Like a Skunk

I recently told someone I'd never been really officially drunk before – like really drunk, like hangover drunk.

I am sad to report that is no longer the case.

It started, as these things often do, very innocently. I was in pain (you don't want details), OTC pills didn't work, and I'm trying to steer clear of the mega pills whenever possible. "Why," I thought to myself, in my best Little Women mental impression, "I shall partake of spirits medicinally!"

One vodka later, I was still feeling cruddy.

Another vodka down, and I felt a little bit better, but still not great.

So I went to the place I have never before gone...the third vodka. Mmm-hmm, that did the trick. Definitely feeling no pain.

Reeled my way off to bed. Woke up two hours later. Due to, ya know, the barfing and stuff. And the getting up in the morning while still drunk? Not so fun. Oh, and the splitting headache? Don't recommend it.

Hangovers suck.

Well, I'm Back

I zipped off for a quick little getaway with my parents to the hometown for Mother's Day.

I had a really great time – it was so nice to get away from the anxiety and dread that's happening here and just be somewhere where I could release some of my worries.

But sheesh, it's hard to get away. I didn't get to bed the night before I left until something like 3 in the morning, between the laundry and the packing and the last-minute preparations. The next night in the hotel, I fell asleep with a glass in my hand and ended up spilling Diet Coke all over myself and the bed and the pillow. It was cold and wet and not fun.

I was also woefully unprepared for the weather. I dunno, it's May, it's spring, it's time for short sleeves, or so went my theory. Instead I was greeted with 40-degree temperatures, which produced all the shivering and whatnot. The shame of it is that I would have loved one last little taste of winter before the oven cranks up here, if only I'd been dressed appropriately.

I didn't do much...the trip was mostly about seeing people and eating. My grandmother had the time of her life again....she enjoys seeing us so much, and something as little as a lunch out makes her so very happy. She seems to be doing very well – everyone talked about how good she looks, better than she did a couple of years ago at 95.

Not to be all conceited, but I think seeing us so often has made a difference...we noticed several years ago that our visits really perked her up, and now that we're up there every few months, well, maybe that had something to do with her renewed health. She had four waffles and bacon at the Mother's Day brunch today (I ate everything else. In the whole buffet. Urk). We've promised to go back for her birthday in August.

Which reminds me...I need to once again place an order for a birthday card from the president. I have done so every year since 2000 (because, I am sad to say, she was no fan of Clinton), and she's only actually received two. I'm not holding my breath.

Well, Something's Tingling

I wish people would give poor Spider-Man 3 a break. I saw it last weekend, and I liked it just fine, thankyewverramuch.

It was entertaining and exciting. It rounded out and resolved issues from the previous movies in, I felt, a satisfying way (no spoilers here, though).

Yes, it had a whole lotta villains, but I didn't find it confusing, as some reviews have suggested, though maybe that comes from who knows how many years of superhero media immersion. Ho hum, any episode of Smallville could outdo it in that arena. Besides, I liked the fact that the whole movie didn't SO focus on a single villain, which can get dull (and would have, as none were so compelling – think the Joker – that they could carry the movie). I got a little tired of the villain from movie 2...yeah, yeah, I get it, you have lots of arms and are full of the angst. Yawn.

I'll concede that it wasn't on par with the first two movies, which were just so great and unusual, especially the second one (annoying octopus dude excepted). But part of what made #2 so good was the fact that it went to that place that a lot of movies wouldn't – the whole loss-of-power storyline, the big reveals, the way Peter actually got the unattainable girl. The fact that people found out who he was made for great cinema, but the letdown in #3 was inevitable...the buildup is always more fun than the aftermath (seriously, didn't Frasier kind of suck once Daphne and Niles got together? Yes, I'm still watching the reruns at midnight).

Anyway, I seem to have lost my point, so I'll just say that I had a good time watching it. What more could you ask for?

Some Other Me

I visited my college's website the other day to look something up. I ended up looking through the course schedule and was surprised by the pang of loss that hit me. I wanted so much to erase the past few years and find myself back there again, 19 and happy and not nearly so stuck.

I wanted to feel the heat radiating off the ugly concrete architecture and the icy blast of the classrooms in the summer. I wanted to bubble in answers to multiple choice questions, answers that I knew because I studied and back then, you know, that was the point of tests, for you to be able to answer questions if you knew the material. I wanted to be the person who believed she would meet the love of her life any day. I wanted to be the person who could have become some other person.

Time goes by too fast. I was that person a breath ago, and then suddenly I wasn't.

Dang. I need a margarita!

Name Game

I don't know how much explanation the name of this blog really requires. I mean, I am a lawyer, and I like margaritas.

But I should give credit where it's due. Oh, I'm the only one to blame for this really stupid name I eventually chose, but I should mention that Ags had suggested that I call it "Two Dogs and a Lawyer." I thought that was cute, but I could also see that making me very sad when the day comes that I do not have two dogs (a valid concern, as at the time my poor Mr. Lou was so sick).

Still, I liked the "Three Men and a Baby" kind of ring it had. So I started thinking...what would I like to have three of? And the rest is history!

A Costly Cure

I used to have road rage, but I don't anymore.

Actually, I started my vehicular career as quite the granny driver. Speed limits were followed; courtesy was exercised.

Then I went to law school. I can't explain what it was about law school that made me so ANGRY (well, okay, maybe I can think of one or two things), but next thing I knew I was ripping down the roads leaving a trail of terrified travelers in my wake.

But a few weeks ago I saw something so horrible, it changed everything. I was close to being part of that something horrible, in fact, and I'm so grateful that somehow I wasn't.

It was kind of a normal morning...I was much later than usual, so the roads were clearer, enough that I and others were tooling along at top speeds and weaving around slower cars.

Then suddenly everything came to a screeching halt. The accident a few cars ahead of me was as awful as an accident can be when cars are going too fast and following too close and someone isn't wearing a seatbelt.

Suffice it to say that it was upsetting, the most shocking thing I've seen in real life (and funny, isn't it, that you can see so many horrible things on TV, and they say that it desensitizes you, but I found nothing even slightly comparable between faked tragedy and the real pain of a real person before my eyes).

Fortunately, incredibly, from all I have been able to gather, that person escaped serious injury.

And as for me? Well, it's like a red haze has been lifted from my eyes. I just don't feel that sense of frustration and competitiveness that I used to, and I'm happy going a slower speed – I'm actually grateful when a not-so-fast car gets in front of me because it gives me an excuse not to drive so fast myself. (Since I would never be the slowest car in the left lane, knowing so well as I do what that does to the angry drivers behind me.)

I wish I could have figured all this out without having seen what I saw, though.

Gotta Dance

I've been having what can kindly be described as a rough time lately. I don't feel much like writing when that's the case, which I guess means I don't have a future as an angsty 19th century French poet who spends her days in smoky cafes penning great works of literature. Alas.

So I thought I'd tell you about something that makes me happy. My little niece, now nearly 17 months old, has got rhythm. I mean, the girl can dance, and she knows it. Or maybe the point is that she doesn't know it, that it happens without her consciously realizing that she's dancing. She just can't help it. The moment she hears music, she starts stomping and swaying.

It's so frigging cute, I can't stand it.

Next Time I'll Try the Burlap Sack

There's just no point in my even trying to be fashionable. I was born to spend my life in sweats, and I might as well accept it.

I've been feeling like my work clothes aren't feminine enough, or maybe it's just that even the girliest suit never feels particularly sexy. I thought I'd try a nice dress instead.

It's okay to wear a dress, but of course it has to be a work-appropriate dress. I have, oh, 9,325 dresses in my closet, and none of them were work-appropriate. Too short, too long, too low-cut, too tight, too sloppy, too fancy, too lacy, too young, too old.

I'd need to buy one...easier said than done. I felt that it should cover my shoulders, not be too form-fitting, and not be too revealing. Every dress in the world is at least one of those things. I finally found a dress that met all of my qualifications: a little bit loose but not a sack, cut past the knee, and with flowing sleeves that ended at my elbows.

Unfortunately, I was so busy looking for those details that I failed to take in the entirety of the dress.

So I wore the dress today, and I was feeling pretty good about myself. Then I happened to glance at myself in the full-length mirror in the ladies' room. Oh, the horror! Somehow...and I don't know how it happened...I'd embraced '70s fabulosity. I have seen that dress, with its polyester stretchiness and bohemian breeziness and its godawful loud mod pattern. In my mom's closet. Next to the bell bottoms.

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On a sad note, I did want to thank everyone for the kind words about Louie. It's been very hard. I was so steeled for the possibility that he would die that the news didn't shock me in the least, yet I wasn't ready in the least for the reality of him being gone. I can't believe how much it hurts. Everywhere I look, I see a place where he was. Even as I sit here typing, all I can think about is how he used to delight in parking himself in front of the computer monitor so I couldn't see it, how he'd purr when I nudged him to the side and then move right back where he was, looking at me with his eyes full of light and love. How can he be so very gone, so very fast?

Louie, 1999-2007

My cat Louie died today. He was 7.


I got Louie on December 5. He was only 8 weeks old, a skinny little ball of crazy kitten.

My beloved Pomeranian had been killed that Thanksgiving. I felt like I was drowning in a sea of grief, and I decided that a kitten might ease some of my pain.

I went to the shelter with the goal in mind of getting a black female kitten. I was in love with my brother's glossy ebony cat, and I wanted one just like her. When I got to the shelter, they had apparently had a bumper crop of black kittens. There were something like eight to choose from.

Meanwhile, my brother, who came with me to help me choose, took Louie out of his cage. After playing with him for a while, he said I should look at him because he was such a nice cat. I wasn't all that interested – I wanted a solid-colored cat and was not fond of his black-and-white coloring. But I held him a bit. The other kittens were happy to be held for a little while, but then they wanted to get down. Louie snuggled in my arms and fell asleep. When I tried to put him back in his cage, he struggled and cried piteously and plaintively tapped at my hand with his paw through the bars.

I was hooked.

I cried all the way home with him that day. I was still so sad about my little dog, and yet so filled with a sense of meaning in all of this...that this cat coming home with me got to do so only because of the horrible thing that happened, and how wonderful this day was, with that kitten's whole life ahead of him. And I cried because I knew that one day I'd be saying goodbye to him too.


Louie was a darling kitten, the most affectionate I've ever seen. Almost every picture I have of him shows him curled up on someone's lap or shoulder or even their head. I had a hard time finding pictures of him alone to post here.


He grew up into a rough-and-tumble little tomcat. He still loved to sit in my lap and to mess with his kitty roommate. We went through a rough patch of occasional biting and scratching for a couple of years in the middle. Some people thought I should give him away, but what they didn't understand was that I loved him, even if he could be mean. He could also be very sweet, and he was my baby that I had raised from a tiny kitten, and whatever he was, I felt like I was responsible for it.

Over time he grew out of it, and the last few years the cat that I had seen in the kitten emerged. He loved to sit in my lap when I watched TV. If I had to get up, I could lift him in a blanket, place him down on the chair, and then pick him up and place him in my lap again when I came back, and he'd be perfectly content. He loved people and always ran to greet them. He loved to play in water, and he'd do anything to get some Fancy Feast. He loved to chase little foam balls and climb on the cat tree and drape himself over sofa arms. He loved me and would wail every time I stepped out of the house. He purred when I talked to him and had the brightest green eyes and the pinkest little nose and the perfect tuxedo coloring that I could finally see was so beautiful. He was always so full of life, and he always seemed so happy.

I loved him.

New Digs

This was the "real" first post on this blog....

Welcome to my new and improved blog! Same great taste, less filling.

I've blogged elsewhere, but it was time for a change. Let me know if you're interested in reading posts from the old blog.