Open bar: life lessons

In the interests of keeping this blog relatively free of blackmail material I'm not quite sure if I should write about Thursday night, but I'm doing it anyways. This was the night of the Halloween party at the club with the open bar. Open bars are perilous. Lesson learned...now. The problem with the open bar is that there were always lines and because the drinks are free you might as well save time and get two. So every time I went to get a drink I got two drinks. If I had any foresight whatsoever I would have noticed this was going to be a problem. Good thing I had a couple of beers before I got to the bar, so my powers of foresight were diminished already. Long story short I had a good time hanging out with people, don't quite remember how I got home (there was a taxi that I ended up jetting from - don't quite remember the circumstances), and ended up with my own miniature version of "The Hangover" in my apartment the next morning. That is to say that there were some things that were just off. I woke up in a different shirt than the one I was wearing the night before, I had two full cups of water on my night table (why did I pour two?), and one of the plastic drawers I have in my closet was in the shower. I can't explain much of this. I woke up at 8 am, emailed my professor I was using one of our three free 'skips' for class, and went back to bed. I woke up again at noon, thought the clock was joking me, and somehow made it to my make up LRW class. The entire day my body could not get enough water to rehydrate itself no matter how much water I drank. It was ridiculous.

Last night I went to a networking happy hour with some lawyers who my friend knows from the FTC. (Note: I did not touch alcohol yesterday; the thought of it made me ill.) It was nice to see that there is something waiting in the future beyond law school, namely jobs that can be enjoyable. They all work for the government and love it. And they all hate big firms and say law school sucks. Good to get some encouragement from those who have come before. One woman who went to Harvard was especially vehement about law school sucking. It's nice to know that even the best and the brightest have the same issues as the rest of us little people.

When I was walking back from school the other day there was this guy waiting to cross the street right next to me. I couldn't help but notice he was wearing a "National Rifle Association: Member" leather coat. He was also holding an NRA bag. And had on an NRA hat. Gulp. What's the status of gun laws in the district? I wanted to ask the guy if he was packing heat. I also wanted to ask the guy if he was familiar with the clause in the Constitution that says "A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state." But you don't really want to mouth off to NRA members...

Procrastination Face

It's been a pretty busy week. Between doing work and procrastinating that's filled up a lot of my time. Tonight my time will be filled up by an open bar for Halloween, sponsored by school. How could you say no to that? Tomorrow will hopefully be filled up by actually getting work done. What's that? Oh yeah, every day I don't write more on my memo is a day closer to it being due. Which means that soon I'll have to, you know, do it.

Yesterday I spent my time not doing work by doing improv with a group called Jesus Cat. I miss improv a lot. It was great to just be humorous for a couple of hours and not have to deal with the stresses of 'school' and 'homework' and 'the real world' and 'money,' etc. I'd much rather pretend to be the first dinosaur to walk on the moon than to read about some idiot who drove drunk and what kind of homicide he can be prosecuted for. Plus it's good to get away from current and future lawyers who, I've noticed, have an unnatural propensity for inducing stress. Hooray doing comedy! Hopefully there is more comedy to come.

My feelings on my Torts professor have to soften, I have no options. While today he dissed Oliver Wendell Holmes again, he did mention in class that his ten year old daughter is taking up fencing. That's a classic dilemma for me. I appealed to my better side and went up to him after class, told him that I fenced for a while and recommended a club in the area. He said he was thankful for the recommendation and that if he had any further questions about the sport he'd come to me. I told him no problem. So maybe he doesn't hate me? Life lesson: even stupid conservatives have feelings, and he loves his daughter...awww. I can get behind that. I think I may have actually convinced him into making his daughter fence though. He told me he watched her and she was really into it and aggressive. I told him that aggressiveness is the most desirable quality in female fencers because most of them just don't have it. He said something to the extent of "Well, I think we may have found the right sport for her." If she likes it then great, but I retain my mixed feelings about fencing. It had its good times and it was good for me, but it also had awful moments. I hope I didn't just inadvertently set this little girl onto a miserable life path. It's not likely, but hey it could happen. Maybe she ends up selling coke on the street to raise enough money to rewire her epee. You don't know, it could happen. Probably not though since her father is a lawyer and presumably has a decent amount of money. Oh yeah.

About 15 people in the entire school wore Halloween costumes today. I was not among them, though I was sitting there feeling pretty awkward for them. Best costume award goes to a guy and girl who dressed up as Kanye West and Taylor Swift, respectively. It was hard to get at first because I don't really know who Taylor Swift is and the guy being Kanye was white, but they had a picture with them which helped the understanding process a good deal.

My boss from the summer (the one that I hated) got fired this week, I was just informed. That's what you get for tip-splitting as a salaried employee. Not only is it illegal and immoral, but it also opens up the people you work for to a lot of lawsuits. Good call firing him. Also, he sucked, so that's another good reason.

It's not fair

On Sunday when I was coming back from Boston the person who gave me my ticket at the gate was awesome. I walked up to get my actual boarding pass - for some reason Southwest didn't feel like giving it to me when I checked in automatically - and there's this guy sitting there behind the desk with clearly fake boobs, wearing a blouse, skirt, and heels. The guy has a 5 o'clock shadow and isn't wearing makeup. The best part is that he has long hair dyed bright blue, saying "I don't give a crap what you think of me." It definitely takes some self-confidence to pull that all off. Go for it, man. If that's what you want to do and it doesn't inhibit you doing your job, rock those boobs and that unshaven face. My guess is this is a guy who has put up with a lot over the years.

I really had to buckle down today to get a substantial portion (think a third) of Memo 2 written today. It took 3-4 hours, but the first draft of that much of it is done. I just have to remember to send it into the Writing Center tomorrow to give them adequate time to look it over. I wouldn't want the reason I stayed at school from 10-7 today to go to waste. Wowza that was a lot of work. And I haven't even/am not doing tonight all my reading for tomorrow. Instead I hung out with Dan for an hour and tried to care about my homework. That wasn't very successful. If I get cold called in Torts tomorrow I might be pretty screwed. Here's hoping. But my professor probably doesn't like me anyways, so whatever. It's a tie though, since I'm not his biggest fan, ideologically speaking that is. Some time in our last week of class he declared that he doesn't care about fairness. This is in the context of a debate about whether strict liability or negligence should be the standard. If you don't understand that, don't worry. My professor went to Chicago, is conservative, and thus loves law and economics type stuff. What is important to him is that law makes society run efficiently (in a very monetary sense of the term). Basically the point of law is to save money for society (probably an unfair attribution, there are more nuances, but that's the crux of it). As such, some things are unfair, but he's ok with that because remember he doesn't care about fairness. So if someone acts completely non-negligently going about their daily business and some accident happens to his neighbor involving his property, he should have to pay no matter what (strict liability) as long as this is what is efficient for the court system. To illustrate his dedication to this efficiency idea he talked about how his kids fight. If both of his children get ice cream and one comes to him and says "She got more than me. That's not fair," his response is "Well, I don't care about fairness," and so his kids learn quickly not to use that argument. I don't care if he is joking or not, someone should call child services. Can you picture rebuking your children that way? You don't care if they are treated fairly? That is your flesh and blood, sir. I certainly hope you want them to be treated fairly and not just efficiently. I hope that if child services ever did take away his kids he would tell them "It's not fair!" and they would just laugh maniacally.

For a lunch break today I got to meet with an investigator for my friend's government security clearance. It wasn't too hard. Most of the questions were gimmes. For example "Has she ever been part of or associated with a group who desires to violently overthrow the government of the United States?" It wasn't too difficult to get the right answer on that one. Not the most discreet of investigators. He's nothing compared to Sherlock Holmes, whose magnificently clever tales I have been enjoying of late.

Not enough people use semicolons anymore; someone should do something about that. Haha, I'm hilarious.

Bull

So that wasn't the best trip to Boston that ever happened. But this is not the forum for talking about problems (that's livejournal). This is the forum for recounting hilarity and voicing pointless opinions. And in the past week there have certainly been opportunities for hilarity and opinions. Good thing.

The most notable ridiculous thing was going out for Erica's 21st birthday to a club in Boston. A bunch of people (Erica, Chris, Scott, Karishma, Dana, Dave, etc.) took the shuttle into Boston from Waltham. By the time we got off the shuttle everyone had to pee pretty badly. The boys were complaining a little louder than the girls about it, and the girls (mostly Erica) told us not to cry so much. You try having a prostate! I considered peeing in an ally and did not do so; in retrospect that was a poor decision. We walked from the shuttle stop to the T, took the T (everyone except Scott and I almost didn't make it off the T for lack of paying attention), and walked to the club. By this time there was no more being called a wussy for having to pee really badly. Everyone had to. We ran/wadled into Dunkin Donuts. They always have bathrooms! False. Employees only. Across the street, Starbucks has bathrooms! Employees only. Well that did it. We got to the club slightly before I exploded with urine. A couple of people didn't make it past the bouncer (for bad, yet legal reasons). I couldn't wait to see how the situation would resolve itself. I ran to the bathroom. (I'm sure you want to hear this) I would say it was one of the most rewarded pees of my life, but it wasn't. I think I had been holding it in for so long that it went past the point of being rewarding and reaching the stage where it was actually difficult. Gross. The worst part of the bathroom was by far the fact that this club employed a guy to hand out paper towels. So this guy's job is to stand there, watch me pee, offer me a paper towel (because it's usually really hard to get those for yourself), and hope for a tip. A tip for paper towel guy after I paid a cover at the door? I don't think so.

Now I don't like clubs very much in general. Anyplace where the music is too loud to have a conversation with someone, the drinks are expensive yet served in plastic cups, and the DJ combines Rihanna and AC/DC and everyone loves it is not particularly for me. Clubs just kinda scream date rape. But getting beyond my regular skepticism, the best part of this club was easily the mechanical bull. A vehicle for attention and embarassment. It was pretty clearly meant for girls; every guy who went on lasted about 4 seconds while girls lasted closer to 4 minutes. One girl had the right idea, she wore under armor shorts. Another girl had the wrong idea, she refused to let go of the bull even after her dress simultaneously rode up and came down. She actually asked the guy running the bull to stop it for a second so she could fix her dress, apparently thinking that the exact same thing wouldn't happen when the bull started up again. She was wrong. Mercifully she fell off. Not to be deterred she was dancing on one of the polls soon after (a classic case of high self-esteem).

I ended up re-living the glory days, in the way that I was up until 4 am that night/morning. I didn't know I still had that in me. At least I, unlike some other people, didn't wake up and start drinking again. Of course I did wake up pretty early comparitively and go with Chris to Dunkin Donuts and to reclaim Dana's car. I got to drive her car back to Erica's house. It was a BMW. No big deal. Easily the nicest car I have driven. It had all these newfangled features like 'power windows' and 'automatic locks.' What is all that mumbo jumbo? My car never had that. Half way through the drive in the BMW I got cut off by some guy pulling out of a parking space who immediately pulled into a different parking space 3 cars down. Right after that some guy turning left tried to cut me off. That's when I remembered I was driving a good car and am from Boston. I stepped on the gas and cut him off in his attempt to cut me off. Take that, jerkface. In retrospect it wasn't that exciting or novel a move. It was also a little reckless given that I was driving someone else's Beamer. But it's the one move that I pulled while driving a sweet car, so I felt pretty good about it. Big man on campus. Look out.

Shaked and I went to the craziest book store in Brighton. There is some ambiguity in how that sentence can be interpreted, so let me clear it up. The first interpretation of is that I went to the craziest book store in all of Brighten, or Brighton's craziest book store. The second is that I went to the craziest book store and it happened to be in Brighton. Both interpretations are valid, and I mean both. Why point out the ambiguity then, you may ask. Good question. This book store literally looks like someone's attic. It's cramped and full of used books and records. And there is absolutely no discernable order to how they are shelved. We found two copies of the same Hemingway book in completely separate places. Every book's spine seems to be breaking. If there aren't significant creases in the book it's not allowed in the shop. It was a lot of fun poking around to see if there were any golden finds in the stacks of useless aged books. I almost bought a copy of Voltaire, but changed my mind. Sometime when I have more time I'm going back there.

No more...Mr. Nice Guy

I'm pretty sure there is no more studying I can do for this midterm that will be productive. I had a review session today; I went over a practice midterm with a few classmates; I reviewed all my notes again. Was any of that helpful? Probably. But not definitely. So no more. I'm worried that I'm not worried about the test. Is that worrisome? Who cares? Let's do this.

"Fly, you fools."

Ok, tomorrow I'm flying to Boston. Woohoo. Sometimes I love capitalism. Usually when there is a good deal of competition which is driving down prices (so not in reference to the current health insurance system in this country), like in the airline industry at least between Washington and Boston. Southwest, Jet Blue, and (God help us) Air Tran are all competing. Which makes my tickets cheaper! Air Tran is the crappiest airline I've ever had the displeasure of flying on, and as such I refuse to give them my patronage. Granted I flew on it when it was first getting started and was figuring its stuff out, but my flight attendants referred to themselves as "The J Team" because they were three women whose names all started with J. Fantastic. Give me my peanuts and shut up. (I was in no mood for their shenanigans at the time of that flight. Nakul knows.)

My biggest problem with watching postseason baseball or Sunday football is definitely the commercials. I have seen the same Viagra commercial three dozen times, and I'm still not anywhere nearer to using their product. That has a lot to do with my age, however. Also the Blackberry commercial that has "All You Need Is Love" in the background and has nothing to do with phones? It's driving me crazy. I now dislike that song, thanks Blackberry, I'll remember that favor when I consider purchasing your product.

We got our Memo 1 grades back today. I did fine I think, but that's not the point. The point is that Gunner is not a somehow brilliant, just socially retarded, kid. He's just a regular socially retarded kid, who is also plain bad at academics. The only reason I know is that Gunner told someone his grade and asked to see the other kid's paper because he felt the professor had "discriminated" against him in grading. Our papers were graded blindly and did not have our names on them. Yes, your memo was discriminated against in grading because it was bad. But apparently he can't keep his outrage to himself. He's gotta share it with everyone. Too bad no one cares. I almost feel bad for him. If he didn't speak in class for 3 days I would be willing to give a bit of sympathy. Deal, or no deal? Of course it is no surprise that he can't keep his grade to himself because he can't keep all of the dumb ideas he has in class to himself. Wow, vitriol much? Apparently.

Umbrella

Being in a Yankee bar was incredibly uncomfortable during a baseball game. While I was not wearing any Red Sox paraphernalia I did not want to cede the moral high ground to Yankees fans by pretending I was one of them. So what did I do? Root for the Angels and commiserate with the two other Red Sox fans who were also there undercover.

Yesterday it was awful out. Cold, dark, and rainy all day. It was a study/laundry type of day. I think I ate three bowls of cereal, but now I'm out of milk so I don't know how that's going to work today. Dry cereal? But I did get a lot of studying done. Woot. I ventured out of my apartment in the evening to go hang out with Gavi. On the way down the escalator of the Metro I got stuck behind a woman with a huge umbrella, just standing there. The escalator is covered, there was no rain coming down, but she's just standing there like the queen of the escalator, completely oblivious that maybe her 5 ft. wide umbrella is in the way. This is a long escalator, and I didn't want to wait for her to realize that once you have a roof over your head you no longer require an umbrella, so I politely said excuse me. I got the dirtiest look, like I had just told her she was so fat thatI was going to roll her down the stairs. Whatever lady, be considerate.

This damn news story about the kid who wasn't in the balloon in Colorado is the dumbest thing ever. It is still getting coverage. Now the coverage is of the coverage. Who covered it too much? Who made this into a story? Whose fault is this? It was a dumb story; the kid was in the attic, let's get over it and move on to real news. At the end of the day it's a story about a kid who wasn't in a balloon. There are hundreds of millions of people in this country who are not in a balloon every day. La-di-da.

Greater good

Both a lot, and very little has happened this week. I'm just ready to get this midterm over, and I'm thankful that it's Friday and I don't have class next week. Of course I have Memo 2 to beast, but all in due time. I also have baseball to watch, even if the Red Sox have sadly sucked sufficiently to be taken out of the postseason. Oh yeah, and Torts to study for. Meh, I'm not too worried.

What I am worried about is Gunner's conduct in class. One day I am going to lose it and just yell at him. His ability to get called on is downright uncanny. He gets to voice his (dumb) opinion usually a minimum of 3 times per class. And he always starts off with "Well as I take it," or "In my experience." No one cares what you have to say! And two thirds of the time what you say is exactly wrong. Often the professor is too nice to tell you that point blank, but I think they are losing their patience. Yesterday Gunner was particularly bad, which is what is inspiring this. In Torts, for whatever reason, he started saying a theory of liability seemed to be justified by "the greater good. Like Nietzsche and Nazi-fascist kind of thing." He continued for a minute or two talking about how Nietzsche valued the greater societal good while the five philosophy majors in my class had miniature seizures. Jared started audibly saying "No, no, no," and after a minute of my mouth hanging open I couldn't control myself and just said "That's not what Nietzsche says. At all." By the way, Nietzsche is a rabid individualist, who has no purposeful ideological ties to fascism and says nothing of the sort. After class Jared went up to him and asked Gunner what Nietzsche he had read. "Some things," was the response. It quickly became apparent that by "some things" he meant "nothing." And Jared politely told him he was full of crap. I had nothing nice to say, so I said nothing at all. But this is why people shouldn't repeat stupid things that they hear just to sound smart.

Speaking of things I don't understand, Matt shared a nice article about the large Hadron collidor (that physics thing in Switzerland?) which is crazy. It's in the NYTimes. Apparently there is a particle they are trying to create which two physicists believe is so unnatural that the particle is actually working against its own creation and will sabotage the project. The useful analogy they provide is a time traveler going back in time to kill his grandfather. What? Are you for serious? This is blowing my mind! Ask Matt about it, he'll have a better grasp. Physics is something I know nothing about, but wish I did. Not liking numbers or math makes it pretty rough to keep up though. However I did have a crazy conversation with Dan about the possibility of time travel. A philosophy major and an economics major talking about something neither of them have much of an idea about, it was pretty sweet. It makes me miss dorm room philosophy. And dorm room Matt explaining science to me so I have slightly more than zero grasp on science. I still don't understand entropy, and I'm becoming convinced I never will!

My boss from the summer who I hated may be in a bit of trouble (read: out of a job) quite soon. I will be following developments with a stupid grin on my face.

This afternoon I went to court to observe a criminal trial, on orders from my Crim Law professor. The judge has a button that creates white noise during side bar conversations so the jury can't hear. It's so cool! I want one! The defendant was charged with possession of cocaine and marijuana with the intent to distribute. He was caught with an eight ball (3.5 oz.) of coke, and half an ounce of pot. The defense is just trying to get them to drop the intent to distribute. Good luck with that. He was caught with the drugs in 32 separate baggies? Oh right, because that's how drugs are usually used and not sold. Good call. Highlight was when the defendant was on the stand and responded to a question that he has never smoked drugs with anyone else, always by himself. That's about as believable as Nicholas Cage's acting. Hi, my name is perjury. Ok, cool.

Torkts

I'm pretty sure that law school is a large conspiracy to make 1L's as panicked as possible. That's why we get a writing assignment today that is due Friday right before our first midterm.
My perspective: it's a draft on a memo section and the midterm is a 1 hour test.
Other people's perspective: I don't know exactly what I'm supposed to do and when I write I have to make actual decisions which may have consequences for my grade, and this midterm is my first test and I don't know how it's going to go and I don't know how well I know the material.
The big difference is that other people's perspective is a run on sentence.
But, I believe, we are expected to take the midterm on our computer. I've never taken an exam on a computer before. Back in my day we hand wrote papers and used computers for exams and sporcle.com. Not anymore. This ain't your grandfather's test. Your grandfather probably doesn't even know how to use the internet. Unless he's wicked hip. Hell, I realize that I barely know how to use the internet. I'm part of the last generation to remember the pre-internet dark ages. That's creepy. And internet isn't one of those things where you don't let your kid use it until they are in middle school, like a cell phone (I have a plan). My real trepidation with taking exams on my computer is that my K key has been acting up recently. So I may be turning in an exam talking about a lot of torkts, which I don't see going over too well. Already I've had to delete about 3 erroneous k's in this entry. But now I'm not sure if I'm just blaming the keyboard when the problem is actually my overzealous right middle finger.

This morning someone burned popcorn in the hall outside of my Torts class. I didn't even know there was a microwave up there, but apparently there is, and apparently someone needed popcorn before 10 am. Popcorn is absolutely not a morning food. I don't think it's an anytime food, but I am willing to concede that many people have a different opinion on that. Problem is that I loathe the smell of burnt popcorn. It kills me. In fact I skipped going to the bathroom before class because I would have had to walk through the smell. I eventually needed to go and held my breath the entire way.

My Criminal Law reading had a non-horrific crime as its subject for the first time in about 2 months. Yes, I was relieved to read about a guy who got caught with 138 balloons full of cocaine in his stomach at LAX. But it lead me to question how he fit them all. That's so many balloons to swallow and to subsequently expel from your body. Drug trafficking (from Columbia, way to stereotype textbook) does not seem like a fun occupation.

This evening I got to talk with one of Gavi's friends who did improv in college. It was fantastic to talk a little about improv. Of course she was a bit of a long form snob, but that's ok. I miss comedy...maybe I'll re-read Impro and it will make me feel like I'm doing improv. Starting an improv group at law school? Yes please. Well, I'm working on it. No one really wants to give me information on how to set it up. All I really need is the ability to print out and post fliers. Also, I should probably find a place to do it and decide on a structure for it. But this is all pending approval as a club. Like I said, I'm working on it. A little comedy is just what life needs.

Mostly Empty

Emma came to visit this weekend. Predictably, though through no fault of her own, she was about 4 hours late getting here on Saturday. Jessica also came from Delaware for Saturday night. Emma got kicked out of the Big Hunt for hopping a wall on the patio and sitting on someone else's property. In preparation for my Torts midterm, I can tell you that is trespass. But a fifth grader could also have told you that. Apparently Emma wasn't thinking about it at the moment. What repercussions? Oh, right. It wasn't a big deal. Also not a big deal: stealing nachos. But there were soggy, so it wasn't the best. Sunday morning Jessica woke both me and Emma up at 7 in the morning to try to convince us to go to Starbucks. Um, no. I'm sorry. That's too early for life on Saturday. It's an ungodly hour. I like Starbucks, but that's no excuse for being woken up that early.

Sunday Emma ended up staying for the night partly because she's awesome and partly because her ride ditched her/didn't pick up her phone because she stupidly left it in the trunk of her car for 5 hours. But before all that we went to the National Equality March. We walked down the the White House, met up with the march, and walked to the Capitol Lawn. Google Maps says that's 2.5 miles. Woot. There's my workout for the day. They didn't release crowd estimates, but there were tens of thousands of people. I wouldn't be surprised if it surpassed 100,000 people. With almost as many homemade signs and rainbow flags. It was a really cool experience. I was very proud to be a participant. Also, Don't Ask Don't Tell and DOMA are awful laws and are state-sponsored discrimination, which I'm not so ok with in any way. (Except against Republicans...?) Among the speakers who we saw were Judy Sheppard, Matthew Shepard's mother (or related to the Laramie Project, if that's how you prefer to understand things), Miranda (I think?) from Sex and the City, and Lady Gaga. When Lady Gaga got up to speak there was a mad rush to the stage, like someone was giving out free beer only the beer was irresistible to gay men. She spoke for a little, it was fine. She loves her gay fans. But she included a quip about how she won't support any homophobia or misogyny in music. That's all well and good, Lady Gaga, but didn't Akon sign you? Aren't you on his record label? Oh yeah. Just checking.

On the way back from the Capitol Lawn Emma and I passed an ambulance taking care of someone. But I'm pretty sure that the guy was dead. As in, he didn't look like he was breathing or moving and the paramedics weren't in a particular rush to do anything, like get a dead body off the street. Holy crap! I'm not sure I've ever seen a freshly dead guy before. A little spooky. I'm not a fan. I'll try really hard in law school so I don't have to drop out and become an undertaker. Or a professional wrestler (The Undertaker...that was the most hick-ish thing I've said maybe ever).

I don't want to even talk about Boston Sports right now. But I will say this: Papelbon maybe should be on suicide watch right now. But, as BDP pointed out to me, the Celtics won their preseason game yesterday. So the glass is about 1/8 full, better known as mostly empty.

Imperial Stormtroopers

Success! I finally got to have a good, quality Star Wars conversation with people at school that I didn't even initiate! I didn't even have to look like the only nerd! It was inspired by this movie:

http://www.collegehumor.com/video:1920944

I recommend it. I talked about my ambition to attend class dressed as an Imperial Stormtrooper and one girl actively encouraged it. She actually said she would give me between $15-20 if I did it. Fantastic. As true Star Wars fans do, we all agreed that Empire is the best movie. Made some nerdy references. I refrained from talking about IG-88 this time (that's a bounty hunter droid, for you lesser nerds). And the conversation even got to Lord of the Rings. I am now, more than ever, motivated to spend an entire day watching the extended versions of all the LotR movies consecutively. Matt and I never actually got around to it. Some day, dammit. But it's nice knowing I'm not the only out of the closet nerd at school.

Last night I ended up going to bar review at an aptly named bar named George. You'll never guess where in DC it is (Hint: Georgetown is an area of DC...). I went in crappy jeans, sneakers, and my Red Sox cap. When I got there there was a guest list, people in suits, and classy stuff all around. Whoopsies. But I kind of liked being the person who was clearly not uptight in the bar. While there were a lot of things that screamed class in that bar, there were also things that gave me pause. Here's a perfect example: $3 PBR's as a drink special. A $3 beer special is on the expensive side (and every other drink was minimum $5), yet the special is PBR, which is the opposite of class. It was a conundrum. It got crowded pretty quickly and there were a lot of non-law school students there, so it wasn't your typical bar review. I also became an old man this year and got tired early. Plus the Red Sox lost, so I didn't have motivation to stay out that late. I awoke to the news of Obama's Nobel Peace Prize. What? Confused. For now, I'm looking forward to the weekend. And go Red Sox.

Dick Dastardly

Baseball is a fantastic sport. I am so excited for the Red Sox and the postseason. Pardon me, I am wicked excited. Wicked. I'm gonna throw the ball wicked hahd.

At school this is kind of the week of impending doom. Through some confusion I didn't hand in my outline for Memo 2 on time. But it's ungraded and my professor understands, so it's ok. But that's not a great start to the memo. Now I'm trying to get ahead on the memo this weekend so that I can study for my Torts midterm all week next week. And by all week I mean in addition to our regular classwork. No big deal, right? Ahhh. That's why impending doom. But I can't be too worried about the midterm, particularly when my professor names a character in the situation presented "Dick Dastardly." At least he did that in last year's midterm, of which we have a copy, but of course I have not looked at yet. We'll get to that in good time. A week is enough to study for a 1 hour test, right? Well it'd better be.

Yesterday I was planning on working on Memo 2 after classes, but I planned to meet up for a drink with my godfather's daughter's ex-boyfriend. No joke-that's the connection. His name is Sam. Actually, one of his paintings is in the hall of my house. He's a good deal older than me, I think he helped babysit me when I was like 9, but no matter. Now we are both of legal drinking age and met up during happy hour, which makes any social situation more likely to be a success. And a success it was (not because I was drunk, I wasn't). We talked for a while and then a friend of his from the Peace Corps came, who was cool too. Yeah, Sam did Peace Corps in Turkmenistan. That's a real place I'm told. Apparently it is home to a brutal totalitarian dictatorship. Sweet. Sam's been in DC for 3 months working as a journalist covering nuclear energy policy, in which he has no particular background. But he likes his job and he has a job, so good for him. We talked about shoes and ships and ceiling wax and cabbages and kings. And other things which are more relevant. Sam's a cool guy whose done a lot of stuff, and, very importantly, he's not a law school student or lawyer, so it was a good time for me. Also it was at the Big Hunt which is the most normal bar in Dupont Circle. Because it is Dupont it is clearly not a dive bar, but at least it tries to be. You can't really be a dive bar when everyone (except me) is wearing a collared shirt. But at least they don't put up trendy photos or make everything leather or new-age in some way. Overall I'm a fan.

It actually makes me miss hipsters. I'm not a hipster, but sometimes I like having them around. I'm sympathetic to their attitude. And I like watching them be too cool for everyone else. Also messenger bags.

Right, hanging out with Sam. Basically we had a couple beers, ate some burgers (half price burger night!), and did normal, non-stressy things. I hope to do it again some time. Also, we sat on the patio where Sam and his friend (damn, wish I remembered his name...he's Brazilian and not Thiago?) pretty much chain smoked the entire time. For the first hour after I left all I could smell was smoke, and I was convinced I smelled like a pack of Marlboros. I made Anat smell me and then smell my coat, but amazingly there was not a trace of smoke on me. Crazy. Maybe cigarettes really are magical. Probably not though. Also, we got approached by some guy promoting Camel cigarettes who suckered me into giving him my email address by promising me a free Camel zippo lighter. Of course I got to see the lighter after he had all my info. Then he immediately peaced out. Hrmm. Well, turns out the lighter looks awesome, but doesn't come with any lighter fluid. Awesome, that's how I like my lighters. Jackass.

Shippin' Up

Friday to early today (Monday) was spent in Boston. And it was glorious. It was great to see everyone. Erika, Shaked, Robin, Jordan, and lots of other people.

Friday I'm done with class at noon, so I got an early start to my trip. I got to BWI around 2:30 for a flight that began boarding at 4:15. Good thing I brought some work to do. I sat in a restaurant, ordered a beer, and spread out the 12 cases I had printed out earlier that morning. Yes, it was Memo 2 time. I got a lot of work done in that Mexican-themed airport restaurant. But what really made the experience was the guy who sat down next to me. This guy kind of looked like Barney Frank, but he wasn't quite as heavy and didn't have the accent. Also, he wasn't my congressman. He looked like the quintessential business traveler with a ruffled suit and worn briefcase. He sat down next to me and gave me a nod. I kind of nodded back and look at the case I'm reading. I'm pretty sure he was a lawyer and recognized what I was doing because he said, "Make it easier on yourself, get a drink." I laughed and showed him my beer glass, then turned back to my case. The waitress came up and he ordered a Jack Daniels. "Would you like to make it a double for only two dollars more?" "Oh yes." I kept doing my work and peeked over at his drink two minutes after it came. It was gone. The waitress came back over and he ordered another one. When it came he started draining it. I look at him and say, "Friday, huh?" He says, "No. Everyday." Well then. He seems satisfied with life.

Saturday I hung out with Shaked. We went to Natick so that I could procure a birthday gift for my mom. I got her a Snuggie. You know, the blanket with sleeves so you can wear it. Laugh if you'd like, and I admit, I had strong reservations about buying one. But in the middle of winter when my mom is warm and cozy in her Snuggie and you are wrapping yourself in 12 sweatshirts and 3 blankets we'll reexamine the situation. I think my biggest problems with the Snuggie are (1) that it an "As Seen on TV" thing, which immediately makes it suspect to being a scam somehow, and (2) that it comes in 3 colors-blue, pink, and leopard print. The first issue I got over, the second one was a no-brainer. Gotta go with the blue. I think I would die if anyone I know ever wore a leopard print Snuggie. As Shaked pointed out, the woman who posed in that Snuggie ad that comes on the box must have felt like a complete idiot in her leopard print. Grinning from ear to ear like a complete fool.

We eventually ended up at Marshalls in Newton, waiting to meet Ron for lunch at Fresh City. I had just found a Red Sox jersey/shirt that was really cheap when all of the sudden the fire alarm went off. After 3 minutes a manager came and made us all evacuate, along with all the other stores on the row. We met up with Ron in front of Fresh City (also experiencing the fire alarm) and watched about 6 people try to go in while the alarm was still on. Idiots. The best of these was a couple who were the biggest pieces of Eurotrash I've ever seen. The girl looked relatively normal (her jeans were really trendy, but also sparkly in a trashy way), but the guy looked like a cross between a punk rocker and the Wicked Witch of the West. He had longish hair, carefully messed up, a nose piercing, light eye makeup, and boots that got really pointy about 5 inches beyond where his toe could have been (witch boots). Eventually we all got inside the restaurant and ate. But I had an awkward incident with Mr. Eurotrash in the bathroom. It is a single bathroom. There's a lock on the door for your convenience and so that you don't get interrupted. If you are utilizing the facilities, please lock the door. I opened the unlocked door, thinking there was no one in the bathroom, only to find Mr. Eurotrash delicately applying lip gloss in the mirror. What?? Get out of here and let me pee. It was so awkward. I didn't know what to do. Luckily he was finished with his lip gloss by the time I had to wash my hands, so there was no dispute over the sink. But next time close the door when you put on your lip gloss!!

Saw a lot of people Saturday night. Matt "Foxy" Brown, Leah, Keara, Ben, Sam, Erik, Kuss, maybe another person or two. I was declared a Star Wars nerd, reaffirming everything I already knew about myself. Luckily Matt Brown out-nerded me about Lord of the Rings. Also, I got to talk about "Dr. Stevens" and the antidote. It's not really a story for here.

Sunday: A Quick Rundown
Breakfast at Allston Cafe with Erika, Robin, and Jordan: Hot as hell, with (according to the girls) people doing drugs in the bathroom.
French toast: quality.
Harvard Square: Missing from my life.
Starbucks taste test between instant coffee and brewed coffee: Failed
Actually failed?: I think they messed with the taste test
Coffee: Awesome, addictive?
The Informant with Ron, Yael, and Shaked: Not what I was expecting, also not great 6/10
The Green Line: Late due to a "police action" (??)
Bananagrams with Robin and Jordan: I love spelling!
Gone Baby Gone: Only got the first 30 minutes, looking good. Jordan says it was fantastic.
Boston accents in that movie: Aw yeah!
Anna's Taqueria for dinner: All I need in life.
Visit to Boston: Priceless

Then I woke up at 4:30 this morning and took the following methods of transportation back to Washington. Taxi, plane, bus, commuter train, metro, feet. I made it to my 11 am class. Barely. And I am exhausted! So sorry if this isn't the most coherent. That's a lot of transportation for one day.

This afternoon in Civil Procedure, a classmate actually advocated the position that racism might not be bad. My professor asked us if it was ethical to prosecute in a state where there is a lot of jury bias based on race when we have the option of prosecuting in a less bias state. A bunch of people didn't see a problem with it. It's the adversary system after all, and if your case can be helped by racism and it's not illegal to do, then why not? This was a little odd to me - people defending the adversary system without thinking about the moral component. Then this one kid essentially said that some people think racism is a good thing, so who are you (professor) to say that using a racist jury is a bad thing or contrary to the interests of justice. My professor (and I) almost had an aneurysm. For one thing it is unconstitutional. For another, we are all educated people, can't we have a consensus that racism is bad? Apparently not. That was basically my professor's reaction. Mine was more along the lines of "What the hell? Did you just say 'justice' and 'racism isn't that bad' in the same sentence? I think you did. I also think you need to take that foot out of your mouth and start walking that back immediately." Racism is bad. Hatred of certain groups isn't necessarily. For example I hate stupid people, like the person who just told me racism isn't bad.