the things we do for those we love

so today, a very popular question has been, "did you go to 3L bar night?" well no, no i did not. and i'll tell you why.

jared happens to be a bit of a NASCAR fan. ok, jared is a lot of a NASCAR fan. he has that same ability that all boys have to remember every freakish little detail of whatever sport it is that he loves, but he doesn't use it for basketball or football or baseball or any of those sports that would allow him to interact with anyone else i know. (it's really irrelevant to me, b/c i don't get it with any sport.) instead, he knows nearly every detail of every race since like 1978.

and he is the hugest dale earnhardt fan ever. like 3 has been his lucky number since he was born and he sometimes gets choked up when he talks about his death and he remembers every race dale was ever in and...well, he's a fan.

which is why we drove the 2 hours each way to danville last night to watch dale: the movie, which was playing there.

both the 7:00 and 9:30 showings.

only that's not the best part. see, about 3 weeks ago he had ordered tickets to a theater about an hour away that was showing it. only last week he got news that the theater had closed, so we would have to go all the way to danville to see it. and he was CONVINCED that the movie would be sold out. so after calling on friday, to ensure that their were still ticket's for this wednesday's showing available, we drove the 2 hours down, and the two hours back, on saturday to buy tickets. to both the 7:00 and 9:30 showings.

but that's still not the best part. the best part is that after we drove the 2 hours to danville to get our seats early enough to have good seats, b/c we were sure the theater was going to be packed, there were approximately 30 people at the 7:00 showing. and exactly 9 at the 9:30 showing.

(as a side note--jared would like to express his extreme disapproval to all NASCAR fans in the greater danville area. and i'd like to say that we could even extend that to all NASCAR fans within at least a two hour radius of danville. i mean, i'm asking what "pole position means" and i managed to make it out! poor showing, "fans!")

but it was a good movie and it meant a lot to jared and gave me some more appreciation for NASCAR and dale earnhardt was a pretty cool guy. so for as hard a time as i've been giving him (and as hard a time as my friends have been giving me), it was worth it. let us know if you want to see it when it plays in richmond in a couple of months!

oh, and other things about the trip that i can get behind include the fact that i got my first-ever trip to bojangles. and my second. and third. in addition, i learned that there is a restaurant called "biscuitville." how could you go wrong? i may insist on driving to danville every other night and i may weigh 300 pounds very shortly. that is some good stuff.

finally, a certain someone was so good as to remember which historic marker i wanted to stop at on our first drive down, and even remembered to stop at it yesterday, so i could learn about the wreck of the old '97. the historic marker didn't tell me much (actually, i thought, "9 people died and they're calling this a 'train wreck?'"), but the wikipedia entry informs me that there was a copyright lawsuit involving the resulting ballad! a copyright suit! i love me some copyright law!

so all in all, i'm saying it was a good trip. i mean, what could i have done at bar night? get drunk with 3Ls? well, there's always tonight.

welcome to the newest additions to MY family

matt and trish may have decided they were ready for a baby, but i've been making some pretty big additions to my home recently too.

about a week ago, i finally decided that i was ready to commit to a lexis prize. now, as you know, this had been a problem for a while. i had been accruing points like a madwoman, with no end in sight, b/c i was unable to commit to what i wanted. i had seen this frozen drink machine last year, and it had tickled my fancy, but it was about 24,000 and it seemed totally frivolous and did i really need another large device to sit, unused, in my kitchen. i mean, the cuisinart i got earlier this year is still sitting in its box, unopened, in my entryway. from december. but i decided to make a frozen drink last week, and i remembered that every time i try to use my blender to do so, the thing smokes. which is exactly how my last blender died. AND then the very next day, rob sent an email heralding this device, saying it was what he wanted, as tho he had found it and was the first person to think about using lexis points to buy it. so sunday, marva deposited 300 points in my account, and i decided it was time. so i ordered the margaritaville. and with that great amazon shipping, it arrived yesterday. and here it is:

as you can see, it did not sit for 6 months, clogging the entryway to my apartment. i plan to use it tonight. reviews should be up shortly. it should be amazing!

secondly, jared and i decided that we were ready for a garden gnome. on our drives to danville (posting about this little excursion next), i was overwhelmed by the variety of garden gnomes out there, and i started to think i needed one. i had seen them on my visit to big lots and had been very tempted, but they were pricier than what i thought i needed to spend on a garden gnome. but today, we went to target to scope them out. well, they are far pricier at target than at big lots. we then went to big lots, where i grappled with the decision for a while. i mean, i loved him, but was he worth $8? well, that decision was made as jared looked up while i was cradling the garden gnome like an infant. it might have been too much for me to spend on a garden gnome, but it was not too much for jared to spend on my happiness.

so i am proud to introduce you to sampson:

feel free to visit my home to visit either sampson or to enjoy a tasty frozen beverage. mmmmm, i don't know why i'd ever leave again.

CONGRATULATIONS to the maddens!

ok, so that is probably overkill on pictures of the maddens, but you know how bad i am at making decisions and so i didn't! i figured this way you could see that they were both pretty and fun.

anyways, noticeably missing from the pictures is the big news--

matt and trish are the proud new parents of a baby boy, colin michael madden (a name of which i heartily approve. love it, love it, love it). he was born this morning at 10:16am, weighing 7 pounds, 9 ounces, meaning (for those of you keeping track), his birth weight is three ounces more than mine.

we're all really excited that the big day has finally come and that everyone is doing well and yay for baby madden!!! congratulations matt and trish!!!

dammit

and i woulda picked VCU over duke!

tho i suppose that wasn't a very uncommon pick with how duke has been playing lately.

of course, i'm now being forced to support jared's picks, and he sure didn't pick VCU over duke. what am i supposed to do with that! oh, and he picked old dominion over butler. i would never have let butler lose in the first round. only b/c i remember them being the 12 end of a 5/12 upset a couple of years ago and that will forever get them thru the first round in my book.

not that i actually have any idea what i'm talking about.

S*@$!

it is 2:30. i just got an email saying that BC had won its first round game (in the NCAA tournament).

then it hit me.

I NEVER FILLED OUT MY BRACKETS!

my plan was to do it when i got home from pong for PILA last night. well, maybe you shouldn't make plans to do something after you complete hours of heavy drinking. well, it wasn't supposed to be hours of heavy drinking, but that's what it was. so all that happened afterwards was passing out. the kind of passing out that involves not brushing your teeth or taking your contacts out even.

now this is very disturbing for a number of reasons.

the first is that i will not care at all what happens during march madness. and i LOVE march madness. but only when i have $10 to motivate me to care. i mean, what about march madness am i supposed to love now? the sport of basketball? puh-leeze.

secondly, i always love the false hope of the big win. and the thing is, i'm usually really pretty good at brackets. and when i say "really pretty good," what i mean is that i am the first person in every pool who does not get money. so if the pool gives money to the top 3 people, i'll come in 4th. and if it gives money to the top 5, i'll come in 6th. the first year i ever entered a pool (i actually did not know march madness existed until after i graduated from college), i would win in something like 4 of the final 6 scenarios. and i would have won everything were it not for the fact that maryland won the whole shebang. and i was living in DC where there are lots of terps fans, so of course they had that picked. and then there was the year i had the final four exactly right and not one of the final two at all. so i'm good but not good enough. that's my point. but i do derive some sense of dignity from it.

and i'll just sound totally uninformed all month. not like i was ever informed in the past, but the fact that i didn't spend 3 days scouring the internet, only to make my final decision by flipping a coin, means that i don't even know who's in and who the upsets are and all that stuff that is what makes the tournament so much fun.

boooooo for laura not filling out her brackets!

mi dushi aruba

so i've decided to make another quick and brief spring break post b/c i had been meaning to do so, but i never did, and the time is probably past, since i've been back to griping about law school things, but this is going to be a public service, so you'll thank me for it, i'm sure of it.

first of all, our culture lesson. "mi dushi" is how you say "i love" in papiamento.

second of all, we loved the bar at la cabana far more than the bar at the marriott. the second time we showed up, they knew us. of course, that's probably not very difficult, since the first two times we went to the bar, the five of us were the only ones there. plus, we're f$!#in' delights, as i'm sure you can imagine. plus their drink specials were on everything, not just a specific drink, and they had two happy hours per day. oh! and they had great music! i don't even like to dance, but somehow the music at the bar compelled me to move every time i heard it! it was like it wasn't even me!

but the best thing they did was introduce us to the "mi dushi."

essentially, it's a pina colada colored with blue curacao. then you put creme de banana in the bottom of the glass, fill the glass with your blue pina colada, and top it off with some coecoei. now i don't know what this coecoei is, but in the interest of informed journalism, i had the man show me the bottle, so i could get the spelling correct. not that jen and i could find it in the liquor aisles in aruba, so i'm not sure that bodes very well for finding it here, and none of us could really discern what flavor it is, but we would guess cherry, and really isn't what's most important that it is red? actually that is what's most important b/c the drink is intended to resemble the aruban flag.
so now you have learned something new today. a few something news. and one of them is a tasty beverage. you are welcome!!

i have found my life's greatest aspiration

greater even then being the keeper of the documents at the supreme court.

i want to be the source of a lexis fact or fiction question!

today's question is essentially, did chris chauvin graduate from UT? no! he graduated from LSU!

but even more fascinatingly to me, he graduated in 2004. he's a 2001 college grad! he's my age (hell, we were probably both even in baton rouge high schools at the same time) and he has already become a lexis fact or fiction question!

of course he's also written a law review article and clerked for the 5th circuit, but neither of those things really incite my envy.

but golly, LEXIS FACT OR FICTION! my heart kinda stopped just thinking about it.

another boo

so my final cite check is supposed to be out of my hands by mid-week. i'm not sure if you recall that b/c of delays in getting my last one, it was in my hands during finals first semester and the christmas break. and now this one came to me the day before spring break! booooooo.

anyways, i'm the articles editor, so my job is to make sure that everyone else's cite checks are turned in and accurate and that the changes are entered. well, it turns out that fixing 300 footnotes sucks way more than fixing 20 and every time one of these comes my way, i kick myself for having signed up for the job. but the kicker is some of the ed board. i'm sure you can imagine that every cite check team has one or two people that make my job WAY harder than it would normally have to be.

my group has one girl that is AWFUL. she has never turned anything in at all on time, and will then email every few days to apologize and say that she'll have it in to me by "tonight," which invariably means that 3 days later i'll have to email her again and ask her where it is.

anyways, the last cite check was due 9 1/2 days ago. BEFORE spring break. there were a series of about 30 emails among the whole group the week leading up to that date b/c there were lots of problems getting some of the books, etc etc. i worked with everyone to make sure they had what they could get and we would work out the rest of the kinks after break. people were offering to come back early and crap, and i told them that was just crazy b/c this is a cite check whose author couldn't get back to us on time and we're not hurrying back from tropical dessert islands for that.

but anyways.

so on sunday, four days after the cite check is due (and the first time i have internet access), i learn that the usual suspect has not sent in her cite check. not even the usual explanation that "she's working on it" and is "so sorry" and will have it to me "by the end of the day." so i send an email asking her about the status.

which she has just replied to, 7 days later (fine, i suppose not everyone has internet access on spring break, but i'm not 100% willing to believe that is the case)--

Wow, I left for spring break and totally forgot about this. Cross my
heart that i'll send it to you by the end of the day, and apologies for being
the big pain during your last cite check duties...

yes, that makes TOTAL sense. i mean, the slew of 30 emails the previous week probably didn't tip you off to the fact that you had a cite check due. fair enough.

NO! NOT FAIR ENOUGH! you are a lazy cretin who has now done this for EVERY SINGLE cite check in the last year. AND she applied for the managing board! in a position that would involve timeliness! and promptness! and not screwing things up for other people to make their lives more of a pain!

anyways, i realize that this is one of those things that could get me in trouble, but i kinda figure that if you've now done this AGAIN, it's fair for me to anonymously rant about it, even if you can figure out who you are. anyways, so that's what i have to do today. deal with 300 footnotes. and want to shoot myself. mmmmm, sweet. at least i'll be really tan while doing so.

boooooo

so i have just received my firm's stipend and start date in the mail. our stipend for the bar and moving expenses and all that other stuff is $10,000, which is at least a significant increase from the $5,000 we were initially told it would be. which would cover just about nothing. particularly when you factor in that it is $10,000 minus taxes. and it turns out the taxes on $10,000 are $4,000! how is that even true?!!?! yick.

oh, and my start date is SEPTEMBER 5! so much for needing to worry about where to go on my bar trip, since that has been cut about 3 weeks shorter than anticipated. not that i would have traveled all that time, but still. it's the principle of the thing. boo for my real world not holding off until october, like everyone else's real world.

la cabana

(i would like to apologize in advance for the fact that this is the most out of sorts post ever, BUT i did manage to get EIGHT pictures up at once! i mean, yeah they're all screwy and the text is all out of sorts, but whatever. they should still take you on a journey thru gaudy resort decor.)

the first two days we stayed a lovely little resort called "la cabana," which i absolutely must share pictures of b/c it is...well, hysterical. the second we walked in, we felt like we were in an episode of the golden girls.




(which was fitting, b/c last year while we were in aruba, we would play a drinking game to the golden girls about 4 times a day when it was on lifetime.)

this impression was only confirmed when we made our way upstairs, to what could only be described as a room blanche devereaux would be proud to occupy.

and i don’t know what the golden girls’ bathrooms looked like, but let me assure you that la cabana’s are worth taking note of.

oh aren't those something!

i don't know which i like more--

the fact that they’ve got their name printed on the tubs.



or the soap that leaves you wondering if they’re supposed to be making you feel totally sketched out by the things you could catch at their resort. (even best case scenario, they're trying to herald the fact that they're providing you with soap. yet i'm not sure i've ever been to a hotel that hasn't provided me with soap. but anyways.)

or that this is the hair dryer they’ve got! love it.

oh! or the fact that there is a bedet. because that’s always funny.

so really, there was just too much to choose from.

one final spring break tip

i'm back, but i can't believe i didn't remember this one.

shriek "SPRING BREAK!" loudly and enthusiastically very frequently. wave your arms around a lot, and leave people wondering if you are 20 years old, wildly drunk, and about to stir up lots of trouble at their nice resort. no one needs to know that you're really a bunch of 45-year olds at heart. it keeps the old people on their toes.

spring break!

well, i should be outside basking in the sun some more, but i seem to have turned bright red on some of my extremities today, so i'm hiding inside for the rest of the day. i thought i was napping in the shade, but the coloration of my arms leaves me with a sneaking suspicion that the shade moved on me. bastard sun.

anyways, we've been in aruba for 4 days and it's been grand times. i was going to post all of my reviews and things for you to know, but it turns out that the world's slowest internet will not allow me to upload pictures and these stories are nothing w/o pictures. i guess you'll just have to wait another 4 days for the scoop. alas.

i suppose this means i should go figure out something else vacation-y to do with my time. i tried to take a bath, but i was bored by the time the tub was half filled up. i would say i could work on my cite check but HAHA THAT IS THE WORST IDEA EVER. i suppose that just leaves trashy magazines and drinking rum. hm. yeah, i can probably handle that. i'll be on the patio if anyone needs me!!

oops

i have made a fatal mistake. after having spent a year looking forward to going to aruba, and two weeks making fun of the group of boys who are going to cancun (we are, after all, nearly 30), i went to their resort's website.

now i want to go on their spring break.

for starters, it's all-inclusive, which is pretty nice when you think about the fact that you'll never have to pay for a meal and you can just eat whenever you want and ooooh, that does sound nice.

but they've also got recreational activities included! one free scuba diving lesson! kayaking! windsurfing! snorkeling! aerobics classes! geez, that would be awesome.

but not as awesome as the idea of knowing that you can just roll on up to the swim-up bar and have your pina colada for free. i mean, if i could just swim up to a bar and get pina coladas 24 hours a day, well i would. and the thing is, i'm not even someone who really wants to just go and drink myself to death on spring break. but this! this sounds like heaven somehow! maybe because my cheap outweighs everything else. so that i could be someone who wanted to get drunk on spring break, if it wouldn't cost so damned much money. i have a feeling that every time we swim on up to the marriott ocean club's pool bar and order our 2-for-1 happy hour specials (the only time we allow ourselves drinks at the swim-up bar), i will think about the boys in cancun and cry a little.

anyways, none of that is my favorite thing about where they are staying. my favorite thing is that there are in-room liquor dispensers. but even better than that is that this is mentioned, as tho it is a perfectly common amenity, about seven times on every single one of the hotel's pages.

it sounds like heaven. i mean, a heaven that is probably littered with very drunk and very obnoxious frat boys and girls who look so good in their bikinis that i would just wind up inside suckling from the teat of the in-room liquor dispenser, but heaven nonetheless.

anyways, since i am leaving in 45 minutes and i'm still not exactly done packing, i must be off. enjoy your spring break!!

cheap!

so it is now march. CVS still has valentines out. they are now 90% off. i did the math. 19 cents. well how could i resist? i have a supicion that despite their ridiculously cheap price, everyone else's reaction is, "are you kidding me? why would i buy valentines in march?"

so if you happen to get a valentine in your mailbox a solid month after valentine's day, just consider it part of my charm.