Monday, May 29, 2006

Sunday

BC and Miss D have lived in New York (or near it) since college, and I've come to associate them with this city: 2 smart, fierce, independent women with style, glamour, and a touch of excess. So when I met them for brunch yesterday, I thought, "Ahhhhh! I really am in New York."

Mimosas at lunch were followed by a bottle of champagne at the Four Seasons, to celebrate BC's new doctoral status and new job, and generally being together in New York. Yes, that touch of excess -- but appropriately applied and in retrospect, a perfect way to memorialize the occasion. I agree with most viewers of Sex and the City that the most remarkable thing about the show, in the end, was the four friends' commitment to seeing each other on a regular basis, to making time to share their lives. A bottle of bubbly in the afternoon was, in retrospect, hardly excessive at all, considering that I met Miss D in math class in junior high and BC in marching band in college; introduced them lo, these many years ago when we had just graduated from college; and was now sitting with both of them, the lovely ladies, at lunch.

Miss D went off to attend a wedding, and BC and I did some shopping, after which she went to mass, and I continued in my search for work clothes. I came up with precious little than one skirt, development of my bitchy side, and a lot of attitude. Oh, and a compliment from a parrot.

Attitude: I returned The White Shirt to Bloomingdale's and went back to Banana Republic, where I found a pair of pants that seemed very promising, but were a tad too long. So I stepped out and queried a sales clerk, "Do these come in zero petite?" To which the clerk quoth: "I'm sure they do, and you can go look for it if you want." To which I was so stunned, I could only say, "Well, I guess that's what I'll do." Damn! That's some serious bitchiness. Where exactly doth this bitchiness come from, and why doth thou direct it toward me, the customer?

Bitchiness: I must admit, I had a fairly low opinion of the BR sales clerks before this, because I was trying on a suit, and asked the ladies of the dressing room, "Do these wide-leg pants make my legs look short? I feel like they make me look shorter than I am." To which a random sales clerk said, "Oh, that's the style now." To which I, the woman who hates shopping, replied, "I understand that's the style, but do they make me look short?" Because who gives a flying fuck about the style if the style is going to make me look like Stumpy McStubbins?

Further bitchiness: And before that interchange, I asked another clerk about a cardigan on one of the mannikins, to which she replied, "It's over there." "Does it come in petite?" I queried. "No, but you can buy it extra small, and it'll be okay," quoth the clerk. "Uh, actually it's not okay, because I just returned something that was extra small because it didn't fit right. But thanks!" And I walked away.

Explanation of bitchiness: I don't know, I just get mad when people are being stupid. Like, an extra small is NOT the same thing as petite. The proportions are different. That is why "petite" exists. As a sales clerk, you should know there's a difference, so don't feed me bullshit about it being okay, because it's not. Along the same line, I don't CARE if wide-legged pants are the style right now, because I'm looking for something that flatters my figure and size. If I were a slave to fashion and just bought things because Sienna Miller or some other starlet started wearing them, I might be impressed by your, "That's the style now," but the fact is that I'm not an automaton who will just reach for her credit card because someone tells me it's "in," when it's actually not flattering. GOD. I'm getting irritated just thinking about it.

Explanation of clerks' bitchiness: probably dealing with cranky customers like me all day.

Oh yes, and the parrot: I was walking out of Ann Taylor Loft, where I found polite staff and a skirt, if not a flattering suit jacket in sight, when I saw a woman holding out a stick with a parrot. "Oh look, a pretty girl!" she gushed to the parrot, who ruffled his feathers and stretched his wings. "Oh yes, I know you like pretty girls, don't you?" she burbled. "Ooh, and she just got a wiggle waggle, didn't she?" The parrot looked noncommittal. I stifled a laugh and walked on, but I admit, I was pretty pleased. It's not every day you get complimented by a wiggle-waggle from a parrot.

And the happy ending: After all the attitude, crankiness and lack of success, I hopped on the bus to BC's place, where she fed me wine, tacquitos, and cheese. And it was damn good.

Today: More searching for office clothes. Ugh.

Saturday, May 27, 2006

Luxuriating...

... in my humble grad student sublet, which:

- smells a little bit like Tide, because I did laundry (YAY!) for the first time in, oh, 6 weeks
- smells a lot like garlic, because I cooked (I know, I'm stunned too!) a nice meal of couscous and eggplant and canned tomatoes
- is warm, because the humidity has arrived (it's 77 degrees out there, but I went for a run -- a run! -- at 10 and it felt like 85)
- is unfortunately still devoid of food (the food I cooked was left by my subletor) because rather than buying and cooking food, I've eaten at the office or out
- is unfortunately still occupied by a certain $185 white button down shirt, which will depart tomorrow, when I return it to Bloomingdales and do some more office wear shopping
- is a very nice place to loiter aimlessly

I got an assignment at noon yesterday from the employee benefits and executive compensation department, which required an hour-long explanation, after which I returned to my office and sat, stunned. I had only the most superficial understanding of the issue and what I was supposed to do. I haven't taken securities regulation, okay? Or corporations! I took econ pass/fail in college! And I dropped accounting in the fall because I was scared of numbers! ARgh.

I finally did figure out the issue and emailed the partner to make sure I was on the right track, and then finally found something that I think is relevant, and finally wrote up an email with my findings.

You can get a car home from the office after a certain time, and I tripped out of the building at 10, knowing that I'd be driven home rather than having to take the subway. Funny - when I stepped out of the building, it was as dry as a bone, but driving up Manhattan, I noticed the streets were wet in the 60s. While we drove through the 70s and 80s, lightning lit the sky repeatedly. And at 96th St., driving through the park to cross town, the heavens opened up and it poured.

I thought about going out of town for the long weekend (which I kept forgetting about -- holidays don't mean as much in school), but decided to stick around town and loll about. So far, so good.

Thursday, May 25, 2006

Second Wednesday and Thursday

Wednesday:

I had a really lovely evening Wednesday night with a high school friend visiting NYC with a couple of her law school buddies. We haven't seen each other in five or six years, but it was like we hadn't missed a day. Well, except for all the catching up and stuff.

Being far more cultured than I, she took me to see a spoken word performance hosted by writer Jonathan Ames. The show consisted of six medium-wigs telling stories, and the theme was the news. So we had:

- the host, Ames, who told 2 stories, one about smoking weed on a Caribbean island somewhere on assignment and another about taking his father to see a porn shoot (apparently, after coming out of the studio, his father called his mother, and the first thing he said was, "It was very dark in there, I almost tripped!");
- the author of The Orientalist, who was a very longwinded and boring storyteller;
- a TV news producer and only woman, who spoke about being in Rome when 9/11 happened;
- a TV news anchor, who told stories about when he thought he'd made career-ending mistakes: once, when he was reporting a story about the "credit card crunch," he mistakenly said "and now a story about the credit c*nt crunch" -- ON THE AIR!; another time, he nearly missed the press plane when he was a White House correspondent and had to run after it on the runway;
- another TV news producer, an elderly man who talked about the day JFK was shot (and ended with the great line, "You shut up -- I was there"); and
- Moby, the musician, who told 2 stories about gossip and news.

I'm rather surprised I remember the details of all the stories as well as I do. But that's what I remember -- stories. The facts of the case, not the legal theory. The fun stuff. The lives that people live.

What story would you tell, if you had 10 minutes to tell a story to an audience?

Thursday:

Went to a firm function -- bowling night -- tonight, with the kids. Oof. Five years too late for these things. I drank, I bowled a 7 and a strike, I talked, I looked for the cute associate I worked with yesterday who called today to thank me for my work and asked if I was going to this thing tonight (he didn't show up, though, bastard), I left with a Chinese girl and we looked unsuccessfully in DSW for shoes, and then I sat on the Columbia Univ. campus for a while and talked to Fearless T and Double M.

Big things are afoot in the lives of the people I know -- births, deaths, graduations, new jobs, new cities. Life seems to be on fast forward these days, like that time-lapse credit card commercial where you see the young couple use a series of credit cards from the same company as they graduate, move into their house, have kids, have grand kids. It's almost too much sometimes. It's too easy to constantly be doing things, and never contemplate them.

What story will I tell, at the end of this life? What story do I want to tell?

Wednesday, May 24, 2006

Second Tuesday

Last Tuesday, I left the office at 4:45 pm.

Yesterday, I left at 8:45 pm.

But at least I got a car home.

The car service kicks in after 8:30. You apparently have to have billed a certain number of hours that day. I don't know if I reached that or not, but a tax attorney who was in the elevator with me said I should just take one, so I did. Summer associates can get away with anything, he said.

It was nice being taken home in one of the nondescript black sedans that ferry the Big and Important People around. And it was a lot faster than the subway.

What did I do to deserve this? I worked on 2 capital markets equity derivatives offerings, drafting final pricing supplements for both. They'll be checked over by the associates on each offering, and then checked over again and signed off by the partners. You know what that means in terms of actual work for hk. Monkeys.

Reading through a document carefully and editing it with pre-determined data is something that I enjoy and am good at. So I left with a sense of having done some work, albeit trained monkey work.

I know there's more to the work -- like, if I were to try to actually understand the stuff I read through, I'd be in the same position as the trained monkey: totally bewildered and possibly desiring a banana. (Maybe bananas foster. Mm.) But the stuff they entrust to summers is just as much as I can undertake.

My office mate, a very nice, geeky, tall, blond, corn-fed Nebraskan, left the office before me last night and said, "8:30 as a summer! I don't think I or any of my summer class ever stayed that late."

The thing is, I don't know how to slack off and not feel guilty about it. Which is what the Passive Aggressive Mighty Big Law Firm is counting on. And which is why law firms love Asian American women. We work hard and we're not threatening. (Usually.)

Monday, May 22, 2006

Apology to my fashion stylists

They were marvelous. They formulated strategy in the stores we should approach. They tirelessly picked out pants, shirts, coats, and sweaters. They appraised, critiqued, advised, relented, encouraged, shepherded, and approved. They were the Js. My sisters-in-law.

But I can't do it. I just can't keep the white shirt.

It's a simple piece of clothing. As they all said, everyone needs one. Caroline Herrerra, J1 reminded me, only wears crisp white button downs -- they are classic, stylish, flattering, and simple.

We had already looked at Brooks Brothers, and nixed the no-iron white shirt there as not quite well-fitting enough. And now, at Bloomingdales, they oohed and ahhed over the plain white shirt I had put on. Bowing to my experts, I brought it to the counter with a pair of black pants and pulled out my card. The total came up: $383.

"Whuh!? huh? uh ... whoa," I said. "How much IS that shirt?"

"A hundred and eighty-five," the bored sales associate said.

I imagine my eyes bugged out like a cartoon character. And so I turned to J1 and J2 and asked, "$185 for a white shirt that I have to alter?"

"It'll be five bucks to alter the sleeves," J1 advised.

"Yes," J2 said firmly. And wisely added, "Just get it now, and you can always return it. But if you want it later and you don't get it now, you'll never find it again."

So ... I did it.

But then my card didn't go through. And the sales associate gave major attitude. And my credit card company said there was a security hold on my account (later revealed to be the fault of the sales associate, who had too hastily run the card and mistakenly rung up the sale twice, which automatically triggered my anti-fraud protection).

At the end of the adventure, J2 looked deep into my eyes and said, "hk. Promise me that you'll take the shirt home. Try it on. Think about it. It really is a great shirt."

"Okay," I promised.

But I just can't do it. I hang my head in sorrow at my inability to live the good life. Ach! The shame!

I'm sorry, fashion stylists! The cheapness - she is too strong. I must submit. The shirt ... it must go back ... to its real home -- Bloomie's.

Discontent

Well. PMS-y, tired, feeling I spent way too much today on clothes*, frustrated, upset, alone, lonely, and depressed.

Yes, it's time to go to sleep now, hk. And to resume exercise tomorrow.


*Which takes nothing away, of course, from the 3Js' heroic efforts and success in getting me to actually BUY clothes today.

Saturday, May 20, 2006

First Saturday

I moved out of Camp Bella midday today, sad to say goodbye to not only the posh surroundings but the companionship. I've never done well wholly by myself -- I have a tendency to sink into myself and out of sight if I don't have someone around to report things to. This is what happened to me as a senior in college, when I retreated from college life to rather unhealthy level (couldn't face going to the dining hall, for example).

My sublet is ... a rather nice grad student apartment, actually. I was going to say that it was modest or humble, but it's actually quite decent. The kitchen, living room, and dining room are all one room roughly the size of my dorm room at school, and the entire apartment would fit into the kitchen and living room of Camp Bella, but it is quite enough for the likes of me. The thumping bass on the floor above or below me, however, attests to the fact that it is indeed student housing.

Yesterday was a slow day at the office. Having completed two assignments on Thursday, I wasn't eager to pick up a new one, so I tried to read the background material on the other assignment I have. I quickly realized I couldn't understand a word I was reading, so I started reading some background material on credit transactions, which was deadly dull. I have a feeling it would have been a lot more interesting if I had been able to understand the finance terms being tossed around every five words.

I bolted out at 5:45, unable to take the boringness, and it being a relatively nice day, I walked across town and up 55 blocks to Camp Bella. It wasn't so bad, except that I started needing a bathroom around the 60s, so the last 10 blocks were a little painful.

Mr. and Mrs. Camp Bella allowed me to treat them to an outstanding Peruvian dinner, which I think was the best meal I've had so far here, even including the first lunch at Gramercy Tavern. I tried ceviche for the first time, which is fish marinated in lime juice. For some magical reason, the acid cooks the flesh. It's amazing! And very tart. But delish. And the arroz con mariscos was SO flavorful and marvelous ... mmm. Perfection.

Mr. Camp Bella asked me about what I was going to do with myself, given my complaints about Mighty Big Law Firm even in the first week. It was a rather uncomfortable conversation, and it made me realize that I do have to think about this. A year from now, what will I be doing? Will I really come back to this? On the walk back home yesterday from the office, I had one of those moments of clarity, which do strike occasionally: "My god," I thought, "What am I doing? What have I done? This is not for me, no matter how much I try to rationalize it. I can force myself to do it, but it's not what I was meant to do. Not even close."

But Mr. Camp Bella pointed out, and I agree, that a job isn't always the be all and end all. It's lucky if you can find a job that you love with all your heart and wake up glad to do. But as my cousin once said when I complained about the boringness of law school: "Yeah. My job is boring too." There are much worse things than being paid an obscene amount of money to do monkey work.

Today, after a languid start to the day over the New York Times and a multi-section breakfast -- an amusing interlude where both Camp Bellas tried stuffing money in my pants (trying to pay me back for dinner, you see) just outside the cab -- I got to the sublet, chatted with the very, very pleasant resident of the this apartment, unpacked, considered going out for food, scrounged an egg and toast from the pleasant resident's leftovers instead, bade farewell to the pleasant resident when she left for Italy, and then set off to a night at the theatre.

One-Armed Maggie's mom was in town for a firm retreat, and so the Camp Bellas and she went to get discount tickets while I settled in, and invited me to dinner and Sweeney Todd. So, remarkably, I have already had a theatre night in my first week in New York. Thanks, Camp Bellas! Thanks, One-Armed Maggie's mom! The show was entertaining and directed in an unusual manner -- all the actors played instruments on stage, providing their own accompaniment.

I remember I did see a production of Todd when I was in college, but I remembered NOTHING about it. It was as if I had never seen it before -- which may be a testiment to the director's inventiveness, I suppose. But you'd think I'd remember SOMEthing of the storyline. I don't know, theatre rarely sticks with me.

Anyway, I am now home, with the music thumping (just like college!) and looking forward to a day tomorrow with the three Js, who have promised to take me shopping and deck me out with clothes for the summer.

And so in sum: ceviche and arroz con mariscos = AWESOME!, having lots of people visiting town this weekend = DOUBLE AWESOME!, Sweeney Todd = inventive and disturbing, dorm = very decent, and thumping bass = SUCKS the big one. On the whole, tilts rather toward the positive, wouldn't you say?

Thursday, May 18, 2006

Day Four

I was very busy and important today, with two projects due by 5 pm and one due ASAP from the start of the day. I ended up saying no to one of the 5 pm projects, which I hear you can only do when you're a summer associate, and the other one I worked steadily on throughout the day when I wasn't fielding phone calls from associates with "tiny little comments" on the ASAP project and trying to pin down other associates for the remaining piece of the document.

The ASAP project was a kind of equity derivatives/capital markets/Mighty Big Investment Bank money-making instrument type of thing. I can't describe it because I don't know the lingo, even though I understood the general principle, and anyway, it's way confidential and secret and stuff, and I'd have to KILL you if you knew.

I got to send the final product out under my own signature, to the Mighty Big Investment Bank and the team at the firm, and it was -- whatever. I'm just not moved by making money, or helping companies make money. Too abstract for me. (I have to say, though, that the basic instrument was more interesting than I thought it would be.)

The other 5 pm project was a real estate department assignment, which I enjoyed, because I loved property and it was something I understood, rather than this totally foreign language of finance and securities and shit.

I left at 5:45 to go to a cooking class and dinner hosted by the firm. A group of about 30 took the subway down (at rush hour, I presume, it would be madness to take cabs) to the southern tip of the island. In Times Square, I almost changed my mind and took the uptown train, because I was feeling antisocial and tired, but I soldiered on, and was glad for it in the end.

Why was I glad? Because after the schmoozing and the drinks, we went into the kitchen and gathered around metal tables like you see in professional kitchens, in groups of five, and we learned stuff. The woman who was teaching our group (we made one of the sides -- roasted red peppers and rice with tomato/garlic/smoked paprika coulis) was very cool, and showed us how to handle knives, how to cut an onion, how to unwrap garlic cloves, how to cut basil. What was really interesting was how everything has a scientific reason -- for example, in order to chop up basil, you roll up a couple individual leaves and cut against the grain, because otherwise, it tends to oxidize quicker and you get that blackened look. In order to cut down the smokiness of a dish, you can add something acidic, like red wine vinegar. To get a nice roasted red pepper, you can plop it right on the gas burner, char it, then put it in a plastic bag, let it steam, and then rub the blackened skin off with paper towels. And supposedly, you can get some of the garlic and onion smell off your hands by handling metal.

Very cool stuff.

So the learning was good -- I liked that. We got firmly pushed out of the kitchen and into the dining room so the chefs could finish up properly, and then it was dinnertime: tomato and parmesan gratinee tarts, crispy chicken breasts stuffed with spinach and goat cheese, the aforementioned rice dish, crisp lemony green beans and carrots, and a chocolate cake with chocolate mint fudge. Mm! So the dinner itself was good too.

Dinner as a social outing was less successful. I think I was at a dud table (and I take full responsibility too as part of the dud-ness), because other tables seemed to be chatty and talky, but ours dragged. I was reminded of why I like talking to people my age -- and especially men my age -- rather than younger folks: especially for the men, age brings a realization that there's more to dinner conversation than sports. Every single goddam topic was about sports, even though a good four members of the table (out of 9) were clearly not into it and didn't say a word. It was a bit excruciating.

It's not that these people aren't interesting -- I mean, the guy sitting next to me, who was going on about playing soccer with some big pro player -- he mentioned he liked making pottery, and had taken two classes. That's interesting! Whereas sports? Eh.

So I'm biased. And it'll work against me, in this atmosphere -- in order to get ahead in a male-dominated field, you gotta talk the talk, you know? It's depressing.

So in sum: Mighty Big Investment Bank work = very busy and important hk today; learning and cooking = jollity and fun; and 25-year-olds who only talk about sports = boring. But hey, I got a free cab ride home, so that makes up for everything. Except for the fact that my hands still smell like garlic. Must go find some metal to handle.

Hey, isn't it funny that a week ago, I was studying for con law?

Wednesday, May 17, 2006

Day Three

New York moments:

- I forgot to mention that on my first day this week, I opened a blue nylon satchel that was on my desk, sitting on the cardboard box containing my desk supplies, to find: a flashlight, a glowstick, one of those ultra thin astronaut blankets, a whistle, and a face mask. The usual post-9/11 emergency bag, I guess.

- I was reminded of that today when I was waiting for the 2/3 train and saw 8 cops file past me down the platform. A small part of my brain went on alert. I felt a little uneasy. But nothing happened, and the express arrived, and I got on.

Law firm moments:

- None of the summer associates seem very interesting (keeping in mind that I have a real attitude problem with this job) (also, they ARE, like, 12 years old), but some of the associates in the tax department, where I am housed, seem quite friendly and nice and ... I don't know, have personalities? But the male-female ratio is startling, both in the tax department and in the summers who started on Monday with me. Of the 50-odd folks who started this week, I would say that about 35 are men (and before you start singing that the odds are good, a good number of those are married, Jewish, way too young, or a combo of all three). And based on the number of people who showed up for the tax practice weekly luncheon yesterday, the men outnumber women 2:1 in the tax department. (And if the women were around but didn't go to the lunch, that would be bad too -- the networking can't happen if you don't show up.)

- So I was in the firm library until 9 pm and then in the Camp Bella* kitchen until 1 am last night trying to finish my paper for history class. I had planned to get up at 7 am to figure out where to move a problematic section, and do a final read-through, but somehow I woke up at 7, then woke up again and it was 8 am. With a 9 am training session waiting, I crammed my notes into a bag and rushed out. I figured I could work on it a little during the day, and I was right. I had some stuff to read, but had been told it could wait, so I spent an hour and a half completing the thing, and emailed it to the prof just before lunch with the partner who is my mentor this summer.

- I was lucky, because after lunch (which was nice -- the partner is only 6 years older than me and was pretty approachable, if a little rushed -- she like, gulped down her food), I got a call from one of the coordinating attorneys, who had another assignment for me. That was for a real estate department deal, and the associate wanted it done by the end of today. But then my other project roared to life, and THAT had to be done by the end of the day, so I got the okay to work on the real estate one tomorrow, and spent 3 hours drafting a price supplement for an equity derivative. Don't I sound very smart and important, having done that? Now, the actual financial instrument/process is rather ingenious, and I don't know if I fully understand it. But the actual thing I was doing? I'm telling you, trained monkeys could have done it. It was like the $140,000 corporate law version of Mad Libs -- fill in the blanks -- but even simpler than Mad Libs, because we fill in the blanks with terms that we receive from the client.

I don't know, people. I just don't know. It was really not bad (though I should wait till I get comments back tomorrow morning) -- sort of like editing, but way less challenging than the substantive editing I used to do for $50,000 a year (i.e., one third of the salary I'd be getting as a first year associate).

So, in summary: New York = memories, law firm = Place Where History Papers Get Finished, and summer associates = monkeys.

Also -- whee, I'm done with 2L year! And to celebrate, I will go to bed, and try to make up for yet another night of shortchanged sleep.

*Camp Bella is the home of the One-Armed Maggie and her bonny husband.

Confidential to bigbro and J1: AAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!

Tuesday, May 16, 2006

Day the Second

I'm appalled. I really didn't think this would happen -- that this COULD happen this summer.

I got assigned some work today.

Boo!

(Although, I did spend a good four hours in training, an hour and a half at a tax practice group lunch, and at least an hour revising my paper on company time.)

Also? I had to PAY for dinner. After free meals for breakfast and lunch yesterday and today (and tomorrow, come to think of it). Appalling!

Speaking of lunch yesterday: lobster appetizer, rabbit entree (tastes like chicken), six flavors of sorbet.

And today, not too shabby either, even if it was at the firm: cajun salmon, saffron rice, green beans, fruit, brownies.

Oh, I SO need to find a gym, pronto.

Now, the final push on the paper. Die, paper, die!

Monday, May 15, 2006

First Day

NEW YORK MOMENTS:

I.
After breakfast, I walked with One-Armed Maggie to 96th Street, where I got on the downtown express. At 72nd Street, a seat opened up and I took it, only to be sandwiched between these two ladies:
"What choo said, that was rude."
"What?" (lilting Caribbean accent)
"Choo tell me to move over and close my legs because there ain't enough space? That was rude, and choo need --"
"What? You want to take up all de space, den rent your own train."
"Choo need to shut your mouth!"
"You want to take de space, put a 'Reserved' sign on the seat! Or hire your own train!"
"Choo sittin' there, reading your bible, and choo telling people to close their legs -- choo need to learn -- choo need to --"
(hand to the face)
"Choo need to shut your fucking mouth!"
"No, YOU need to shut your mouth."
"Whatevah."
"No, whatEVAH."
(hand to the face)

Because I was trying not to look at them, I kept my eyes straight ahead and only saw their hands gesturing at each other. The (Long Island?) accent came from the hands with metallic magenta finish; the Caribbean accent came from hands with light blue lace-patterned press-on nails. I came THIS CLOSE to laughing out loud. But I didn't. 'Cause they probably would have hurt me.

II.
Saw a woman playing a saw in the Times Square station.

LAW FIRM MOMENTS

I.
Partner on the recruiting committee: "Just to put your minds at ease, we expect that every one of you will get an offer at the end of the summer."

But seriously? What if someone really, really sucks?

II.
Among the advice given on how to have a good summer:
"This is the start to your professional career.'
"You should ask questions."
"Try to be reliable."
"If you have something due in the afternoon, it's probably not a good idea to go to lunch for two hours that day."
"You'll be able to enjoy New York on a lawyer's salary."
"Return your phone calls."
"If someone is calling a second time and leaves a message saying 'Did you get my first message?' that means 'You should have called back earlier.'"
"We have a $70 limit per person per meal."
"You should try to bill 20-25 hours per week."
"We won't give you assignments til Wednesday. And it may take us longer, so don't worry."
"You can go back to your offices and just try to process all this information until it's time for your 15-minute meeting for assignments." (Note: the assignment meeting took 15 minutes -- with SIX summer associates! I mean, you take 45 minutes to tell us to be reliable, and then you take about 2 minutes per person -- less, because first the assigning committee talked about possible assignments -- to ask about preferences? Because it's not like we're here to, you know, WORK or LEARN about the work or anything.)
(at 4:45): "If you don't have anything else to do, you can head out. And you shouldn't have anything to do."

Are you frigging serious? You're gonna pay these people $140,000 a year, and you feel the need to remind them to return their phone calls? In what fucked up reality are you all living in?

The really horrific thing was that there was nary a smidgen of a sense of irony about the whole thing.

Sunday, May 14, 2006

V. briefly, as must get to bed, as must get up for work (work!) tomorrow (tomorrow!): was at library trying to revise paper til 9:15 on Saturday, went home and packed from 10 pm to 4 am with the help of Joiner and Friend (forever indebted), got up this morning at 10 am to finish (with the help of Rossdale, who moved six boxes into storage and carted the remainder to Def and Stave's), got totally lost getting out of Crimson City, sat in passenger side of the Cadillac of minivans as Rossdale drove to New York in 4 hours, and am now in One-Armed Maggie's and her husband's beautifully decorated and re-done pre-war condo, ready to succumb at last to sweet, sweet slumber. G'nite.

Saturday, May 13, 2006

Finito...

...but not really. Though I enjoyed going out with Joiner and Scifi and Sally last night to dessert and then a law school function (horror of horrors!). When we got to the law school function, I thought, "Gosh, if only I'd arrived five years ago, I might be having fun here..." I'm SO over the thumping bass bar/club scene. If ever I was into it. (It was, however, a lot better than holing up in my darkened cell of a room and watching About A Boy while crying, which is what I did after my contracts exam last year.)

Once I email my paper to my professor on Wednesday, THAT will mean it's finito, this (school) year of corporate wooing and future whoredom ("corporate whoredom or public interest poor-dom!"); this year that was fat and full of experiences like New Orleans and clinical work; this year that reminded me how much I love - truly love - history research; this year that was about the Not-Gay Boyfriend and the Bulgarian Real Estate Agent and not being friends with Friend and being/not being friends with the Destroyer; this year that was the second and the penultimate year here, at Crimson Law School.

Not being finished yet, I will reserve my comments for the rebuttal -- er, later, I mean. (It doesn't matter how fast you run away from the law; when you're in law school, it comes hunting for you, tackles you to the ground, pummels analysis and legal-speak into your brain, and, when you're lying there on the dirt with no more fight in you, feebly muttering "sua sponte! federalism! courts are ... not ... legislators!" it rises with a smirk, dusts its hands, and sprints off to pounce on the next unenthusiastic law student. You can run, but you cannot hide.)

Off to the undergrad library now, with 20 pounds of books to return (hopefully) and four hours to finish research for the damn history paper.

Friday, May 12, 2006

30 minutes in...

...and I totally can't concentrate on my con law final. It's like I can't even take it seriously. Whee!

This is the problem with studying for a week and a half straight. You get to the end and you just feel entitled.

I set myself up in a carrel downstairs in the library, but I came back with my test and saw Mr. Destroyer sitting on the opposite side of my desk, and I just ... couldn't deal with his destroyer-ness. So I am now in the computer cluster upstairs, where it is much cheerier and far less solemn and destructive.

Except... now 38 minutes in. Yack.

Okay, okay, don't have a cow, I'll start now. It IS an 8-hour take-home exam.

Thursday, May 11, 2006

One down. Way down.

Crap. Is what I wrote.
Lost ability to care.
So resigned am I.

The death penalty!
It sucks! The big one! But I
also suck (see: test).

Third, final question:
How would you change the system?
I couldn't decide.

So: four hundred words
Instead of the six hundred
She recommended.

And the first question:
I looked at it and pondered
Gee, what IS the law?

Oh! Resignation
Is growing more comfortable
Each year of law school.

Wednesday, May 10, 2006

Rising panic quelled (but not really, since I woke up with a stomach ache from hell and continue to feel queasy)
(Alternate title: How can I amuse myself while procrastinating from studying con law and capital punishment, both of which I apparently want to fail?)

The cover of the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy tells you: "DON'T PANIC." And when you open it, it starts speaking to you in a soothing, intelligent-but-not-intimidating tone of voice that breaks it down, lays it out, and schools you in the most gentle, understanding of ways. You close the book and think, "Damn! Now I understand why prior restraints on free exercise of speech are considered bad!"

That is, if you have the Hitchhiker's Guide to con law. Which reminds me: I'm breaking the 40-something-tall-good-looking-liberal-dad-of-three mold to introduce my new boyfriend:


You laugh, but Erwin Chemerinsky laughs along with you, because Erwin Chemerinsky is a legal genius who -- oxymoronically -- writes beautifully and clearly, enjoys chatting with Supreme Court justices on various issues of national significance, turned down a deanship at UNC to teach with his wife at Duke, and generally has a cooler, more fulfilled, and far more significant life than yours. And someday, he will come to his senses and marry me.

(That doesn't mean anything's changed between us, Stephen! Aw, baby, don't be like that. You know I love you the best.)

Tuesday, May 09, 2006

Schedule

Wednesday: read my beautiful, lovely, clear hornbook for con law in am, study for capital punishment, then study some more capital punishment

Thursday: capital punishment final

Friday: con law final

Friday night: RELAX! WOO!

Saturday: work on history paper until library closes at 5 pm

Saturday night: pack up my shit

Sunday, noon: drive to Nueva York with classmate

Sunday night: contemplate the craziness and stave off feelings of post-partum-ness by ... hm, drinking? TBD

Monday: start summer job. Kee-rist.

Sunday, May 07, 2006

WANTED: DEMONIC JASMINE TEA. HIGHLY DANGEROUS.

Oh, jasmine tea that I drank so much of last night at the Chinese restaurant. You were so tasty and so innocuous, in your strangely expensive way, your secretly potent leaves hidden in a white pouch, steeping in the authentic-y looking black iron teapot.

Where did it go wrong? Perhaps it was at 2:30 am, when I was doggedly transferring and reviewing notes to my outline, and I felt strangely awake. Or perhaps it was at 4 am, when, wired as all hell, I tried to go to sleep, knowing that I had to buckle down and work hard upon waking, and yet, when I I tried to lie down and go to sleep, you made me toss the covers aside in annoyance and caffeinated exasperation at 4:30 and get up and review the last week of capital punishment class until 6 am. Seeing the sky lighten and turn a pretty deep blue was not so fun, jasmine tea. Evil, evil, jasmine tea.

Saturday, May 06, 2006

Taking a "break" from "studying"
(or, Being Unable to Get to Studying On This, the Fourth Day of Con Law Review, When I Should be Wrapping Up But Have Not Even Gotten Around to Reviewing Religion or Speech Yet, and Yes, I am Totally F****d, So What?)

So here I am, reading a horn book (study guide) for con law and trying not to freak out as the words blur before my eyes and I struggle to make sense of what fundamental rights we have, and it occurs to me -- what is it with the 40-something-year-old men right now?

Not only am I currently obssessed with Stephen Colbert (call me, sugar! anytime! really!), I must also admit to an embarrassing crush on The Turtle, my supervisor from this term's internship. Who has the same first name. Same initials. 40-something. Tall. Slender build. Liberal. Married. And has 3 kids! The similarities are astounding. (Or at least, interesting.) (Er, to me, anyway.) (Oh, shut up.)

I had my in-person evaluation with The Turtle yesterday morning, and after some reassuring words about my work, he looked at me and asked, "So what do you want to do with your life?" (Just like Professor Inspirata earlier this term! You professor/instructor types need to stop that shit now -- you're gonna make me think people at this school care or something.)

I was so taken aback that I started laughing, and stuttered out, "Um, be a good person? Achieve some modicum of happiness? Do more good than harm?"

And then we talked about choices and difficulties and getting off the wheel and what I really wanted to be doing, and it was, like, a conversation with an adult. A real person. Who was interested in what I was saying, had some good, sensible things to say back, and is interested in what happens to me.

So... Was that actually a nice conversation with a person I connected with? Or is law school totally degrading my expectations of people? Am I just in need of a boyfriend? Will I ever stop procrastinating and get back to con law?

Just one more week, and it will all be over. Well, except my history paper, and packing up all my shit, and moving to New York. I'm going to drive down with a friend who's renting a mini-van to move his shit and a couple other people's shit down there. Whee! Should be fun. But oh, so many miles to go before I start my cush summer job where a welcome breakfast will be waiting for me on the 15th at 9:30 am. So many, many miles.

Thursday, May 04, 2006

Studying

We interrupt this, the 2nd day of studying, for these important announcements:

- Stephen Colbert is my new boyfriend!

I know people have been saying that his speech at the White House Correspondents' Association dinner last week wasn't funny, and yes, it was about 10 minutes too long, but daaaaamn, the man has got some major cojones. And it did have some really, really funny moments, such as:
"I stand by this man. I stand by this man because he stands for things. Not only for things, he stands on things. Things like aircraft carriers and rubble and recently flooded city squares. And that sends a strong message, that no matter what happens to America, she will always rebound -- with the most powerfully staged photo ops in the world."

This, while looking straight at the Prez. hk *hearts* sc.

- I am psychic. I kid you not. On my birthday, I got an email from Will's Dad, and so I holla'd back, what's up, how's it going, hey, I have this spooky sixth sense feeling that another baby's on the way for you guys. Lo and behold, yesterday Will's Dad emails that Will's Mom is preggers, and was when I emailed -- even though they didn't know it! Congrats to Will's Mom and Dad -- lots more health, happiness and joy to come.

- I put out a bunch of fires:
Friday: I had the depo (whoo!)
Saturday: morning I made a toast at the 25th Anniversary event of Student Org #1

Saturday night: on a whim, went with Junebug to her house in Providence
Sunday: wrote draft of history paper to turn in, while eating Junebug's food
Monday: I co-presented about Student Org #1 to our Advisory Board
Tuesday: well, on Tuesday, I flopped onto my bed after class and read the Curtis Sittenfeld book Prep, which majorly depressed me (more on that in an upcoming post)


- I need to get back to Equal Protection.