divine angst

I am no fan of jinxing things. So I am just going to ask for some waves. For the next 24 or so hours, please.

It always amazes me how many people never learned proper telephone manners. I mean, I am not a huge fan of the phone, much preferring an email–for getting quick messages to people–or a personal conversation–for those more in-depth discussions–but at least I know how to talk on the phone.

Today, I am calling people about apartments because I’d like to go look at some this week. I have spoken with two people who were VERY nice–cordial, informed, and apparently completely cognizant of the fact that, as people looking to rent an apartment, they need to be POLITE.

I have also spoken with one person who was all but unintelligible, though helpful, and I can forgive her lack of mechanical skill with the telephone because her attitude was nice.

But the two other folks I reached on the phone today? Heh heh heh.

One is, presumably, the resident of the apartment. I called. He answered with a mumbled, muffled, hungover-sounding “‘Lo?” It’s 1:30 in the afternoon on a Monday, by the way. I asked for “John.” He replied, “’s John.” I said I was calling about the apartment and wanted some more information. He said something that I couldn’t even guess at, it was so muffled, and promptly hung up on me.

Nice.

The other one is even worse, really. He was an apartment finder/locator. I called and said I was curious about the apartment they had listed. He interrupted me to ask, “When did you need to move in?” I said, “Well, July 1 or maybe la…” and he, again, cut me off to say, “We can’t rent that for July 1.” And then he hung up on me.

Whatever happened to a nice, “I’m sorry. Thank you for calling!”? Or at least a “Goodbye!”? It’s easy to blame geography (like, “All New Yorkers are rude” and “All Southerners talk too slow.”). But I talked to at least three helpful people today! So it’s not geography!

I’m not thrilled about continuing to make calls. But I will, and I will keep my manners, and I will hope that no one else will hang up on me today.

*This was the way one of my grade-school textbooks said everyone should answer the phone. That’s a little extreme, but I wouldn’t mind a return to it, if it meant no one would hang up on me.

Did you watch tonight’s Grey’s Anatomy?

DAYUM.

I’m not getting ANY work done tomorrow night.

So our management company sent our lease renewal last week and they want to raise our rent 10% for us to renew. Ten percent! That’s, frankly, a lot for an apartment with 20-year-old appliances that gets STEAMING hot afternoon sun all year long. (And it’s fully $20 more per month than the high-end price they’re advertising on apartments.com for this unit.)

Mr. Angst and I are, accordingly, trying to find a new apartment. We’re sort of torn. We both want something vintage, preferably with hardwood floors and ceiling fans. We’d also like a two bedroom apartment, so we can have an office. But we also like our neighborhood a lot, and those sort of apartments in our neighborhood are…a little pricey.

Today, then, we hopped on the train to go look at a neighborhood not too far north with lots of affordable, relatively large apartments. It was not, actually, a pleasant trip. Mr. Angst didn’t like how far most of the places were from the train, and I was tense the whole time because I thought he hated the neighborhood (which I love because I think it is So Cute). As it turns out, he really just didn’t like how far it was from the train.

I’m looking, then, in other neighborhoods, now. There is affordable stuff out there, but not much of it is that much bigger or better than what we have, and I hesitate to move again (for the third time in about fourteen months) just because we can. It’s sort of frustrating, too. I really hate looking for apartments, and I hate calling management companies and dealing with people who are just looking for a commission. I just want a handy, convenient search engine where I can plug in exactly how much rent I want to pay, what the minimum square footage I want is, how many rooms or bedrooms I want, and what amenties I want–and have it spit out The Perfect Apartment.

So. I’m just so torn, between not wanting to move, but also being pretty unhappy in our apartment. And between not wanting to move right now just because I’m unhappy, but also realizing that we picked this apartment in a matter of minutes on a quick trip to this city almost a year ago, because we only had so much time to find a place. I hate that I don’t want to spend time here because it’s small and crowded, and that we aren’t really comfortable having people over because it’s really just so small and crowded and dingy, but I also don’t want to spend all the money on moving–boxes and movers and security deposits–when, in a year, when Mr. Angst has graduated, we might be able to afford something much nicer–and then we might want to move again.

Whatever the case, we can’t stay here at the rent they want to charge us. So we either talk them down or we move.

Now that that thing I was doing this week is over, I’m relaxing with some wine and some Buffy.

So I just want to note that my summer research position* would be completely awesome if it were like the research they do on Buffy. I mean, who doesn’t want to get to use the word “viscera” while doing research? Don’t say CrimLaw researchers because, ew. Seriously, though–talk about your immediately useful research, eh?

*Yes, I am doing research this summer. There may have been hints (or outright statements) of this before. I actually have two part-time positions, leaving me with one full-time summer. It should be fun–full of library-ish goodness.

The last several times I’ve gone to the grocery store and bought wine, I’ve ended up with the same checker. And every time, as she’s ringing up my purchases, she asks me to ring up the wine.

The first two or three times, I was confused. I thought she was busy or had her hands full, and wanted me to ring up the bottle to save time. But then I noticed that she wasn’t busy and why would she care about saving time? (This is a very low-key grocery store.)

I finally figured it out a couple of trips ago. She’s too young to ring up alcohol. I don’t know why the grocery store would hire her as a checker if she can’t ring up alcohol–particularly since this is a state where you can buy even hard liquor in the grocery store–but she’s a good checker, and polite, and seems to work hard. So I cheerfully ring up my own wine whenever I’m in her lane now.

—

A few weeks ago I bought a pair of black flipflops from Old Navy. Their flipflops are so cheap–$2.50 or so–and they come in every color of the rainbow. I needed black ones, though, so I bought black ones. As soon as I got home, I pulled off the tag and the plastic hanger and put them on. But something was wrong with them.

You know how the straps on plastic flipflops are molded into a certain curve? A high curve on the inside strap and a low curve on the outside strap? That’s so when you put them on, the straps curve around your feet, where your feet sit on the shoe. All flipflops are like this.

Except that pair of black flipflops. One shoe was right, with a high curve on the inside and a low curve on the outside. The other one was backwards. I put them on and they just felt funny, so I looked down and I could see that they were just wrong.

Today I took them back, planning to buy a non-defective pair. But every pair of black flipflops above a size 6 was wrong. All of them! I tried to find a pair where the correct shoe in the pair would be a mate to the correct shoe I already had. But no. All of them were wrong–on the same foot.

So I bought a pair of gold wedgy flipflops instead. They were more expensive. But they are also cuter, and they are not defective.

—

I bought my mom the best Mother’s Day card today. To understand it requires some backstory, though.

What you specifically need to know is that my mom has probably not cooked a meal in about ten years. Oh, maybe she’s thrown a salad together, or a deli plate for guests. She might have poached a piece of salmon at some point. But, on the whole, my mother doesn’t cook.

Which isn’t to say that she can’t cook. She can. Pretty well, too. (Her liver and onions are really terrific, and that I can say that about liver and onions is a testament to the truth of the previous sentences.) The thing is that she went back to school when we were kids, and she also worked full time, so she wasn’t home to cook dinner most nights. My brother (and I, to a very minimal extent) cooked instead.

When my mom met my stepfather, she hit the jackpot because, honey, he can cook. My brother and I stopped making as many dinners and my stepfather took over the meal-making duties. And that’s been the status quo for quite a while now.

So I couldn’t resist the card. On the front is a cute, fifties photo of a little girl next to her mom, who is lying on the couch. It says, “Mom, you deserve a relaxing day.”

Open it up, and you get the kicker: “But then who would make dinner? Happy Mother’s Day.”

It is the perfect card. It makes me laugh every time I look at it. I should stop looking at it, though, and pop it in the mail.

It appears I have become one of those writers who forgets to do things when she is writing.

Mr. Angst had to force me to stop my Bluebooking so we could go have dinner. That was at 6:30. We got back at maybe 7:30. I thought it was about 8:15 when I started this post. It is actually 9:05. Since we got back, I have listened to the entire Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring soundtrack, and I am six songs into the Two Towers soundtrack.

I have no idea where all those hours went. What I do know is that I am, miraculously, at the page limit and (I think) all of my cites are in the right order. I wish Word had a function that understood “Id.” and would change it when you move a footnote around. I understand that I can probably use EndNote for that, but EndNote hasn’t proven itself all that helpful for legal citations, despite advertising itself as having the capability to handle legal citations. Maybe someday I’ll have time to sit down and fiddle with the formats so the application becomes more useful. I’m not sure it would have been a great help in a closed universe assignment, anyway.

I’m off to do some printing and editing and more Bluebooking.

My ass is sore. I mean really, REALLY sore. My shoulders are sore, too, but I don’t have to sit on them.

I got a private yoga class today!

Basically, none of the other women in my class (yeah, they’re all women in my Wednesday lunchtime class) showed up today. It’s a small class anyway, but today it was EXTRA small. Just me and the teacher. So she put me through the ropes! My legs? Still shaky, an hour and 15 minutes later. Even my hands are shaky. I am SO going to hurt tomorrow.

Still, it was a GREAT class! It catered to MY yoga wants–lots of pigeon pose and triangle pose, and some hardcore downward dog. My legs haven’t shaken that much in a yoga class in YEARS. But when you’re the only student, you can’t really cheat on form and hope the teacher is more concerned about someone else. No sir!

I really wish I could take a nap right now. But I don’t really have time since I’ve been so procrastinate-y lately. So I’ll just relax in the comfy office chair and keep writing.

Last night, as I was lying in bed, preparing to drop off to sleep, I had the BEST idea for a post! It was great! I was all but writing in my head as I lay there, listening to the humidifier and the traffic outside our (open) window. It was a compare-and-contrast type post, talking about two things and which was better or worse and why. It was witty, timely, interesting, and I was really getting into the idea.

Of course, I remember none of it this morning.

This despite thinking to myself, “I’m not going to remember any of this in the morning. I’d better repeat those two things that this post is about to myself, several times, like I do when I’m learning someone’s name, so they are committed to my memory.”

Needless to say, the repeating it to myself thing didn’t work. It’s OK. I need to be writing something else this morning anyway. (Um, notably, that something is not this post. Hee!)

I think Bradley Whitford is one of those actors whose hairstyle gives away whether he’s a good guy or a bad guy. (Noted when I passed this movie, in which he is at least redeemed, despite having evil hair.)

I’m hitting that writing wall.

Do you know that wall? I think every writer does, although I’m sure we all hit it in different stages of the writing process.

For me, the wall springs up, out of nowhere, right after I’ve really grasped all of the background and started to develop an idea. I go to put pen to paper, get the idea down, articulated, and suddenly my brain crashes. I can’t outline. I can’t organize. I can’t remember what I was going to say. Everything falls apart.

Sometimes, when I hit the wall, I sort of stand there, bemused, and walk away. Then, when I come back some time later, there’s a door in the middle of it. A door I didn’t see before but that now leads me right through the wall to the sea of words beyond it. I love it when that happens. I love it when I have time to let that happen, to let the process be organic and natural.

That is NOT what is happening today. I don’t have time to walk away and wait for the door to appear. So I’ve been doing the other thing I do when I hit the wall: hit back. I have been beating at that wall with my brain all damn day. My brain is bloodied from it. Sadly, all that effort hasn’t yielded anything. There may be a chink in the wall, now, a small vent, perhaps, through which I can see the sea of words. But it’s too small for me to see the WHOLE sea of words. I’m just getting bits and pieces and what I really need now is an OVERVIEW. I need to see the whole expanse.

I’ve never been much of a time-crunch writer. I’ve always needed a little more space. This is a good experience, though–working on a tight, tight deadline. I’m going to go back to beating my brain against the wall. Maybe I can knock a whole brick out.

The weather outside today is absolutely perfect. It’s just slightly warm (around 70 degrees), it’s sunny, and there is nary a cloud in the sky. A little breeze blows off the water every few minutes.

I am planning to take a nice run down the waterfront later today with some friends, but until then, I can’t really enjoy the weather. I’m working on our journal writing competition. I’ve also had meetings with my summer job people today, figuring out what my schedule will be like for the next ten-to-twelve weeks, and what sort of tasks, exactly, I’ll be taking on. I’m pretty excited about my summer, actually. But I have to get through the writing competition first.

So I’m sitting in a spot with a clear view of the water and the sun, and I’m reading and writing and underlining and tabbing and generally just working. My pace is much more relaxed than it was during finals, though, and I am, on the whole, feeling good about life.

Later: a little something on the “anti-contraception” movement, captured in the New York Times Magazine this weekend.

Just seen on the Music Choice Classical channel:

“JS Bach was accusing of fooling around with a chambermaid in the church wine cellar during sermons.”

OK.

Sure, fooling around with a chambermaid is bad. And doing so during sermons is also bad.

But what really gets me is….church wine cellar???

Damn.

I updated some of my blogroll categories, since not all of the 1Ls are 1Ls anymore, and a lot of the other students out there are starting to finish up and get ready to graduate. If I missed you or wrongly categorized you, please let me know.

In celebration of Cinco de Mayo, Mr. Angst and I are making a Mexican feast. We had thought to go to a restaurant near our apartment, but then figured it’d be packed all day, and we’d better just do for ourselves. That works well, since I do a pretty good job with the Tex-Mex. So I’ve made a batch of salsa, Mexican rice will go on the stove soon, and then we’ll do the tacos! I even picked up a bottle of my nemesis (tequila) and some Tecate.

The only real problem is that my salsa didn’t really turn out. I roasted a quartered red onion, three cloves of garlic, three jalapenos, and eight plum tomatoes, then blended all of that with some cilantro, lime juice, oil, salt, and pepper. It’s smooth, really pretty looking, and smells like it should be awesome. Instead, it’s just sort of bland. It’s sitting in the fridge right now, cooling down, and hopefully the flavors are coming together. But I admit that I’m a bit disappointed.

To lessen the disappointment, I think I’ll go make the rice. Just so you know how, sweat some onion and garlic in a pan with some oil. Throw in a little cumin (or comino, depending on where you live and where you shop), and maybe some other spices, as you prefer. Just as the veggies get transluscent, throw in a cup or two of rice, depending on how much you want. Brown the rice all over in the pan. When it’s good and brown, add a can of diced tomatoes with the juice, and another can worth of water or chicken broth. You need enough liquid for the rice to cook, after all. Cover the pan, lower to a simmer, and cook until fluffy. Serve with TACOS, MARGARITAS, SALSA, and whatever else you like. Avocado is good.

Feliz!

At the last Bar Review of the semester tonight, to which I wore a string of lovely, if sort of large, silver beads, someone told me that I looked like Lisa Simpson. Classic. For the record: I am not yellow, nor do I have strange hair, nor do I play the saxophone.

In other news, Britney Spears did NOT have a press conference today (yesterday). I was hoping she’d announce she was dumping Popozao (sp?) or at least that she’s spawning again, a fact the press has known about for WEEKS. The best I can do is tell you that she is, apparently, renewing her vows to the goatee’d one.

A classmate (who found me out ages ago) told me tonight that my blog was too nervous. I admit, this semester was a challenge, at least on the finals front, and I let myself write about nothing but school for at least…what, two months? I am going to try to rectify that. I don’t hate law school, nor am I a nervous twit. I am actually a well-balanced, relatively fun human being. (At least, I think I am.) I really am not Lisa Simpson.

So consider this a New School Year Resolution. No more nervousness. Or, at least, nervousness plus. Plus what? Maybe celebrity gossip! Like the above bit. Maybe someday I’ll even write about my absolutely incomprehensible fascination with Br!tney. [Don’t want to attract too many links, though. I still get a slew of links, daily, for a post I wrote in which I included the words “Jess!ca B!ehl.” I learned my lesson.]

Good night.

One L is officially over, kids. No more 1L classes. No more 1L exams. I have a 1L summer job, but that’s really just a pre-2L job. Right?

I promise I will post more….of something….later. For now, I’m catching up on things I missed over the last two days.

My outline is done. My short outline is done. My flowchart is done. Twenty-six pages, four pages, and two pages, respectively. In no greater than 10 point font throughout. I have two practice exams printed out, which I will look at tonight, probably someplace that is not my apartment. In less than 24 hours (hopefully, in less than 18 hours, actually), I will be done with my first year of law school. OK, except for that writing competition thing. Shh. Don’t tell my brain.

Right now, though, I am taking a break. It’s the second significant one I’ve taken today–the first I took so I could go to yoga. I’m watching a movie, I had a cookie (and some dinner, I’m not totally depraved), and I am craving a beer. I won’t have a beer. Instead I’ll probably have coffee at whatever establishment I land tonight.

Deep breaths. I’m ready to be done with this year. I really am. And yet, something keeps me from wanting to be finished. If I finish my last exam, it means I’m really done with the first year of law school. And if I finish my first year, I have to think about the second year, and about picking classes and deciding what sort of law I want to practice and what sort of things I want to write about for my senior paper and what sort of things I’m going to do after I graduate.

It’s a little terrifying, actually. But deep breaths. I can do this. I am ready.

There are so many posts floating around in my head right now, things about conflicting news stories I’ve read and crazy cat ladies I’ve seen…but I have NO TIME to write any of them.

Sorry folks. A day or so more, and I think I’ll be back up to speed. Until then…

Yesterday, the weight of confusing material bore down on me, leading to procrastination. Today, it’s the weight of pretty-much-just-boring material, and material-I-learned-last-semester that’s pushing me to read every online newspaper in my bookmarks, every blog in my blogroll, and watch some You Tube.

Light a fire under me, someone! Please!

Have you ever had that experience where you’re feeling completely overwhelmed and confused and baffled by something, say, the first quarter of your outline for a hard class, and someone comes along and you start talking about the class, and that person asks you a question about something later in your outline, and you realize, Hey, I know this stuff! I’m NOT stupid!

It’s really a good feeling. Puts things into perspective.

Back to the outline, but with a little sense of renewal.

I just sent my mom an email that read like a telegram. Stop. What’s happened to me? Stop. I’m buried under the books, that’s what. Stop.

Will cry for help soon. Stop.