and Friday are a bit more relaxed, with two classes (Crim, then CLR, aka Legal Writing), starting at 10:25. I'll be done no later than 3:30 any given day--at least, done with classes. I'm curious at how frequently I'll actually be able to get a free lunch, as opposed to how it's advertised (that is, it's possible to get it every day if you're a good little opportunist). There will be updates on this one.
So, that's pretty much how law school stands at the moment (except for the apparent hilarity/absurdity of some of the readings: a case on who owns a fox that was being hunted from common ground [property], a case of murder/cannibalism on the high seas [crim], a case of skin-graft surgery gone wrong [contracts], and a case of a mayor using his city credit card for video poker [CLR--our prof was actually the asst. atty. general arguing the case). Other parts of life... well, I still have one. I've been setting my apartment up a bit further.
I had an excellent excursion to IKEA last week with Jimmy and Jade, two other 1Ls in my section, wherein we were horrible people through the entirety of the largest IKEA in North America (seriously. It's dauntingly huge). I also achieved one of my lower-end lifetime goals: to--randomly and without provocation--do a forward roll in a public space, just to see how people would react. I got picture frames and bookshelves and potholders and scissors.
Now that I have books in one of the bookcases (I actually didn't have enough to fill more than a few books into one shelf of the other, so it's just waiting for the law books and few fun books I buy for non-law reading to fill them), my apartment has really come together. Having books--organized books, on shelves, rather than merely in boxes or piles--is something that not only makes me happy, but makes me feel comfortable and at home. So between shelved books and a few more things on walls, my apartment is really home, now. I've decided where the three posters I'm going to put up are going, once I find cheap frames for them that don't look positively hideous (where does one go for cheap frames of the 2' x 3' variety, or--worse yet--for the 18"x24" variety?). I got a couple other frames so some of the printer paper sized things (Free Lawyers, Lawyers for All!, Defenestration) are up.
I've decided on a name for the apartment as well--I had last time too, as noted by the title of the blog, but I failed to explain it last time. I'm on the 26th floor of this building, looking out onto a city, and the apartments central themes seem to be IKEA, books, and dragons (with a few gargoyles and one plush Cthullhu as additional mythological oddments). Discounting the first as necessary to cheap life, and the second as necessary both to me and law school in general, it really leaves an apartment full of dragons. Eyrie is defined as either the nest of a bird of prey (in fantasy, it's usually extended to gryphons and particularly to non-cave dwelling dragons as well) or as a high-altitude living place. My apartment seems to qualify on both counts.
Last week was a lot of meet-and-greet events, or else someone had organized some sort of bar-thing. You who read this know that meet-and-greets tire me out, and that I'm really not much for bars. The only worthwhile of the former type was the professorial meet-and-greet, where they were stationed in small groups around the law school with food tables and bars nearby and the students wandered around getting into conversation with them--or watching them hold court, in some cases. I was greatly impressed with all except for one of my profs as I went around and met them--once again, it was Property that caused me reservations. The prof in question was as outgoing in the evening as he had been dull in the prior morning's presentation. That wasn't the problem--the problem was his living up to his reputation as a Jekyll & Hyde type insofar as he was freely badmouthing the other professors teaching my section's classes. This really failed to impress me. As for the rest, there were a few entertainments as bars went--a polish dive bar (where I was drinking water rather than beer or chancing the grass-filtered vodka that reputedly tasted of cinnamon) at which I met a Carl from the class of '05 of whom I had never heard, had never seen, and for whom the same was true of me. It was rather a shock. He's a good guy, and better yet, in my section.
Yesterday I finally took my camera out for a thorough spin around Chicago. It was great. I covered probably five, maybe six miles of pavement on foot, and got a few pictures printed at a 24-hour kinko's way the hell over by the Brown Line (the Red Line is the nearer El Train line, about a 10-minute walk west. The Brown line is about twenty minutes farther west, but is where the Red is rerouted during weekends because they're adding a third set of tracks to the Red, have been for some time, and will be for the foreseeable future as far as I know), one of which--a naked tree on Farragut Square with a variegated cloud background in winter--is now up above Kyle's picture of the observatory in one of the good frames. I took some 70 or so pictures, mostly of architecture (because it's what I do) and reflection--I got a couple cool shots of tall buildings looking to sway and distort because of double-hung window reflections, as well as some nice shots of passing El trains. Mostly it was nice to be out, walking, with music, and not in the company of people forcing me to make small-talk. I'm so tired of having to come out--implicitly or explicitly--over and over that I could just scream.
On that note, however, there was an OUTLaw barbecue on saturday, which was great fun. Small gathering--two men, seven women, which was itself minorly noteworthy in my admittedly narrow experience. Good food, good conversation, and lots of meat jokes during the distribution of excess food on the way back (because I ended up taking home the excess brats, in someone's spare Lambda Legal bag, which I will now be using to get groceries). At the moment, OUTLaw and Habeas Chorus (the a capella group) are really the only student groups I'm terribly interested in dealing with. I was pleased to find out that Habeas graduated its basses last year. There may be hope for me.
Also, since Nik asked about why boys being stupid was worthy of note in my last post, here's a quick explanation. Because I failed to know people in DC, for the most part, and because I failed at the traditional ways of getting to know people in DC as well--from work, from established friends, from organizations, and from bars/clubs--I decided to join the wonderful world of internet dating (ha). It was mostly my being bored and finding that the site I'd gone to for years to take weird internet personality tests had turned itself into an internet dating site that (unlike eharmony.com, for instance) actually acknowledged that gay people exist. So I decided to give it a shot. Recently, I had started talking to a guy who was quite interesting, and cute, and intelligent, and so on. And who, it turns out, lived not in Chicago, but Cincinnati. Thus boys are stupid (him for living so, and me for not having realized it sooner). On the other hand, I ended up talking to another guy the night before last on IM for about three hours. So there's possibly something there.
I could be that stupid 1L who tries to start (rather than maintain--I'd say 40% of NU Law students I've met have been married or otherwise relation'd) a relationship while being 1L.
In any event, it is now 11, which suggest I should try going to sleep so I can get up at 7 with enough time to get to classes with breakfast and coffee from the starbuck's across the street from me (which, incidentally, is surrounded on its two interior sides--it's a corner shop--by a single Dunkin' Donuts amoeba). G'night, all. More when I have the time, the inclination, and the news.
Also. Those of you with blogs that are not LJs--could you comment with your blog's URL so I can post it up in my sidebar if you're interested in my doing so? Thanks.
Frankly, I am terrified.
I've never really had to work seriously seriously hard in school before. It's never been that big of an issue: I've been smart enough to bounce and bumble along, doing what I feel I need to do and then doing more pretty well only when it interests me. And I'm used to having that be enough to carry my grades--they may not have been as good as they could have been if I'd been neurotic about it, but they were good enough to get me here. The scary bit is that first year (really, first term) grades are the most important grades in all of law school, from a job-search point of view. First, employers will want to see your grades. Second, journals have grade requirements--and since I want to clerk, being on a journal is almost a necessity.
Thursday and Friday are a bit more relaxed, with two classes (Crim, then CLR, aka Legal Writing), starting at 10:25. I'll be done no later than 3:30 any given day--at least, done with classes. I'm curious at how frequently I'll actually be able to get a free lunch, as opposed to how it's advertised (that is, it's possible to get it every day if you're a good little opportunist). There will be updates on this one.
So, that's pretty much how law school stands at the moment (except for the apparent hilarity/absurdity of some of the readings: a case on who owns a fox that was being hunted from common ground [property], a case of murder/cannibalism on the high seas [crim], a case of skin-graft surgery gone wrong [contracts], and a case of a mayor using his city credit card for video poker [CLR--our prof was actually the asst. atty. general arguing the case). Other parts of life... well, I still have one. I've been setting my apartment up a bit further.
I had an excellent excursion to IKEA last week with Jimmy and Jade, two other 1Ls in my section, wherein we were horrible people through the entirety of the largest IKEA in North America (seriously. It's dauntingly huge). I also achieved one of my lower-end lifetime goals: to--randomly and without provocation--do a forward roll in a public space, just to see how people would react. I got picture frames and bookshelves and potholders and scissors.
Now that I have books in one of the bookcases (I actually didn't have enough to fill more than a few books into one shelf of the other, so it's just waiting for the law books and few fun books I buy for non-law reading to fill them), my apartment has really come together. Having books--organized books, on shelves, rather than merely in boxes or piles--is something that not only makes me happy, but makes me feel comfortable and at home. So between shelved books and a few more things on walls, my apartment is really home, now. I've decided where the three posters I'm going to put up are going, once I find cheap frames for them that don't look positively hideous (where does one go for cheap frames of the 2' x 3' variety, or--worse yet--for the 18"x24" variety?). I got a couple other frames so some of the printer paper sized things (Free Lawyers, Lawyers for All!, Defenestration) are up.
I've decided on a name for the apartment as well--I had last time too, as noted by the title of the blog, but I failed to explain it last time. I'm on the 26th floor of this building, looking out onto a city, and the apartments central themes seem to be IKEA, books, and dragons (with a few gargoyles and one plush Cthullhu as additional mythological oddments). Discounting the first as necessary to cheap life, and the second as necessary both to me and law school in general, it really leaves an apartment full of dragons. Eyrie is defined as either the nest of a bird of prey (in fantasy, it's usually extended to gryphons and particularly to non-cave dwelling dragons as well) or as a high-altitude living place. My apartment seems to qualify on both counts.
Last week was a lot of meet-and-greet events, or else someone had organized some sort of bar-thing. You who read this know that meet-and-greets tire me out, and that I'm really not much for bars. The only worthwhile of the former type was the professorial meet-and-greet, where they were stationed in small groups around the law school with food tables and bars nearby and the students wandered around getting into conversation with them--or watching them hold court, in some cases. I was greatly impressed with all except for one of my profs as I went around and met them--once again, it was Property that caused me reservations. The prof in question was as outgoing in the evening as he had been dull in the prior morning's presentation. That wasn't the problem--the problem was his living up to his reputation as a Jekyll & Hyde type insofar as he was freely badmouthing the other professors teaching my section's classes. This really failed to impress me. As for the rest, there were a few entertainments as bars went--a polish dive bar (where I was drinking water rather than beer or chancing the grass-filtered vodka that reputedly tasted of cinnamon) at which I met a Carl from the class of '05 of whom I had never heard, had never seen, and for whom the same was true of me. It was rather a shock. He's a good guy, and better yet, in my section.
Yesterday I finally took my camera out for a thorough spin around Chicago. It was great. I covered probably five, maybe six miles of pavement on foot, and got a few pictures printed at a 24-hour kinko's way the hell over by the Brown Line (the Red Line is the nearer El Train line, about a 10-minute walk west. The Brown line is about twenty minutes farther west, but is where the Red is rerouted during weekends because they're adding a third set of tracks to the Red, have been for some time, and will be for the foreseeable future as far as I know), one of which--a naked tree on Farragut Square with a variegated cloud background in winter--is now up above Kyle's picture of the observatory in one of the good frames. I took some 70 or so pictures, mostly of architecture (because it's what I do) and reflection--I got a couple cool shots of tall buildings looking to sway and distort because of double-hung window reflections, as well as some nice shots of passing El trains. Mostly it was nice to be out, walking, with music, and not in the company of people forcing me to make small-talk. I'm so tired of having to come out--implicitly or explicitly--over and over that I could just scream.
On that note, however, there was an OUTLaw barbecue on saturday, which was great fun. Small gathering--two men, seven women, which was itself minorly noteworthy in my admittedly narrow experience. Good food, good conversation, and lots of meat jokes during the distribution of excess food on the way back (because I ended up taking home the excess brats, in someone's spare Lambda Legal bag, which I will now be using to get groceries). At the moment, OUTLaw and Habeas Chorus (the a capella group) are really the only student groups I'm terribly interested in dealing with. I was pleased to find out that Habeas graduated its basses last year. There may be hope for me.
Also, since Nik asked about why boys being stupid was worthy of note in my last post, here's a quick explanation. Because I failed to know people in DC, for the most part, and because I failed at the traditional ways of getting to know people in DC as well--from work, from established friends, from organizations, and from bars/clubs--I decided to join the wonderful world of internet dating (ha). It was mostly my being bored and finding that the site I'd gone to for years to take weird internet personality tests had turned itself into an internet dating site that (unlike eharmony.com, for instance) actually acknowledged that gay people exist. So I decided to give it a shot. Recently, I had started talking to a guy who was quite interesting, and cute, and intelligent, and so on. And who, it turns out, lived not in Chicago, but Cincinnati. Thus boys are stupid (him for living so, and me for not having realized it sooner). On the other hand, I ended up talking to another guy the night before last on IM for about three hours. So there's possibly something there.
I could be that stupid 1L who tries to start (rather than maintain--I'd say 40% of NU Law students I've met have been married or otherwise relation'd) a relationship while being 1L.
In any event, it is now 11, which suggest I should try going to sleep so I can get up at 7 with enough time to get to classes with breakfast and coffee from the starbuck's across the street from me (which, incidentally, is surrounded on its two interior sides--it's a corner shop--by a single Dunkin' Donuts amoeba). G'night, all. More when I have the time, the inclination, and the news.
Also. Those of you with blogs that are not LJs--could you comment with your blog's URL so I can post it up in my sidebar if you're interested in my doing so? Thanks.
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