Not wasting the pretty

Now for a mini-update on the sad affair that is my love life...

The short version is that it is no love life. As usual, He's Just Not That Into Me, in that he's not sure if he wants to get back with his ex. A situation somewhere between chapter 9 and chapter 10 of The Book. I hate dating. But, again following the HJNTIY approach, I must brush myself off and not waste the pretty.

For those of you who missed the HJNTIY thing, my mom, bless her, got me an autographed copy of this book last year at an authors luncheon. I am sad to say, it's the only dating advice book I have ever read that made any sense. The capsule summary is that ambiguity and fuckwittage are bad, and if a guy is that into you there will be no ambiguity or fuckwittage. So, yeah. Girls, read it and giggle but take at least one or two notes. Guys, read it, these are the new rules of engagement. And you all know how much I loath self-help books in general.

Resisting the urge to stay at home and wallow with girlie movies while wandering around the house in flannel pants and a sweater shirt is proving to be rather difficult this morning, but I will get up, I will put on pants, and I will go out to class and learn about homicide and substantive due process while being pretty and fabulous. Hurray!

On the knitting front...
I know I need to post pictures. I suck. What can I say? But the current project is a tweed jacket from Knitscene (pattern is available for freehere). My version is done with a reddish brown suri alpaca from knitpicks and the pine forest looking yarn I handspun and used for the last major sweater project. The colors sounds a little weird, but the effect is quite nice and not like anything else I have, so I'm happy. Venturing out of my usual palate is always kind of exciting. I like the design, but I really detest the way the collar shaping is done. It's all jagged and lumpy along the edge if you follow their directions. I should be able to block out the weirdness, but it annoyes me. Really, not a major problem and the jacket is otherwise cute so it's not a major gripe, just use your common sense with the collar shaping if you decide to use the pattern. I'm on the second sleeve, and hope to either have it done by the end of the week or shortly after getting home so I can search for buttons while I'm in the vicinity of good fabric stores with nice button selections.

5 more days

until I leave for spring break that is. Few things are as attractive to me right now as the idea of getting the hell out of here for a week. Of course, I get to go back to my parents and do homework for an entire week, but still, I won't be doing it here.

I'm still really cranky about the Heffalump-Bitch-Who-Stole-My-Job. I know I need to let this go, but I am really sick of being made to feel as though I am complete rubbish all the time. Law school sucks that way.

Anyhow, I had a tolerable weekend. My neighbor had people over Friday to send up hot air balloons, and we freaked out some of the people in the complex, who were very drunk, and thought our balloon was a UFO. It was pretty funny watching these two dumb girls freak out over a trash bag and some birthday candles. I did a lot of homework, and had some people over for chocolate and crepes on Saturday, which turned into more or less a wake for poor old Hobbs. That was actually kind of fun, but I sort of overdid it on the whole wake concept and spent of Sunday feeling more like rubbish than usual and napping before I met Someone's mother for dinner. Now that was a freak show. Having dinner with your ex's mother and her neighbor is just strange, but it ended up being rather nice for all that.

I'm totally sick of school though. All I want to do at this point is sit at home, drink tea, knit, and wait for it all to end. I just don't see the point in any of this right now, and I really am sick of not having anyone much to talk to it all about. Is it so wrong to need someone to tell me I'm not total rubbish once in awhile?

Rest in Peace

Hobbs, Sept. 6 1992 to Feb. 23 2006. A good cat and a good friend. Hobbit, I'll miss you.

Oh hell no

NASA called. They gave my job to the school Heffalump. I hate this girl. I mean, seriously hate, as I never hated before. She stole my goddamned job. And she's dumb as a rock and disgusting and loud and has no class and lies and backstabs and I hate her. hate hate hate.

Just what I need today. I've said it before, and I'm sure I'll tattoo it on my ass one of these days, but law school is seriously not calculated to make you feel good about yourself. It's days like this when I start to wonder if anything in my life is calculated to make me feel good about myself. I'm coming down pretty heavily on the side of "no" at this point.

I have another interview this afternoon, which considering that I've already accepted the research assistant job, is a bit irrelevant, but it'll at least be useful experience. In so far as more rejection is useful experience...

Random thoughts

It just occured to me that I really need a new suit. Not so much becasue I anticiapte wearing suits all summer, but mainly becasue I am tired of wearing the same suit all the time to interviews and school functions.

I also would like it if someone bought me diamond earrings. Just nice studs, something I can wear all the time.

It's good to dream I suppose.

Good thing redux

I have yet to hear anything back from NASA beyond the 9 page application they wanted me to fill out. It's a bit annoying, but since I had to let the professor who wants me to help him out this summer know what I was going to do this week, I've decided NASA can wait. I'll be working on campus as a research assistant and helping out with god knows what sort of techno-law stuff for the Courtroom 21 project. (Which you can read about here if you are so inclined) It should be interesting, and it'll give me at least one person on campus who is on my side and knows me.

Other than that, not much is going on. I'm looking forward to spring break. After all the drama with the stupid plane tickets, I worked something out with my parents and will be spending beak with them, camped out in the dining room doing outlines and getting caught up on my reading. Which is all good, I want desperately to get out of here and be someplace where I am not so alone and people are pulling for me. Law school is just not calculated to make you feel good about yourself. At least my social life is starting to take some sort of shape. It's been difficult, since most of the people I knew outside law school were Someone's friends, but I seem to be making progress finding other people to socialize and go out with. I'm still pathetically lonely, but at least I'm starting to understand what the source of that is and how to get around it.

Of superheros and snow

Yesterday I got to see my first real snow and my first real client. How it can go from the high 60's on Friday, to over an inch of snow on Saturday, is totally beyond my comprehension but there it is. The cat was not impressed, and driving was a little scary, but the world looked beautiful and soft, and somehow comforting, all covered over in snow. The snow is gone today, but there are chunks of ice and frozen puddles all over.

Had it not been for the legal aid clinic yesterday, I would not have been out in the snow at all. A bunch of lawyers in the area volunteered yesterday morning to take on pro bono work for low income people in the community, and a bunch of law students helped with client intake and basic screening. Actually interviewing a real client, with a real problem, was pretty amazing. We do client interviews at school, but the clients are other students who are roleplaying. These people had real fear in their eyes, real problems, that impacted real lives. I got to sit in on the actual attorney meeting with a couple that I screened, and when they left, they thanked me just as profusely and with just as much gratitude and relief in their eyes as they had when they thanked the attorney.

Hopefully I will get to continue working on this case. These people need help, and as little as I can do for them at this point, I want to do it. They placed their trust in me, a first year law student who knows next to nothing about their problem, and that is a precious and somewhat frightening thing. This is what my life will be, I know that, but I don't think I was really expecting this profound sense of awe when faced with the reality and responsibility of a client who is afraid and yet trusts me enough to hand their problem over to me. It's a very humbling experience.

Of course, I am a little afraid myself. Afraid I will not live up to that trust and responsibility, afraid I will let them down and in so doing make a bad situation worse for people who are already struggling. To be given that kind of power over some one else's life and wellbeing is just plain frightening. But they have faith in me. The attorney who took their case has faith in me and wants my help. My brother, who called me a superhero once, has faith in me. Somehow, reminding myself of that and being reminded of that makes all the difference as I struggle through the day to day process of becoming worthy of that trust.

One good thing

I still have not heard back for certain about NASA, but I have a job offer! Hurray! They want me to work on a project on campus over the summer doing all kinds of things, including research assistant stuff and some course development and web development. Yeah! It's nice to know that I for sure have a job lined up.

Now back to your regularly scheduled con law...

So bitter

Not so much as a post card or piece of junk mail today. What gives?

Right now, I'm sitting in flannel pants listening to my personal theme song and doing property reading. How romantic.

I was a fool to think this valentines day would be any better than the last 29 of them have been.

Oh so bitter today!

I hate today. Stupid contrived Hallmark holidays. I'm very bitter. Being alone today is bad enough, but why must the stupid bimbo girls at school be all giggly and annoying about their lame-assed boyfriends? It's just enraging.

And deeply depressing and lonely and sad.

At least I have plenty of exciting homework to keep me busy. On top of the usual pile of reading, I have to get through a huge stack of Pennsylvania employment and whistleblower law cases for my skills class. None of them seem to be on point for the case we've got either. Yippie. What a way to spend Valentines Day.

Oh dear...

Only a few hours later and I have completed my grocery shopping, failed to find a double boiler, vacuumed the entire house from top to bottom, including the stairs, mopped the bathroom, cleaned the sink, and changed and washed my bed sheets.

This is very bad indeed. What is my problem today?

Focus?

I am so hideously unfocused today! This is bad. The huge heap of reading is one thing, but I actually some motivation to get a bit ahead this weekend so I can play after school next week, if I could only concentrate!! I'm so distracted and jumpy I actually mopped my kitchen last night and organized the under-sink cabinet in the bathroom this morning. Cleaning is always a bad sign, but at least my house isn't such a sty anymore.

Maybe I should go to the grocery store...I'm making dinner for a friend tomorrow, getting all the parts together for that today might be a good idea. Especially since I can't quite decide if I should make a pie or tart of some kind or chocolate dipped strawberries for desert. The strawberries will require getting a double boiler...which I need anyway since some of the people from school and I are planning on a chocolate making party sometime in the next week or so. And I can't quite decide what to do about a vegetable. So far I'm planning to make grilled salmon and roasted garlic potatoes, and salad? or spinach? or something else? I need a green thing. Asparagus would be good if it wasn't $5 a pound.

Can you tell I have about 200 pages of reading to do?

Law school, the zen approach

I am trying to be philosophical about school this semester. Grades are important, but they aren't everything. I need to maintain some sort of outside, normal life. This is not easy. Saying that I'm under a lot of stress is sort of life saying the Titanic had a tiny little leak. There are moments, lots of them, when I just want to bury my head in whatever casebook I have in front of me and weep.

But then I find someone on the outside world who seems to appreciate what I'm going through, who respects it, accepts it, and is supportive. Someone who, like my brother, makes me feel like what I'm doing is worthwhile, and more than that, almost heroic. I need more of those kind of people in my life to keep me focused, directed, grounded. People who take an interest and care and won't let me lose myself in this thing I am doing.

I have to simply let go, allow this whole experience to unfold, and not fight against it. Last semester I think I fought too much with myself, with school, with the environment, trying to force everything to fit into some mold I had in my head. It got me nothing really, except exhaustion and frustration, neither of which I need. I must simply do, or do not. It's a very binary sort of thing and there is no use in trying to resist that. Somehow that seems to be helping with my focus and perspective.

Such a geek

I am torn. Should I go to a friends house and watch Stargate on Friday, or the Olympics? Why oh why do I not have cable and a TiVo?

Maybe I should start dating only guys who have TiVo? How sad is that...will date for TiVo and sushi. But as they say, a girl has to eat, and I'm po'.

Updated to say woo! I got another interview! For a job that pays even! Hurray! We're still keeping our fingers crossed about NASA though...

Life goes on

I have very little to report today. School seems to be sucking up most of my life right now, which I suppose is just as well. If I keep busy I don't have time to think about some of the larger questions in life, questions about my future and what I really want to accomplish with my life. That old tension between career and family just seems to keep rearing its ugly heady. And there just aren't any answers.

I'm still lonely here...lonelier than I was last semester, or even a few weeks ago actually. But I'm starting to either find the courage to express my own true self, or finding people who accept me for what I am. Probably the truth is someplace in between. I've made a goal for myself to meet people outside of school, and so far that seems to be working out fairly well. It's jut hard to find the time some weeks.

I've decided that somehow or another I really need to start sewing again. Since I need suits, I'm going to make a suit. I have some good patterns from Vogue that should be good, I just need to find some good fabric. I was thinking a linen would be nice, especially for the summer and fall interview season. It gets so hot here, wearing wool or some synthetic is going to kill me. I just can't quite work out what to use for lining in a linen suit. More linen? Cotton? Silk or rayon seems like it would be too hot, and defeat the whole purpose of making a linen suit.

More later when I have something meaningful to say...meanwhile, it's back to the con law reading and hiding

Death and Taxes

My taxes are done. The good news is I get a nice refund. The bad news is that I also had to do my FAFSA for next years financial aid, and my net assets are 0. How depressing. In fact, according to their calculus (which leaves out money from financial aid) I have nothing in my checking account either. How thrilling. Hopefully I will either qualify for in-state tuition or get a stipend or something for next year. Another $40 grand or so in loans does not sound like fun to me.

On January 24th, I found out one of the ladies from my OES group died, and I lost my best friend. Rest well Dena, you will be missed. M...what more can I say? I loved you.

Got geek?

Woo! I had an interview this morning for an internship at NASA. I think I nailed it. Hurray! I'll know for sure in two weeks anyway. The idea of some practical application for what I'm doing in class makes the reading so much easier to get through. Though I still don't understand how it's possible that for twenty pages I read, seventy-five more seem to appear out of nowhere. Ugh.

Last night I finished my mittens and started on the matching hat. I just need to finish the hat, weave in the ends, take pictures, and type up the pattern. That's some kind of progress anyway.

It seems like school is getting easier, not exactly in the sense that the workload is any less, it's actually a lot more, but I'm understanding things and putting it together faster, and seem to be doing well when I get grilled by my professors. I was the daily Socratic victim in Con Law on Monday, and managed to hold my own for most of the class on a case we didn't actually read directly, and have managed to have intelligent conversations with potential employers about the vagaries of contract, tort and property theories, so I think it's starting to click.

Of course, it feels like the rest of my life is falling to pieces...I never have been able to maintain professional/academic success along with a personal and emotional life. Too many of my ambitions and goals seem to be mutually exclusive these days.