divine angst

Look, no matter what they say, work is almost always going to take over your life less than school. (At least when work is steady and/or slow. When work is busy, forget it.)

Case in point: Today was a sort of slow day for me at work. I did some research, I ran an “errand” related to a project, I went to lunch. I got home at a decent hour, changed into comfy clothes, and prompty felt like I needed something to do. Mr. Angst cooked dinner, so I really didn’t have anything to take care of.^[1]

I’m not good at sitting around watching TV–and I don’t really have anything fun to read right now, at least not that I haven’t already read.^[2] I needed something to do. So I made some banana bread, since the bananas were getting pretty ripe. Then I bathed the dog, since he hadn’t been bathed since we moved and was getting itchy. And now . . . I am actually POSTING ON MY BLOG.

This has been a pretty sweet week as far as just living goes. I’ve been eating a little healthier (the summer weight has been creeping onto me and there are clothes falling out of the rotation because they don’t fit right now), I’ve been home by 6 each night, there haven’t been any outside-of-work events extending the day well past sunset. We’ve cooked at home every night this week so far. We’ve cleared out most of the empty boxes. We’ve stocked one bookshelf. We’ve figured out where certain things will get stored and our apartment is looking less like a storage unit and more like our home. Things, right now, are very comfortable. And I like that.

I have no illusions that working at a law firm will always be like this–I think being home after 6 is more the norm than the exception, and I’m sure there will be nights when things are looming, things that could and should be done before tomorrow. But I’m just as certain that there will be at least a few nights like the ones I’ve had this week, nights where I can sit with Mr. Angst and Himself and relax, eat a home-cooked meal, do some baking, and just be myself. I love school–and working this summer has really driven home to me how much I love school–but I also love feeling like my life is a little less of a one-note chorus.

1. Were this the school year, I would almost certainly have reading to do, research to do, journal stuff to do. There’s always something more to do, something that could and should be done before tomorrow. ↩
2. I finished The Kite Runner for the second time last night. ↩

Man, I just don’t post lately. This was sort of a busy week at work (though it’s tapering off now), and it was a busy week at home (what with the graduation on Sunday and trying to finish unpacking stuff and sell the remainder of the stuff at the old place).

I’d feel worse about not posting if I had anything to post that I thought would be interesting. But since I don’t blog about Work Club, all the interesting things happening in my life are off limits. Because today, the most interesting non-work thing that happened to me was discovering Banana Republic has a 14-day price adjustment policy. This worked out well, since I just bought a dress at full price and I was able to get half of that full price back.

So that’s it around here. How about you guys?

Hah HA! FINALLY, a roundup at divine angst that is published ON TIME. And you all thought I’d become a total flake. So HERE, on time, without delay, this week’s Law School Roundup, featuring fun posts by pre-Ls, law students, and recent grads.

• Yep, it’s about pre-law-school-freakout time. (Legally numb)
• Yep, it’s about time for all the insecure idiots to start showing their colors. (A little fish in law school)
• We’re all getting a little tired of the abundance of obviousness. Is this what we pay for? (Lunching with Lions)
• It’s really looming, isn’t it? (Frequent Citations)
• A little reality from Work Club. (katlet)
• Take your nap time when you can. (Magic Cookie)
• If you’re thinking of switching schools, start here. (Mel Woods)
• Work versus dog. Dog might win. Might. (think like a woman. act like a man.)
• Those crazy New Yorkers. (Thrown for a Loop)
• Because law students need to be more passive aggressive. (Legally Blonde)

And that’s it for this week’s roundup! Look for it next week at Evan Schaeffer’s Legal Underground and back here in two weeks.

Malfunction 1: First train of the morning herked and jerked its way from one stop to the next. After being twelve minutes late.

Malfunction 2: Farmers’ market is TINY this morning, with four times as many flowers as edible vegetables or fruits.

Malfunction 3: The cart escalator at Target broke. While our cart was on it. So we had to ask the security people to stop trying to FIX the cart escalator and stop the people escalator so we could walk up it backwards and get our stuff so we could leave. Meanwhile, someone kept trying to run the cart escalator anyway, causing our cart to get wedged on top of the cart in front of it and go “Bang! Bang! Bang!” This was bad because we had two boxes of wine glasses in the cart. Thankfully, none were broken.

Malfunction 4: Not really a malfunction, just a pain–it started to rain while we were getting the Very Very Last Stuff out of our old apartment, with help from the Angst-in-laws.

Malfunction 5: No room in the car for me, so I took the train home from the old apartment and, you guessed it, there were train problems of the herky jerky kind again.

Thankfully, there have been no further malfunctions. The evening went well. The kitchen is fully unpacked, we have 8 new wineglasses (including some lovely new pinot goblets), and I made a delicious dinner for all four of us. Mmmmm.

Ta!

Our building is having some work done to the facade right now, including power washing. The building manager posted a helpful note the other day, letting us all know that the power washing guys said sometimes windows leak because of the high pressure of the water used when they power wash the walls, and we should all be aware. Then the sign said that if the workers got behind, they might have to make the time up on “Saturday’s.” [sic]

This morning, as I got in the elevator to take the dog down for his morning constitutional, I noticed someone had circled the offending apostrophe and written right next to it: -2

I love our new building.

So Work Club and Moving Club are keeping me SUPER BUSY, so super busy that I haven’t really been posting at all lately, and for that I apologize. The nutshell on my life is:

Tax is more interesting than I thought it would be.
Our new apartment is so much better than I even hoped it could be.
We still have a bunch of stuff at the old apartment that has to be dealt with this weekend.
Mr. Angst graduates this weekend and the Angst-in-laws will be here, so there’s a time management problem looming.
Journal stuff looms and looms and looms. And looms.

Um, yeah. That’s my life. That and trying to figure out where all of our books go, now that we’ve gotten rid of two of our bookshelves. (We haven’t actually gotten rid of them; if anyone in Our City needs bookshelves or a honey oak media shelf (or a baker’s rack or wire storage shelving for that matter), should Let Me Know.)

By the way, I want to take a moment to give a big, giant CONGRATS to Mr. Angst, who got his last grad school grades today–and yes, his GPA is a million times better than mine–and I am SO PROUD of him.

Of course, he also sprained his ankle this week, so he is not only a proud soon-to-be holder of a Master’s degree but he also has a zombie ankle. (It’s all bruised and purple. Mmmmmm.)

Congrats, Mr. Angst! I am so very, very proud of you.

If one more person posts about The Sopranos without spoiler tags or warnings, I’m gonna get pissed. Because of Comcast’s ineptitude in EVERYTHING, we still do not have HBO at our new apartment and I still have not seen the finale. So SHUSH.

Thank you.

Whew! There was a lot to get through for this Roundup, and I hope I’ve done justice to the two weeks of posts I had to choose from! Not only did these posts get published, but also a bunch of folks graduated and started bar study. Others started their summer jobs. It’s been a busy couple of weeks for all of us, in other words. Enjoy these posts, then, and take them as a sample of how law students live and breathe and write.

• The trick to losing that 10 lbs: cook and eat for you, not one more of him. (Ostranenie)
• Yep, you really can’t talk about Work Club. (A little fish in law school)
• The LSAT wasn’t bad enough?? (From Malibu to Waco)
• Can’t you wait till 3L to do this stuff? Gunnner. (loco delictis)
• Rollie bags are always sort of lame (ask me, I have one), but at work, they’re even lamer. (Who Owns the Fox?)
• Of course there’s a uniform in this profession. (Burning Light of Reason)
• The best advice it might be too late for you to follow–but valuable anyway. (Frequent Citations)
• Yep, that sounds like a summer in Work Club. (katlet)
• A day off as a summer associate? Seriously? Paycheck plus free daylight? ROCK. (Lag Liv)
• Being a working mom has some trickier logistics than non-moms might think. (Magic Cookie)
• Some good transfer student advice (Mel Woods)
• Snort. (Peanut Butter Burrito)
• Apparently respect comes cheap these days. (T Sinister)
• Bus scholarship (Thrown for a Loop)
• It’s the end of an era. (Crescat Sententia)
• Reminder: Law school ≠ Bar study (Transmogriflaw)
• Choose your snack food considerately, please. (pseudostoops)
• One heroic law student. (The Merits of the Case)
• That seems pretty typical. (The Namby Pamby, J.D.)
• Parents, teach your children well. (Pargolo goes to the circus)
• Books on tape aren’t just for road trips anymore (WonL: Bar Edition)

And that’s it for this week’s Roundup here. Evan has his normally scheduled Roundup in the works, and I believe it’ll be posted tomorrow, so check over there–it’s Double Fun Week! Next week’s Roundup will be right back here. We’ll be back on our normal broadcasting schedule soon. (Or, I’ll be back on my normal broadcast schedule soon; Evan’s a rock star.)

So I was supposed to do the Roundup last weekend, didn’t; meant to do it belatedly this week, didn’t; and now it’s Sunday and technically Evan’s turn.

So this post is to let you know I WILL be doing the Roundup tonight. Consider last week a hiatus, and this week a return. I’ve moved, I’ve been away for the weekend, I’ve been buried under work–but now I’m BACK and ready to get my routine going again.

Look for it in a couple of hours.

I think it finally hit me.

That is: the lack of sleep, the non-stop packing and editing and editing and packing, the general worry about whether I’m doing enough at my summer job, and the stupid, stupid weather.

I think I’ve been pretty tireless for the last two weeks–and that’s good, because I needed to be–but I think it’s finally caught up to me. I’m wiped. I’m wiped and I’m pissy and I’m brain dead. I reread the same two sentences twelve times this evening (while trying to make up for some lost hours at work), and I still couldn’t tell you what they said, or why they were important. At home, I find myself unable to concentrate on finishing one task–I keep getting distracted into doing something else. Everything seems sort of hazy.

I keep reminding myself that tomorrow is moving day and we’ll be done with all this soon, and that I’m taking a little vacation this weekend (albeit work-related). And that when I get back on Sunday things will look better, clearer, brighter. But right now, I just want to hide my head in the sand and sleep.

Apparently I don’t sleep any more. I go to bed late and I get up early. I wake up hours, or at least significant portions of an hour, before my alarm goes off. I can’t go back to sleep, even when I try thinking about the really cool dream I was having (and that almost always works).

I’m hoping this extended stretch of psuedo-insomnia (insomnia for me, who is accustomed to sleeping 8 hours at LEAST) is only related to the journal duties I’ve essentially finished (for the time) and the move. I’m hoping I’ll sleep like a baby on Tuesday night. I’m hoping this lack of sleep isn’t affecting me in other ways.

In any case, the apartment is very nearly completely packed up–we have all the most important stuff in boxes. All of the food is still in its usual place, but I’m less worried about my spices and nonperishables (and the scant collection of stuff in the fridge) than I am about things like the cover and pillows on the futon and bed (must be packed up by 8 am tomorrow) as well as the ulcer I’m pretty sure Himself is developing. Lucky for him, he gets to go to the vet today and play with his friends. When he comes home, he’ll be coming home to a new place. I hope it’s as much a relief for him as it will be for me.

After a full day of boxing stuff up, I now actually feel like we’re moving this week. We have only a narrow strip of floor to walk on, foam peanuts and packing paper litters the floor in the kitchen, and I’m starting to get that edgy tummy feeling.

It’s always this way for the few days leading up to a move with me. I start to feel really crappy about moving, between getting nostalgic about the place we’re leaving and dreading having to get settled in the new place. And it’s not just about getting our stuff settled in. It’s more about me getting settled in–finding the neighborhood spots as well as learning the tricks about which outlets are switched and how best to arrange the clothes in the closet.

So I’m in that place right now. The next day and a half won’t be fun. But when I go home from work on Tuesday, I’ll be going home to a new place, and that’ll be really nice.^[1]

1. As stressed out as I am right now, too, I can’t imagine how much worse I’d be if we didn’t have a full month left to get everything out of the current place. The money guilt isn’t enough to make me regret that decision. ↩

My last offer of furniture here was incredibly successful–my coffee table and end table are now gone, to a reader. I’m glad the set goes to a good home; it’s good stuff, just doesn’t match the rest of our stuff any more.

In light of all that, I’m offering MORE furniture! If you live in my city or know someone else who does, I have bunches more stuff to sell (well, practically give away). We have a media bookcase that fits CDs and DVDs perfectly (and so is very slim in profile–handy!). We have some bookshelves. We have an old TV stand that’s perfectly serviceable, if inexpensive. And we have some wire shelving (purchased at The Container Store–the kind where you buy the poles and the shelves and then you put it all together yourself). Finally, we have a baker’s rack, which I LOVE, but for which there is no place in our new, open-floorplan apartment.

Can you tell I’ve got moving on my mind? I’ve been packing up the kitchen this morning, and it seems to be going well. The best part about packing up the kitchen this time is that we are not taking our dishes with us. We are getting NEW dishes, so I’m leaving the old ones here and will offer them to anyone who wants them, as well. (It’s good stuff, but a couple of the plates and bowls are chipped.)

OK, my break is over. Back to work!

I think I may have some mental relaxation time coming up now. I’ve finished most of my intellectually demanding tasks–at least for now–and all that’s in front of me is The Move. The Move involves some non-relaxation time, but that non-relaxation time is largely non-intellectual, non-relaxation time. I.e., physical labor. Packing and lifting. Lifting and packing. Things I can do without mental stress. Or much mental stress; I will continue to worry about getting everything done “on time.”

Anyway, it’s Saturday, I finished some important work, I’ve been out with some friends, and I’m going to meet up with some old college friends in a bit. So it’s been a good day.

Has anyone else noticed that NO ONE looks good in those super-skinny jeans? I mean, every girl (or boy) wearing them might as well be wearing denim leggings. And leggings should only be worn at costume parties.