And It Only Took Me a Decade

I finally finished reading The Canterbury Tales, purchased for high school English IV. My cheap paperback copy is yellowed with age; it looks like it actually is from the Middle Ages. It feels like I have been reading it since the Middle Ages.

It's kind of a relief. That book has followed me for years, taunting me, demanding to be read, tormenting me everywhere I went. It accompanied me from my parents' house to my first apartment...and to the second apartment I moved into three weeks later when it turned out the first apartment was a crime-ridden, death-courting cesspool...and then back to my parents' house...and then to the next apartment...and then back to my parents' house...and finally to my current house. My parents thought they would never be rid of me; I thought I would never be rid of that accursed book. It was a millstone around my neck. Inescapable. Omnipresent.

It haunted my dreams.

Ironically, I actually finished it in my parents' house. Perhaps the book wished for its journey to end where it first began. Though in truth, I never actually had read beyond the first couple of pages, until I read it all at once. I know it's a great work of literature and all...it's just...it's, um, boring.

As for my English class, I'm still trying to figure out what the purpose of that was. We focused for weeks and maybe even months on the prologue, analyzing every word and every nuance and researching all the great contextual meaning that is hidden to us but supposedly would have been so clear to a reader of its time. At some point, I figure, a book has lost all its value except as a historical artifact if you can't appreciate even a quarter of its content it without extensive research. After all of that, I guess I knew all about how utterly scandalous the Prioress was. But gosh, since we never got beyond the prologue, there was still an entire book that I knew nothing about.

And now I do.

Eh. I could have done without it. At least it's finally done and gone.

So I've started a new book. Uncle Tom's Cabin. It bears a sticker indicating that it was purchased from a small family-owned bookstore...that was run out of business by the big boxes, oh, sometime around 1996.

Thus continues my tour o' literature a la death march....

I Went to Work Today

It is overrated.

I Didn't Go to Work Today. Again.

My car told me this:


After it stopped wanting to go. On the highway.

Fortunately I was able to get it to eke out those last few miles to the next exit, even though the car wouldn't go faster than 10 mph. I had my hazard lights on and was in the right lane, but everyone decided I was driving so slow because I am insane and they were all really really mean to me.

I pulled over here and waited for the tow truck as the rain poured down. A homeowner walked around the car sweeping the rain with a broom. I think he might really be insane, but maybe he had his reasons, just like I did with my 10 mph.

I Didn't Go to Work Today

But not for lack of trying:



(The black bars are for the purpose of removing identifying info, not because the wheel was lewdly attired.)

Dude, Where's My Door?

My front door is nice and all, but sometimes it is frustrating in that it falls short in certain areas. Such as functioning as a front door. It's rotting and doesn't quite fit in the frame anymore. There's a gap at the bottom that lets leaves and bugs blow in, which no matter how often I vacuum makes me look like a slob. I think a nice hard kick would easily break it open. Even a soft kick. A gentle breeze, perhaps.

Well, as I mentioned I am renovating, and this clearly needs to be addressed sooner rather than later. For the last month I have searched and searched for a door. And searched and searched. And then I searched some more.

And just when I think that maybe this is it, maybe I will actually really truly get to buy me a door, something happens to foil me. I can't believe it. People, I am here. I have money I want to spend. Lots and lots of money. Please, somebody, take my money.

Home Depot doesn't care. Lowe's doesn't care. And...um...I don't know of any other place to buy a door that doesn't cost $10,000. But if I did, I'm sure they wouldn't care either. It's like pulling teeth to get anyone to so much as call me back.

I don't get what the problem is. My door is a fairly standard 30" wide, 80" tall. I would like fiberglass, as obviously the wood is bad in that it rots and steel is bad in that it looks cheap. And I would like it stained a lovely, rich, dark reddish-brown color. Is that asking so much? IS IT????? Apparently.

I finally thought I had found it at Lowe's, where a guy named Fred took my sheet of paper with the measurements on it and worked up the perfect door for me. It kind of looks like this, except in the mahogany stain. Fred was a little bit weird. He greeted me by asking, "Am I bleeding?" Err...nooooo. "Really? Because my head was bleeding earlier. A lot. It still feels weird. I don't remember how it happened." Um. "But I can't tell customers about that because it would freak them out." Uh-huh. I'm a customer. But I didn't say that to him and instead offered my bland sympathies. Since I'm really desperate to give somebody somewhere LOTS OF MONEY.

So Lowe's sent out their measuring guy, and I told Fred I would buy the door and was all set to stop by and sign the contract. Then Fred calls and tells me that the door I chose did not come in my size. The door we worked up was based on incorrect measurements.

I was really ticked about having measured improperly...until I looked at the sheet of measurements I had given Fred. They were right. He's the one who messed it up when he was inputting the info into the computer. I guess an unexplained head wound will do that to you.

Summer of My Discontent

It's official. Summer is over. It may not feel like fall; it may not look like fall – but the calendar says "September," and that's good enough for me.

I celebrated by going to Overpriced Craft Store and buying Overpriced Autumnal Decor. It's totally cheap if you buy the components and make your OWN autumnal decor, but pleeeeze...what do I look like? So I paid the price and plunked it on my dining room table and it looks totally pretty.

Other than that, I guess I'm doing okay. This summer was tough, as you know. I'm still feeling disillusioned about work and particularly bummed since I DIDN'T win the lottery last night even though I think I really really deserved to. And I spent a good part of it worrying over That Bad Thing I Hoped Wouldn't Happen But Could Very Likely Have Happened...but which thankfully didn't happen. And it could have totally screwed me over at work if it had, so you'd think I'd be more grateful about work since it DIDN'T, but being human and irrational, it really doesn't. Of course, it could still happen, though I think more likely not at this stage. Whew.

All in all, it was a great relief to see the calendar turn over to September. I've been so exhausted lately...bad attitude all around, struggling to shove it down inside so no one notices and then feeling completely overwhelmed with emotion and stress each evening when I get home that I take it out on people who don't deserve it.

I left work early on Friday to go to a conveniently scheduled doctor's appointment, then spent all evening hanging out with little A. She left and I went to sleep, and then I slept and I slept and had dream after dream about oversleeping for work and for class and for other important things, but it didn't matter. I finally got up at 5 in the evening and felt...drained. Like I'd been in a coma for a month instead of asleep for 17 hours. But I also felt really good and, for once in my life, like I didn't want to climb right back into bed.

I think I needed it, and it's been good. I'm hopeful that the fall – and my SECOND year of legal practice – will be better. I think maybe yes to the first and no way to the second. I'm considering my options going forward, since I don't see that this state is sustainable. I've resolved to fix up my home so it's great for resale or for me to stay in without needing to make changes, and if I can manage that, I will try to pay it off, and if I can manage that, I will work on increasing my savings....until eventually I just can't manage it anymore, and then I will do something else. I think I can, at a minimum, make it through year #2, and then we'll see where that takes me.

Blast from the Past

It's hard to find time to post lately. So I thought that between original posts I would occasionally add vintage posts from my previous blog, which is no longer publicly available. I realize that, if you read the previous blog, that is really boring and a total cop-out that does nothing to alleviate the lack-of-posting issue. I'm really sorry about that and stuff. But I will do it anyway. First of all, there's stuff from the old blog that I don't want to leave languishing in password-protected oblivion. Second, I will never unlock the entirety of the old blog. Third...there is no third point.

And with that thrilling introduction, I bring to you the first new old post. I wrote it on my bar trip almost a year ago, something I've been thinking about a lot lately, what with it being all really fun and whatnot and what with this current September offering up such comparative thrills as a trip to the dentist.

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Death by Donkey
Originally posted Sept. 5, 2006

We're at sea today, but yesterday we were in the Greek island of Santorini. The island is basically a big old mountain, and the towns are built at the very tippy-top.

And of course the boat leaves you at the very bitty-bottom. So how to get up there, you ask? You could ride up on the cable car. And you could walk it (I don't recommend it, for reasons to follow).

Or you could ride up on a donkey. Doesn't that sound like fun? Who doesn't love a donkey? Nobody, that's who, because everybody loves donkeys.

I love a donkey too, so naturally I chose the donkey. So I got up to the donkey-giving guy, paid, and then suddenly I was hoisted in the air and tossed onto a donkey. "You go!" the man yelled, and the donkey, well, he went.

And that's when it became clear that I'd been given the demon donkey. My brother went cantoring by, waving cheerily and hooting, "Look how well he obeys me!" My sister-in-law wielded her camera in one hand and her bag in the other, snapping pictures as she glided up the mountain.

Me? I held on for dear life, screaming, "I don't wanna diiiiiiiie!"

My donkey didn't care. He went where he wanted to go. He galloped at breakneck speed. He crashed repeatedly into the cliff face, crushing my leg in the process. He rammed other donkeys, and then tried to bulldoze them to the side (leaving my poor defenseless legs right in the line of fire of the other donkeys' hindquarters).

He had a particular yen for the other hapless tourists making their way down the mountain. He headed right for them at top speed. Oh, the poor souls, how they tried to avoid him, stepping this way and that, but my donkey was far more nimble than they. He'd draw nearer, hot breath like the flames of hell washing over them, and they'd press themselves desperately against the cliff wall. Their eyes would grow wide with horror.

And the screams, oh God the screams, they haunt me when I try to sleep. "Nein! Bitte nein!" or "Non! Mon Dieu, non!" or any of a handful of other languages that I do not speak, but the meaning was clear enough: terrified denial at that which could not be avoided.

Somehow, miraculously, I survived and so did the tourists. The cruelest thing would have to be the way that, with (what felt like) miles to go to the top, the donkeys stopped, and the donkey-handling dude came up behind me, grabbed me, and yanked me unceremoniously off the donkey. "Done!" he yelled. "You go now!"

Sheesh, I went. And just about died climbing up the rest of the mountain. I have grave, grave concerns regarding my ability to climb Mount Vesuvius tomorrow. If I do not return...remember me.

Taking the Suckiness Out of Law School

My brother is staring down his first day of law school. I've given him all of my old outlines, and, if he wants them, he can have all of my old bar studying materials (I never did sell them back because sooner or later "they" will tell me it was all a mistake and I'll have to take it again). Other than that, I find myself oddly helpless.

What is there to say, really? "Good luck"? "If it sucks, that's normal"? "I will understand if it turns out not to have been the right choice for you"? (Some days that last one hits awfully close to home.) Just because something is true doesn't make it the right thing to say.

My brother has always enjoyed school and learning in general, and he particularly enjoyed it at higher education levels. I think he gets excited about it – he actually wants to know about things like, say civil procedure, as opposed to someone like me who viewed most classes as purely a means to an end. My hope is that he'll find law school satisfying, and that his more laidback nature will prevent the type of daily anxiety attacks that plagued my first semester. Maybe he'll be one of those people who really loves law school. Weirdos.

I do think there's about a fifty percent chance of him being a gunner. Sigh.

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So, what would you tell a person about to embark on that neverending carousel of delights that is law school?

I guess I will just say that it's normal and right if it feels like nothing makes sense. A lot of the time you won't quite get the full picture until shortly before finals (at least, one hopes you will get it by then ;), and as awful as that feels that first Thanksgiving, I wish I had fully understood just how common that was.

I did everything wrong that first semester – everything people advised us not to do – and I waited way too long to study for finals and I didn't outline during the semester and I remember this one day near the beginning I sat there trying to read for class and it was getting dark outside and then the electricity went out and I was drinking a can of cream soda and it felt like the whole world was so dreary and black and to this day the thought of that thick cloying soda coating my tongue makes me feel ill. I felt out of control and stupid and slightly insane, like the mental equivalent of reeling drunkenness, and I stayed up all night before finals too.

And gosh, I did well in law school. If I could figure out why I would write the definitive book on it and make tons of money and that would be awesome and ironic, in that being good at law school would be the thing that freed me from actually practicing law. Alas, I can't figure it out. Maybe it's that I had great outlines, mostly thanks to other people, but as long as I could bring those suckers in to the final, I knew I could find the law that I needed (especially since I extensively indexed them). And I was really really good at blabbing on and on forever, though I am sure you would NEVER have expected that. In law school they call that "applying the law to the facts," and they love it. I call it B.S.ing, but whatever.

So apparently that is the key to law school. And all of the reading for class and knowing all the answers when called on (which I did NOT – I was a blathering idiot, among the worst there were) and panic and fear and bragging and posturing and one-upmanship are ultimately irrelevant.

Or not. Everybody I talk to seems to have a different take.

Why They'll Never Let Me Telecommute

I had car issues today – AGAIN – and ended up borrowing a car just long enough to run into the office to pick up some work to do from home while waiting for the repairs to be completed.

Which is a great idea, except that by the time I started actually working it was after lunchtime. And then I was just so, so sleepy. And my bed looked so, so nice.

A nap made PERFECT sense.

But it's not nearly as much fun right now, as I enter billable hour number 4 for the day and the clock ticks ever closer to 10....

Worst. Movie. Ever.

I saw an early preview of Hatchet because I'm special that way. I had never heard of that movie before, but apparently it is all the rage at film festivals and all the cool people love it.

I think the theory is that you go to the preview, and then you tell all your friends how totally awesome the movie is, and then the movie comes out and they all see it and good times are had and money is made. But, like evolution and gravity, the theory simply doesn't hold up.

I feel compelled to use my powers of movie previewdom to warn all of you, my friends, to stay away from this movie. Do not waste your time. Do not waste your money. In fact, I want my money back...and I got in for free.

No redeeming value. Stupid story. Terrible acting. A horror movie utterly lacking in horror. It doesn't even have kitsch value. It was just BAD. I can't even describe it as torture porn...more like "gore porn." Which served as a great counterpoint to all the real porn, which is unabashedly featured throughout, in the grand Shakespearean tradition, as a movie within the movie. Stupid. Stupid. Stupid stupid stupid.

For the first time in my life, I was ready to walk out – and after the first three minutes, to boot. Quite a feat. Except I couldn't because I had to pay my bill for the food, and the service was rotten and I didn't even get my bill until half an hour after the movie ended, and when it came there were three margaritas on the bill that I had not received, though it's true that I had ordered one, and then repeatedly reminded the server of that fact when it did not appear, to no avail in terms of my own personal margarita consumption, though clearly the orders were noted for the purposes of bill padding. Maybe a margarita or twenty would have have made the movie go down easier, or at least it would have placed me in enough of a stupor that I could float along mindlessly until permitted, mercifully, to leave.

Bah humbug.