Oh, the LSAT. October 2, 2008

So I don’t know if I’ve mentioned this, but I graduated in three years, so most of the people I know/was close with in undergrad are still in undergrad.  And now a bunch of them are taking the LSAT.  That’s kind of a weird feeling, I have to say.  But not in an aww-I-wish-I-was-still-in-undergrad kind of way, because I definitely don’t.  I guess I’m sort of a nerdy, serious-boyfriend type who doesn’t so much go out and get crazy like most of my ex-sorority sister counterparts.

It’s surprising to me that a lot of really stupid people I know are taking the LSAT.  Of course just because they’re taking it doesn’t mean they won’t screw it up or that they’ll even last in law school, but when it comes to some of them, I’m just like, damn, seriously?  You?  Nahh.  My freshman year roommate who makes the whore of Babylon look pure as the driven snow is taking it.  I mean come on, she pretty much majored in liquor drinks and abnormal pap smears.  Lord help us all if she ever becomes somebody’s lawyer.

And a girl in my sorority who was a PR major because she wanted to plan weddings for awhile, I mean, just until her and her boyfriend got married and started having kids.  But since he’s a skeezbag and they broke up last month, she’s suddenly decided she wants to be a lawyer.  Maybe she’ll get it together and I’m just being a snarky bitch, but there was a reason she wanted to be a wedding planner.  Because she’s an airhead drama queen.

I think everyone imagines this is going to be just like Legally Blonde, complete with the pink suit and the chihuahua.  It’s not hell or anything so far, but it ain’t Elle Woods.  And it ain’t a sorority sleepover.  Hehehe, they’ll soon learn, I suppose.

I come bearing gifts. September 30, 2008

First, I’ve really gotten into cooking lately.  I used to do a little bit when I was forcing the parents to be on Weight Watchers (as opposed to their usual routine of eating cheeseburgers for lunch and drinking beer for dinner), but lately I’ve been making comfort food.  Maybe it’s how I cope with stress…well, that and rewarding myself for doing homework with wine before bed.

Anyway, my grandmother made me a cookbook with all of her recipes, handwritten in her cute little cursive with instructions like “taste it and see if you should add more.”  I’ve been having a serious macaroni and cheese craving lately, so I’m about to attempt “Nana’s Macaroni and Cheese Deluxe.”  In case any of y’all feel like whipping up a little comfort food.  I have other recipes for spaghetti sauce and a million kinds of pound cake that are more original, but I can’t be giving all my family secrets away just yet.  At any rate, y’all will like this, I promise.

Nana’s Macaroni and Cheese Deluxe

Ingredients:

• 8 oz. package elbow macaroni
• 2 cups small curd cottage cheese
• 8 oz. carton sour cream
• 1 egg
• 3/4 teaspoon salt
• dash of pepper
• 2 cups shredded cheddar cheese
• paprika

Cook pasta and drain.  Combine all ingredients except paprika.  Pour into a 9-inch pan.  Sprinkle with paprika.  Bake at 350 degrees for 45 minutes.

And because I’ve been promising pictures of my house, I better slap those up here before I’m made into a liar.

Oh, and Tallulah’s preferred location in the house.  Yep, my closet.  Juuuust to make sure we get maximum cat hair coverage on all my clothes.

I’ve been a bad blogger. September 23, 2008

I promised myself I wouldn’t abandon this thing when I started it, so if y’all haven’t yet given up on me and assumed I’d been carried off by palmetto bugs, here goes.

My last post was about bugs, and I feel like that’s all I talk about, but I’m sure you’ll want to hear this. Or not, but I’m gonna tell you anyway. So after 2938475 sightings of these damn huge things, I decided I either had to take action or have a heart attack, because that’s what it was coming to. The action, I decided, would come in the form of a Raid roach fogger. The box told me I should leave for two hours while I set it off, so I covered up all my dishes, took out the toilet paper, put the cat food out on the back porch, and ran like hell. Tallulah and I took refuge with my friends C and L while I poisoned the apartment, thinking this would be a magical solution.

After we all did homework together and had a lovely, relaxing time, I came home to Vietnam. I came up the stairs and thought all was good. I mean yes, there were roughly 48 million roach carcasses in a variety pack of sizes littering every room in the place, but at least they were dead. Then after about 20 seconds, I start choking on the noxious fumes and think I’m going to die right there along with all the roaches. Of course I can’t get the windows open in my little 1920’s bungalow because they’re all painted shut and physical exertion isn’t exactly working out for me what with the toxic atmosphere. So I did what every responsible, normal, respectable adult and law student would do – I went out to my car and sobbed.

The cat was crying in the carrier, I was crying in the driveway, and I didn’t know what in the world to do. I called my mom and sobbed to her, and she told me to go back to C and L’s house but I felt bad enough that they’d had to shut up their cats so Tallulah wouldn’t eat them (she just ate all of their food) and put up with me for several uninterrupted hours. I’m just not that girl who will call and beg for a place to stay.

Fortunately, L texted me to ask how the post-bug apartment was and I responded by saying “TERRIBLE, I can’t even go in there because of the fumes.” She didn’t respond for a good long while, in which I was still sitting and sobbing in the driveway. But thank the Lord, she called me back and insisted that I come back and stay with them, and she was pretty much my mommy for the rest of the night. She fixed me dinner at 11:30, made me a bed on the couch and then my own mommy came down here and rescued me the next day while I was in class. She cleaned up my apartment, washed my sheets and comforter and all my dishes, wiped down my counters, and put together 2 pieces of furniture that had been sitting around in skeletal form for 2 weeks because I’m too dumb to put them together.

So life has been great for awhile.

Now the only issue I have is Tallulah. I left her alone for the weekend and I assume sometime last night, after I came home, she decided to forgo the litter box and use the front entryway/cute Target floor mat instead. I was thinking she was just mad at me for having been gone. So I cleaned all that up and tonight when I got home from the gym, she went down there and sniffed around for a minute. I was thinking she was just noticing the fresh Febreze scent of the Swiffer wet pads, but then lo and behold, she turned around faced me, looked right at me, and peed all over the floor. DAMMIT.

I left a message for the vet to call me in the morning, because I’m wondering if she’s sick. She’s usually not funny about the litter box, and in any case, it was pretty clean anyway. And after that little incident, rather than kicking her outside with the roaches, I cleaned out the whole thing, washed it out and put in brand new litter. She hasn’t gone on the floor again, but neither has she gone in the litterbox. This worries me. Oh my poor hardwood floors. And my poor possibly sick kitty.

I hope y’all like my bitching, because that’s all I do. I really am a happy person, but the happy stuff isn’t so liberating to write about, and I know y’all are actually probably reveling in all my little mishaps.

I’m going to be carried away. September 3, 2008

I had a lovely labor day weekend, which I would love to tell you about some other time.  It involved a lot of mimosas and water-skiing.  Certainly not what this evening has involved.

Again, I sound like I know nothing about the South.  But I swear, where I am from, we do NOT HAVE these ridiculous insects that are present down here.  I have battled several of these things, which are horrifying, disgusting roaches the size of small rodents.  The things don’t when you shoot them with half a can of bug spray.  They hide.  In a most cunning fashion.  Or they fly out at you when you’re least expecting it, causing you to pee on yourself just a tad.

Such as earlier, when I went in the kitchen to get a glass of water before bed, oh, two and a half hours ago.  The thing was sitting there on my kitchen counter, my damn kitchen counter, mind you.  GROSS.  I’m sure my little Serbian-professor-neighbor who lives below me in my little duplex thinks I’m crazy, because I immediately jumped six feet in the air and hollered, “Son of a bitch, fucking wild animal!” at the top of my lungs.  You think this is silly.  I hope you never have 12 pound cockroaches in your home.  You will then understand.

Not to mention the gigundo spider currently living on my shower curtain.  Not being a fan of creepy crawly items of any kind, I put my makeup on in my bedroom this morning so as to give him his space.  I then left for class, went to the gym, and did homework, only to return to the bathroom to find him in his usual spot.  Despite me yelling, “VACATE, JACKASS!” and “SHHHT” like Cesar Milan does on The Dog Whisperer, I have been unsuccessful.  And he is right next to the toilet.  Which is why I’m seriously considering peeing in the empty Diet Mountain Dew bottle in front of me.

The other reason I’m all ramped up tonight is because today was trash day, and thus, when I was being a responsible citizen and bringing in my recycling bin, the cops were driving down the street and stopped to ask, and I quote, “Hey hon, have you seen a black dude in a blue jersey running through here?”  I was like, “Uhhhh, no, but I think I’ll go back inside now, thanks.” ….And load my shotgun.  For the roaches and the random fleeing criminals.

Taking one for the team. Right in the gut. August 27, 2008

Well, we’ve heard nothing but horror stories from 2L’s all during orientation about how it would happen: we’d be unprepared for class, we’d have an out-of-body experience when called on by a professor, we’d suddenly realize that our first language was Chinese and we would have, in fact, no knowledge of how to deliver an appropriate answer in English.  All us little 1L babies have fretted and worried over this concept, wondering when it will happen, and breathing a sigh of relief at the end of each class when we have all escaped with our feathers unruffled and feeling smugly like we really “get it.”  Sure, the professor has told many of us we’re not quite hitting the right part of the issue or we have the wrong idea about something, but none of us has really choked.

Well folks, meet Screw-Up McGee, right here.  It’s a pleasure.  So I was sitting in criminal law this morning, thinking I was doing great, following along with theories of utilitarian and retributivist punishment, thinking once again, “Damn, Merritt, you hot, you got this.” And then Prof says, “Where is Merritt?”  I meekly raise my hand from behind the computer, trying to look smart and prepared, yet sweet and innocent.  Mainly I was just turning red and  beginning to sweat heavily.  I plaster a fake “pleasant smile” on my face and she asks, “Why don’t you tell us all what happened in Fowieutqeoitn v. Etirxlsqpswpw?”  And I’m thinking, “What?  WTF?  I did this reading, why do I not remember a THING about this case or where it is or what class I’m in?”

So I start frantically paging through the book, looking for Rqoiwurroqinxc v. Pibneqlrtyuasdecvfgy, or whatever the hell it was she was wanting, the girl next to me whispers “It’s on page 49.”  Again in my panicked state, I’m thinking wtf, how does she know this all of a sudden??  I get to the case and I swear, the harder I look at it, the more my brain goes on automatic shutdown.  It’s like those moments when someone’s standing over your shoulder and you really need to show them something on the computer right then and the SOB goes into full freeze-up, lock-down mode.

I sit there and blubber for a minute, saying god knows what – I’m pretty sure I announced to the entire section that this was “the first time I’ve been called on and oh Lord I’m freaking out right now.”  No, I really did say that.  As if I’m not already over the coals because I simply can’t function as a normal human when asked a question.

Through some eventual miracle, the words on the page stop looking like Arabic and form themselves back into real-live English words and I am able to remember that yes, I did read this case, I’m not a total fool, and answer her questions.  But of course not before looking like a total jackass in front of everyone. Funny thing was, the case was about a bunch of guys who are stranded in a lifeboat and they decide to kill and eat the weakest little boy, who they think is probably going to die soon anyway.  I was feeling a lot like the little boy.  Go ahead and feed off of me y’all, I’ll probably just totally lose it and perish soon anyway.

No seriously, I was being a drama queen, it’s just one of those things that’s a funny story now.  Though it was definitely horrifying in the moment.  I knew it was bound to happen at some point, and this probably won’t be the last time, and the professor was at least nice to me.  But still, yay for Labor Day Weekend soon.

Bitching and Moaning, Part the Second August 26, 2008

Reasons why today was ridiculous:

• It is 9 MILLION DEGREES with the HUMIDITY OF SATAN in this state.  No, seriously, I’m from the South.  I know humidity, and I know hot, and I’m generally a fan of summertime.  But this is the hottest, most miserable part of the country, I am convinced.  Though now it’s just storming because of Fay, and the sad part is, I’m actually excited about torrential rain, because I can’t help but think that it just absolutely can’t be 9 MILLION DEGREES with said torrential rain.  Though I have been horribly wrong before.
• So this morning, as if I wasn’t sweating enough, I got stuck in horrendous traffic because some numb nuts pulled out in front of some other numb nuts and backed up the whole situation.  Well, crisis averted because a Miracle of the Lord occurred and I happened to get a coveted meter spot right by the law school.  If I had to park in the hinterlands, I never would have made it to class and that terrifies me – my professors have all made ridiculous huge deals about being late and I might die if one called me out about it on the second class meeting.  However.  Upon procuring said coveted space, I realized that I had only enough change to feed it to get me through one class.  I had ten minutes between my first class and second class, so I got through Property, trying all the while to develop a master plan that would get me to Crim Law in time.  I couldn’t do any better than going to the bookstore (where I had to buy a Luna bar in order for the tight-ass bitch to give me change), and then sprinting through the law school to my car.  And back.  People clearly thought I was insane.
• I got home today to discover that my chest of drawers and dresser had arrived at my house.  Was then a little freaked out, because the nice UPS man left a note on the door that said they’d been left at the back door, and I went out to retrieve them and found them on my screened porch.  Which had been latched, and was still latched, with said boxes of furniture snugged safely on the porch.  And no holes in the screen, no apparent jimmying of anything.  I was mystified.  I can only assume that the maintenance people happened to be working on my neighbor’s downstairs apartment and let themselves in and delivered my furniture.  Or I have a spook who’s also interested in keeping me and my furniture safe.  I’m unsure.
• Well, said furniture came in frighteningly flat boxes to be a chest of drawers and a dresser.  But I decided to put on my big-girl panties and put it together.  Bad idea.  I am clearly not capable of such a feat at all.  I spent 3 hours on the floor, bent over, crouched under the stupid furniture.  And I did quite a poor job.  Which means that it’s half-constructed (poorly, I might add) and the other half has been relegated to said boxes in the study.  And I have a sort of wobbly dresser skeleton and a lot of screws in my bedroom.  Cute.
• After the furniture adventure, which left me with an aching head and back (I know, I’m such an old lady), I realized that in my haste to get the hell out of the law school, I had left all my criminal law stuff in my locker.  Dammit.  Had to drive all the way back to the law school in the raging storm.
• Then had to come home and actually do work from the books I had to retrieve.  Ick.

So now, I’m watching Everybody Loves Raymond in an effort to soothe my little brain.  And I’m going to play the Glad Game – did anyone else watch and love Pollyanna as a kid?

• I’m glad that I don’t have class until 10:30 tomorrow.  Sleep, glorious sleep!
• I’m glad that it can’t possibly be 90 bazillion degrees tomorrow.
• I’m glad that this weekend is labor day weekend and I’m unashamedly going home to see my parents and The BF.
• I’m glad that this isn’t undergrad and I can do whatever I want without providing justifications for why I’m missing X frat party or bar night at blah blah blah.
• I’m glad that football starts this week.
• I’m glad that the fair is next week!  I love the fair so so much.

See, look at me, all being positive and not crummy, despite today.  I can do this.

Getting Brighter August 24, 2008

Well, this weekend was nice. I’m not nearly so down. Mainly because The BF came down to visit me, so I wasn’t rambling around here by myself. It was good to see him…it felt like forever since I’d been home, with him. I won’t make anyone gag with lovey-dovey descriptions and all that stuff, but suffice it to say that my mood is better. I feel like I’m much more ready to hit the week of rough classes on my own now.

So far, classes aren’t so bad.  My legal writing and legal research teachers honestly seem like they’re just genuinely interested in making us better and giving us as much help and advice as they can so that we really know how to do everything.  Criminal law seems good too.  My prof is a mid-50s-ish lady who wears a lot of big, chunky jewelry and outfits from Chico’s.  I know this because my grandmother has everything they’ve ever put in that catalog, so I’m pretty good at picking out a Chico’s jacket when I see one.  Her jacket the other day was covered in geishas in kimonos and Chinese writing, I’m assuming in honor of the Olympics.  At least, that’s precisely why my grandmother would wear it.  She even has an election day sweater, for heaven’s sake.

Torts, contracts, and property, on the other hand – oh lord.  I know it’s the whole law school thing, and the Socratic method, but to me, it just comes off as being an asshole.  And I’m sure that feeling’s going to intensify as the semester goes on.  They’ll ask questions that no one knows the answer to, and has not a clue what kind of answer they want.  Then when we all fumble through it, they just respond with a very curt, “No, that’s completely wrong,” and move on to the next person.  I’m the girl who hides in the back of big lecture classes, and takes little English classes where the professor appreciates your little silly ideas and lets you think whatever your silly little brain would like to think about the material.  Gone are those days.

But overall, my mood is better, and probably just because I’ve gotten to a) hang out with someone in general and b) hang out with someone I actually know and love, rather than having to do yet more of the whole “get-to-know-you” thing.  I know that’s all part of it, but I’m ready to get past that point, which I think will hopefully happen soon.  In the meantime, I’ve got to leave you with this ultra-boring post and get to work so that I won’t be embarrassed in class tomorrow.

I feel like I’ve been here for years. August 21, 2008

And it’s it’s only been two days.  That sounds bad.  And it’s not necessarily bad, it’s just that everything is so different, all this adjusting has required a lot of energy.  Things that have happened:

-Orientation.  Years and years of orientation.  We’ve had lectures from the Student Bar president, the director of, student affairs, the director of admissions, the dean of the law school, the associate dean of the law school, and every professor from torts to property to contracts to writing to defense against the dark arts.  Erm, I meant criminal law.  This whole thing really does feel somewhat reminiscent of Hogwarts.  Except for how it’s not cool and we don’t have magic.

-Being lost.  I swear, I have a GPS thanks to a fabulous sale at Target, and praise the Lord for that, but I am still lost about 60% of the time.  It took me like 30 minutes of circling campus trying to find the student union to get an ID card made, and when I figured that out, I couldn’t find a parking space because of 9 million undergrads swarming the place.  So, long story short, I still have no ID card.  But that’s a fabulous excuse for me to not go to the gym, because you can’t go without one of those.  Darn.  Maybe tomorrow.

-Being freaked out.  Being by myself is a little tougher than I expected.  I’m rapidly getting used to it, but I still get the heebie jeebies when I hear little noises.  I’ve been locking deadbolts and imagining people kicking in doors and chopping me into little pieces.  It’s silly, but there you have it.  I’ve gotten a lot better in the past 24 hours, and I imagine it’ll get easier, but I’ve just never been without a gang of sorority sisters or my family, or at the very least, The Whore of Satan Nasty Roommate from my undergrad years.

Truth is, the whole “school” part of things doesn’t seem so bad right now.  I’ve met a few people who seem nice enough, but it’s like no one’s really interested in going to Wal-Mart together or hanging out and watching the Olympics.  Everyone seems more concerned with when they’re gonna have time to start their work.  I’m sure I’ll start feeling that way soon, but right now, I’ve pretty much gotten everything done, and I feel rather pathetic sitting here with Tallulah.

Sorry to whine.  I’m just gonna need some real-friend, non-awkward hangout time with The BF, with my family, just with someone I have something in common with besides worrying about law school.  I’m hoping that can be arranged after one more night.  There’s only so many times I can get Tallulah nipped up before I start to question my sanity.

I think things will get into a better rhythm once classes start.  Hopefully people will want to hang out in the lobby, go to lunch, do something besides fret about work we don’t even really have much of yet.  Lord, I sound like a huge loser.  I swear, it’s really not just me.  I’m not all that weird, and I don’t smell bad, and even though I am the crazy cat lady, I don’t really think I come off that way.  People are just stressed and weird right now.

Ending on a positive.  I really do like my apartment.  I kind of have things strewn around now, but I promise, pictures are to come.  I’m looking forward to classes starting and getting into a routine, hopefully making some girlfriends, and in the meantime, I’m looking forward to the weekend.

It’s Official – August 17, 2008

I am now moved into my apartment. That’s right, my first time living all by my lonesome. Well, except for my big, lazy cat, Tallulah. I got all of my furniture and such moved in on Friday, but I came back home to get clothes, do more shopping, and basically spend even more money on apartment stuff, so I have to do the 2-hour drive back tomorrow. With Tallulah. I’m really considering going to the vet and getting her kitty-drugs for the ride down. Now I know that sounds horrible but seriously, you have never heard the noise that this cat makes in the car – continually. It sounds like she’s being poked with sharp knives. So I’m thinking one of us is gonna have to take some meds, and since I have to drive, maybe it better be her…and then maybe I can save some for the first week of law school – ha.

Anyway, moving was much less painful than it ever has been, I have to say. My dad has friends in my new city, who were nice enough to come over and help me move. So I had The BF, who might be one of the generally largest and strongest people I’ve ever met, Dad, and 3 of his friends who work out like 86 times a week. So I grabbed some boxes and trotted up the stairs a few times, but for the most part, I was content to set up the kitchen and fluff throw pillows. I know, I’m a bad person. But there was a lot of testosterone in the air, and I would’ve hated to spoil the massive display of speed and finesse in hauling a couch and bed and desk and a washer/dryer up to the top of my little narrow stairs.

In other news, in a sick way, I’m kind of getting excited about law school. I’ve been lifeguarding all summer like a 15 year old, making 8 bucks an hour. Thus, I’m feeling like a worthless pig. And the liberal weenie in me is getting excited about pro bono stuff – there are so many neat things! I know I probably won’t have a spare minute to vacuum the cat hair off my couch, much less save the youth of the world through law, but it sure sounds neat. They have a program where you can be a child advocate and appear in court for kids who have been abused and neglected, do confidential investigations, work with their attorneys to get everything worked out…it sounds wonderfully gratifying. Like I said, I probably won’t have time for any of that fabulous stuff, but I think I’ll try to stay as bright-eyed and bushy-tailed as possible for as long as possible. I will not let the stress get to me – at least not for the first week or so, ha!

After I get back down to the apartment and finish unpacking and picture-hanging and putting furniture together, I’ll take pictures. Hopefully before everything is covered in cat hair and dirty clothes, because I know how I am. So, expect pictures sooner rather than later, because that’ll be about a 25-second window.

August 12, 2008

I’m excited to be getting my hair done this afternoon. This makes me a silly, shallow, person, but it is amazing how much better I feel when my hair is freshly cut and highlighted. And especially when someone else does my hair – why is it always just different when I do it?

Law school countdown is now at one week. I feel like I should be doing something to prepare, such as reading one of the prep books I have. But I just feel like they all say the same thing…”How to Brief a Case,” “What to Try to Write on Your Exam,” etc. I already did a sample brief of a case provided by my law school, to be critiqued in my Legal Writing class later, and I honestly didn’t think it was too terrible, I think I got a lot out of the case and figured out the brief. Now I know it ain’t perfect, but it’s not the gut-wrenching nightmare I expected for a first assignment. I’m sure I’ll be horrified later, but at the moment, there’s some hand-holding going on, which is giving me a sense of security as far as work goes.

I bought my first “real” suit yesterday at Brooks Brothers, which was interesting. I had some cheap crap I bought in the Juniors’ Department at Kohl’s when I was a junior in high school and went to DC for a youth conference thingy, but I’ve never even tried on anything like this. Wearing a suit every day is going to take some getting used to when I have to be out in the real world. My idea of getting dressed up is usually a jean skirt. Yeah, I know, I’m in trouble. But I do love the black patent peep toe heels I got. They please me.