Thursday, December 29, 2005

Post Xmas Post

Sometimes I think I'm clever. Usually it turns out I'm only clever in my head and it just doesn't resinate the same way on paper or out loud. Then I ask if that was my outside voice and turn red. Finally, I accept that I am not clever and repeat the process more quickly then I care to admit.

I also know that I am always disappointed by the holidays. It is not because I didn't get anything I wanted (I am an admitted spoiled brat) but because I feel like I could have done better. For instance, I bought cards to send to people before I needed to pack and leave and stuff and instead I farted around and watched daytime TV. Neither did wonders for my brain nor did they help me get the cards done on time. Nor did ordering online a week in adavance allow me to get stuff shipped in time to my parents house. Although it was only amazon that seemed to have that problem. I am angry with them so I will stop now. Basically, the disappointment is with myself and not being better at the whole holiday thing. It is one of my favorite times of the year because I get to go out and buy stuff for other people, but I never have enough time or great ideas or enough money to make sure that everyone gets great stuff. I know that's not the point, but I just get sad when it still doens't work out. Perhaps that's the fun of it, thrill of the chase and all that.

Next is New Years, which is very weird for me this year. New Years has always been the holiday about friends and partying. For the last six (or maybe more) years, I have always chosesn to spend that night with my friends. This year, however, I can only call my friends when they are at the hieghten frenzy of celebration. It is sad and it is the the most final of all the feelings that I've had since I left to go to school. I always joked that it was the end of an era and now it really does feel like it. This years plans are still in flux (although that's not my fault) and I am not sure that I'll even be at a party. It makes me sad because that party with my friends has always meant a lot (even if I don't really cut loose until after midnight and have to help clean for five hours the next day). I will truly miss that this year and I don't think that will go away for a while because I see nothing to change it for this year.

This is why the end of the holidays disappoints me. Hopefully, I can find something to be cheerful about next time. Or perhaps a rant because those are much funnier.

Also, movies are great, movie theatres are kept too cold.

Monday, December 19, 2005

Christmas time

I have to say that Christmas time is my favorite time of year. However, the TV makes it hard to love the holidays. Except for the insistance on play the Peanuts Holiday movies, which is awesome, the TV keeps trying to sell diamonds, razors, and cars. I don't particularly like diamonds and the TV tries to make me feel like a weirdo for not wanting them. I don't feel like a weirdo (other than the fact that I am weird in many ways which is fine because as the family motto says, normal is boring) and I don't like my TV trying to make me feel that way. It's like being bretrayed by my friend. Stupid TV.

However, I can't be too mad at it. It brings me football and trashy daytime shows that make me feel better about my life and my friends. And it's taught me that being rich prevents you from dating or hooking up with new people. When you're rich, apparently, you can only date the exes of people that you know, especially if you're in the middle age category, then you date someone's dad and then sleep with the son who is in a rough patch with his naive wife who knows there is a hole in heart but can't see past that to know that her husband doesn't love her anymore, but does love his ex-step-mother who is dating his business rival. That and you have to dress up to go to dinner everynight and that's just too much pressure. The crazy house staff would be fun to have around, though.

That's what TV has taught me. Shopping has taught me that there is a bunch of crap for sale and if you look while desperate enough, you can find a gift for anyone. Oh, and obnoxious christmas music is worse for sales clerks because no matter how much it just blends into the background there is always one song on the hour long mix that inserts itself in to the conscious brain and makes them aware of what it going on. They can't just leave or put earphones in either.

A final note, and a comment on my sanity, is this: pipe cleaners offer hours of fun and frustration for the psuedo-crafty. It's like Martha Stewart in the trailer with nothing really looking right. So, next year, the pipe cleaner ornaments may or may not make it back (it's a durability thing) but they may be the theme of the gifts I give next year. Perhaps a diamond made from pipecleaners and a car made of pipecleaners. The razor pipecleaner would be just too darn hard to make or convience anyone with. Besides beards are all the rage right now...

Thursday, December 15, 2005

What now

So, without the finals to study for, I find myself not doing anything that I've told myself I need to do. Mostly, clean my apartment and buy the christmas presents taht I need to get. But, hey, my family will be happy with must the gift of my presence right. Oh wait, that's not right. Well it is, but it's not nearly as fun.

The biggest problem is that I am trying to do most of my shopping online. This means that I am using the internet. This means that I can surf around and do things other than shop or write people e-mail. Everything is so dang distracting. That and my brain is doing all sorts of things like forgetting what I'm doing while I'm doing it and wondering what I should do next.

That and I forget to go to sleep and my couch isn't that comfy.

Really, I did have a point, but I forgot it. Probably because I'm on the internet pretending to do about four different things.

Maybe next time.

Saturday, December 10, 2005

Oooh, shiny object

Okay, so I have now completed two out of the three finals. I don't know how that makes me feel, which says that I cannot think anymore. This is problematic because when you say two out of three, that implies a third. If I can't think, how can I take a third final. Even if it's multiple choice that doesn't mean I don't need to think. Which I need to do, but I can't. If I can't think then I can't make the educated guess because I cannot eliminate options. This speaks to the falisy that multiple choice tests are easier. Often, the people writing the test have both a process they expect you to follow to get the answer that they came up with. So, you have to decided what the issue is, what you can easily discern about the answers that cannot be right and then you have to determine of the two answers that you think might be right which made a common application error of the rule/logic that's being tested. That isn't easy. Especially when you have to do it for complicated fact scenarios and rules you're not sure you understand to begin with.

Given all that, I now am so distractable that I have taken to watching golf, off-road racing and analizing commercials. Which leads me to this comment:
There are a few bail bondsmen shops in San Diego (it is the county seat and a bigger city so it's understandable) but three of them advertise on TV. One shop has ads featuring "regular people" who had friends/relatives surprisingly jailed and in need of bonds. In one of the ads, the woman says, They walked me through the rights my son has...blah, blah, the right to bail. Which is not true. Read the damn bill of rights.
The next shop features an 70 year old bondsman claiming that if I'm in trouble and need bail it's better to know him then not. I am confused by the message, and then I am confused by the fact that it appears he is wearing a Burger King crown as a way to help remember him and his name (which has a King in it somewhere, but that's all I know).
Finally, the last shop has ads that feature the family that owns it (I presume because you don't hire people to be that bad at speaking). It is fairly clear to me that english isn't necessarily the first language. The air of the company and commercial make it seem like they're from Hawaii, but the last I checked, Hawaii's primary language is English. Regardless, the main problem I have with the commercial is that the main bondsman is a woman who maybe is attractive (I am not a good judge of these things) who both looks and speaks as though she is completely stoned. That's who I want in charge of my freedom, a stoned woman who seems confused by the words coming out of her own mouth, let alone someone who had multiple takes to determine what she was saying.

Then I realized it is just easier to avoid being arrested and needing bail then to deal with ads.

Fortunately, an ad featuring a singing, golfing banana came on and then the golf came back. Plus I stopped reading the materials for my test and found the internet to complain about these commercials.

But then I realized that I really do need to study so that I don't need to drop out and get stuck in a criminal career where I become reliant on bondsmen in anyway.

What scares me more is that next semester there are four finals.

Wednesday, December 07, 2005

One down

I just took my first law school final exam. It was hard, and it was long. Now I have this information in my head that part of my brain wants to throw away, but the other part tells me I will need in the future (if I want to take the bar and pass it anyway).

Soon I will have time to write real email, and clean my apartment, and do holiday shopping, and live like a normal, not school attending adult like I play on TV. Oh wait, that's not TV, that's my imagination, the TV in my brain. This all, obviously, assuming that I survive the next five days and the time I spend in the library during them. Surviving Friday will be the key. Then the next step is surviving Monday. Step by step. Day by day. Ahhh, that reminds me of a horrible TV show that still gets air time and really it shouldn't. It's just not right.

Gah! now it's stuck in my head!

Okay, so my insight for the day is that it is much better to joke around right before a test then cramp for it. It's much more relaxing and that is better then stressing. That, and metal travel coffee mugs are stupid. Because the metal gets warm, it expands holding the lid more sealed so it drips less. Also it keeps the coffee hot longer. However, if it's too hot then you can't unscrew the lid to provide more air to the coffee so you don't get to drink it because it's too hot. This is a problem that could be solved with vents.

More problems should be as easily resolved. Or else I shouldn't be in law school and should be inventing coffee mugs instead. But where's the advanced degree program for that?

Must go learn...

Tuesday, November 29, 2005

My first blog

Well, it is no longer my official birthday, but since I haven't gone to bed yet it still counts.

I am getting older now, but not old. Even with the maturity that supposidly comes with age, I still want to feel like a five year old. However, this is the first year that I've spent most of the day without anyone around. I did buy myself some ice cream to celebrate (and I noticed that Ben and Jerry's has reduced the number of cookie dough chunks in thier pints (or at least on the top)).

The great part was the number of friends who remembered my birthday despite the fact that I am so bad about remembering theirs. The sad part was, there was no one to go out to celebrate with me anywhere near here. This is because I don't have the friendships here that I did in college or in DC. It just reminds me of what I miss the most, and then I hear a dumb song "Closing Time" and suddenly I am nostalgic for days past and starting a blog.

So, happy birthday to me and I'm glad I got the ice cream.