HAPPY NEW YEAR, FRIENDS!

so i've been out of commission at the beach house, and then getting my hair dyed very fun colors, and then buying multiple dresses for barrister's, none of which i am too sure about (but i swear to you that you will never see the formal dress selection you will get in BTR outside the deep south, what with the mardi gras balls and the deb balls and the various cotillions and all the private schools and their multitude of dances, so i figured we would do it while i was here and had oodles of options), and now i will be out of commission for the next few days too b/c i leave in the morning to fly out to austin and meet up with molly for a couple of days and to revel in the joy that is an 80s cover band for new year's eve. oh what good times should be had! i may even see some friends i haven't seen in years. but probably not b/c these are the sort of friends i have learned not to expect much out of. well, the one. the other is so reliable and has always been there to pick up my pieces when flaky friend the other flaked out on me, but i no longer have a working email address, and i sent a text message, but the phone number may also be outdated and if you know a joe morris from amarillo, TX, well you tell him that i will be in austin and that i am looking for him this weekend.

also, i would like to send a shout out to jared for having visited my blog from vienna, and perhaps also from a layover in england. most of my foreign visitors are just looking for "little lexi barely legal" or any configuration of those 4 words. actually, most of my visitors lately are. and i know that my commenting on it only increases the hits i will get, but still, i can't help myself.

so the point is that i will not be posting again for a few days, and maybe not even until i return to the 'ville, but i hope you all have very very very happy new years!!!

christmastime fun!

yes, i could be talking about going out and drinking with all my friends from high school, only i don't have any friends left from high school (i'm not missing much, trust me). and i could be talking about watching movies (tonight's pick: sahara) and doing puzzles with my parents, but that would make me look like a loser. (oops. i guess that cat's out of the bag.) but instead what i mean is watching my sitemeter say that people are visiting from places more exotic than cville, now that we have all dispersed from the mother ship. actually, that's not the fun part. then i try to figure out who is whom. ok, so this does not sound like fun, but i am really not wanting to work on my cite check and my neck was starting to hurt from working on the puzzle.

but this is made infinitely more difficult by the fact that not only do i not actually know who reads this (i always thought it was just 8 people who i knew pretty well), but also by the fact that the city i think people live in is not necessarily where their internet connection registers. unfortunately, even with these complications, this is a game that is either easy, or which feeds into my crazy.

so "wynnewood, PA" is pretty easy b/c she visits 18 times a day. has to be lexi. khang gave himself away by visiting when we were IMing, so i know that he comes up as DC. plus, his comments are pretty distinctive. after what i had initially said, i've decided that the cville that is still at virginia.edu is pai, b/c he is back in town and is totally nerd enough to be back at the library working on stuff. also, he's supposed to leave me a book, so i can't complain. [ok, so i initially i had said the person was jared b/c it sounded like a comment he would make and for some reason, it made sense to me that jared would still be in cville, but then i decided that there was something wrong with that and i changed it, but it turns out that it was jared and he is in cville and did leave a comment and now i would like to say that i am very psychic, but also too second doubty.] i can't figure out who the person still in ivy gardens is, but i'm going to have to guess it isn't someone i know b/c shouldn't law students all be at home with their families? but today's great mystery is "hingham, MA," which is made more interesting by the fact that i swear this person visits w/in 2 minutes of my checking my sitemeter. literally, every time i go to my sitemeter, someone from hingham, MA is probably still reading my blog. anyways, i have who i would like to think this is, but really, MA is full of all sorts of little towns with all sorts of internet access and i would not have ever thought that this person read my blog and i am always torn b/t if i would want people to or not, and you would think that would keep me from posting all of these things that only make my crazy clearer, but of course they do not, and so here i am again, posting about the crazy and only making the situation worse. oh well. i figure if you're going to be my friend, it's only about 2 minutes before you've figured this out for yourself. ok, so that doesn't even begin to explain it. the truth is more like if you're standing across a bar from me, it's probably 30 seconds before you've figured this out for yourself.

anyways, to hingham, MA and all other readers out there, i hope that you won't not be my friend just b/c i am crazy.

[also, i am going to be way busier for the rest of break, so you don't need to worry about me doing this every day. i promise. but today stretched out before me like an empty...well a 24 hour span w/ nothing to fill it. you get my point.]

another reason ice age 2 is the best movie ever

i can't believe i had forgotten this piece of dialogue--

Sid: Maybe we could rapidly evolve into water creatures.
Diego: That's genius, Sid.
Sid: Call me Squid.

HE WANTED HIS NICKNAME TO BE "SQUID"!!!!! LIKE I WANT MY NICKNAME TO BE SQUID!!!!

see, all the cool kids are doing it.

also, i noticed that much like my friends never remember to call me by my chosen nickname, neither did his friends. i guess it's just the curse of such a great nickname.

christmas wrap-up

first and foremost, MERRY CHRISTMAS!! or i hope that everyone had a merry christmas, since i am posting this late in the evening.

and on to the actual post....

i unwrapped 4 presents today, and three of them were totally worth mocking in a public forum. when i told my mom that all of my christmas gifts would be featured prominently in a blog post, she said it figures, since i have spent years complaining about what i have received, and now i am just doing it in a more public forum. (actually, that wasn't what she said. she said she wasn't sure if she should be insulted, or pleased that she was giving me material. i said at least this wasn't the great thermometer incident of 1995.) so here is what all i got today.

1. an awesome camera, about which i cannot complain at all, and a few accoutrements for said camera, about which i can also not complain at all. if you think the pictures in the future are of far higher quality than previous photos, or if you are my friend and you no longer have to smile for approximately 31 seconds before the final flash goes off, well you can say thank you to my parents for their wonderful christmas gift.

however, they felt the need to get a few other things to put in boxes. the thing about me is that i am impossible to shop for. and that i don't need anything. and my parents have years of experience with this. which would explain why the following picture is 2 of my remaining 3 gifts:


2. a 100 piece puzzle of happy feet, which as a fringe benefit, GLOWS IN THE DARK! and of course it's already done b/c how long do you think a puzzle designed for the average 8 year old really takes. well, it was totally fun. then i made them turn off all the lights and watch it glow in the dark.

3. what looks to be some device with which to inseminate a cow. adding to this impression is the fact that the box was "to: laura, from: mom, daddy, kelly, ellen, and U.B." "U.B." is my uncle brian, who is a cattle rancher and does have all the appropriate equipment to artificially inseminate a cow. kelly and ellen are my parents' best friends, who recently drove out to the ranch for a week with my parents. all of this kinda points to the fact that dear god, what is this they have given me?!?

oh but even better than a cow impregnator, it's portable sharps dispensers! see, i'm diabetic and tho i do not believe that appropriate sharps disposal is very important, they stayed in a hotel near an indian reservation during the same trip and said that these were provided in all of the rooms, because of the high incidence of diabetics amongst native americans. so they each took theirs from their room and then wrapped them up as a christmas present for their favorite daughter/friend's daughter/niece. and that explains that.

4. well if you know me at all, you know that of course i received a "god book," to add to the unread collection on my shelf. only this year, my mom has wisened up. she is no longer giving us god books that she has read and thinks are worth our reading. no! indeed! she is now reading the book, buying us each a copy, and then HIGHLIGHTING THE COPY SHE IS GIVING US, so we can just skim thru and find the passages that should really speak to us. ah yes, it's reading/god-enlightening at its best. so that is my absolute favorite. (that was when i told her i would be blogging about xmas.)

anyways, my other favorite gift, which is not mine but my mother's, is a day-by-day calendar that teaches you a new spanish phrase every day. see, my sister has been living and working in honduras for the last year and a half and my parents are trying to learn the language. well i tell you, this calendar has already taught me so much, i'm hoping we all go visit in a year. it starts out nice and simple--Jan. 1 is "happy new year!" and jan. 2 is "what are your new year's resolutions?" well that's when it gets good. jan. 3 is "i gave up chocolate and ice cream this year." it goes on and on and on like this, and i thought i would check my birthday, you know, just to see. actually, aug. 10 is just "i am on a low-carb diet." but aug. 12 is my favorite--"i'm not permitted to have cheese on my diet." well i thought that was a hoot. also very practical, since the people in the village where my sister is doing her mission work subsist solely on tortillas and beans and if you are visiting you probably do not need to worry either about consuming excessive carbohydrates or cheese. alas. at least their spanish will also travel well to resort villages.

best movie ever: ice age 2

so my family has a very tried and true christmas ritual. we don't change out of our PJs all day and we just watch movies. now in the past, my mom and sister have dominated this ritual with these terribly sappy made for tv movies where there is invariably a single/widowed/divorced parent and some sort of christmas wish by a child and a christmas miracle and the parent falls in love with some great future parent for the child. oh, or the year they gave jenny the BBC version of "pride & prejudice" and we spent the whole damned day watching that. i still haven't quite forgiven them.

well, i'm the only kid in town this year, and the tv guide said that "borrowed hearts" wasn't on this year (thank god. i think my dad and i might have doctored the tv guide to get out of watching it.), so today we watched ice age and ice age 2, neither of which i had seen before, and both of which are great.

but ice age 2: the meltdown is hysterical. i don't know who came up with the idea of a mammoth that thinks it's a possum, but it is SHEER COMIC GENIUS! oh god i loved it. i recommend it highly. i mean, A MAMMOTH THAT THINKS IT'S A POSSUM?!?! comic gold, my friends. comic gold.

small town news is the best

we had the BTR news on last evening, and they must have reminded kids at least 10 times during the 30 minute broadcast that "santa doesn't come until you're asleep." literally! on the news! and i swear to you that it was about 10 times. it was the best. also, maybe the most news-worthy thing that happened in BTR yesterday.

overheard in greensboro, NC

friend of the family: "Hi! How are you?"
senile grandfather: "Well, I think I'm senile, but other than that things are great!"

the long (and sugar-laden) journey home

so i must have been the last person to leave cville, as i did not fly out til about 4pm on saturday. fortunately, this left me contending with no one else for cabs or window seats on the flight out. unfortunately, this did not make me any more impervious to flight delays and i then proceeded to spend 4 or so hours in the charlotte airport. now i love the charlotte airport as much as the next person (probably more, b/c i actually really like airports and charlotte is one of my favorites, what with those rocking chairs an all), but on this particular occasion, i decided that i would eat my way thru a tub of fudge, and it was particularly brutal. at some point i quit looking up at the departure board, since every time i did so, the flight was delayed again. i was quite pleased to make it out of CLT, having died from neither boredom nor the over-consumption of sugar. thank god.

well, the last two days have been fraught with the same difficulties, and i am not sure i will survive. particularly the sugar. my mother was supposed to starve me skinny, and she mostly upheld her end of not putting tasty deliciousness in the house, only the silly people always love to send their doctors things for christmas and these things are generally 99% sugar and well, i cannot resist sugar. speaking of which, it has been minutes since i ate something that could send me into a diabetic coma. i’d better go get something out of the kitchen.

[seriously, will y'all still love me if i don't fit thru doorways when we return for next semester? b/c i'm not sure this is such a silly fear.]

late to the party

i'm sure everyone else is already aware of this, but just in case you are even less informed about what seems to be going on in the world than i am. (dear lord, how sad is it that i just referred to the website phenomenon "hornymanatee.com" as "what is going on in the world"? ok, well this was brought on by the fact that i knew nothing of "dick in a box" and saw something on facebook that i did not understand and then i went and watched and then eventually i got to this. b/c why would i be asleep or packing at 3:30 in the morning?) anyways, the point is that i laughed really hard while watching this and there is more out there, but since this was my introduction, well it will serve as a fine introduction for you too. a lovely way to waste 6 minutes while you're bored out of your skull at your parents' place.

assorted nothingness

i don't leave for BTR til tomorrow afternoon and i have spent the last two days doing absolutely nothing. and when i say "absolutely nothing," i mean that i haven't even felt like watching tv. of course, i also haven't felt like packing or cleaning, so i have truly done absolutely nothing.

anyways, just wanted to say congrats on being done and i hope everyone had a great semester and has a great break and a happy holidays and a happy new year and that i see you next semester and that we have lots and lots and lots of fun together, b/c after that, the fun in my life is going to decrease exponentially.

i've had a couple of really great last few nights, so now i'm being all nostalgic for law school. wednesday was just a few of us hanging out at cabell playing "strip flip cup," which was pretty hysterical b/c i wasn't even playing and i just kept giving scarves and gloves and purses to the perpetually losing team and despite a string of like 42 losses, the only things that ever changed hands were jewelry and winter accessories. i suppose that's what happens when you play strip anything with a small group of close friends who really has no desire to see one another naked. oh! and i hit the last two shots in a beer pong game and it was amazing! also, i was informed today that i was yelling things i don't remember. sounds about right. [also, would like to say a great thank you to the posters who suggested microwavable mac&cheese. it was amazing to have mac&cheese in 5 minutes and to experience no fear about burning down the house! best. idea. ever.]

and then yesterday, randomly hung out with some 1Ls and then out to the 1L finale party, where much fun was had, and a number of the 1Ls made no sense at all, but that is totally allowable. actually, totally encouraged. ah, good times.

anyways, i hope everyone has made it safely home and that you have a great couple of weeks. i probably won't post while i'm at home, but you're in luck b/c i am only going home for like 10 days and then i return to take the trial ad institute, where practicing attorneys and law students who really care about being trial lawyers and have already completed trial ad learn MORE about trial advocacy skills. oh, and then there is me. who had the pre-req waived and is using this class in place of trial ad b/c i figured this way i could cram the pain into one week and it was pass/fail, meaning i couldn't get a B-. it seemed like a really good idea, until i learned that the first assignment for before we start is to prepare an opening statement and i don't even know what that means! so the point is that i figure this is a new way to embarass myself in front of dozens of new people and if that's bad enough, well of course i'd like to share.

oh, and one final story--seriously, some kid wrote 28 pages on a final. TWENTY-EIGHT PAGES?!!?!? i pointed out that his prof was going to hate him. personally, i think it would be my lack of knowledge that would keep me from typing 28 pages on an exam, but others are more impressed by what his wpm must be. either way, it's a bit ridiculous and i figured we could just mock it a little bit in a public forum. seriously?!?! 28 PAGES?!?!

alrighty. happy holidays!!

best [pre-finals] mood ever!

if you had seen me on my walk over this am, you would have never guessed i was on my way to a final. i do not know what it was! i wanted to skip over! or dance. maybe i would want to dance this much if i listened to my ipod other than during finals.

but this mood will just not stop! here are the things i have gotten to do even before securing myself a great spot for my final--

• sleep til 11. again. and not worry about getting over to my exam on time and freak out etc etc. i may not be done at noon like the am exam takers were, but i am ok with that.
• it was cold enough this morning, that i got to open up my hat/scarf/gloves combo and wear them over on my walk! very cute! ok, so it actually wasn't that cold and i didn't wear them, but they are still very cute and i have them for my walk home. oh they are adorable! tell me so if you see me! you can also tell me how much you like my sweater. it's a good sweater.
• i got $52 for my T&E book! unprecedented! and $20 for telecomm, but i would have sold that back for $4. i mean, what was i ever going to do with it? and now i don't need to go to an ATM b/f going out tonight! i can start drinking the second i get home!
• i have gotten to throw the football around for a few minutes.
• and i still have an hour to look over my outline b/f i pick up my exam! as tho i'm really going to do that. but still. the option is there!

anyways. it is time to pretend to look over my outline for a few minutes and revel in the joy that is trademark law. if i am lucky, w/in the next 4 hours i will get to give a WHAT WHAT to the trademark dilution revision act of 2006. oooooooh, what an act it is! (ok, so maybe after all my talk about this act i should go figure out what it does for the state of trademark dilution law in the united states.)

whew!

lucky for me i did not attend the law school any time between 1845-1895, or i might have faced the prospect of having john barbee minor as a professor. not that i have anything against john barbee minor, but i'm pretty sure i would have if i had been his student, as in his first ten years of teaching, only 9% of his students were able to pass his exam and earn their degree. yick!

you can learn more about the storied history of uva law profs here. (i wouldn't actually say it's much of a read, but i would recommend taking note of the fact that prof. bevier looks about identical to the picture of her taken over 30 years ago. well maybe that picture wasn't actually taken in 1973, but it was clearly taken a while ago and it still looks strikingly similar to how she looks now. so props to prof. bevier for aging so well.)

if only i was good at titling my posts. tho maybe that would be helped if my posts were actually about anything.

so in the middle of taking my trademark practice exam (actually, i say "in the middle," but what i really mean is that the practice exam was 7 questions long (SEVEN QUESTIONS?!?!) and so i just gave up after a few. tho i do think i get some credit for having made it around to this at all. i mean, in the last 3 days, i really have spent all of about 6 hours on preparation for this exam) and eating half a box of lightly toasted rice cereal for no apparent reason at 1am, i decided to look at facebook again.

i am seriously tempted to join some of these groups, just to tell them that their groups are hysterical and have been the highlight of my evening. it's too bad that you can't post to groups, or on pictures w/o being a member/friend. b/c there is probably nothing at all creepy about my commenting on groups or pictures consisting solely of people i do not know.

anyways, if you're interested, here are some of the sample answers from my practice trademark exam. you know, before i gave up. you can see that i am a force to be reckoned with.

I. ...... finally, this little lady might have herself a claim about the misappropriation of her image, either false endorsement or right of publicity. she’s not a celeb, but that doesn’t matter. like the court in cheatham said, the Q is about the distinctiveness of the identity and the degree of recognition amongst those receiving the publicity. so if she is a famous skier and people who get this mag, who are largely ski buffs, are going to think this means she is supporting the line of clothes, she’s got a case. but if she is just some girl, then nope. also, what’s she doing just standing around wearing their shirt where they can take a picture of the sort of quality they would put on a magazine? i mean, that’s a bit weird, right?

II. WELL THERE MIGHT BE LIKELIHOOD OF CONFUSION! AS TO THE SOURCE OF THE GOODS OR AS TO SPONSORSHIP OR AFFILIATION. that pretty much takes care of that, now doesn’t it! we want to keep consumer search costs low! and consumers of alcoholic beverages are probably even more susceptible to confusion b/c they might be drunk when reading this ad and maybe we should account for that as a market factor. just saying.

III. oh no! why the hell did they go and do this! they are genericizing their own word! in an ad! oooooooh, it pains me just to see! didn’t their lawyers tell them anything about running this sort of ad and the potential ramifications of your trademark becoming generic! shudder!!

also, i was pretty pleased to have occassion to give a WHAT WHAT to the federal trademark dilution revision act of 2006. i thought it only fitting to give a WHAT WHAT to a statute that has really done a lot to clarify the status of trademark dilution as a federal cause of action.

and those were supposed to be 20 minute questions, but really, my answers pretty much sum it up. it is clear that i have a knowledge of the law that will be unparalleled by other takers of the test.

WHAT WHAT TO MY KNOWLEDGE OF TRADEMARK LAW!

outlines

so i know that this is everyone's favorite post about outlines, as well it should be. but see, this was a joke.

i just spoke to a friend who proudly opened up his tax outline to show me that he had integrated footnotes into his outline, containing the in-class examples. and i saw it! it's for real!

or maybe that's normal. is that what the kids are doing these days? i wouldn't know. my "outlines" aren't really outlines. my "outlines" suck. there's a reason i use the quotes. my trademark outline is the best one i've ever made and i say that is solely b/c of the font (bookman old style, if you're interested).

anyways, i have only just made it to the library (had to get my 10 hours of sleep last night) and now i've got to read thru it and highlight it in color! i have never been a mutli-colored highlighter girl, and i'm experiencing a bit of shame having them on my table in the library, but i'm going to push thru it. it should be fun!

any tech geniuses out there?

so my IM smileys have not worked for like forever and this has never bothered me and i actually have some sort of vague recollection of having turned the feature off years ago, b/c i did not want to send smileys and i guess i figured that i would not receive them either and well, i'm sure you know enough about me by now to not be surprised to hear that i had no idea the two were not related, etc etc.

well i have just downloaded the new AIM version and now, rather than just getting the =) or whatever the person entered on the other end (which is what I had always gotten with the previous verion, i am receiving smileys as an error picture box (the smiley does not load, but i get a box with a red X and the keystrokes from the other user). this is annoying! also, i have decided that while i may not want to send smileys, i do want to see what other people are saying and their way of saying it is important and if that is smileys, then smileys it should be, even if they opt to use the particularly annoying ones. also, megan pointed out the other week that i don't even make smileys in a way that AIM recognizes and changes them, so this whole thing was never even an issue to begin with and it's just another computer problem i have totally created for myself.

anyways, eli and i just spent 30 minutes trying to figure this out and navigating the AIM "help" page and their answer does not translate to the new version and with my computer, it doesn't even fix the problem on the old version and well, my computer is crazy, as we all know.

so we decided that we would send our question to the nice people at the AIM help service. and i typed up this whoooole explanation of my problem and even ended with an amusing and very friendly little anecdote about eli and i and our efforts and how we were about to go crazy and please how i hoped they could help us! only before you send your "report," you have to click a box that tells you think is not a service to actually get you an answer and it is just a way for you to send them complaints and they will probably never even read or care about my smiley problem, since all the people who have become aware of this are pretty convinced that this is a laura-unique problem and just another example of technology hating me.

so, anyone have any suggestions for how to fix this, so that if you try to IM me with multi-colored emoticons with all the latest features i can receive them? if so, that would be great. i'd love you forever.

aaaarrrrggggghhhhhh

so i had the best plan for today. i came in, i was going to work on this cite check (figuring that if i held off til after i was done with finals, i would never come in and do it; and also figuring that it wouldn't really be that bad if i sat down and worked on it) and i would study a bit and then head home early, like at 7 or so, stopping by the gym on my way home for a smidge of exercise. it was brilliant i was so excited.

only THIS CITE CHECK SUCKS. and it has always sucked (i have never seen an author who had less idea what was going on), but i thought i was mostly done with it and i don't know if the problem is that i am inept or what, but it is taking me forever b/c i was going back thru the things i had already fixed and re-working some of those things, and i have just decided that i am going to quit looking at anything unless it is in bright yellow, specifically denoting something i have not yet done, and i am going to not feel at all bad if this is the worse bluebooking ever published in a journal.

anyways, none of that was that point. so this has kinda pissed me off a bit. it just sucks. and i want to do kickboxing. and there is a KB class today only it is at 5:30 and that is not now and that is totally out of harmony with my entire plan for the day, etc etc etc. so i decided that i would just go between a few of the stacks and do some boxer's feet and throw some punches and wish that those boys i was friends with in college who would just let me hit them (their hands, for practice, not really them) were around right now.

of course as soon as i start throwing punches in the middle of the library, wearing a bright red shirt no less, some guy walks by. oops.

seriously, is there a punching bag around the law school? or at north grounds?

i'm thinking throwing the football around might have to suffice.

JUST THOUGHT I'D SHARE

I THINK THAT PEOPLE PROBABLY THINK THAT I AM WEIRD RIGHT NOW.

I HAVE MY HAIR IN POM POM HEAD. AND I'M STANDING IN THE MIDDLE OF THE SECOND FLOOR OF THE LIBS B/C I AM TIRED OF SITTING.

AND I AM DANCING.

WHILE TRYING TO READ MY OUTLINE.

ONLY I CAN'T REALLY READ B/C MY HEAD IS BOUNCING AROUND.

ALSO. IT IS NOT A TIME FOR TALKING. IT IS A TIME FOR YELLING. only w/o being loud b/c we are in a library. a little respect, please.

FYI re: trademark

so if you're thinking about taking trademark law during your time here, the only thing i think you should be aware of is that you should be prepared to have cravings for any number of foods (pretty much all terribly unhealthy for you), based solely on your class reading. unless you're not someone who is plagued by very fickle whims re: the foods you MUST eat RIGHT NOW. i am very susceptible to these whims and it has made the past semester difficult at times.

it was bad enough throughout the school year, when i would be reading late at night and all of a sudden i'd turn to a new case and suddenly need some some mcdonald's or ice cream or those tasty pepperidge farm goldfish crackers.

and the fact that it was at 9am meant that class discussions could be even more brutal. i generally haven't eaten breakfast before my 9am, so the first thing you put in my head, well that's what i'm going to want to eat. the real problem was that while this could be donuts one day, it could also be mexican food another day and i didn't want to be thinking about burritos at 9am! i don't even like burritos! not even after noon!

and now that i'm outlining, i'm leaping from one food product to another with such rapidity. just minutes ago, weak with hypoglycemia and the fact that my dinner was approximately 1/3 of that horrible lean cuisine hours ago and it is now 1am, i started in on the section on false advertising, only to be so cruelly confronted by Papa John's v. Pizza Hut and the overwhelming need for pizza. piiiiiizzzaaaa. i sat here thinking of all the pizza options i could get. i could quit outlining, leave the law school, and get piiiiiizzzzzaaaa. oooooooohhhhh, taaaaasssttty. somehow i pushed thru, i knew that was all silly and i live alone and do not need to eat a pizza at 1am, especially not when i am being so good with the outlining.

i moved on to the next topic on the syllabus. false endoresement. Waits v. Frito-Lay. great, so now i'm going to want chips. only, wait! i can do something approximating that w/o even moving! i have a bag of salty deliciousness right here next to me! (and the website tells me that frito-lay is responsible for rold gold pretzels.)

i think i'm safe for the rest of the syllabus, but i just figured i would warn you, in case dreaming of taco cabana for dinner one night and whataburger the next (neither of which you can get within a day's drive) doesn't sound like something you could handle.

i won't even get started on the day i decided i had to buy a fire truck...

today's PSA

DO NOT, UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES, BUY THE LEAN CUISINE "SALMON WITH BASIL" MEAL!! IT IS THE MOST VILE THING TO EVER BE MADE FOR HUMAN CONSUMPTION! ok, so maybe that is an exaggeration, but it is horrible and i am sitting in the library forcing myself to eat it and about to die from the revulsion of having done so. SO AWFUL. nevermind. i'm giving up. pretzels for dinner it is.

secondary PSA, if you have not yet seen borat and you are planning to do so, just show up 27 minutes late. a group of us (finally) saw it last night and i normally love previews (i figure it's like seeing 8 little movies all for the price of a movie you already paid for. plus, with my attention span, a movie in 3 minutes is about all you need.), but there were LITERALLY 28 minutes of previews and they were THE WORST PREVIEWS EVER! uniformly HORRIBLE! ok, there was one that was decent, but keep in mind that to have nearly 30 minutes of previews, you've seen quite a few. oh, and the kicker was that in the middle of the previews, they did the whole "carmike cinema" spiel, so we were all convinced that the previews were FINALLY over (we had already been laughing about how comical it was how many previews there were) and then they STARTED UP AGAIN! WITH MORE PREVIEWS! oh, and the second kicker was that the movie was like an hour and 10 minutes. SO I WATCHED 30 MINUTES OF TERRIBLE PREVIEWS TO WATCH AN HOUR OF MOVIE! (oh, and i didn't like the movie either, but i should not admit that b/c everyone else loved it, only well i am sorry, i did not like it and that is that.)

also, since i am sharing with you things that no one cares about at all, i have brought back pom-pom head and joy to all. who can resist the charm of the poofy balls on each side of my head?

ok, back to the trademark outlining, which is going slower than any bit of knowledge gathering has ever ever ever gone before. and what if i'm not even gathering any knowledge?!?!

lessons from my T&E outline

turns out that in some instances, my outlines are as bad as my notes. these aren’t particularly funny, but i think they’re a smidge funny when you think about the fact that they came from my outline, which is supposed to be the document that gives you all the information you should have readily available during the exam.

feel free to use any of this in your own outline. very helpful if you used the dukeminier casebook.

lesson I. why bother putting it in the outline when it’s already in the book?

• this includes certain written provisions, which you’ll find on p. 330 if they really matter
• there are all sorts of problems with this and you can read all about it on p. 289
• should anti-lapse statutes apply to non-probate transfers?, p. 397 if it matters

lesson II. lots of people get “screwed” in T&E cases. just no better way to explain it.

• in past [non-marital children], were just screwed
• Estate of Lakatosh (Pa. 1994), p. 159—elderly woman with weakened intellect gives Roger power of attorney and he totally screws her over
• cases on p. 368 with outcomes that really screwed people b/c of a lack of extrinsic evidence

lesson III. detail schmetail

• In re Strittmater (NJ 1947), p. 149—woman who left her money to the National Women’s Party. Of course she was crazy.

as a comparison, here is how someone else described that same case in his outline:

In re Strittmater (N.J. Ct. App. 1947) [21 CB 149]: Evidence presented that testator exhibited hate of men and regard for feminism, which manifested itself in certain physical acts (smashing clock, killing pet kitten); testator left her estate to the Nat’l Women’s Party. Rule: Evidence doesn’t show testator took great interest in the Party, so it is her insane delusion regarding men that caused her to leave it to the Party, thus voiding the bequest on account of insane delusion.
i. Case appears an anomaly based on judge’s conception that this doesn’t fit very well into socially accepted mores of this time
ii. Judgment is based on his social beliefs rather than testamentary intent, and the paranoia is founded based on social mores rather than testator’s state of mind

today

i am at the library. but i do not want to study. I WANT TO DANCE! seriously. DANCE PARTY IN THE LIBRARY! i blame debbie gibson. she was on my ipod on the way over and that was that. of course, with an ipod, you are subject to the whims of the shuffle and bush does not make you want to dance.

but i really want to do something fun. like bowl. or dance. or play a real game of something. or something. see, this is why i put my exams back to back. b/c immediately following an exam, i am ok with launching back into studying, but if i leave and take like an hour off, that's it. and i'm going to want a whole day and a half or so. i learned this last year. SO THIS IS MY DAY AND I WANT TO DO SOMETHING FUN!!! unfortunately, i am very bad at coming up with fun things to do. i mean, it is warm enough to play golf, but i can't really go play golf. OOOOOOOH, WHAT TO DO WITH MYSELF?!!?! other than suck it up and outline for trademark.

secondly, i would like to file a slight grievance about the pita chips from the bookstore. well, it's not really a grievance. b/c i know that they cost a dollar and that they have like 6 pita chips in them, but when you want a cinnamon sugar pita chip, there really isn't any close approximation for the sweet starchiness and so then you are captive to the cinnamon sugar pita chips and you pay your $1 and then you open them up, and well it still disappoints you every time you see that there are only 6 pita chips. alas.

assorted reports on today

1. sometimes you feel a bit silly wearing earplugs to finals. i mean, you're just blocking out the breathing of other people and the sounds of typing. and i know that we're stressed out law students and all, but really?!?! (you can see more of what i think about earplugs here. i am a user.)

but today. (ok, so yes, i am the moron who opted to take my final at the WB101 end of the hallway.) but finally today, my earplugs finally felt needed! that's b/c during my exam, my earplugs were used to block out the bona fide sounds of jackhammers!

jackhammers! during an exam!! it is a good thing i'm not a 1L or i might have lost it.

2. worst. traffic. ever. in charlottesville right now. i don't know what the hell it is. i have taken a break in my errands to come home and have a drink. that's how bad it is.

3. just another complaint about the weather. the man on the radio said something about it being IN THE 70S TOMORROW! and i just received the box that is my xmas presents and i have not opened it yet, but since i bought my xmas presents and gave them to my stepmother to wrap and send back to me, i know what they are. AND A NEW COAT AND CUTE MATCHING SET OF HAT AND SCARF AND GLOVES IS NOT GOING TO DO ME ANY FLIPPIN' GOOD IF IT NEVER DROPS BELOW 58 AROUND HERE!!!

new favorite

what can i say, i'm fickle.

today, someone got here by searching for "Spastic Paraparasis." (ok, so it turns out i had spelled it wrong.)

and once again, not a mistake.

also, is it all of you who are the reason my number of hits for "little lexi barely legal" shot up today? or is that just coincidence?

also, ajeet reports that i do not show up if you enter "friend of little lexi barely legal." i don't think he would recommend you try it.

more backstory to that fateful day

ok, now here’s the backstory to the previous post, which i figured i should separate out or my inspirational message about “it’s all gonna be great” would be lost in the midst of all the weird laura-isms.

so all along, i had been calling the law school "the LS" and i thought that everyone did it. b/c we type that in IM and don't you just say everything like you type it? of course, i call people by their email addresses too, even tho the UVA email addresses are a random string of numbers and letters. seriously, ask me some time. it's kinda creepy how many i can do. but anyways. so at some point it is brought to my attention that not everyone calls it the LS and that is weird, but it is now my thing and people take to it and associate it with me.

well one day, i see one of my 2L friends wearing a blue t-shirt that says "LS" in white block letters on the front. I AM ECSTATIC! I LOVE IT! i really really want this shirt.

fast forward to the end of the semester. i decide that i am going to borrow the shirt and wear it to our contracts final, which is the last final of our first semester. in addition, we are taking a section picture right after the exam and it's going to be the end of our first semester of law school and oh! everything is going to be fabulous! i am VERY excited about this. i talk about wearing this shirt for DAYS in advance. (perhaps i should have spent some of this time studying contract law.)

so i wear it the day of the exam, you all know how that goes, i flee before we take the section picture, there is no immortal image of me wearing this FABULOUS shirt OR of me with my section, whom i adore. it is all very tragic and i really truly seriously lament the lack of this picture for weeks.

but then....i borrow the shirt from andy again. i wear EXACTLY what i was wearing to the final (it was painful, but i was willing to pay that price) and have rob take pictures of me sitting in the front row of the classroom in which we had taken the exam, just as people had been doing that day. seriously. i have him take like 10 pictures, posing me in various spots, so that we have the best chance of getting one that will fit perfectly into the section I photo. (ahhh, the things rob has done for me. these are the friends you make in law school. these are the people it was worth failing contracts to meet.) then i have saunders photo-shop me in to the picture.


OH MY GOD! IT IS JUST LIKE I WAS THERE!!!!

the minute this showed up in my inbox was perhaps the best of my 1L year. gosh, it still makes me so happy to see.

good luck, 1Ls!

well, and everyone else taking exams, but my story is about my 1L contracts final and i figured that is appropriate. it was my "buck up" email to a 1L friend the other day after the crim exam, and i figured i would pass it along.

whatever happens, here is the story of my contracts exam. there was a 2 hour essay question and i wrote 5 pages. literally. five pages. i fled the room after the exam, bolted from the school and sat in front of north grounds crying for about an hour. literally, wailing. no calmer, but realizing that everyone is probably leaving the school and i really don't want to miss everything going on that night and that i really also don't want to be alone at this time, i head back to the law school where only about 5 of my sectionmates are still around (i am still balling hysterically). well they had all taken a shot of jager, which i had obviously missed out on. jack hands me the remaining fourth or so of the bottle, just as a joke, telling me to take a swig and it'll help. i finish the bottle. i don't even like jager. and within 15 minutes i was the tipsy, blotchy red-faced girl with snot all over her shirt who was known for the rest of the year as "that girl who absolutely lost it after the contracts exam."

that was my contracts exam.

and the point is, i still have a job. you will too. some of this stuff sucks, but we all pull thru it in the end, with a bit of help from our friends and maybe the solace of alcohol every now and then.

so good luck thru the next week and a half to everyone and may you maintain your sanity and some degree of good cheer!

you know

it is probably trouble when you IM a friend with a (sincere) question you have about an exam you are taking tomorrow, and they reply, "hahaha."

yup. rock on.

oh, only then we tried it out on justin too. and he wasn't on IM, so he just laughed audibly.

i'm ready. bring it on!!

classroom selection

so i finally made it to take my T&E exam this morning. tho i almost missed it by sleeping thru my mom's phone call. literally, i snoozed my mother, calling from baton rouge. i had her call at 6:45 to wake me up, but then realized that was a bit excessive, and i was still exhausted when she called, so i asked her to let me sleep for another 30 minutes. only then i either slept thru that call or my phone did not ring, so it was 7:45 when i woke up to her third call and i was all flustered and well, that is all besides the point. i have some things to say about how my exam went, but i am worried that lexi would report me to the honor committee.

however, i do have one tidbit that will reveal nothing about the exam.

so normally i like to take the exam in the room i took the class in. my theory is that some of that knowledge has probably seeped into the walls and that i could then just absorb it back from the walls. so this morning, i was really tempted to find out where barry cushman had taught T&E last fall. i figured that even if that knowledge had been leaking out of the walls for a whole year, there was probably still more in those walls than this year's classroom. (i'm sorry. that was mean. also, my whole theory is stupid. i know that.)

ok, just one more

i figure that if no one else is going to post during finals, i may as well post 18 times as much. unfortunately, that doesn’t save you from the fact that my posts generally suck. oh well.

so lexi has been getting google hits to her blog for eons. [she wrote about some of her favorites here.] and i had always been jealous b/c i never got google hits and i could not figure out what made my blog less worthy than hers.

well my latest conclusion is that you have to be up for a while b/f you get google hits (this is probably totally uninformed and wrong, but whatever), b/c i have recently started getting a few. not as many as lexi b/c my name is not that of a porn star, but whatever. (incidentally, some of my google hits have started coming from people looking for "little lexi barely legal." please! if you're going to come to my blog, you should at least be looking for "friend of little lexi barely legal.")

a few of come looking for info on the bean and zyde co. (the new restaurant) and maybelline colorstay lipcolor, and i feel very pleased b/c my blog is actually helpful on those topics, as i have posted specifically to tell what i think of them.

the most popular search that gets people here is "god hates me." yes. a number of people have wound up here with that search. as a side note, if you google "god hates me, part XVIII" i am the only hit that comes up.

but i have just received my favorite search hit ever. well, yet. a google search for "Minn. Stat. § 1.1496 2005." and when i saw that, i was like “WTF?!??!” why would that be on my blog? oh but it is. of course, the next question is why was anyone looking for the great blueberry muffin statute of 2005. but who am i to question?

any day now, i'll probably start to get hits for "family matters porn." i can hardly wait.

what i have learned today

it's nearly 2pm and so far, what i have learned today is that the younger daughter on "family matters" went on to work in porn. [i feel like i have to explain this. i was flipping thru the channels, family matters was on, for some reason i figured i would look it up on imdb and see if any of them had really done anything other than that show]

and i suppose that i did learn what §§ 2(a)-(e) of the Lanham Act bar from being registered.

since i slept til 11, i suppose that's not bad work for 3 hours, right?

but what to wear?

so i have just (as in like 30 minutes ago) decided that i might take T&E tomorrow, even tho i haven't looked at it today. but i figure that i have to start at some point, right? i can't just keep putting them off just b/c i don't want to take an exam. (this is still up in the air. now that i am home, text twist and bed sound very tempting.)

my fingernails are clipped (seriously, i think this is the most important box on the pre-exam checklist) and i suppose i'll start to assemble all the things i insist on taking to exams with me (snacks, glucose tablets, glucometer, water, diet coke, advil, tissues, contact case, glasses) (actually, as i list those, i now carry all of those in my bag on a daily basis or keep them in my carrel. guess there's no need to put things in order).

but what is totally stumping me is what to wear to an exam when it is going to be 60 degrees outside. and don't say anything about how spring exams are frequently taken when it is 60. that is totally different and you know it. finals are a time for hoodies and sweats and sneakers (too long since my last pedicure).

AND I AM VERY DISMAYED THAT THE HIGH FOR THE NEXT 10 DAYS IS PREDICTED TO BE SOMEWHERE BETWEEN 58 AND 61, MEANING THAT MY WARDROBE OF FINALS HOODIES IS TOTALLY USELESS!!!

another wise use of my time

technically, i am outlining. only what i am really doing is adjusting the fonts of the outline over and over and over and over.

see, we did a group outline. so there are 5 parts. and i decided that we should each have our own font. only a number of people just used times new roman. so i have to pick new fonts for them! well picking a font for a person is not easy. not only are there my preferences (can't be too narrowly spaced or too dark), but there are also the individual people to consider (boy vs. girl fonts mostly, but not too far either way b/c it also has to be plain enough that it's easy to read). and there are so many choices! and you have to actually change a block of type before you can truly appreciate what it's going to look like. and once you've picked your font style, then you have to pick the size. b/c some of them are right in 10, and some in 11, and some in 12 and i know that i am the moron using at least 5 different fonts in the outline, but i want all of them to be approximately the same size and there are very specific parameters for what is an acceptable font size, and you can't exactly tell til you have printed it out, so you've just got to keep fidgeting until you think you've got it right.

so in the last hour, i have done about one case, and 49 font changes.

eeeewwwwwww

so last night, rather than push thru the 10pm period where i always feel tired, and then i am not tired again until 5am, i decided to go to sleep at 10pm, figuring i could get a good night of sleep and wake up at 7 to hit the library. only i knew that would not happen. and i was right.

i woke up at midnight, completely wide awake.

so i allowed myself to sleep til 9 this morning. well, i had been snoozing since 7 (i am the world's most annoying neighbor for about 2 hours every morning), when i noticed a noise coming from my bathroom.

"what is that gurgling noise coming from my bathroom?" i wondered. well i will tell you.

it is a foul-smelling black sludge bubbling up from my sink! like to the degree that the stopper in my sink was flying up out of the sink b/f splashing back down into the goo.

and since i didn't want to shower until that was tended to, for fear that it would start welling up from my shower drain, i am now sitting around my foul-smelling apartment waiting for al to show up.

so this is my way of saying that even if you had an exam today, at least you didn't have black grossness welling up and sputtering about your bathroom.

(i think i like trusts & estates)

well, estates. i still don't actually have any idea what a "trust" is. i think it's just one of those concepts that will forever be beyond my grasp. like atoms and molecules. those still don't make any sense to me.

but this is an area of law with rules, and with people, and where you use words to try to convey a point that hopefully some stupid court will not come along later and decide they don't like and they will twist your words. i like that sort of thing. and i like people.

and it turns out i'm kinda having fun answering all these sample questions in these hornbooks jen lent me. it's fun to figure out who gets what! of course, so far i have been "wrong" by the book's standards about half the time, but i am making very solid argument for why i am right, so i don't think she can fail me for that. it's not my fault the authors of the sample answers can't interpret as well as i can interpret.

oh, well except for the times when it turns out that i am not reading with a finely trained eye and i give half the estate to somebody, only it turns out that he was dead. oops.

anyways, i really didn't mean to do many of these, but i am just getting such a kick out of it, so why would i ever start trying to learn telecomm law. i mean that ain't ever happening.

study break!

sometimes during finals, you want to take a break. but you can't find anyone to take a break with you. and 7:30pm tonight was particularly barren b/c a ton of people weren't around the LS b/c they had taken exams this morning, and people were at dinner, and well everyone else is just people i don't know.

but i felt like a study break. an outdoors study break. i decided i felt like a game of catch.

and you know how i am when i get my heart set on something. there is no backup plan.

so i got out the football from the secret society box and i began to play what many probably think is the saddest game ever--one-person catch.

only i actually really enjoyed it. i wanted fresh air. i got fresh air. i wanted to throw the ball and move around a little. i got to throw the ball and move around a little. i just proceeded to throw the ball from one tree to another, run over to it, throw it to another tree, and so on. ahhhhh, i have no qualms about being pathetic.

[lest you think i'm totally pathetic, i got zaruba and berde to play with me and they were very impressed by my skillz. zaruba says i can both throw AND catch, making me one of the best girl football players of all time. and he didn't even see me hit anyone! sometimes i wish i had grown up in a family where we played sports, b/c maybe i could be a member of a professional football team right now, rather than a soon-to-be lawyer. (i'm not going to complain about being a law student, not even during finals.)]

no need to worry about me

i may have slept til 1pm (i have no idea how), proceeded to watch 4 episodes of seinfeld on DVD, taken a nap at 2:30, eaten about 2 pounds of popcorn, and not shown up to the library til 5:15.

but you don't need to worry about me. i am totally ready.

i have just saved the "class final" word documents with the headers and footers containing my blind grading number, class name, and page number for all three of my exams.

soooooo ready. so do not worry about me.

it is the darndest thing

so molly just IMed to see if i was going, and i'm like, OF COURSE i am going. and both of our biggest concerns was that we had to get off of our couches to shower, rather than the fact that it will be at least another 18 hours b/f we can study again.

the funny thing is that i am very well aware of the fact that i am WAY BEHIND where i should be. but i am not panicked. and i am wayer behinder than i have ever been.

but unlike most 3Ls, who go with the old, "i have a job, why worry?" theory, mine isn't at all a conscious "why worry?" as a matter of fact, i'm pretty convinced that the firm is going to fire me within the first few months i'm there, and i'll be back to looking for a job, with my 3L grades on my transcript. but somehow, w/o thinking about it, i'm just not worried. i think it's plain old senioritis.

and i tell you, i like it! i probably actually don't feel any more guilty than i have in the past, and i am way less stressed and hyperventilate-y. well, at least now. no promises about future dates. but still.

in other news, i would like to give a WHAT WHAT to the frozen foods that get us thru finals. i am currently heating up little spinach artichoke bits, and i am pretty excited about them!

this mighta been a bad idea

well i hope everyone enjoys their first reading day, a day you can dedicate to working diligently, uninterrupted by those pesky classes.

or you can have (at best) about 3.5 hours of working time before you hop in the shower and then into a car to drive up to DC and go to a concert tonight.

it seemed like a slightly foolish, yet ok, idea at the time. i mean, i've only got 3 exams. and i've always been so good about working in the days and even weeks preceding reading days. and i had seriously thought about going to vegas for my brother's 30th birthday, and surely this was less than that. so it would be good. i would work so hard for the days leading up to thursday, and it would be a nice break!

only none of those things have happened and i have been trying to outline communications law for like 8 hours and i have made it thru all of 1.5 classes and this is clearly never going to go anywhere and we are doing a group outline and when i give it to the group they are going to say, "WHAT THE HELL WERE YOU DOING?!?!!?"

but i have been looking forward to it and i am going to go and that is that. even tho i am wishing i could plug my computer in in the car.

anyways, if anyone has any suggestion how to layer yourself for a concert when the "feels like" temperature in the city you are going to be visiting is 16 degrees, and you have no idea how long you will be outside, or what you can do with your excess layers when you get inside, please let me know. b/c spending the next 3 hours thinking about that sounds like a way better plan than learning about regulatory options under section 706 of the telecommunications act of 1996. (hey, at least i know what the major act is called, right?)

straight from the source

we have received a comment from the girl with the snackbar, and here is what she has to say--

Dearest friends of the snackbar,

It was my friend and I who had the 'buffet' for a passle of our friends and random wanderers to munch on; though, contrary to popular myth, we did not in fact have a George Foreman grill. (But what a good idea, right?) :) We don't mind any mocking at all; We're sure our plight is an understandable one - we needed a hot Pop Tart like whoah (and we attempted to choose carefully foods which would not smell or crinkle too much), and offered to our neighbors, though they regretfully did not take us up on it. So now we've relocated, but if you see us again with our bag of relatively unhealthy breads, cookies and cheeses, you are *more* than welcome to partake.

P.S. Oh, oh, and someone had said that we were *selling* our foody wares. Not so, my friends! Though we do not in fact take orders, we provide our caloric neighborliness free of charge.

see, i was totally right! also, this sounds much like the roni to me, tho there is no way it was, as the people i knew discussing this would have referred to her by name. but i'm just saying, that is a voice i enjoy. perhaps you would too.

and now i want a pop-tart. there are no pop-tarts in my home. phoo.

1Ls--love 'em or hate 'em?

rather than posting the world's longest comment on evan's blog, i've decided to write another post and explain my thoughts on what he has to say about 1Ls.

normally, i LOVE 1Ls. love them. i think they are the cutest things in the whole wide world and i wish i could be a law student for forever, so i could keep having new crops of 1Ls to love. (seriously, i want to be dean ballenger.) i love that they haven't taken a law school exam yet or looked for a firm job. oh, and i love how they all have the same classes and the same schedules and their section is their world and the law school jokes and all of that.

but this time of year, i vacillate b/t loving and hating 1Ls. on the one hand, it's so cute how prepared and eager and worried they are! it's so early and they are running around with all this fear and nervousness and knowledge. they've been outlining for weeks! and having study groups! and sitting around in scott commons talking about the points of law and debating something about mens rea or the statute of frauds or whatever those other things they "taught" us about first year were.

and that's also exactly what i hate. it's how aware the 1Ls make me of how little i have done. their outlines have been done for weeks. i am maybe 1/3 of the way thru mine. and that's pushing it. they know when their finals are. i actually don't know what day they start or what day they end, and i certainly don't know when i'm planning on taking mine, or even in what order. plus, groups of people sitting around talking about "the law" have always panicked me (well, at least since i came to law school) b/c i see them and even w/o hearing them, i can tell that they know WAY more than i do and then i start to hyperventilate and it is a downward spiral and it is not pretty.

and i know that "it doesn't matter this year" and i am supposed to be all laid back and cool and that my "experience" at taking law school exams is supposed to count for something. only i am not laid back and cool. i freak out. it is what i do. well, i might add. and the evidence should clearly indicate that my "experience" on law school exams hasn't taught me anything, except that i am bad at taking them. and it does matter a bit and i really might fail and oooooh, it is just all very troublesome.

anyways, now i have to quit posting b/c i have agreed to buy people PILA cups and i am going to get lunch and then i am going to come back and finally start working. only 2.5 hours after i meant to.

it never gets old

i have decided it is up to me to pick up the slack of all the LS bloggers who aren't blogging b/c it is "finals." unfortunately i don't have a following and no one will ever know, but i'm here! and i'm not not posting b/c i'm studying! no! instead i am posting b/c i am not studying! see how that works?

anyways, in honor of the fact that i think i may have learned some trusts and estates in the past few days, i offer you this comical view of T&E from the libel show two years ago.

there are others!

so i have not yet seen this, but my trademark class was all abuzz this morning with talk of the "1L buffet." seems that some girl has brought a toaster and a tea kettle or a hot plate or something into the library. and everyone knows about it. here is an email describing the situation:

I understand that it’s finals time and you want to settle down somewhere in the library and get crackin’ on the books. Obviously, you want to be comfortable, whether that’s wearing that pair of sweatpants or bringing a granola bar to snack on. For example, I have put a box of mini candy canes at my carrel and you’re free to stop by anytime for a treat.

But if you have a minute and want to see the most ridiculous library setup I’ve ever seen, go upstairs to the second floor, hang a left at the reference desk, and go all the way to the far windows. The girl sitting a table to the left has enough food to literally stay in the library until the end of exams. Who is this girl? Check it out if you want to procrastinate for a minute.

as you know, my motto is semper paratus. especially during finals. i have always kept plastic forks on hand. and i had candy in my carrel for public consumption all thru finals last year. and there is always a bag of popcorn there (mostly b/c i haven't eaten it in a year) and at least one can of soup in my locker (ditto, two years. probably should have been expunged in the great canned goods expunging of 2006). and during finals there were frequently an apple or pretzels or any number of other snacky-type foodstuffs. and there is a blanket and a space heater. but it gets cold in here! and croquet and bocce. but you need fun things!

and even i am willing to admit that this may border on comical. but i'm still not ready to laugh at her. on the one hand, when you need to heat food to sustain yourself, it might be time to take a break to scott commons, where your SBA has so kindly provided such services for you. i guess my vote on the toaster and the electric kettle depend on if she is willing to let others use them and if she is being careful that they do not burn the library down.

plus, maybe the whole thing is funny to her. my space heater is funny to me, but i am not oblivious to the fact that when people walk by and see a space heater under my carrel, they probably question the freak show that brought it. (ok, i thought i had posted about this, but i can't find it, so now i have to explain--remember the first week of classes when the LS was particularly cold? FREEZING even? and there was some reason like "the chillers are broken." chillers??!!? what?!?! anyways. i decided that a space heater would be great (not quite sure why i thought i would be spending time in the library early my 3L year, and i never did wind up doing so), and i had one sitting around from when i lived in DC and used it to heat my un-heated bathroom before i showered in the morning. anyways, it was just taking up space in a closet at home, so i brought it in. mostly b/c i thought it would be funny. and, of course, i never used it.)

anyways, my point is, to each his own. and it is that time of year where we are all supposed to give one another great deference in our behavior and our moods and to realize that we all just deal with finals differently and that law school finals are completely different than undergrad finals and who never knew that we would would be like this about a test. i mean, i have totally had nights where i didn't think i could take the time to go to scott commons to get something to eat. i've been known to conveniently position myself near restrooms, so as to minimize commute time on my only permissible departures from my table. (of course, that is not right now, as i have just spent an hour and a half wandering around the LS and posting on my blog. crap.)

anyways, feel free to help yourselves to the fun and the heat in my carrel, but make sure to exercise the space heater with caution! and maybe i'll bring candy one of these days.

if you see me today

compliment me on my sweater!

library chairs

so i have just spent another 35 minutes hemming and hawing about where to sit in the library. this is always a very agonizing process for me, b/c i am no longer a one-locale kind of study girl, but a w"hat am i in the mood for right now?" kind of study girl. subject to a few other factors. for example, the last few days, i have gone and sat across from rob downstairs in the main room. but then i remember that i generally can't study down there anymore b/c it turns out i am just too easily distracted.

but the chairs. so these nice chairs are particularly crucial for those of us who are short b/c you should see me when i'm in one of the normal chairs. it's like my book is at my shoulders and i'm holding my hands over my head to type and it just doesn't work very well. in the past, i tried to sit on books, but that just doesn't really work very well.

so i am all for the practice of moving the comfy chairs around, rather than just keeping them in the two main rooms. particularly since we all know that you generally only have two people at a table anyways. so it makes more sense to spread them out for maximum utilization.

but here is what is kinda irking me right now. and it's not irking me too much, b/c i don't sit in the two main rooms, but people are taking chairs and not replacing them. so the back corners of the library have chairs strewn all about, and there are whole tables sitting w/o chairs at all. ok, so this isn't really a big deal and i'm not really irked, but i didn't have anything else to post about and i really don't want to start trying to outline for comm law (i also spent 25 minutes wandering around the law school trying to figure out what to eat. i was starving, but it was breakfast time and i wanted lunch.) and i just think that maybe you could replace a chair when you take it b/c it is one thing to go of your own volition hunting for a good chair, but i think it's probably annoying to show up at a table, or especially your carrel, and find yourself w/o a chair. tho i'm sure there is one sitting close by. but still.

see what a great lawyer i am going to be. i am very convincing.

adding insult to injury

so i was working very diligently in the library when i just started to feel really gross, like i wanted to throw up (sorry, but it's part of the story). i had been feeling the groggy heavy head thing for a while and that slows me down, but i hate feeling sick to my stomach. anyways, i'm not sure what it was--maybe the hours of T&E reading (seriously, i don't remember reading having ever made me feel so awful in the past. but now, after like an hour and a half, my head feels all full and hazy and it's very annoying) or my bloodsugar or what, but i decided to be a baby and use this as an excuse to get the hell out of the library (where i had intended to stay til at least midnight).

and just as i was pulling into my parking lot, so close to the comfort of my home, the radio started playing a McRibs commercial. guys! that is not helping anything! cruel and unusual. dammit, now i'm thinking about the McRib again and it isn't helping anything.

anyways, then i came home and sat on my couch with my porch door wide open for a bit, so tomorrow i'll probably start feeling like i have pneumonia. i am very frail.

two random anecdotes

1. and this totally goes against the policy of not directing negative comments against specific people on a blog, but i'm sorry, it was funny, and if you are a 2L or a 3L at uva law, you will appreciate it. so--

proposed feb club theme: the ned andrews memorial party.

decorations: glocks, signs listing constitutional rights, big pictures of ned

activities: 11PM spelling bee. 11:30 geography bee. 12AM: ghost stories outside of things that ned did that scared people.

(dellis gets all credit.)

2. lexi and i went to bodo's at 9am saturday, to get ourselves out of bed and to the library. doug leslie showed up while we were there. he sat nowhere near us, read a magazine, and we left shortly after his arrival. today, before class, he asked lexi if she had a relative in town this weekend. she said no and asked why he would ask that question. he replied that he thought the girl she was with at bodo’s must have been a relative, as they looked so alike and acted so alike.

can you even imagine being in the family that had to have TWO of us?!?!? i feel bad for my mom having had one.

this is the new low

every year during finals i wonder when i have gone too far. at what point have i moved in to the law school to a degree that is truly unacceptable or done something else that is just silly enough that even i should be ashamed by it.

i have never thought the fact that i keep a toothbrush, toothpaste, and forks in my locker was wrong. that's just common sense. plus, once i put them in there first year (when it was totally justified), it didn't take any effort to just leave them there.

and bringing extra pants to the library so i could change at the point in studying when i no longer wanted to look cute and wanted to be comfy, there was never anything wrong with that either.

the space heater was pushing it, but i meant it as a joke, so that was ok. (tho i seriously contemplated walking to my carrel to get it earlier today. it was so cold in klaus it took me 20 minutes to fall asleep! and i think i'm lucky i didn't die of hypothermia while i was asleep.)

but i have always mocked ajeet for his fingerless gloves. because they are TOTALLY WORTH MOCKING! i mean, it is ridiculous to have a pair of gloves specifically made so that you can type while wearing them, right? two and a half years i have said so. and then, during the BarBri T&E tape on saturday, i realized my hands were so cold i could not type. maybe he wasn't so silly.... and then, i was at the kroger, and there were gloves for $1.99. for $1.99 you don't need to feel bad about taking a pair of scissors to your gloves and cutting off the fingers so that you can be the biggest loser in the law school (i would say second to pai, but at least his record of success says that he's been doing something right, so i'll step up). you might need to feel bad for being such a loser, but not for ruining a pair of gloves.

so now, as i write this, i am wearing a pair of fingerless gloves. they're a bit clunky, but i bet if i just push thru and keep wearing them, i'll be used to them in no time and i'll be back to my usual 100 words per minute. (i don't actually know my wpm.)

i'm also thinking i might wear them to bed. it's supposed to be in the 20s tonight, but it's still not cold enough in my apartment to turn my head on, but i just feel like you can't go wrong with wearing a pair of gloves to bed, just in case. says the girl who doesn't think it's wrong to cut the fingers off to make typing gloves. (ok, i obviously still think it is kinda wrong. that just didn't keep me from doing it.)

the comic

so i was going to post about this on friday, but then the law weekly had not uploaded their most recent edition online, and now it is sunday, and i guess they are never going to do so, so i am afraid that you do not have the visual, and i apologize. but for those of you at UVA, particularly those of you who know lexi and i (which is about all that reads this, i think), i am sure you could hardly miss the "mel the 3L" this week in which the two of us got our shout-out. which probably explains why we each had about 40 extra hits on friday, and then our readership dropped down to its normal levels yesterday. alas, we did not capture a new audience.

first of all, we liked josh's accurate portrayal of us--lexi got a martini and a flat chest (sorry hon, but it's true.) i changed my line in panel 5 so that i am going to check on my 30 other bids, which as you know if you either know me or read this after PILA, well that is all too accurate. (it was my suggestion. he initially had me going to the bar. not that that would not be an accurate representation either.) and i liked that sometimes josh departed from reality--i got a really nice rack. which was truly multiple people's first comment upon looking at the strip. hurrah for animation!

anyways, a number of people seem not to get it, and josh had to explain it to lexi and i, so here is the explanation--in panel 3 she says she isn't sure she wants to be drawn. and then in panel 4, i go into this whole spiel about how he couldn't draw her that ugly for various reasons. and then in the final panel, she looks like frankenstein. not even the bride of frankenstein. frankenstein himself. tho josh did remove the hairs from her chin, which were probably my favorite part of the draft we were sent.

anyways, i'll upload it if the law weekly staff ever puts it online.

in the meantime, i feel bad for having left you w/o entertaining commentary for so long, and so i leave you with this--

yes, i realize that when most people put amusing things on their blogs, they put pictures/videos that have been passed all around the internet and approved of as funny by millions of people. and i opt to put a picture of myself that makes me look, well i apologize but there is really no better way to put it, at least slightly mentally challenged.

but the point is that if you are worried about what finals are doing to you, well you should be far more concerned about what feb club may do to you.

another drunk kitchen disaster

my friends are usually so good about giving me advice when i am drunk. as a matter of fact, as lexi dropped me off on the corner last night, she told me that if i returned home drunk, i should not try to open the amazon.com package waiting for me there b/c she was worried i might kill myself with the scissors or knife i tried to use. and i followed that advice.

unfortunately, by the time it was clear how drunk i was going to be when i returned home, there was no one around to tell me not to boil water when i got home. truly, nearly every time i get drunk someone tells me not to try to boil water when i get home. saunders once told me that if i was hungry when i got home, i should call him and he would make me food b/c he does not trust me in a kitchen when i am drunk. and really, who blames him?

there was the time first year when i got the pasta in the boiling water before falling asleep on the couch and waking up hours later to a charred clump of blackened spaghetti sitting in the now half-ruined pot. my apartment smelled of char and fire for the next few months. it was really not good.

then there was the time last year that i stayed awake long enough to get the pasta out of the water, but i poured the boiling water on my own stomach, searing off my flesh the week before we were to go to aruba to bask in the sun for a week and giving me an upside down christmas tree shaped scar.

and then there is last night, when i didn't even make it to the putting the pasta in the boiling water. instead, i woke up at 5am, walked into the kitchen and noticed how hot it was (b/c the stove had been on high for hours) and that my pot somehow now looked like this

and smelled vaguely of sulfur. so i think it might be ruined. but don't tell my stepmom b/c this is the second of the nice pots and pans she bought me that i have ruined. i mean, how does a pot even change colors to red? it's kind of amazing.

pretty much, if you ever live in an apartment building with me, you should really be sure to have renter's insurance. or you should give me a standing offer to let me wake you up and have you make me macaroni and cheese when i come home drunk, b/c at least that way i won't burn down your home.